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hell on earth,’ Ava said, her eyes filled with tears.

      ‘Maybe this will be your month to get a house,’ Aisling added, patting her hand.

      ‘We said that last month and the month before, too. When we moved into this hotel, we thought it would be temporary. Couple of weeks, max. Six months later it’s getting harder to be upbeat,’ Ava replied. She pulled the pot of pasta off the stove and drained it over the sink. ‘I don’t think my husband, Brian, can cope much longer.’

      ‘It will be your turn soon, you wait and see,’ Aisling said.

      ‘That is most unlikely. Twenty per cent of those on the housing list will remain on it for five years,’ Ruth interjected in an effort to join in.

      Ava and Aisling both turned towards her, Ava in distress, Aisling in irritation.

      ‘Read the room!’ Aisling said. She made a face, nodding her head towards a tearful Ava.

      Ruth looked at the floor, wishing she was an Aisling, someone who knew automatically what to say, how to make Ava feel better. Why did she always find her voice just in time to say the wrong thing?

       11

       RUTH

       Then

      The past couple of months had been difficult, the worst of Ruth’s life. First of all, the man she loved, Dean, disappeared. She missed him. She refused to give up hope that he would return. But the realisation that she was pregnant brought a whole new world of trouble. And telling her mother, dealing with her reaction, was the start of the end for them both.

      ‘A baby? No, that’s impossible,’ Marian had said, picking up her cigarettes.

      ‘Yes, Mother. It is quite possible. I am twenty weeks pregnant.’

      Her mother’s eyes dropped to her abdomen and Ruth automatically placed her hands over it. And then her mother did something that she’d never done before. She threw her cigarettes at Ruth and screamed at her. The box bounced off Ruth’s hands. The blow did not hurt, but the rage behind her mother’s actions did.

      Things had not improved since then. Had Marian told Ruth’s father about the baby? She did not know. She guessed her mother called him to complain that there was an even bigger inconvenience on the way.

      It was Mark who came to her rescue during those awful few weeks after her announcement, unlikely ally though he was. When her mother called him to garner support in her tirade of abuse about the pregnancy, he stood closer to Ruth while Marian ranted and raved.

      ‘You can’t have a baby!’ Marian said. ‘Tell her, Mark. It’s preposterous.’

      ‘Why not?’ Ruth asked. ‘I am perfectly healthy.’

      ‘What if it’s like you?’ Marian replied with a shudder. At that damning question, silence fell over the room.

      Mark broke the silence. ‘Have you listened to yourself, Mother?’ His voice was low and gruff.

      Ruth looked at him in surprise. He sounded angry.

      Mark continued, ‘Seriously, have you actually listened to the fucking shit that comes out of your mouth?’

      ‘How dare you speak to me like that?’ Marian screamed, horrified at Mark’s words.

      ‘How dare you?’ Mark replied.

      Ruth and her mother both looked at Mark in shock. He had never stuck up for his sister like this before.

      Marian found her voice and screamed, ‘Get out. Get out. Get OUT!’

      ‘With pleasure,’ Mark said. Then he turned to Ruth: ‘If I were you, I’d get the fuck out of here, too.’

      Three days of non-stop abuse from Marian followed.

       That boy Dean used you. A cheap and easy tart, who fell for his lies.

       You have really gone and done it this time.

       You ruined all our lives when you were born, and this pregnancy will be the final nail in my coffin!

      Ruth would block out her cruel taunts by looking at a slip of paper with a fortune printed on it. A memento from her lost weekend with her soul mate. He had loved her. He would be back. Her old friend Odd whispered to her that she must always hope and persevere. But nevertheless, conclusions had to be made.

      Dean was not coming back to rescue her.

      She was having this baby on her own.

      She needed to do as Mark had said and get the fuck out. Not just for her sake. But for the sake of her unborn child.

      She moved from the village where she grew up and hitched a lift to Wexford town. Fate was on her side, because Pat from the arcade in Curracloe pulled up beside her in his beaten-up Jeep. Ruth did not have any friends, but she had gotten to know Pat over the many summers she had spent on Curracloe beach, buying ice cream from him in the arcade. He did not waste her time offering raspberry or chocolate syrup, as he did with the other kids. Or sprinkles or hundreds and thousands. He took the time to know she liked hers plain, in a tub, not on a cone. That was her way.

      And Pat liked Ruth. She was a good kid once you took the time to get to know her. Not like her older brother, Mark, the little prick. He was forever in the arcade kicking the machines, trying to get them to cough out money. Trouble. Always looking for trouble. And he watched other kids pick on Ruth, letting them call her names. That’s no way to be about family. Pat had had to step in once or twice.

      As Ruth climbed into his jeep, Pat realised that she wasn’t a kid any more. Short cropped hair, not a scrap of makeup on, wearing oversized dark sunglasses. He didn’t think he’d ever seen her without them. They’d been too big for her for many years, like she was playing dress-up with her mama’s things. But now they suited her perfectly.

      ‘Where you off to?’ he asked.

      ‘I am pregnant. I have to leave home.’

      And Pat felt heart sorry hearing this. He remembered all the times Ruth had put coins into the fortune-telling machine in the arcade. He wasn’t sure what she hoped would come spitting out of it. But if Pat could rig it so that it gave her whatever it was her heart desired, he’d do it. He told her he would take her anywhere she wanted to go.

      ‘I am going to Mark’s in Wexford.’

      Pat was pretty sure that Ruth was jumping from the frying pan into the fire, but he held his counsel. Before she said goodbye he pressed a fifty-euro note into her hand. ‘Come back sometime with the baby to see me. Always an ice cream for you and the little one in my arcade. OK?’

      She nodded but she had a feeling that she would not be licking ice creams in the arcade any time soon. She made her way to Mark’s flat, which was at the end of Wexford Quay, opposite the railway tracks. She had been there just once before, when he first moved in and had asked her and their mum around. But he had never asked her to visit since and she was not sure how he would react now.

      His response – ‘Oh, for fuck’s sake!’ – when he answered the door was problematic. She stepped inside, taking it as a good sign that he had not told her to go away.

      ‘I have left home,’ Ruth said to his Nike trainers. They were new and brilliant white. He usually wore Adidas.

      ‘Good for you. Didn’t think you had it in you,’ Mark replied.

      In the end, he let her stay. He did not have much choice, she supposed. She loved Wexford town. A place that was big enough that she could get lost in it, where she could go days without meeting anyone who knew her or thought she was strange. She liked that. She liked that a lot. His flat, without the oppressive disapproval of her

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