The Second Sorrow

The old family joke wasn’t so funny after my mother died. Of course, my father never really found it funny.The name his parents gave him plagued Dad throughout his life. Even his own father would often say that, when he was older, he’d have four children who would be turned into swans by their wicked stepmother.On his first day at school, the teacher; on hearing his name: said, “Ah! Your mother is a fan of Shakespeare, I see!” Immediately my father corrected him:“No sir. My name is Lír. L-I-(fada)-R. As in, The Children of…”

I was born to Lír and Joanna Macready; their firstborn and only surviving child. Though he’d flinched under the yoke of his legendary name all his life; when he had a daughter…my father named me Fionnuala. Of course, he did.My earliest memories of my mother are of her lying in bed in a darkened room; the covers pulled up to her neck, the curtains permanently drawn, the atmosphere heavy with the underlying smell of stale smoke. After me, my mother fell pregnant with three boys. The first was stillborn; the second she miscarried: the third died in childbirth and took my mother with him.

After that, my father and I retreated into a world of our own making. Every night he would read to me the ancient tales of gods and fighting men who populated Ireland’s mythological past. Of the heroes who became gods and then little more than fairies living beneath the hills. And, of course, he would read to me the sorrowful tale of the three sons and daughter of his mythic namesake.

He would take me out of school on a regular basis to go on little daytrips with him. Sometimes we’d drive to the coast and take the midday ferry to a small island amidst a grey and angry sea. We’d take a small, packed lunch to a secluded part of the island, where four flat stone slabs lay in a bed of dark tussock grass.“This is where the Children of Lír are said to be buried” he’d say, almost reverently. Then we’d sit and eat our sandwiches and drink lukewarm tea from a thermos flask.

When I was thirteen years old, my father introduced me to Evie. They were old school friends, though failed to mention that he’d been her teacher. She was very pretty and laughed when she was nervous. When they were together, my father smiled more easily and talked more frequently. I could see that Evie brought it out in him. And I didn’t like it.

It was shortly after meeting Evie that I had The Dream for the first time.I’m standing in the middle of that small island. Alone. A storm bears down, heavy and oppressive. A furious wind whips at my soaked summer dress as dark screaming waves rise, roar and shatter all around me. I turn to see those four stone grave markers in the grass; they’re larger, more vivid and stonier than I remember.As I stare in expectant horror, three faint shimmering figures rise from the stones. Though their lines are undefined and translucent, they are unmistakably the shadows of boys…and each has the face of my father, softened and feminine with youthfulness. As they take full form before me, they begin to cry; a terrible and mournful lament which rises slowly over the island and drowns out the sounds of the crashing waves. This dreadful song of sorrow; this barely human sound: moves me so deeply that, despite my fear of these strange shades, I find myself taking one trembling step, then another, towards them. Then…they begin to speak. The words do not exist on the air; the air still weeps with the sorrow of their song: but whisper insistently in my mind:“Fionnuala, why did you leave us? It’s so cold and the lonely storm hurts so much. Come to us. Come home to your brothers.”I’m so scared, my hands tremble and my fingers hurt with the cold; but the song is so sad and the words so inviting that I raise out my arms to embrace the shadows. And then I see it … my arms are covered in brilliant white feathers and as my powerful new wings encircle the shades of my brothers, they grasp and clutch and claw at my body. Their faces contort in triumphant rage as they begin to drag me under the fourth gravestone.And then I wake up.

Evie moved into our home and my father stopped reading to me at night.“You’re getting too old for that now, child. Besides, you’re more than capable of reading to yourself at this stage.”I tried to tell him that that wasn’t the point, but his mind was made up.

My nightly tales of gods and heroes were replaced by The Dream. The same island. The same storm. The same wind. The same waves. And the same four grave markers. But no shades rising from the stones. No lament rising on the air. No words of pleading or desperate struggle to drag me down to them. Nothing.Just the island. The storm. And me. Alone.Completely. Utterly. Alone.

I wrote my first song about The Dream. Describing the whole scene in a series of clumsy couplets, I tried to set the words to what I remembered of the lament sung by the shades. For my fifteenth birthday, I asked for a guitar as my main present. My father was delighted for me to take up a new hobby.Evie arranged for a musician friend of hers to give me private lessons. I resented her interference, of course, and took much persuasion and cajoling from Dad before accepting her offer. But the truth is that, looking back on it now, I am grateful to her for it.

