‘Have you seen your dad much?’ she asks, changing the subject, her voice shaking now so badly, telling me thebig breakdown moment I’m expecting can’t be too far away.
Now it’s my turn to force a smile and try to stay positive.
‘Yes, yes, I have seen him quite a lot lately,’ I tell her. ‘He’s keeping well. He was asking for you.’
She looks away and I see how her eyes glisten at the very mention of him. This is as hard for her as it is for me, I know that.
‘He was?’
‘He was.’
She inhales. What I can’t tell her is just how angry my father is at the dogs on the street who know my mother has been set up. What I can’t tell her is how we’ve argued that he mustn’t get involved or he could do something stupid in revenge and end up behind bars too.
Both my parents grew up in an era where shootings and bombings were the norm, where Protestants and Catholics lived at war with each other. While my father has his own strong political beliefs due to his own experiences growing up during The Troubles, he has never in all my years on this planet taken those beliefs into his own hands. I don’t want him to start now. He might have his own issues with those he sees as being on the ‘other side’ and has been cautious of their motives, but to stand up now to the bad boys in our own community who have wronged my mother is a path he dare not go down – for his own safety and for all of ours.
‘Did he give you money?’ she asks me.
‘He always gives me money when I see him,’ I reply. ‘He’s a lot more financially supportive these days. I think he knows he’s a lot to catch up on.’
‘That’s good.’
She takes it as it is, and I can sense her mind scramble as her thoughts build up into the inevitable crescendo. I can tell by her short breaths, by the shake in her voice, by her lack of eye contact, by the way she fidgets with that chain.
I often wonder if it makes her better or worse to see me like this once a month, on the other side of a table with other people lined up like ducks beside us, nodding and talking in stilted hushed tones.
‘And your sister?’ she asks.
Her eyes fill with tears now.
I know this is killing her, stuck in here so helpless and trapped, unable to do the things she is used to doing around her own home: making sure Shannon gets to school every day without a fuss or an argument, or that my sister Maureen doesn’t go off the rails and disappear again like she used to.
‘I’m keeping a very close eye on them both,’ I say, as though I’m reading off a script, ‘and look, before you know it, we’ll have all this sorted and you’ll be back home again where you belong. It’s nearly over. You’re so nearly there.’
She nods.
We sit in silence, our eyes skirting the room, finding eye contact with anything but each other.
I hate this part. I dread this moment, these few seconds before she breaks down as the pain of the life she has left behind hits her.
I wait. I know it’s coming, and when it does, even though I’m prepared, it just never gets any easier.
An apology is first as usual.
‘I’m so sorry, baby!’ she says, gulping back a wave of emotion that threatens to choke her and stabs me in the heart at the same time. ‘I had no idea the place was being used to hide guns! And I’ve never touched drugs in my life, you know I haven’t! It goes against everything I’ve always stood for and—’
‘I know, Mum. I know,’ I whisper. ‘Everyone who knows you believes you.’
She looks so tiny and pathetic, so I try my best not to frown or crumble as we repeat the same patterns from before. Her voice gasps and peaks, like a squeal almost, so much so that other visitors and inmates look our way, then shuffle back to their own business. The prison guard shifts from one foot to another and folds his burly arms.
‘I’m so sorry to put you all through this, my darling! I’ll never, ever let anything like this happen again to our family and—’
‘Hush, please. Please don’t cry. I already know all of this,’ I tell her softly, taking her hand, all the while feeling thestare of a silver-haired woman across from us who is gaping in our direction with her mouth open. ‘You don’t have to keep saying it, now take a deep breath and try to relax. They’ve promised us peace and there’s great work going on out there. You’ll be home sooner than you think. You’ll see.’
I grip her hand tighter. I want to fidget, to do something with my hands to occupy my mind so I can hold in my tears and not add to any of her mounting fears that seem so overwhelming every time I come to see her. I close my eyes and breathe, just like I’ve asked her to do as well. I won’t let her down. I can’t let her down. I try to remember something, anything to make her feel even just a little bit better.
‘I bought Shannon the most beautiful new dress in Belfast this week,’ I announce, shifting in my seat to change the energy. ‘I got it for her birthday. Oh, it’s so pretty and she looks like a real princess, or so she keeps telling us every time she tries it on.’
She lightens up immediately and so easily, like a crying child distracted by a shiny new toy. She closes her eyes tight and tilts back her head so that her eyes face the low ceiling.
