Page 128 of The Missing Sister

As the family sat down for their tea, chattering like a flock of birds, Daddy sat silently, his face like stone.

Later, after they’d finished the soup and bread, then said their prayers together, Katie and Merry went upstairs to their room.

‘Daddy didn’t look very happy about Mammy being well, did he?’ said Merry.

‘No, he didn’t. Do you... do you think the doctor was just lying to us and Mammy’s going to die?’ Katie asked her.

‘I don’t know.’ Merry shivered at the thought.

‘Holy Mother, ’tis cold in this room,’ Katie pronounced. ‘Winter is coming in. Can I share your bed tonight?’

‘O’course,’ Merry agreed, wondering why Mammy and Daddy had chosen to give them separate beds in the first place, Katie was so rarely in her own.

They snuggled up together and finally the feeling began to flood back into Merry’s frozen feet.

‘Aren’t adults a mystery, Katie?’ she said aloud in the dark.

‘They are indeed. And guess what, Merry?’

‘I can’t, Katie, what?’

‘One day, we’re going to be adults too!’

It was Christmastime and Merry had already been an angel in the little play Miss Lucey had put on in the school hall for any parents that wanted to come and watch. Katie had hated every moment of being a shepherd, but Merry had loved her own costume, even if it was only made out of an old sheet and a bit of tinsel that sat like a crown on her head. She had to concentrate hard as she’d had words to remember as well:

‘And Mary will bring forth a son, and you shall call His name Jesus, for He will save His people from their sins.’

Being called Mary, she’d have preferred to be the Holy Virgin herself, but there were three other Marys in the school (which meant being called by her nickname was much better than being ‘Mary M.’ or ‘Mary O.’ or ‘Mary D.’). None of the Marys had been given the part. That honour had gone to Bridget O’Mahoney. Of course, her mammy had had her costume made by their seamstress, and as Merry stared at Bridget, in a lovely blue dress that matched her eyes, she thought that if it were hers, she’d never take it off.

Mammy had come to watch, and even though baby Pat had screamed during the ‘Silent Night’ carol, Merry had decided she was the prettiest mother in the room. She was well now, with colour back in her cheeks and, as her brother John had said, ‘a bit more meat on her bones’.

Bobby Noiro hadn’t been given a role in the play, as punishment for hitting Seamus Daly on the head. Ever since, Seamus had been after saying that all of Bobby’s family were traitors and murderers. Bobby would have most likely hit Seamus several times more if Mr Byrne, the caretaker, hadn’t pulled them apart.

On the walk home, Bobby’s favourite new thing was to disappear behind trees, then jump out shouting, ‘Bang!’ He told her he was shooting the ‘Black and Tans’. Merry didn’t know why he’d want to shoot at them, because those were colours, weren’t they? Katie always got cross with him, flicking her red hair and walking faster ahead, so it was Merry and Bobby walking together and him recounting the stories of ‘the old days’ that his granny had told him, which were all to do with some war.

The next day, what with school being over for the Christmas holidays, she knew it would be the last time she walked home with Bobby, so she gave him the little card she’d drawn for him, spelling out the word ‘Christmas’ very carefully. She’d only made it because the day before, when the class had been exchanging cards, Bobby had been the only one who hadn’t been given any. Even though he hadn’t said, Merry could tell it had upset him something fierce.

When he saw the card she’d made him, he gave her a big smile and handed her a crumpled bit of stained ribbon.

‘’Tis blue, like your eyes,’ he said, staring at his boots.

‘Thanks a million, Bobby. I’ll wear it for when Santy comes,’ she said. Then he’d turned and run off with Hunter at his heels towards his cottage, while Katie made kissing noises at Merry all the way back home.

For some reason Merry couldn’t quite work out, the atmosphere in the house felt different to normal Christmases. Even though the paper garlands had been made, and holly brought into the house and carols sung, something didn’t feel the same.

Merry decided it was because Mammy and Daddy looked so miserable. Before Pat had been born and the visit from the doctor had happened, she’d often seen Daddy give Mammy a kiss on top of her head or squeeze her hand under the table at tea, as if they shared some secret that made them both smile. But these days, they hardly spoke and Merry had watched Daddy’s whiskey bottle go down and down until there was almost none left.

Maybe I’m imagining it, she thought when she woke up on Christmas Eve and felt that lovely tingle of excitement in her belly. ‘Today will be a GOOD day,’ she announced to herself. This morning, she was up to the priest’s house with Mammy to help her clean, because it was the Christmas holidays. She hoped Ambrose would be there as she hadn’t seen him for what felt like a very long time. She loved sitting in Father O’Brien’s study with the fire burning brightly in the grate. Last time, they’d had chats about how her schooling was getting on, then he’d taken a book of fairy stories by Mr Hans Christian Andersen and read her ‘The Little Match Girl’. The story was all about a child on New Year’s Eve, who burnt matches because they gave her light and warmth. She froze to death out on the street, but then her soul was sent into heaven and she was happy to be with her beloved grandmother.

‘That sounds very sad,’ Katie had pouted after Merry had told her the story. ‘And it has no fairies in it at all!’

Merry heard Pat crying in their parents’ room. The babe seemed to be always hungry, and sometimes Merry looked at her mammy with Pat to her breast, and thought she was like the cows being drained of their milk morning and night.

Anxious for the day to begin, she dressed in her warmest jumper, which was really too small for her now, a skirt and a pair of woollen socks, then made her way downstairs. Since Mammy had been so weak after the babe had been born, and had to feed Pat early in the morning, she was now an expert goodie maker, getting stale bread to mix with the milk and a dash of sugar. But this morning, in honour of it being Christmas Eve, Mammy had said that it was a proper porridge day. Merry switched on the overhead light, took the oats from the pantry and filled a jug with milk from the churn. As she stirred the porridge on the range, Merry looked outside and saw the fields in front of the farmhouse were sparkling with frost.

‘To be sure, it looks like a Christmas picture,’ she said to herself. She had actually started to enjoy the quiet moments in the kitchen before everyone tumbled down the stairs and Daddy and John came in from the milking shed, ready for their breakfast. While the porridge simmered, Merry took the loaf of soda bread Mammy had made yesterday and put that and the butter on the table. Placing the bowls to warm on the range, she thought of the presents she’d bought with her birthday pennies for her family. Beautiful new ribbons for Ellen and Nora, a special comb for Katie’s hair, and a toy rabbit and a toy mouse for Pat and Bill. She’d bought some embroidery thread to make Mammy and Daddy handkerchiefs out of squares of cotton, though the ‘D’s were a little bit wonky. Now she’d only tuppence left, which she’d keep for a rainy day, as Mammy always called savings. As it rained most days, she supposed those savings were important.

‘Morning, Merry,’ said Mammy as she walked into the kitchen with baby Pat tucked into the sling strapped across her chest.