 One night, for the first time in a long time, I heard the old lament rising on the wind.The sound seemed more distant than it had been before but, when I looked at the four grey stones, there were no signs of the shades. And the sound was coming from overhead.Then I saw them. In the sky; beyond the shores of the small island: gliding high above the dark waves were three gigantic, powerful, beautiful swans…their sleek elegant forms brilliant against an inkblot sky. The old familiar lament was coming from their bright orange beaks and they were calling for me to join them above the waves. I raised my arms in joyous greeting; longing, aching to be with them: and saw that my arms were covered in those brilliant white feathers which had once terrified me. But now they delighted me. Now I understood why I needed them.I started waving my arms up and down and could feel their tremendous strength and power to command the wind. But still I couldn’t rise off the ground. The island refused to release me to join my brothers high above the waves.The swans gave one final burst of song in rebuke then they banked and wheeled away, disappearing behind a cascading mountain of dark seawater.I awoke. The pillow, the sheets, my t-shirt and panties: everything was drenched in sweat. My arms screamed in pain from the shoulder blades right down to my fingertips.Had I been sleep-flapping?!

The first song I ever learned to play and sing properly; after three sessions with my teacher and over a week of determined seclusion in my room: was The Man With A Child In His Eyes by Kate Bush. I practised it every evening, over and over again for hours, until I got it right. And then I couldn’t stop playing it.One afternoon as I played it for probably the thousandth time, the door of my bedroom slowly creaked open and my father was leaning against the jamb, a mistily sad smile on his face. He let the last chord die on the air, before…“That was your mother’s favourite song.”He came into the room as he continued to talk.“When I heard you through the floorboards, I thought you were playing a tape! I had no idea you’d got so talented, Fionnuala.”“No-one plays tapes anymore, Dad!”“Well…mpds…or whatever?!”I laughed; unsure if that was a deliberate joke. He sat on the bed beside me and a rolling wave of motion set me swaying briefly.“I didn’t know Mum liked Kate Bush.”A small smile flashed quickly on his face.“Yeah…loved her.” He stared at the floor for a moment…lost in a memory. “You look like her, you know”, he said, looking directly at me.“Kate Bush?!”He raised an eyebrow in bemused condescension. “No…your mother” As the words filled the distance between us, they were warm, simple…and heart-breaking. Several moments passed, unmarked by anything other than silence. Then he raised his palm to my cheek and gently traced my cheekbone with his thumb. It tickled.“She’s always looking at me out of your eyes.”The guitar slipped onto the floor, unnoticed and forgotten. I very nearly cried there and then. It was the sweetest thing my father ever said to me. Yet I couldn’t help but wonder if there wasn’t a glint of reproach in his words.

On the morning of my seventeenth birthday, I awoke to Evie; her face manic and contorted by a wide, almost desperate, smile: standing by the bed.“Good morning, birthday girl!!”“Huh!?!”“Your Dad’s away at a conference all day. He won’t be back till tonight.” “I know. He gave me my card and money last night.”“I know he did!” She almost sang the words. “Which is why…I thought we might go out for the day, just us girls.”“I dunno, Evie. I’ve got school…”“No school today! You only turn seventeen once. I’m taking you into town. We’re going for lunch, shopping and then to get our hair done.”Her unrelenting cheerfulness would brook no refusal.“Oh … okay!”“Fantastic! I’ve got a present for you.”She brandished a large bright papery cushion in her outstretched arms, beaming.“Your Dad gave you money last night and, of course, that’s from both of us. But this…is just from me!”I had little choice now but sit up in bed.“Oh, thanks. You didn’t have to buy me anything.” I took the gift from her; it was a little heavier than I’d expected.“Well…I didn’t actually buy it for you. It’s not new. Actually, it used to be mine. I got it when I was around your age.”“So…it’s pretty new then?!” The barbed comment bounced off her wall of exuberant anticipation and, truth be told, I regretted it immediately. She watched intently, smiling all the while, as I pulled open the wrapping and drew out a jacket of the most exquisite crimson velvet. Very slim-fitting, its elegant lines drew into the waist then flared out a little at the bottom.“Do you like it?”“It’s…beautiful! Evie, I love it. Thank you. Thank you so much!”“Try it on!”She didn’t have to tell me twice. I threw the bedclothes off, stepped out onto the carpet and slowly put the jacket on. Glancing at the mirror I could see it fit me perfectly. Evie’s rictus-smile had softened into genuine affection and she had tears in her eyes.“Aww…Fionnuala…it suits you so much! Even with nothing but a t-shirt and knickers!”We both laughed.“So, birthday girl! Get dressed. We’re going out!”

