again, telling myself there was no danger in my delusions. The shadows of the room added little color to the man. The hue of his hair—dark—was unchanged from the photograph, but the slicked-back waves from yesteryear had fallen over deep-set eyes I knew to be blue, the only color separate from the fog. His lips were softly parted, and their forgiving shape and gentle slope tempered a chin that was too square, a face that was too thin, and cheekbones that were too sharp.
He wore the clothes of a much older man—high-waisted trousers topped with a fitted vest secured over a flat torso. A pale, collarless dress shirt was buttoned to his throat. His sleeves were rolled to his elbows, and his feet in black wingtips were firmly planted, as though he’d drifted off expecting to be immediately reawakened. He looked long and angular in the high-backed chair, limbs loose and dangling, wrists and fingers pointed toward the floor, an exhausted warrior king asleep on his throne.
I was thirsty, and my bladder was full. I eased to my left and attempted to push myself up, gasping at the fire in my side.
“Careful. You’ll reopen your wound,” Thomas protested, his voice rough with sleep and soft with Ireland. The chair squeaked as I heard him rise, but I ignored him, feeling the covers fall from my shoulders even as I braced myself and held the sheet to my breasts. Where were my clothes? I was turned away from him, my back was bare to his view, and I heard him approach and stop beside the bed.
He held a glass of water to my lips, and I drank gratefully, shakily. His hand was at my back, warm and solid.
“Where have you been, Anne?”
Where am I now?
“I don’t know.” It was a whisper. I didn’t look at him to gauge his reaction. “I don’t know. I just know that I’m . . . here.”
“And how long will you be here?” His voice was so cold that my fear grew, filling my chest and making my limbs numb and my fingertips pulse.
“I don’t know that either,” I said.
“Did they do this to you?” he asked.
“Who?” The word was a wail in my head but a sigh on my lips.
“The gunrunners, Anne.” It was his turn to whisper. “Were you with them?”
“No.” I shook my head adamantly, the room swimming with the movement. “I need to use the restroom.”
“The restroom?” His voice rose, puzzled.
“The toilet? The loo?” I searched my memory for the Irish terminology.
“Hold on to me,” he instructed, leaning over me and sliding his arms beneath me. I grappled with the sheet and didn’t hold on to him at all, struggling to remain covered as he straightened, hoisting me as he did.
He carried me from the room, down a narrow hallway, and into a bathroom, setting me down carefully on the toilet. The tank was high on the wall, connected by a long brass pipe to the perfectly round seat. The space was spotless and white; the pedestal sink and claw-foot tub with heavy rounded curves gleaming and proud. I was ridiculously relieved that he hadn’t had to traipse through the house and out into the yard to an outhouse or that I hadn’t had to squat over a chamber pot. At the moment, squatting was out of the question.
Thomas left without a word, clearly confident I could handle the rest by myself. He was back, tapping softly, a few minutes later, and I opened the door to him, catching our reflections in the little mirror above the basin before he swept me up again, careful, his eyes clashing with mine in the glass. My hair was a curling mess, flatter on one side than the other, and my eyes were hollow beneath the tepid green. I looked terrible, and I was too exhausted to care. I was almost asleep before he laid me back on the bed and pulled the covers over me.
“Five years ago, I found Declan. But I didn’t find you,” he said, as if he couldn’t stay silent any longer. “I thought you and Declan were together. I was evacuating the wounded from the GPO to Jervis Street. Then the fire was too great, and the barricades were up, and I couldn’t get back.”
I lifted my concrete lids and found him watching me, his expression desolate. He scrubbed at his face as though he could wipe the memory away. “When the fires consumed the GPO, everyone abandoned it. Declan