Page 16 of An Irish Hope

She nodded, stood, and he followed her to the front, as if in a trance.

“Hey Ethan, we want to do a duet,” she said.

“Great. What song will it be?” Ethan glanced between them.

“Got a favourite?” she asked him.

He shook his head.

“What about ‘I’ve had the time of my life’?” Ethan asked, with a cheeky grin.

“Yeah, no thanks.”

She chuckled. “I know a good one. But we need to do the Hothouse Flowers version. Have you got ‘I Can See Clearly Now’?” she asked Ethan.

“That’s not exactly a duet,” Andy protested.

“It will be once we’re doing it.” She smiled.

And maybe he was still a sucker for a strong woman, for he followed her lead perfectly. She sang the first verse, he sang the second. It was like something magical happened between them as they seemed to anticipate each other’s parts, then harmonising as they built up to the big finish. And yes, he may have needed the lyrics on the screen a couple of times, but there was something joyous in this, something a little like release, like the past box he’d been living in didn’t matter anymore.

Like the song said, he could see clearly now, and what had been said in the past didn’t matter anymore. Because, with God, “It’s gonna be a bright, bright sunshiny day.”

The song ended, and this time there were people standing, cheering.

“That was amazing, you two. Thank you.”

He nodded, waved a hand at the crowd then exhaled as he headed towards his seat. But he didn’t want to make small talk with Grady or anyone else. He wanted—needed—to know what that was all about.

He moved to talk to Ash, when their other sister reappeared, obviously upset. Which made him pause, then offer a small smile as Ash turned to him and gave the same, before she collected their belongings and the four of them hurried away.

CHAPTER FIVE

Aisling yawned, and stretched, but the persistent bleep of the phone alarm continued. “Fine.” She slapped her hand in the direction of her phone and finally switched it off.

Sleep had been a little too hard following the revelations of yesterday. First, that moment of connection with Andy, which had only felt solidified when they sang together in one of the most surreal yet high points of her life. But all of that had felt upended when Fiona came in, her emotions plain to see for once, and they’d needed to hurry her away.

Fiona and Declan had been a thing? It seemed impossible. Hadn’t Fiona always looked down on people like him? Which wasn’t perhaps very nice of Aisling to acknowledge, but was still true. Fiona’s tears had quickly dried, replaced by anger that only seemed to dig deeper the longer time went on. She’d flat out refused to attend church this morning, which was also not completely unexpected, seeing as she hadn’t exactly been showing that Jesus was her Lord for several years now. But still…

“Church!” Oops. She glanced at the time. Winced some more. Then slid from bed and got changed, and was downstairs in record time.

Rory laughed. “Well, looks like someone hasn’t had time to brush her hair.”

Double oops. She dragged her fingers through it, then hunted through her handbag and found a hair-tie and slid it on. A ponytail would have to do. Lucky for her she had enough makeup supplies in her handbag to do that in the car on the way. Provided someone else was driving. “Can I cadge a ride from someone?”

“You can come with us,” Rory said.

She hopped in the backseat of Rory’s red hatchback and fussed with her face, applying the products that would make her freckles disappear. She wasn’t vain, but she much preferred her skin to look smooth than blotchy or kissed too enthusiastically by the sun.

By the time they’d arrived at the church she was looking and feeling more herself. “Do you think Fiona will join us for brunch?”

“I don’t know.” Rory sighed. “I wouldn’t be surprised if she heads back to Dublin today.”

“What?”

“She was pretty upset last night.”

“I feel a little clueless because I still don’t know what that was about,” Aidan said.