The Hunger Within Read online

  I list my symptoms to him, not seeking compassion, but we are frank in here. You don’t try and hide things because someone might have a tip or a trick that could help.

  “Did you take in more water after you were sick?” Sean asks now.

  “Yeah, I’ve kept it down so far,” I reply.

  His response is soothing, assuring, then we move on, discussing any news that anyone has heard from the outside world today. He is telling me about the men who are in the hospital wing, updating me on their individual situations, when I see someone walking down the corridor. It’s Bronwyn, and my fragile heart leaps in my chest as I tune out Sean and grip the bars to watch her. She’s looking good, really smart and really fucking together. Here is the Bronwyn that I knew all those years ago and I’m reminded of how I felt when I stood shakily in front of the priest on our wedding day. I’d thought I might fall down and even the nip of whiskey I’d taken had done nothing for my nerves. Then she’d come down the aisle, walking next to her mother, who she claimed had been both mother and father to her, defying tradition with her head held high as only she could. As soon as I clapped eyes on her in her simple wedding gown my fright dissipated. It was just Bron, there was nothing to be nervous about. It would have been weird if we hadn’t got married, we were that good of a fit.

  Vaguely I can hear Sean repeating my name, his voice getting a little louder with each call. I shush him. I want to watch her walking to me. She hasn’t seen me yet and I become the voyeur, feeling little flips and twists in a place that hasn’t been hard in weeks. I can stand it no more and I put my arm through the window as far as it will go.

  “Bron!” I shout, and the strength of my voice startles me.

  As soon as I call out, a mist comes over the corridor, like the one that hangs over the Clanrye River where I used to fish. I flap my hand uselessly, waiting for the fog to clear. When it does I realise what happened. The mist wasn’t in the hallway, it was a film that slipped over my own eyes and Bronwyn, she was never out there at all.

  My body sags, my arms slipping back inside the cell. As I fall down, I clutch sightlessly at anything solid. I find no purchase and succeed only in scratching my overgrown fingernails down the door as I slide ever downwards. Sean’s voice, calling my name over and over, rings in my ears as I land in a heap on the floor.

  Chapter 19

  March 22nd 1981

  There is someone at Billy’s grave when Mary strolls through the gates. She clutches at her handbag, works the handles with anxious fingers. There is never anybody at Billy’s grave, and Mary has been coming here a lot in the last couple of weeks, more in the last ten days than she’s visited in the last two decades. Each day she comes it gets a little easier, and memories of happy times that she has not allowed herself to think of are coming back, still with sharp stabs of pain, but the hurt has been dulled a little. It has been a revelation, and it is ironic that she’s only found out because of the girl who pushed her out of her home.

  But this person, this woman, Mary can see now, kneeling on Billy. Who is she? Not a sister, for he only had brothers. Mary pauses at a plot a few rows back and places her hand on the steel fence that borders the gravesite. She’s not young, this stranger, in fact Mary would put her at around her own age. And she’s got flowers, the damn cheek of it! Mary grips at her own small bouquet; handpicked daffs from her own garden, and looks at the other woman’s offering, great big daisy gerberas, not in season, far too fancy and not at all suitable for a grave.

  The woman rises, quickly, and turning sharply she strides off towards the side of the church. Mary looks quickly down at the grave she is standing beside. The Parks family is buried here, the dates register as Mary concentrates on not looking at the departing woman. Margret died over a hundred years ago, but it’s a family plot, there’s also a son-in-law, John, and a son, Samuel. She thinks of what her own plot will be like, with Connor eventually sleeping beside her. Her face darkens as she imagines Rose being tossed in alongside them and she tightens her fingers around the rusty metal fencing of the plot.

