I don’t want to think too much about cake, mostly because I hate thinking about my birthday. Because it wasn’t just my day—it washis. Of all the days to be born on, I had to share mine with my father.
One of many short sticks I’ve drawn.
The older I get, the more the mirror betrays me. I see his eyes in my reflection—that specific shade of sea-water blue that looked like it was searching for a storm. My jawline, the way I stand with my weight on one hip, it’s all a blueprint of Patrick Blue. Even football is his legacy, a career he’d cut short when he blew his own knee out in sixth year.
Everything about me leads back to my father’s headstone..
“Alright. I’ll leave it up to Claire, she’ll be delighted. She was asking about gifts, and I told her—”
“Don’t let her spend all her money,” I cut in.
Mam sighs, the sound heavy with affection. “Too late for that. She’s already had Joey take her to the shopping centre. Probably bought out the half of Brown Thomas.”
“I’ll bet,” I mutter. My sister was seventeen months younger than me, and treated birthdays like liturgical events.
Mam pats my shoulder, and I fight the urge to pull away. It’s another thing the alcohol does to me. Always makes me want to push everyone away. “She loves you, pet.”
“I know.”
Her hand lingers as she adds, “And I’ve heard about your little get-together next week. I'm going to ask you to keep that under control. I don't want the Gardaí knocking because JJ decided to do a nudie-run down the main road. Again.”
“I’ll keep it PG-13, Ma. I promise.” She doesn’t need to know that I was the one who dared JJ to do that.
She gives me that trusting look and kisses my cheek. “Is there anyone you want to invite to your birthday dinner at Aunt Val and Uncle Mike’s? A... friend?”
I know what she’s asking, thinking she’s being clever about it. She wants to know if I have a girlfriend. Last year I’d brought Gemma Byrne—a relationship that had the shelf life of an open carton of milk—and another time in second year I had invited Éadaoin Byrne—no relation—and that’s about it as far as my dating (and otherwise sexual) history goes.
“Nope,” I say flatly. “Just the usual suspects.”
Mam nods, and I can tell she’s a little disappointed even though she won’t ever say it. She wants me to be a normal teenager, to do more than put all my energy into football. She wanted me to hang out with the lads, to have a girlfriend, to go to discos, to be happy. But after the summer I’d had—spent in a haze of painkillers, physical therapy and feeling like I’d lost it all—I wasn’t ready to go back to playing the part just yet.
Every year on my birthday we go to the Keane’s house—JJ’s cousins on both their Mam’s sides, so Aunt Val and Uncle Mike are also not my real Aunt and Uncle, just like Aunt Ro. We go because my da always went to the Biggs’ house for his birthdays when they were younger, since they had money and a nice family and he, well, did not. The lads’ll join us there, and then we’ll probably go out back with Gerard and Declan and have a kickabout and a few scoops.
Just like always.
I didn’t mind that routine. Really. I’d have a cake, get a couple gifts, but could mostly fade into the background. It was the big party the next day JJ and Finn were planning that I’m dreading this year.
Something bad is bound to happen at a gaff party.
??` ?? ?´?
March, 2002
IT’S LASHING DOWNoutside, same as it has been all week.
I know now I should have listened to Mam on Thursday when she’d forbidden the lads and me from playing footie in the much, because now my nose is a tap and my head feels like it’s stuffed with wool.
And now it’s Saturday. Fishing Day.
After Da stopped drinking, and started being Normal Daddy all the time again, he’d gotten a boat. And ever since he had, we go out on it every Saturday morning—every Saturday for the past six years. Sometimes we’d bring Claire—but she didn’t like the water anymore, not since she fell through the ice at Riverbend a few December’s ago, and she got bored quickly. We bring JJ sometimes too, but he had the same problem with not being able to sit still for ten seconds.
I selfishly love the mornings where it ends up being just him and I. It makes me feel like the favorite, even if just for a little bit. The rest of the time he loves Claire and I the same, but on the boat it’s just Da and Niall.
But now Ma is saying I can’t go—Da silent and packing his snacks into the lunch pail—as she pours medicine in a little cup for me. I stood in the doorway of the kitchen, still dressed in my dinosaur pyjamas, and utterly distraught.
“Ma, please,” I beg, hands clasped like I’m praying to God. “I'll be fine. The fresh air will do me good.”
“You're sick, Niall,” she says flatly, holding the tiny cup of grossness out to me. I’m convinced medicine doesn’t actually make you feel any better, it just tastes so nasty that it makes you forget you’re sick. “Drink this and get back to bed.”
