Future Popes of Ireland. Darragh Martin

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      Danny Doyle turned the capsule over and over in his hand, the single bed in his old box room already sagging with sadness underneath him.

      10

      Statue of the Sacred Heart (1980)

      Peg stared at the holy water font in the hallway. It was one of the many features of 7 Dunluce Crescent that did not appear in her doll’s house. It was a small ceramic thing, hanging precariously by a nail, a picture of the Virgin Mary on the front. Much too high for Peg to dip her finger into, which meant she relied upon Granny Doyle or her father to bless her as she passed the threshold. Neither was particularly diligent. Peg felt that she’d lost two parents for the price of one. Danny Doyle spent all his days in the box room with the curtains shut, all the Lego castles that they were going to build forgotten in Baldoyle, along with everything Peg had ever cared about (her doll’s house; her shoebox; her life!). Granny Doyle was too busy charging about the house after the triplets to worry about the fate of Peg’s soul. Peg almost felt as if she were becoming invisible.

      ‘In or out, child, are you coming in or out?’

      Granny Doyle still had eyes for Peg when she got in the way. Peg retreated down the dark hallway and left Granny Doyle to her chorus of old ladies. The triplets were asleep at the same time, so the chance to tell everybody just how busy she was could not be missed by Granny Doyle. Peg heard Mrs Fay’s warm voice and suppressed the desire to rush into the porch and see if she’d brought any sweets in her handbag. It wasn’t worth the fuss. Peg couldn’t face Mrs Nugent telling her that you’re a brave girl, aren’t you, love? or Mrs McGinty trying to find some softness in her face or Granny Doyle losing patience and banishing her outside, where she hadn’t a single friend to hopscotch beside. Besides, it wasn’t sweets Peg was after; she’d lost her whole life, even a Curly Wurly wouldn’t cut it.

      Peg made her way into the empty sitting room, an eerie space with the telly turned off. The room had rules, invisible lines that demarcated territory as sharply as barbed wire. Granny Doyle sat in the armchair by the window, its cushions shaping themselves around her body, even in her absence. Danny Doyle took his father’s spot in the armchair by the television, dinner tray propped on his knees when he watched the football. Guests took their pick of the chairs by the wall. Peg might have switched on the telly or clambered onto one of the forbidden armchairs but what would be the point? How could she care about cartoons? There hadn’t been a television in her stately doll’s house, only a library with walls of miniature books that Peg had arranged carefully. Peg squeezed her eyes shut and longed for some magic to make her small and safe and transported inside the doll’s house but no, she was stuck in her stupid-sized body, too small to escape and too big to disappear.

      Peg ambled past the dining room, with its mantelpiece filled with forbidden figurines, photos of people who Granny Doyle never saw, and postcards from places she had never been to. It was the nicest room in 7 Dunluce Crescent: sun streaming through the curtains and catching the dust in the afternoon. People hardly ever went inside, much less dined there.

      Peg meandered towards the kitchen, the heart of the house. But what was here for her? No bright gingham tablecloth like in her doll’s house, for starters, only some grubby thing splattered with stains. The smell of bone soup and burnt rashers clinging to the curtains. More pictures of the Virgin Mary than Peg could count, as if she were a family member. And Granny Doyle’s wireless, the radio she kept on all day, so the patter of indignant listeners and reassuring men filled the room, no space for any thoughts.

      If Aunty Mary had been visiting, Peg might have been able to escape to the back garden. Here at least was some quiet, the hedge nice and big to hide behind, a large stone where fairies could leave presents, so Aunty Mary said, her face gleeful when they overturned the slab and uncovered an old sixpence beside the scurrying woodlice. Aunty Mary had the key to the shed, too, and here, beside the reek of petrol from the lawnmower and the jumble of abandoned possessions, were piles of books in cardboard boxes. Peg longed to put them on a shelf and move them about until they were arranged by colour or size or whatever took her fancy. She couldn’t read them yet, but Aunty Mary left her be. No aren’t you a brave girl? or you’ll be a good girl and help your gran, won’t you? Aunty Mary even gave Peg some books with pictures, to be getting on with, while Peg took ‘a little break’ from school to help out her granny with the triplets. But Aunty Mary was in Galway, teaching other children. The back door was locked and Peg didn’t have the key, even if she could have reached the handle.

      Aunty Mary might have understood why Peg was so upset at the loss of her copybook, another victim of the move. Peg had cried for a solid day when she realized her copybook was gone, her tears intensifying when Granny Doyle came home with a new one, its lines all the wrong size and none of Peg’s pictures or attempts at the alphabet preserved inside.

      ‘I want my copybook,’ Peg dared to say, face red with the rage, fists clenched at such an unjust world.

      ‘Ah love,’ Danny Doyle sighed, patting her on the head and shuffling up the stairs, no use, as usual.

      ‘I went to Nolans special for that,’ Granny Doyle said, in a voice that was trying to be nice, even as she opened up the impostor copybook.

      ‘I want my copybook,’ Peg repeated, wishing that Aunty Mary or her mother or somebody sensible were there, but she only had Granny Doyle, who turned to the counter and started to chop onions. Granny Doyle had a formidable back, which tensed to show just how much she wasn’t listening, but Peg wouldn’t let her win this fight. ‘I want my copybook,’ she howled, hoping that the words might smash windows or send the house tumbling down or right the ways of this wrong world. But all they did was send Granny Doyle’s hands to her brow, onions abandoned as she turned around.

      ‘Be quiet or you’ll wake the triplets.’

      This could not stop Peg, whose words had turned into wails.

      ‘I want my copybook!’

      ‘Listen, Missy, I won’t tolerate this carry-on …’

      Peg would carry on crying until she exploded, I want my copybook and I want my old house and I want my mammy clear in every scream and sob.

      ‘Just shut up!’

      ‘I want my copybook! I want—’

      The slap pulled the air from Peg’s lungs. A quick tap across the face, it only stung for a second, but Peg felt the air in the room shift in that instant. Granny Doyle’s face reddened. She turned back to her onions as if nothing had happened, leaving Peg stock-still in the middle of the kitchen, her face turning white from the shock of it. Something her mother had never done. A violation. Peg knew then that her tears would be of no use here. She swallowed them inside, thinking that this was revenge of sorts. Fury filled her instead, a colder kind that kept her face pale. Her composure remained, even as Granny Doyle turned around in frustration – ‘see, you’re after waking the triplets’ – Peg’s mask fixed as Granny Doyle made a great show of taking away the new copybook and bringing it to ‘somebody who’ll appreciate all I do for them’. Lines had been drawn that day: there would be no more need for slaps or tears. Peg understood there was no out-wailing a baby; if she wanted her way in 7 Dunluce Crescent, she’d have to be inventive.

      ‘Are you all right, love? Would you not want to go outside and get some fresh air?’

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