  Thoughts of the girl have raised her already heightened temper and she stalks down to Billy’s grave, sinking to her knees on the grass. She picks up the bouquet of daisy’s and holding it between thumb and forefinger she puts them to once side. She takes the band off her daffodils and one by one pokes them into the memorial vase. The motion soothes her, and when she’s done she picks up the gerberas again. She thinks about going back to the little outhouse adjoining the church and getting another vase to put these in. Maybe she wasn’t a former lover of Billy, perhaps she was a sister-in-law or an old childhood friend. Mary breathes deeply, calmly. She’s always calmer when she’s here, Billy’s plot has been her saving grace these last few weeks. The sun pierces the grey clouds and the warmth that comes with it envelopes her as she unwraps the cellophane. The woman left the price on, Mary notes, how tacky. And as she pulls out the flowers and crumples up the wrapping, a small card topples onto the grass. Picking it up she see it’s an envelope, a tiny one, and as Mary sees her own name written on it she almost drops it again. She turns around, left and right, and sees nobody in sight at all. She is the only person in the graveyard. Slipping a finger underneath the flap, she opens the envelope and takes out the little card. Five words are written on it, and it is unsigned.

  Mary, come to the church.

  She inhales deeply, thinks back to the woman with the gerberas. She didn’t look threatening; her coat had been fitted, buckled tightly at her waist, unlikely to have been concealing anything. Guns, it’s always guns that Mary thinks about, ever since Billy, always wondering if now, some twenty years later, his people are going to come looking for her, making her pay for his loss of life. A hopeful thought comes to her; generations have passed and the woman is a descendent of Billy. His brothers want to know her, want to get to know their nephew. It is unlikely, she admits that much to herself, the troubles are even more ferocious now than they were back then. Simultaneously she despises herself for still hoping. Regardless of what it is about, Mary wants to know what this woman wants, and so she stands, straightens her coat, stuffs the cellophane into her pocket and walks towards the church.

  Inside it’s cold and rather stark. Twenty-four pews in two rows, the only redeeming feature in Mary’s opinion is the beautiful blue stained-glass window at the far end. Saint Mary’s has been renovated since she came here for Billy’s funeral. The decoration has not changed Mary’s feelings. It’s still cold and unforgiving. Father Pettit has gone now, of course, as has his successor, Father Rooney. This house belongs to the Archdeacon Liam Boyle these days, though right now it seems he is not at home. The stranger with the gerberas is though, sitting in the front pew, head bent as if in prayer. Mary walks up the aisle, heels clicking against the floor announcing her arrival.

  “Hello, Mary,” says the woman softly and stands up. “I have an instruction for you from your friend, Danny.”

  She is thrown, of all the reasons the woman wanted to see her not once had Danny Granger crossed her mind as being one of them.

  “This won’t take long,” says the woman, her tone brisk now, though still soft and quiet. “Wednesday the 1st April you will need to take your son out for the evening. Give it a good couple of hours, come back to the house after 9 p.m and your problem will be solved.”

  The woman offers Mary a smile and makes to leave.

  “Wait!” Mary catches her sleeve. The woman’s smile disappears and she shakes her arm free of Mary’s grasp. “My problem, you mean... do you mean the girl?”

  The woman nods, once, solemnly. “She’ll be gone by the time you get home. Okay?”

  Mary wants to shout, no, it’s not okay, but even though she has so many questions, she can’t think of a single one to ask.

  Another smile, another nod, and the woman squeezes past Mary in the pew and walks back to the doors. Mary turns around when she can no longer hear her. The stranger has gone, and Mary doesn’t even know her name.
>
  She sinks onto the hardwood pew, bows her head, unsure how she should be feeling. Emotions are pushing at her and she plucks one out and holds onto it.

  I’m relieved, she thinks. It’ll be over, very soon, and I’ll have Connor back with me, just me and him, how it should be.

  Chapter 20

  March 25th 1981

  As they stand on the roadside Bronwyn reaches for Alia’s hand. Her mother looks down at her daughter’s touch and squeezes her hand. They exchange a glance before both looking back at the building that looms before them.

  “I’ll come in with you, if you like,” offers Alia.

  Bronwyn shakes her head. “No, I need to do this alone.” She darts a look at Alia. “You’ll wait for me though, right?”

  “Of course I will, I’ll be right here when you come out.”

