‘Lake Vigil’ by Clare O’Dea
I found the perfect rock, a good size and just a few yards from the shore. At this distance from the cars and vans, the shouts and phone calls, I could pretend all of it had nothing to do with me. Like Pia on the bus when she was little. She would insist on us sitting apart, pretend she was travelling on her own. When we both got off at the same stop, we would feign surprise, good friends meeting by chance. What age would she have been then? Five, six?
This is how it will be from now on; the slightest thing will remind me of her.
The reeds took turns bowing to me while patches of ripples chased each other across the lake. Even the air was sympathetic, keeping me warm. I watched the insects skating around in an anxious rush, and I thought of Pia, always harried and late, aggrieved at something.
I could just make out Pia’s car on the far side of the bird watchers’ shelter, parked beside the jetty. Canary yellow; she bought it last summer. Her attempt to inject her possessions – bangles, scarves, cushion covers – with cheerfulness was painful to see. She was a happy child, though. The sort of happiness that choked in adolescence. There must have been a day when the foundations where shaken, when the first cracks began to appear in her character. When the moment came, I was not paying attention – the first of my great failures. Because what is the point? Why have a child at all if you cannot protect her?
I see other mothers regard their children’s chubby flesh like vampires, devouring with their eyes when the little ones are out of reach. I was never like that. I understood that Pia was her own person from the beginning and I gave my affection sparingly and with reverence.
*
The day of our last family appointment, I had to smile when Pia shouted at the consultant to speak up. Exactly what I was thinking; I could never stand a mumbler. But the rest of her vitriol was directed at me. Nothing funny there.
Driving home together was a mistake. We got stuck beside a hearse in heavy traffic and Pia starting ranting. She found it indecent that the coffin was mixing with rush-hour traffic, being ignored by everyone. I felt no sympathy that day, just the familiar exasperation with Pia for making everything overblown and about her. Or perhaps that was the first day exasperation skipped over the border to plain dislike.
’What do you want me to do?’ I must have raised my voice. ’I don’t spend my life pretending death is an unspeakable intrusion into the proper order of things. Death is the proper order of things.’
’My purr Da, blown to pieces,’ Pia whined, in a cruel imitation of my accent. ’I’m so troubled from the Troubles.’
I never stopped loving her. I want that on the record.
*
The young detective was anxious someone should be with me. It upset him to see me making this vigil alone. His concern was touching, in theory. Whenever I met a young man I weighed up his suitability for Pia and this one failed on looks, despite signs of a kind nature. Also, he’d got his shoes muddy. Pia wouldn’t even let people eat in her car for fear of crumbs. Her car. A hard, lurching sensation struck my chest and I waved him away. There should be no distraction from the pain, no comfort today.
*
I once read that childbirth is difficult in humans so that women will seek help and increase the baby’s chances of survival. Twenty-three years ago I defied nature. Unlike the maternity hospitals in the capital, epidurals were not available every day of the week at the Regional. My labour fell on one of the off days. When Pia was about to be born, I wanted everyone out. The midwife naturally refused to go. The birth became a battle of wills between us, me resenting her instructions in that cawing voice, and the midwife, abandoning all pretence at kindness, intent on doing her job.
As soon as the baby was safely placed on my chest, the woman walked out and refused to have anything more to do with me. I was determined never to set foot in a delivery room again. The resentment I felt towards Simon for dragging me to live in that mud-spattered town never faded, and I moved with Pia back to the city as soon as I was ready to work again. It was better with just the two of us.
The sky brightened as the sun threatened to make a grand entrance. I picked at the lichen on my rock, my gaze fixed on the divers’ boat. They were coming closer, making their way methodically along the narrow lake. She’s here, fellas. I can tell you that much. She’s here.
A shout, a raised arm, a poison breath filling my lungs. The man in the boat tossed out a rope and I saw the two divers struggling with something. All the colour in the world dimmed but for one splash of red. The red of Pia’s skirt as they pulled her body to the other side of the boat, away from me.
I staggered to the water’s edge and didn’t stop. They were taking her away. The detective sprinted down the shore towards me. My feet sank into the silt and the cold, cold water dragged at my legs. The howling noise was coming from me.
I struggled free from his grip. Let me lift her one last time, let me clean the weeds from her beautiful face and pull her to my breast so she can feel my heartbeat. Then you can take her, wash her, weigh her, poke her and label her. Just give me one moment when she is truly mine once more.
From issue #5: autumn/winter 2017
About the Author
Clare O’Dea lives in Switzerland on the invisible French-German language border. Her short story, ‘The Favour’, was shortlisted in the 2017 Hennessy New Irish Writing competition. O’Dea’s 2016 non-fiction book, The Naked Swiss: A Nation Behind 10 Myths, is published by Bergli Books.