Appointments had been made for both of us in a fashionable hair salon; she must have been planning this for a while: but we had time for a light lunch and a bit of clothes shopping first. It was a bright day and we had lunch in the open-air section of a busy café-bar. Once we’d finished eating, Evie produced a pack of cigarettes and made a point of offering me one.“No thanks. I want to be a singer…but I don’t want to sound like Leonard Cohen!”She smiled warmly. “Good girl. I’m proud of you.” As she turned her head to light her cigarette, I was surprised by how pleased her words made me feel. “I hate keeping it from your Dad, you know. But he can be such a dick about it.”“I think it’s because my Mum smoked. I think he blames that for her death.”“Yeah.” She said curtly, noncommittally. The atmosphere between us cooled somewhat. She’d been chatting continually ever since we left the house; now she sat in thoughtful silence, smoking and sipping occasionally from her coffee.“It’s not easy, you know…” she said at length.  “…trying to compete with a ghost.”“What do you mean?!”Evie crushed out her half-finished cigarette in a shallow aluminium ashtray and looked me directly in the face.“I love your father. I always have. He’s a little older than me, a bit stuffy and set in his ways, but I love him. When we first started seeing each other, he was broken inside. He didn’t really say anything, but I could tell, you know?!”

It was weird, hearing her talk so openly about their relationship. Weird…and a little thrilling. “Your mother’s death had really torn him apart, but I thought that, given enough time, he’d eventually love me the same way he’d obviously loved her. And then there’s you.” She seemed sad as she said this.“Me! What about me?!” Shocked to have the focus suddenly swing round to myself, I thought she was finally going to castigate me for the years of subtly making her feel unwelcome in her own home.“You look just like her, Fionnuala.” She took out another cigarette and lit it before continuing. “I never met your mother, but I’ve seen photos. You’re a living, breathing image of Joanna…always have been. Your Dad looks at you…and all he sees is her.”She drew long and deep on her cigarette as she looked at me, almost accusingly; the glowing coal reflected in her dark eyes gave a vaguely demonic impression.“I…don’t know what to say.” I really didn’t!“It’s not your fault, sweetheart.” She smiled sadly as twin streams of smoke jetted from her nostrils. “It’s just the way it is!”I cast around in my mind, looking for something comforting to say.“Why didn’t you and Dad have kids of your own?” It was the only thing I could think of.“I’m not able to.” She said this so simply, so matter-of-factly, that all I could do was stare at the tabletop. When the growing silence finally became more than I could bear, I looked up again. Evie was staring at me, a strange almost conspiratorial deviousness in her eyes.“What?!” I was genuinely unnerved by the look on her face.“There’s something about you, Fionnuala. Something so deeply hidden that you don’t even suspect it’s there. But I see it. I saw it the first time we met.”Was it possible? Could she be right?! Could this young woman; whose presence in my life I’d resented for so long: truly see the real me? Or was she just saying it for whatever strange reason?!“You know…the Conservatory in town is starting a new degree course in popular music. You should apply.”“You really think so?!”“Of course!” She flashed me a beaming grin. “Now…let’s go shopping!”

We spent the best part of three hours charging round a high-end store. Evie led the way in a frenzy of renewed activity; finding, appraising and dismissing item after item. Occasionally she would see something which required further consideration.“Oooh! That’s nice.” Then she’d hold it up to me, nod and say, “Yeah…try that on!” She picked up a few things for herself, then we went through the ubiquitous changing room ritual of talking loudly through the thin partition as we tried things on, then mounted an impromptu fashion show in front of the long, highly polished mirror: both of us cooing our approval at each new outfit.Satisfied with our choices, and very nearly running late for our joint hair appointment, we rushed to the cash desk to pay. Evie paid for her own things with my Dad’s credit card; though it didn’t escape my attention that she left me to pay with my birthday money.

“You know…” Evie began with a philosophical air as we sat, side by side, in front of twin light-rimmed mirrors. “…there aren’t many girls who can really pull off pink hair. You need very delicate features to make it work. Refined bone structure, you know?! Most girls don’t have that. But you do.”“What?!” Not for the first time today, she’d taken me by surprise. “I dunno, Eve. I was just going to get a wash and blow-dry.”“Nonsense!” she retorted.The stylist gave me an inquiring look in the mirror. “Your natural colour is very light blonde. I wouldn’t even have to bleach it, if you want to go pink?”“I dunno…”“C’mon Fionnuala! It’s not enough to be crazy talented. If you want to be a rock star, you’re gonna have to look the part as well.”She was right! A thrilling sense of excitement coursed through me and I returned the stylist’s look with an assured determination.“Do it!”

Standing in the middle of my bedroom, I truly did not recognise the person looking at me from the other side of the long mirror. In the crimson jacket, white shirt, tight black leather pants (which Evie insisted I just had to get!), small elegant boots and my new candyfloss mane I was…transformed! Evie beamed at me from the door.“So…what do you think?”“You look fabulous!!”“Really?!”“Really. Now come on downstairs. Your Dad’s home and there’s one last little birthday surprise for you.”