  The prison is spread out, surrounded by tall concrete fences topped with curved barbed wire. A watch tower looms up, floodlights dotted throughout the grounds. There’s no escaping here, that much is apparent. And my husband is inside. It’s a grim thought in an even grimmer place.

  The guard looks her up and down as she checks in. She can feel his eyes and she wonders what he’s looking at. It’s still freezing; she’s padded out in thick jeans, boots and a puffer jacket over her jumper. She meets his stare, forces him to look away first.

  She’s transferred to a different guard inside and this one merely gives her a disdainful look as he instructs her to follow him.

  “Granger is in the hospital wing,” he says as he walks.

  “What? Why?” This is news to Bronwyn.

  He slows and looks sidelong at her. “He collapsed two days ago.”

  I should know this, she thinks, angrily. No matter what’s happening between us I’m still his next of kin. Why has nobody told me this?

  “Why wasn’t I told?” she asks.

  The guard shrugs and looks momentarily perplexed. “Do you have a telephone?”

  She shakes her head.

  “There’s probably a letter on the way to you, then.”

  “Is he... is it bad?” Her voice is tentative now and she wonders what awaits her.

  The guard smiles, showing an overcrowded mouth of teeth, and she stares at them, full of dislike for him.

  “See for yourself,” he says, and pushes open a door, stepping back to allow her through.

  She ducks under his arm, throws him a hateful look. The door swings back and closes. Through the porthole window she can see him, still smiling.

  She turns her back on him.

  She is in a room, a single cell that holds a single bed. She half turns, raises her hand to knock at the door, opens her mouth to call for the guard.

  All of his bluster and he’s shown me into the wrong fucking room. She raps on the door, once, and then she hears him call her name.

  “Bron.”

  The breath that she had drawn in comes whooshing back out in a gasp as she looks over her shoulder. Her hand, poised to knock, comes to her face and she bites down on her knuckles.

  “Come on over,” he says and lifts his head a little. “It is you, isn’t it?”

  She’s beside his bed in seconds, standing over him, looking down at the wasted body and the thin legs. Her gaze moves up the bed, landing on his eyes. They are huge, protruding from his gaunt face. His right arm is up, moving to and fro. She knows she should take his hand, but it’s all wrong, it can’t be his hand, the hand that has grabbed her hair roughly when he’s in a foul temper, smacked her once around the face in anger, stroked her cheek, cupped the small of her back as they walk.

  She breathes his name, settles for touching the tips of her fingers against his.

  He smiles.

  “I was worried it wasn’t really you,” he rasps. “I’ve been having some funny moments, when I think I see you, but you’re not really there, I was worried I was having an episode.”

  She doesn’t know what to say. He hasn’t ever confessed to worrying about anything before, not in all the years she’s known him. And never has Bronwyn been lost for words, usually it’s the opposite problem, she’s full of them, too many of them.

  “Is it worth it?” she rakes her eyes up and down his body again.

  “Ah, I’m all right,” he replies, struggling into a sitting position as though to prove his state of health. “You’ll not get rid of me yet.”

  Sitting up he looks better, not like the old Danny, she can’t imagine him ever looking that way again, but he doesn’t look so close to death this way.

  “Do you want a blanket?” she asks, helplessly.

  He shakes his head. “No, they rub too much, they irritate me. I’ll have a sheet put over me later.”

  It hits her then, right at that moment, when they are having a normal conversation like a normal couple. He’s going all the way with this, he’s not going to stop and pull himself back from the brink, not even for her. She almost laughs at that thought. Why would he do it for her? She’s the one who put him in here, if she hadn’t called the police he would be back at home and she’d be serving him up a breakfast right about now. Sadness and hate burn side by side and she moves away from the bed a little bit.

  Should I take responsibility for calling the police? Should I apologise to him? If I did would I mean it?

  “Bron,” he calls and she sees that he’s squinting at her. “Don’t move so far away, please, my eyes...”

  I’ve done this, if he wasn’t in here he wouldn’t be on a hunger strike... The thoughts tumble over themselves, each one coming to her like a punch in her gut.

