Page 69 of Whale Harbor

“Or what?”

“Or I don’t know. She won’t pray. She likes hiking. She likes being outside. She has her own way.”

“What in the world are you talking about?”

But Mac didn’t quite know what he was talking about. What was praying except time by oneself, hoping for things?

“A full scholarship! Who gets that and she wants to walk away? I don’t know the first thing about the public school except everyone says it’s bad.”

“Who’s everyone? Maybe we should take a look, at least.”

“Could she not just put her head down and endure for another year and a half? Then she’ll either be working or she’ll be off to college. Think of the things we put up with when we were kids. Our teacher called us stupid and beat at least one of us every day.”

“But was that right?” Mac asked after a minute. “Should she put up with things just because we had to?”

Lillie sat up, turned the bedside lamp back on to look at him.

“You’re proud of her. Don’t think for a second that I don’t know that. Monsignor wanted to stab you in the eye. But her being like this, Mac. I’m telling you, it spells trouble.”

“I bet you wish she were only pregnant.”

“Mac.”

“You know what I think, Lillie?” Mac sat up, too, and pulled her toward him. She was always so warm. “I’ve been worried about them since the day they were born. What if something happens to us, what if one of us dies suddenly like Eamon did, like my mother did, how will they cope, who’ll raise them? Today for the first time I knew she’ll be absolutely fine. We don’t need to worry about that one at least.”

Lillie was quiet for a long time. “I don’t know what makes you so sure.”

And then he started laughing.

“Honestly, Macdara. How can you find any of this funny?”

“Did she really mail twenty-three hundred dollars to a women’s health clinic in Cameroon?”

“I know! She could have peeled a bit off for her poor parents, Jesus. Christmas is coming.”

MARY AND BRIDGET STARTED AT the local public school when classes resumed after winter break. They were nervous about their clothes and tried on what seemed to Mac a hundred combinations of outfits the night before. At first, Lillie said she’d drive them to the mall but they had to pay for these clothes out of their babysitting money, but at the last moment she gave them fifty dollars each. When Mary realized Bridget was nervous, too, and that she’d dragged her into this, Mac watched her transform. She sat up taller on the long bench seat in the van. She hiked her backpack onto her shoulder and said, “C’mon, Bridge.”

“You want me to drop you at Divine Child?” Mac stage-whispered to Bridget. “It’s not too late.”

“Yes, it is,” Mary said, taking her sister’s hand.

By the spring, Mary was coeditor of the school newspaper and Bridget was moved up to varsity soccer. The counselor sent information home about colleges and what to expect if Mary chose to apply. They were invited to parties, which scared Lillie because of the movies she’d seen.

“Will the parents be home?” Lillie asked the first time Mary asked to go out with her new friends.

“I doubt it,” Mary said.

“Are kids doing drugs at these parties?” she asked.

“Yes, probably,” Mary said.

Lillie wasn’t expecting that, and Mac had to stifle a laugh.

“But I’m not, Mom. I swear. You just have to trust me.”

AFTER A BATTERY OF CARDIAC tests, only Sean and Fearghal were flagged for potentially having inherited the condition. For Fearghal, the doctor prescribed medicine and he would be fine as long as he was careful about how he lived and got checked annually, but Sean’s case was worse, so his doctor recommended surgery. He got a second opinion and that doctor recommended the same. So Sean had the surgery, had a pacemaker implanted, and would be on medicine for the rest of his life. He had to quit drinking, or at least cut way back, and be careful about his diet. He had to be careful about heavy lifting. The doctor recommended he lose at least thirty pounds. Marie told Lillie who told Mac that it was the first time she’d ever seen him scared.

“He feels he dodged death by a hair, you know?” she said. “And he feels guilty too. It took Eamon dying for him to save his own skin.”