She watched Liam become still, staring off into space as if he could see his mother eating cannelloni for the first time.
It was disconcerting, being here at her old school, as if time was a blanket that had been folded up, so that different times were overlapping, pressed against each other.
She would have to remind Felicity about Mrs Bungonia’s cannelloni.
No. No she wouldn’t.
Liam suddenly pivoted and karate-kicked the rubbish bin so that it clanged.
‘Liam,’ remonstrated Tess, but not really loud enough for him to hear.
‘Liam! Shhh!’ called her mother, louder, putting a finger to her lips and pointing towards the church. A small group of mourners had come out and were standing about talking to each other in that restrained, relieved way of funeral attendees.
Liam didn’t kick the bin again. He was an obedient child. Instead he picked up a stick and held it in two hands like a machine-gun, aiming it silently around the schoolyard, while the sound of sweet little voices singing ‘Incy Wincy Spider’ floated out of one of the kindergarten classrooms. Oh, God, thought Tess, where he had learned to do that? She had to be more vigilant about those computer games, although she couldn’t help admiring the authentic way he narrowed his eyes like a soldier. She would tell Will about it later. He’d laugh.
No, she wouldn’t tell Will about it later.
Her brain couldn’t seem to catch up with the news. It was like the way she’d kept rolling towards Will last night in her sleep, only to find empty space where he should have been, and then waking up with a jolt. She and Will slept well together. No twitching or snoring or battling for blankets. ‘I can’t sleep properly without you now,’ Will had complained after they’d only been dating a few months. ‘You’re like a favourite pillow. I have to pack you wherever I go.’
‘Which particular dreadful nun died?’ Tess asked her mother again, her eyes on the mourners. Now was not the time to be pulling out old memories like that.
‘They weren’t all dreadful,’ reflected her mother. ‘Most of them were lovely. What about Sister Margaret Ann who came to your tenth birthday party? She was beautiful. I think your father quite fancied her.’
‘Seriously?’
‘Well, probably not.’ Her mother shrugged as if not being attracted to beautiful nuns was yet another example of her ex-husband’s failings. ‘Anyway, this must be the funeral for Sister Ursula. I read in the parish newsletter last week that she’d died. I don’t think she ever taught you, did she? Apparently she was a great one for smacking with the handle of the feather duster. Nobody uses feather dusters much these days, do they? Is the world a dustier place for it, I wonder?’
‘I think I remember Sister Ursula,’ said Tess. ‘Red face and caterpillar eyebrows. We used to hide from her when she was on playground duty.’
‘I’m not sure if there are any nuns teaching at the school any more,’ said her mother. ‘They’re a dying breed.’
‘Literally,’ said Tess.
Her mother chortled. ‘Oh dear, I didn’t mean –’ She stopped, distracted by something at the church entrance. ‘Okay, darling, steel yourself. We’ve just been spotted by one of the parish ladies.’
‘What?’ Tess was immediately filled with a sense of dread, as if her mother had said they’d just been spotted by a passing sniper.
A petite blonde woman had detached herself from the mourners and was briskly walking towards the schoolyard.
‘Cecilia Fitzpatrick,’ said her mother. ‘The eldest Bell girl. Married John-Paul, the eldest Fitzpatrick boy. The best looking one if you want my opinion, although they’re all much of a muchness. Cecilia had a younger sister, I think, who might have been in your year. Let’s see now. Bridget Bell?’
Tess was about to say she’d never heard of them, but a memory of the Bell girls was gradually emerging in her mind like a reflection on water. She couldn’t visualise their faces, just their long blonde stringy plaits flying behind them as they ran through the school, doing whatever those kids did who were at the centre of things.
‘Cecilia sells Tupperware,’ said Tess’s mother. ‘Makes an absolute fortune from it.’
‘But she doesn’t know us, does she?’ Tess looked hopefully over her shoulder to see if there might be someone else waving back at Cecilia. There was no one. Was she on her way over to spruik Tupperware?
‘Cecilia knows everyone,’ said her mother.
‘Can’t we make a run for it?’
‘Too late now.’ Her mother spoke through the side of her mouth as she smiled her toothy social smile.
‘Lucy!’ said Cecilia as she arrived in front of them, faster than Tess had thought possible. It was like she’d teleported herself. She bent to kiss Tess’s mother. ‘What have you done to yourself?’
Don’t you call my mother Lucy, thought Tess, taking an instant, childish dislike. Mrs O’Leary, thank you! Now that she was right in front of them, Tess remembered Cecilia’s face perfectly well. She had a small, neat head – the plaits had been replaced with one of those crisp, artful bobs – an eager, open face, a noticeable overbite, and two ridiculously huge dimples. She was like a pretty little ferret.
(And yet she’d landed a Fitzpatrick boy.)
‘I saw you when I came out of the church – Sister Ursula’s funeral, did you hear she’d passed? Anyway, I caught sight of you, and I thought, That’s Lucy O’Leary in a wheelchair! What’s going on? So being the nosey parker that I am, I came over to say hello! Looks like a good-quality wheelchair, did you hire it from the chemist? But what happened, Lucy? Your ankle, is it?’