  “Oh my GOD!” it’s more than a scream, it’s a primitive sound that she’s never heard before, especially coming from herself. It is raw. It is animal.

  She wrenches the door open, pushes past the guard and sprints down the corridor and out of The Maze.

  *

  Alia has opted to stay out of the prison grounds and while she waits for Bronwyn she walks slowly up and down. Stopping occasionally she looks at the prison. She finds it heartbreakingly easy to believe that Dan is inside. He was always headed that way, no matter how much she tried to bring him up and care for him and feed him. Like Rose, there was always going to be a climax. She’s not sure who she feels for more, Rose or Danny.

  Both of them have been led by others, Rose with her boyfriend, Danny with the I.R.A. Is it a coincidence that they both had parents who were either not there or totally useless? Yet they had both had her, Alia, and she’d taken them both in and raised them alongside her own daughter. She had scolded them and even raised a hand to Dan once, when he was caught shoplifting. In her eyes she never treated them any different to her own natural born, and just look at them now. She can see Bronwyn running now, she can hear her too, sucking in great gulps of air as she sprints, head down towards Alia. She’s moving so fast that Alia has to shoot her arms out to stop her running straight past her. They spin in the road, clutching at each other as Alia tries to centre her daughter.

  “He’s not fecking dead, is he?” Alia shouts as she can think of no other reason for Bronwyn’s hysterics.

  Bronwyn shakes her head, tears flying off her cheeks. Alia leaves one hand on Bronwyn’s shoulder and with the other she pats her palm gently over Bronwyn’s face.

  “He’s going to die, though,” Bronwyn sobs. “I can’t believe he’s doing this.”

  Alia draws her daughter close, and latched together they begin to walk. She doesn’t know what to say, the usual ‘it’ll be all right’ really does not apply here. It won’t be okay, not unless Thatcher and her Brits back down and give these men what they want. And it’s not much that they want, really, the right to be seen as political prisoners, to wear their own clothes, to have parcels and letters and visitors.

  As they pass the main entrance Alia looks up at the watch tower. Tears spring to her own eyes, unchecked, as a sudden image of Danny comes to her, aged twelve, at high school. He’d broken his arm on the football field and the school had called Alia
. Not his foster parents at the time or social services, but her. She had taken him to the hospital to get it set and clutched at his good arm while he cried silent tears. He’s like a son, he was always like a son, albeit one she didn’t like at times, and now he’s going to die.

  “Shall we go home?” Alia asks, once Bronwyn has quietened down.

  Bronwyn shrugs in reply and, still holding hands, they walk to the bus stop.

  Chapter 21

  April 1st 1981

  Mary thinks constantly about getting Connor out of the house on the date she has been given. It shouldn’t be as difficult as she’s finding it, and she sees all too clearly now how little time she spends with Connor away from home, with just the two of them. Because home is where they both want to be. But she’s got to get him out so whoever is doing Danny’s bidding can get Rose to move out. The pub isn’t an option; if Connor wants to go there he goes with his workmates. Dinner is too formal, Rose would be expected to attend.

  In the days after her meeting with the stranger in the church, Mary goes back and forth, clutching at any options she can think of. After a while it makes her feel sick, that she can’t think of someplace to take her own boy, just the two of them.

  But it’s because we like to be at home, together, just the two of us, she constantly reassures herself.

  And on the first day of April, the day that Rose will be out of their lives, Mary awakes to an epiphany.

  It’s so glaringly obvious that she can’t believe she didn’t think of it before. She sits bolt upright in bed and leans over to switch the lamp on. Peering at the clock she sees it is only just past 5 a.m. Wrapping her housecoat around her she creeps along the landing to Connor’s room.

  He’s just stirring, rubbing his eyes as she walks in and she’s glad the witch isn’t in his bed.

  “Ma,” he whispers. “What are you doing up?”

  “I need you to meet me after work, just you, outside Saint Mary’s,” she replies, softly. “Will you?”