Peter finally swallowed his pride and turned his collar. The wet cold had worked its magic, replacing the angry heat that had covered his neck at his brief sit-down with his former boss. It had only taken a mile and a half, on the dark gravelly shoulder of the Cilldargan road.
He turned away from the cross he had been revering and faced the dark motorway. The headlights that had swept the back of him a moment ago were now pointing into the rain a few paces ahead, illuminating the moribund drops that passed before them.
The driver lowered a window and whistled. Peter thought how he might respond to this in Manchester - how no sensible person would respond to such a thing, because no sensible person would initiate it. And really, were things any safer here in the country, or were people just more naive? The city-boy in him was given to believe the latter.
He felt rain leaching into his shoes. He supposed his clothes would only get colder and heavier as they grew soggier, and at least his probable murder would take place in a warm and dry automobile. And at least he didn't have to drive it himself.
The horn blared again, and he stepped cautiously down the muddy slope to meet the passenger-side door. Hearing the auto lock disengage, he let himself in. He meant to look at the driver, but a panting animal on the rear seat startled his attention away. The car smelt of wet dog, and rental detailing, and...lily of the valley.
"I'm afraid I haven't brought a towel," a soft, burnt-cinnamon voice apologised.
Peter felt his eyes sting. "What would the late Douglas Adams say?" he managed. Badly.
Now she looked. "Peter?!"
He shook his head, in doubt, in disbelief, in recognition. He tried to speak her name, but it came out a choked sob. A lightning bolt illuminated both their faces for a fraction of a second.
She opened her mouth to speak, but whatever she said next was lost in the thunderclap that immediately followed. He tried to imagine what it had been, tried to think of anything she could say that would be the right thing.
And what could he answer? He wanted to demand an explanation, a confession, a repentance. He wanted to scream, to weep in her arms, to shake her by the shoulders in anger. He had imagined how their first conversation might go, had unfolded a thousand scenarios in his mind. How he'd unleash his wrath, his heartache, his astonishment.
Not one of his thousand scenarios included what happened next.
Niamh tucked Kieran into the daybed, pulling a quilt off her own bed to keep the chill off him. The dog curled up on a fleece throw at the foot. Oonagh had turned up her nose at the sight of two four-legged guests, but said nothing. Her husband had been less surprised by the arrival of two human ones who were meant to be dead.
No doubt the Dooleys were now waiting for the crowd to thin out downstairs, so Paul could explain himself.
Niamh stood and turned off the lights. "Aren't you coming to bed as well?" Kieran asked.
"It isn't my bedtime just yet," she said. "I'll just be downstairs if you need anything."
"Will we see the man again? The one from earlier?"
Niamh choked back an impulse, or perhaps a sob. "We'll talk about that in the morning, okay?"
"I like him. He's very nice, and he knows all about Wallace and Vomit."
She had to smile at this. "Some sleep now, you understand me?"
"I'm not sleepy."
"You kipped all afternoon. School will start soon, and you won't be able to do that anymore."
"Will I go to school here?"
"Yes. You'll enrol where my friend Brendan works. Where I used to work," she realised.
"Will you work there again?"
Niamh sighed. "Goodnight, Kieran."
Father Sheahan ran the pad of a finger along his glass of the sweet stuff, making a narrow window in the condensation. Donal was late to meet him. Probably flaked out altogether. Probably meeting Bruce Willis in his dreams.
Paul Dooley cleared away the straw wrapper that had since become nine little wads of white paper. "You'll be pleased to hear your investment property is fully committed for the time being."
"That right?" Vincent murmured.
Paul nodded. "You'll be amused to know that half those bookings are dead people."
Vincent grimaced. "Finally embracing the old Irish tradition, are we?"
"Nah, Oonagh would never go in for the mortuary arts," Paul breezed. "Another tradition. More localised, I reckon."
Vincent looked up. Paul nodded over his shoulder into the reception lobby, where Oonagh had given Ambrose a cup of tea and a listening ear.
"Tell me, Father. How much did you hear about this town before you came along?"
It took Assumpta some time to understand what had happened. She had been momentarily blind, stuck behind the afterimage of a windscreen lit to a thousand watts. She had a ringing in her ears, as if someone had fired a cannon beside her head.
The car had lost power, was no longer idling on the shoulder, but simply inert. As her senses of sight and hearing trickled back in, she noticed that every warning light on the dash had come on, and the horn was blaring of its own accord. Checking in the rearview she saw the radio antenna going from red-hot to black. Lopsidedness suggested that a couple tyres were blown. A moment later, the car regained its balance. So all the tyres are blown!
The horn went quiet. Fionn was whimpering. It occurred to Assumpta that the car's interior was hotter now. She turned to her left. Peter wasn't moving. Wasn't even blinking.
Her heart sank. Then she realised he was breathing, just stunned.
"Are you all right?!" she demanded. It felt like yelling, but it sounded very faint.
"Don't move," he probably yelled back.
She tried to vent a window to cool the interior, then remembered the electrical system was likely fried. He grabbed her hand away from the useless button, frustrated. "Don't touch anything!"
"Oh what're you, a safety expert?!"
"Sit still!" He squeezed the hand harder. Too hard.
It was perfect.
She turned to look at Fionn. He was calming down; what dog liked thunder at all, let alone so up-close and personal?
"So we just wait?" she said, quietly - a test. Several tests. Can he hear? Will he keep speaking to me? Will he stay?
Peter nodded. "Till it passes, or someone comes by."
"Shall I check if my hazards still work?"
Peter was still clamping one hand; now he blocked the other on its way. "Let me." With a tentative jab, he hit the button. The flashing amber lights began to beam their gross understatement into the dark of the empty road.
For a moment now, they sat silent. Their breath fogged the windows, calling to mind a night long ago at Cill Na Sidh. The night everything began going wrong. He released her hands now. Occasionally, one of them would turn to look at the other, then look away. Every possible thing either one could say was too heavy or too light. The weather left no option to retreat, and the car left no option to move on.
Farfetched? Ah, well. A similar vehicular lightning strike actually happened a few months back, in the opposite end of my home state. Everyone survived, and the story came in handy for research! (Husband wanted to know why I kept Googling "car hit by lightning." I admitted nothing.)
Sorry for the delay. I rewrote this chapter a bunch of times, and I also foolishly took on another commitment. (Only if you'll find it amusing: it's a female lead in a local play, and the character's name is Mary...)