‘No. You are denying it, but you know it is true. You and Father Reznik.’
‘You are still upset that Father Reznik left you.’ I go still. ‘Maria, I am right, no?’
I shake my head, blink. ‘I…What are you trying to…’ And then it steps into my view, an image, a memory, strong this time, all the colours clear, the image crisp. Father Reznik is waving goodbye to me, an aeroplane in the background, me watching, enraged, for some reason, that he is leaving me. My hair is long down to my back, so I am fifteen, perhaps sixteen, and I break free from my mother, her calling out to me that he will be back, but I am running to him, and when I get to him, just as Father Reznik opens his arms to hug me, saying he is leaving for just three months, I kick him hard in the shin.
‘Maria.’ My mother’s voice slices through the memory. It shatters into a thousand pieces. ‘Maria, you were always so angry when he left Spain, angry at the Church. The Catholic Church has been in Spain for hundreds of years, that’s just the way it is, but I know that always frustrated you, that control that you say they had, the lies that you said they told.’ She pauses, a petite cry. ‘You shouldn’t have taken out that anger on someone else, on that poor priest, poor Father O’Donnell at the convent.’
‘But I didn’t. I…’ A slow shriek. It spurts out from me. My mother. She doesn’t believe me.
‘Maria, sssh. There, there. It’s okay. It’s okay.’
Patricia steps over, stands beside me, not touching me, but there, real. I scratch at my scalp, my mind jumbled, exhausted. I let out a long breath and feel my shoulders finally loosen. I simply want to go home.
‘Maria, I’m going to come over to see you, okay?’
I drop my hand. ‘What?’ I sniff. ‘How?’
‘I’ve looked into it. You just need to request a visiting order. Ramon will accompany me. He’s very concerned about you.’
My brother, too? ‘But he has never been concerned about me before.’
Another sigh. ‘Maria, you’re his sister, of course he is concerned about you. We need you to arrange the visiting order. Can you do that?’
Visiting orders. Prison. Iron bars. Loud screams. So much to process, to consider. I feel smothered by it all.
‘Is there anyone that can help you?’ my mother says.
Patricia tilts her head and smiles. ‘Yes,’ I say, after a moment. ‘I have someone who can help me.’
A whoosh of exhalation. ‘Oh, that’s wonderful. Wonderful. Does this mean you are making friends? Actually, no, don’t answer that. Tell me all about it when I see you, okay?’
I nod.
‘Maria? I said, okay?’
‘Okay.’
‘Good.’ There is a tinkle of silver, the coffee pot being poured. ‘Darling, keep your chin up in there, yes?’
‘My chin?’
‘It means stay positive. As much as you can, anyway. At least being in prison means you can get help now, where no one can be hurt.’ She sniffs, lets out another dainty cry. ‘Oh, I’m sorry. Ignore me. It all gets a little much for me at times.’ I hear her breathe in. ‘But no matter. We will fly over to see you.’
Pips sounds. The prison phone. ‘I have to go, Mama.’
There is a stillness. ‘I know,’ she says, after a brief moment. ‘You look after yourself.’
‘Yes.’
She goes quiet. The pips patter again. ‘Maria, you’d better go. Take care. And-’
But she is cut off. For a few seconds, I do not move, just stand, staring at the receiver. Have I remembered everything incorrectly? I have just accused my mother of kissing another man. What sort of person does that make me? Slowly, Patricia reaches forward and prises the phone out of my hand. She returns it to its holder and looks at me. ‘How are you?’
I blink, find a focus. ‘She said they never kissed. That my memory is impaired.’
‘Oh.’
I roll my shoulders, pinch the folds of skin on them to try to get some blood flowing again through my muscles. Maybe everything I have believed is not true. Maybe life has jumbled everything up in my head, mixing memories like the shuffling of a deck of cards, throwing them in the air so they land randomly, out of synch. I drop my head to my hands. All I have are facts. If I stuck with them, if I used the facts I have to piece it all together, would I see the final picture on the puzzle?
