‘Did they not make a plan for you before she died?’
‘I never asked.’ Laura swallows. ‘But Mum wasn’t ever the one to make plans. Gaga made them, Mum helped see them through. I felt that Mum would have approved what happened in the end. I know it sounds odd, like we didn’t communicate, but we did. We lived so close to each other, in one another’s pockets, we didn’t always talk about things, each of us knew how the other was feeling, we didn’t need to always ask.’ She looks at Bo, embarrassed, but trying to make her see.
‘I understand,’ Bo says, genuinely, though Solomon wonders if she does. Bo is a person who usually has to ask. ‘So when did you find out about Tom being your dad?’
‘When Gaga told me about her plan to move me to the cottage. She told me that Tom Toolin was my dad, that he had never known about me. She had met with him and he’d agreed I could live on his land. She told me that he had a twin brother who could never know. That was Tom’s only request.’
‘How did you feel about that?’ Bo asks, and it’s obvious from Bo’s tone that she’s disgusted on Laura’s behalf.
‘I was used to keeping a secret.’ She offers a soft smile, but her eyes reveal a sadness.
Bo decides to manoeuvre away from the topic of Tom and her new life on the mountain. ‘You lived here for sixteen years before moving to the cottage, did you ever want to get out of the house? Away from here?’
‘We did, many times,’ Laura says, lighting up. ‘Before Mum got sick. We went on holidays to Dingle. I swam in Clogherhead, nearly drowned,’ she laughs. ