“Lord, you’re not going back to that, are you? I haven’t heard you sing that old tune since you were sixteen years old,” she said, smoke curling around her smile as she spoke.
“Tell me, Ma. What’ve you got to lose by telling me?”
“He’s dead. What’ve you got to gain by knowing?”
“Some peace of mind,” Rill grated out. “I want to know. I want to know who he was. Who’re you to deprive me?”
“I’m your ma.”
“Don’t make me laugh.”
It was Fiona who laughed after a moment, though, low and rough.
“Do you want some tea, then?” she said after she’d recovered from her bout of mirth at Rill’s expense.
“No,” he bit out.
“Whiskey? I’d heard you’d developed a taste for it.”
He stood, his chair scraping loudly against the tile floor. She shook her head, a smile still lingering around her full lips.
“You won’t find any answers here, Rill. You and I were always as different as north and south.”
He wanted to snarl at her that he’d tried to meet her halfway for his entire childhood and most of his adult life, but she’d been too busy wallowing in her selfishness. How many times had he waited for her as a small child outside a closed bedroom door when she’d told him she’d take him to the park, or promised him she’d take him into town for a festival or a friend’s party?
But Fiona had always had better things to do with her time, was always willing to do them with men who were frightening strangers to a child. As he’d gotten older, he’d learned to treat his mother’s men with a coldness that he’d soon realized they found as intimidating as his mother’s dark, volatile moods.
By the time he’d reached eleven years old, he’d given up the childhood fantasy that each man his mother molded her body against and kissed might be his absent father.
He wanted to tell her she was a coldhearted bitch who had sacrificed her only child to her carnal appetites and laziness.
But what was the point? He continued, determined to finish this mission.
“I also came to tell you I’m going to have a baby. It’s your loss you never knew the mother, Katie. She’s a light I reckon you and I never deserved. One thing’s for certain: I won’t be showing up here with your grandchild. I won’t be showing up on your doorstep ever again. If you call, if you try, Ma, that’s another thing entirely.”
He walked out of the house and didn’t look back. Fiona wouldn’t be waiting for the backward glance. Rill knew that for a fact.
He’d said what he needed to say to Fiona Pierce.
Rill had spent most of his life being embarrassed by his namesakes, William and Ray Pierce. The fact his uncles had just been sent to prison for gambling and soliciting prostitutes had been the main reason he’d made the final decision to film some scenes in Malacnoic four years ago.
But this visit wouldn’t be complete until he’d sat across a table from William and Ray Pierce. Micky the bartender had informed him the pair was currently out of prison, so Rill knew exactly where to find them that evening. William didn’t go anywhere without Ray, and vice versa. They even managed to organize it so that they were conveniently arrested together for similar crimes.
Tonight he was looking forward to seeing his uncles again for some reason. Maybe it was just because after his visit with Fiona he didn’t think any family visit could get much worse.
He waited in a dark corner of the Regal Lion, keeping a low profile and sipping his Guinness sparingly. Round about seven o’clock, the dim, musty pub began to bustle. He recognized his uncle Ray as he walked through the front door—tall, dark-haired, the remnants of great handsomeness still clinging to his worn visage. Rill stood. The movement caught Ray’s eye.
“Well, if it ain’t my long-lost nephew,” Ray bellowed so that most of the people in the noisy pub paused and gaped at Rill. Ray turned and spoke to a tall, wiry man who had just walked into the pub and who looked remarkably like Ray despite his stooped posture and graying hair. “Look ’a there, William. You see him, too, don’t you? It’s our nephew, Rilly, looking rich as a prince . . . rich enough to keep our cups full tonight, at any rate. Howsitgoin’ boy?” Ray boomed as he accepted Rill’s outstretched hand and pulled him toward him for a clumsy hug.
“Well, blow me raw, it is Rill!” said William Pierce, squinting. He joined his brother by giving Rill a hardy hug. “What brings you to this feeble town, then? Come to see your worthless ma, I’m thinking. Come to drown your sorrows now that you have, eh?” William said with a sly look in his blue eyes.
“It’s good to see you both. Have a seat, and I’ll buy you a pint,” Rill offered, waving at the wooden bench on the opposite side of him. He was eager to disappear back into the shadowed corner booth. Every eye in the pub seemed to be on Rill and his uncles.
“Margie, send us over a pint, eh?” Ray called to the busty waitress at the bar. “Look at her, will ya?” Ray leaned confidentially toward Rill and spoke in a low voice. “Ought to be shot for cutting her hair off like that. She was a good-looking woman. If it weren’t for those fun bags she’s got”—Ray cupped his hands in front of his chest—“I’d think Margie was a fucking man.”
“You didn’t seem to have any problems with her two nights ago, back there behind the bar after the pub closed,” William said drolly. “Sounded to me like your pipe was finding the lady parts just fine.”
Both men roared.