LITMIR.BIZ

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      The seat beside her is empty. I coax Dad out of his coat, steer him into the chair.

      ‘Hello,’ he says to Iris. ‘I’m Eugene Keogh. I’m a taxi driver. From Harold’s Cross.’ He offers his hand, and Iris puts her book down and obliges, as she always does, with hers. Instead of shaking her hand, Dad holds it between both of his as though he is warming it.

      The woman in the seat opposite Iris looks at me. ‘Do you want to sit here?’ she says. ‘So you can talk to your friend.’ Her smile is wide.

      ‘Oh … thank you but, I don’t want to distur—’ I begin.

      The woman stands up, hitches the strap of her handbag on her shoulder. ‘It’s no problem,’ she says, smiling. ‘There’re lots of seats.’

      When she leaves, Iris and I look at each other. I don’t know what to say, so I wait to see if Iris knows.

      ‘I can’t believe you got on the boat,’ Iris says.

      ‘You didn’t leave me with any choice.’ I can’t believe how calm my voice is. Iris stares at me as if she knows me from somewhere. Then, she shakes her head and points to the recently vacated seat opposite her. ‘You may as well sit down,’ she says.

      Silence circles the space between us, predatory as a lion. Dad is the one to break it. ‘Where are we going?’

      Iris glares at me, raises her eyebrows in a question, waits for me to answer it.

      ‘We’re going wherever Iris is going,’ I say.

      ‘No, you’re not,’ she stage-whispers at me, stretching across the table so I can see the golden-brown specks that circle the green of her irises.

      ‘Yes, we are,’ I say, injecting as much authority as I can muster into the words.

      ‘You can’t,’ Iris says.

      ‘I can,’ I tell her.

      This could have gone on and on – Iris has alarming stamina – but then Dad interrupts. ‘Where is Iris going?’ he says.

      The question produces a silence that’s as potent as the loudest sound. We stare at each other. If I manage not to blink first, I will be able to persuade Iris home. That’s what I find myself thinking. My eyes water. Iris blinks and turns to Dad. She puts her hand on his. ‘I’m going … away,’ she says.

      ‘Away,’ Dad says, nodding, as if it’s a location he’s familiar with and approves of.

      Iris looks at me. She seems like a different person when her face is shadowed with worry. ‘I’m sorry, Terry, I never wanted you to find out like this.’

      ‘You thought it would be better if I found out afterwards? In a letter?’ Anger is not an emotion I’m familiar with. It burns.

      ‘I know this is hard to understand,’ she says.

      ‘Yes it is.’ I’m not going to make this easy for her.

      ‘Am I going away too?’ Dad says.

      ‘No,’ says Iris at the same time as I say, ‘Yes.’ Iris hands him the sports section of her paper. He runs his finger along a headline, mouthing the words, like the girls used to do when they were learning to read. She looks at me again. ‘I don’t know what you want me to say.’

      ‘You don’t have to say anything,’ I tell her. ‘Just come home with me.’

      Iris sighs. ‘This is not a decision I’ve taken lightly, Terry. It’s something I’ve thought about for a long time. I’ve done a huge amount of research, waded through so much red tape you wouldn’t believe it.’

      I’m about to say that I would have helped her with the red tape. I’m good at red tape. The tedious part of plans, no matter how exciting the plans themselves are. Iris doesn’t have the patience for red tape.

      But of course, I wouldn’t have helped her with the red tape for this plan.

      The questions jostle for position in my brain. The first one out of the traps is Why. It comes out louder than I intended, almost a shout. ‘Why?’

      Iris leans forward. ‘You know why.’

      ‘No,’ I say. ‘I don’t.’

      ‘Jesus Terry, do I have to spell it out?’

      ‘Yes.’

      Iris looks surprised. In fairness, I am not usually so belligerent. ‘Two letters,’ she says, holding up two fingers. ‘M. S.’

      I try to assume a reasonable tone. ‘Okay, so you have MS, which is not great, but it’s manageable. Isn’t it? You’ve always managed so well. And it’s not bad enough to …’

      ‘Which is why I’m doing it now,’ Iris says. ‘While I’m still in control.’ She makes everything sound so logical. So reasonable.

      ‘You hugged me when we had dinner last week,’ I say, remembering. Me, rummaging in my bag for keys as I walked to my car, and Iris coming after me and hugging me even though we’d already said goodbye at her door.

      Iris shrugs. ‘Why wouldn’t I?’

      ‘You don’t usually.’

      ‘Well, I should.’ Iris leans back in her seat, looks out of the window. ‘You’re my closest friend,’ she says, her voice quieter now.

      ‘Which is exactly why I’m not going to let you do this,’ I tell her briskly, as if she hadn’t said something so … well, if she were her normal self, Iris would call that sappy.

      ‘Which is exactly why I didn’t tell you,’ Iris says. A surly-faced gentleman in an ill-fitting suit glances at us over the top of his Tom Clancy paperback. I send what I hope is a reassuring smile in his direction, which sends him scurrying back behind his book.

      I take a breath.

      In one of the many parenting books I have read, readers are advised to approach a discussion from a different angle, if the discussion is tying itself up in knots or backing itself into a corner.

      I train a reassuring smile on Iris. ‘May I ask a logistical question?’ I say.

      Iris rolls her eyes. ‘It was only a matter of time,’ she says.

      ‘Why are you going to Holyhead? What I mean is … you could have gone directly to Calais from Rosslare.’ This is the part of me that I can’t help. The part that drives the girls mad. And Brendan probably. Although I don’t organise him as much any more. He tends to do his own thing these days.

      Iris shrugs. ‘I have things to do in London,’ she says.

      I think about the other letter. Still sitting on the keyboard of Iris’s laptop. ‘Are you going to see your mother?’

      Iris snorts. ‘Christ no.’

      ‘It’s just … the letter?’

      ‘It’s not a letter. It’s a copy of my will. So she knows she gets nothing.’ The bitterness in her tone is shocking. Also the mention of Iris’s will. That seems … definite.

      ‘I know, it’s childish,’ Iris says before I think of an appropriate response.

      ‘It’s not like you,’ I say. Then again, none of this is like Iris. It’s all foreign. Double Dutch, as Dad used to say.

      Break it down into manageable pieces. That’s what I used to tell the girls when they got stressed about something. A school project, for instance.

      I’ll start with London. ‘So,’ I say, ‘what’s taking you to London?’

      Iris shakes her head. ‘I’d rather not say.’

      ‘Why not?’

      ‘For fuck’s sake, Terry, I just … okay

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