I followed her down the stairs, teetering a little in my new boots. As we reached the darkened living room, the song began:Happy Birthday to you…Evie led me in, then stepped aside to reveal my father with a cake in his outstretched hands, bathed in the soft glare of seventeen guttering candles.…Happy Birthday to you…I laughed at the sight of the tiny conical hat perched at an angle on his head; it was covered with coloured balloons and said: ‘Happy Birthday My Darling Girl’.…Happy Birth-The song stopped. The grin fell from his face and his eyes widened in shock.“What the hell is this?!”“Lír…what’s wrong?” Evie’s voice was flat and very far away. All I could see was the blanched horror in my father’s dimly lit face.“Evie, turn on the light.” The room was flooded, and my eyes stung briefly as my retinas readjusted. Streamers hung from the ceiling, helium-filled balloons bobbed around on strings and a large pink banner adorned the mantelpiece: Happy Birthday My Darling Girl.“Dad…what’s wrong?!”“What the hell have you done to yourself?”“What do you mean?”“It’s just a little birthday makeover, Lír.” Evie tried to laugh, but she could see that he wasn’t joking. “Doesn’t she look fabulous?!”“No. She does not.” He put the cake on the coffee table, then excoriated me with a stare. “You used to look like your mother. Now you look like a common strumpet.” He turned and left by the other door.

Evie! Did she do this deliberately? Did she turn me into a whore to deface the living image of my mother and finally win his heart entirely for herself?! Was she kind and girly and supportive just so she could slip in and sever the last few tendrils of affection between my father and me?!?I spun on her; ready to scream and rage and flail her face off. That scheming face which had replaced my mother’s on her marital pillow; that face which…that face which was now contorted with grief and sympathy; her dark eyes magnified behind lenses of heaving pregnant tears.My anger broke under the weight of betrayal and desolation. Evie raised her arms in offered embrace…and I took the offer without shame.“I’m so sorry, sweetheart. He shouldn’t have said that. I’m sure he didn’t mean it.” But we both knew that he did. She held me tight in her arms and I wept into her shiny dark hair. It smelled faintly of apricot.

The island stood desolate amidst the same unrelenting storm stirring the waves; the same blotted and inked clouds. I searched, desperately, for any sign of the swans. There were none.I threw out my wings to attempt flight again, but the brilliant feathers were gone. My arms were just arms…cold and pale, with tiny wrists and long musician’s fingers.I was alone.

Placing the letter on the breakfast table with a triumphant flourish, I stood back to accept the applause. Evie read it first.“Oh…that’s fantastic Fionnuala, Congratulations!!” She kicked her chair back, got up and hugged me. “I knew you could do it!”“Thank you.”“What’s this?!” There was an edge in my father’s voice which chased the joy from the room.“My acceptance letter. I got into music college.”“Well, that’s great…congratulations. But you’re not going.”The air in my lungs heated as grief and rage battled through my slightly trembling body.“I am.” Grief won; the words came out small, muted and pathetic.“Would you give us a moment please, Evie.”Evie caught and squeezed my hand, before leaving without a word. My father stared at me for several moments, my letter dangling precariously from his thumb and forefinger.“Now. We’ve discussed this, Fionnuala. Music is fine as a little hobby…and you’re quite good at it. But you’re going to a proper university to study a proper subject with a proper career at the end of it.”The battle within me had turned. When I spoke again my voice was low and even, but the words were edged with the bright steel of anger.“The world doesn’t work that way anymore, Dad. You’d know that if you took a look out your classroom window once in a while.”He seemed genuinely shocked; even a little hurt: at the challenge.“I don’t know when you turned into this, Fionnuala; I really don’t. The hair, the clothes, the make-up. I really don’t know how my little girl turned into this.”“This is who I am. This is who I’ve always been. I just didn’t know it. Until Evie showed me.”A cold dangerous frost gnawed at the air between us. He put the letter onto the table and stood slowly. For a moment, I could see how age had begun to seize up his joints.“Well. As you say.” He moved towards the door; about to resign from the battle: then turned and looked me directly in the eye. “Losing your mother was the only true sorrow of my life. Until now.” Then he left.It was the cruellest thing my father ever said to me. And I have never forgiven him for it.

The island of my nightmares was desolate and silent; rimmed by a placid, grey sea: the dark clouds hung low and listless. The stone grave markers were gone; overwhelmed by a resurgent undergrowth of heather and bracken. Without the storm and the surrounding pillars of murderous water, the island felt truly small and utterly solitary.I raised my head and sang a lament for the maelstrom. The song was accepted by the clouds, but no reply was offered. The sound which came from my mouth was not the voice of a young girl, but the lament of a swan. I looked at my arms; huge and covered with brilliant white feathers once more. I looked at my summer dress; replaced by downy white feathers.I stretched out my wings and, beating thrashing reaching, clambered onto the air. At first, I was clumsy and unsure but with each stroke of my great wings the wind rose to cushion and bolster my flight.The clouds were no longer dark and grey but luminesced with a strange white light.Then suddenly the clouds tore open to reveal a cobalt sky; and there it was before me—the sun!