Read Online Hot Whispers of an Irishman by Dorien Kelly - Free Book Online
Authors: Dorien Kelly
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outside, and he hadn’t looked well in the days that she’d been home.
“Just promise to be back for me before sundown, if you could.” Candlelight was a fine thing, but not enough to clean by.
“Of course.”
They drove on in her da’s favored state—quiet—and soon made Duncarraig. Town was bustling under the thin sun. Mothers had babies out in prams, and in a sign of optimism, had rolled back the babies’ clear plastic weather shields that were nearly perpetually in place. Unwilling to travel the baby path any farther, Vi returned her focus to the road. Town dwindled, fields took over, and the narrow and rutted bothareen to Nan’s appeared.
As Vi neared the house, she spotted a new addition. A rusted red container almost large enough to hold her car sat beside the house. It seemed that in matters of trash, if not of the heart, Liam was better than his word. She parked in front of the house, then climbed out, leaving the motor running.
“C’mon, Rog,” she said, opening the back door. He hopped out, and she gathered her cleaning supplies. Da came around to the driver’s side.
“I’ll be back no later than teatime,” he said to Vi.
“Bring food,” Vi said over the grumbling of her stomach, which was noting its disapproval over both last night’s sparse supper and this morning’s tease of a breakfast. “Scones, and lots of them,” she called as he closed the car door and drove off.
With luck, he’d know that she was serious. Otherwise she would be left to forage among those of Nan’s herbs that had managed to reseed and survive encroaching weeds over the past decade. Vi bent down. Using her free hand, she pinched a leaf off a plant close to the weed-clotted stone walkway.
“Peppermint,” she said to Roger after rubbing the leaf between her fingers and inhaling its fragrance. “Nan always said it helped bring love.”
Roger lifted his leg, marked the plant, and trotted on.
Aye, and then there was that view, too.
Vi and dog entered the house, then headed back to the kitchen, where she’d made a decent dent in the chaos the day before. Sitting next to the sink was Nan’s garden journal, just where Vi had left it in her haste to avoid being too late to supper.
“Behind as I am, a few pages more of reading will make no difference,” she said to Rog.
Yesterday she’d made a nest of sorts for herself in the back bedroom—a chair that Nan had painted white and blue in a wild pattern, tucked into an old writing desk. Vi settled in and read, smiling at the knot designs her grandmother had imagined but never quite coaxed from the soil. Some of the herbal cures she’d listed had seen more success. Nan had even managed to persuade a few down Vi’s stubborn throat, and Vi in turn had given them more recently to her cold-ridden friends.
It was warm and quiet in the small room, with the sun shining in the south-facing window. She felt almost as though Nan’s comforting presence was with her. As the minutes passed, much needed sleep crept up on her. She closed the journal, folded her arms on the desk like a schoolchild, then cradled her head and finally, blissfully slept.
Liam wasn’t the sort to think much about God, though having a preteen in-house had tempted him to take the Creator’s name in vain more than once. When he’d been a child, God was the anonymous entity whom he’d involuntarily visited each Sunday in Duncarraig’s church. He’d spent his time stuck mid-pew among siblings and cousins, fantasizing about a hidden talent that might separate him from the pack whispering and elbowing about him.
Now grown, Liam found God in science, another view his traditional mother would deem near heretical. Whether it was the beauty of the formulae that permitted him to know just how deep he could dive and how long to decompress, or the complex mechanics involved in righting a damaged ship, it was all glorious religion to him.
This morning’s marvel was the ground-penetrating radar
“Just promise to be back for me before sundown, if you could.” Candlelight was a fine thing, but not enough to clean by.
“Of course.”
They drove on in her da’s favored state—quiet—and soon made Duncarraig. Town was bustling under the thin sun. Mothers had babies out in prams, and in a sign of optimism, had rolled back the babies’ clear plastic weather shields that were nearly perpetually in place. Unwilling to travel the baby path any farther, Vi returned her focus to the road. Town dwindled, fields took over, and the narrow and rutted bothareen to Nan’s appeared.
As Vi neared the house, she spotted a new addition. A rusted red container almost large enough to hold her car sat beside the house. It seemed that in matters of trash, if not of the heart, Liam was better than his word. She parked in front of the house, then climbed out, leaving the motor running.
“C’mon, Rog,” she said, opening the back door. He hopped out, and she gathered her cleaning supplies. Da came around to the driver’s side.
“I’ll be back no later than teatime,” he said to Vi.
“Bring food,” Vi said over the grumbling of her stomach, which was noting its disapproval over both last night’s sparse supper and this morning’s tease of a breakfast. “Scones, and lots of them,” she called as he closed the car door and drove off.
With luck, he’d know that she was serious. Otherwise she would be left to forage among those of Nan’s herbs that had managed to reseed and survive encroaching weeds over the past decade. Vi bent down. Using her free hand, she pinched a leaf off a plant close to the weed-clotted stone walkway.
“Peppermint,” she said to Roger after rubbing the leaf between her fingers and inhaling its fragrance. “Nan always said it helped bring love.”
Roger lifted his leg, marked the plant, and trotted on.
Aye, and then there was that view, too.
Vi and dog entered the house, then headed back to the kitchen, where she’d made a decent dent in the chaos the day before. Sitting next to the sink was Nan’s garden journal, just where Vi had left it in her haste to avoid being too late to supper.
“Behind as I am, a few pages more of reading will make no difference,” she said to Rog.
Yesterday she’d made a nest of sorts for herself in the back bedroom—a chair that Nan had painted white and blue in a wild pattern, tucked into an old writing desk. Vi settled in and read, smiling at the knot designs her grandmother had imagined but never quite coaxed from the soil. Some of the herbal cures she’d listed had seen more success. Nan had even managed to persuade a few down Vi’s stubborn throat, and Vi in turn had given them more recently to her cold-ridden friends.
It was warm and quiet in the small room, with the sun shining in the south-facing window. She felt almost as though Nan’s comforting presence was with her. As the minutes passed, much needed sleep crept up on her. She closed the journal, folded her arms on the desk like a schoolchild, then cradled her head and finally, blissfully slept.
Liam wasn’t the sort to think much about God, though having a preteen in-house had tempted him to take the Creator’s name in vain more than once. When he’d been a child, God was the anonymous entity whom he’d involuntarily visited each Sunday in Duncarraig’s church. He’d spent his time stuck mid-pew among siblings and cousins, fantasizing about a hidden talent that might separate him from the pack whispering and elbowing about him.
Now grown, Liam found God in science, another view his traditional mother would deem near heretical. Whether it was the beauty of the formulae that permitted him to know just how deep he could dive and how long to decompress, or the complex mechanics involved in righting a damaged ship, it was all glorious religion to him.
This morning’s marvel was the ground-penetrating radar
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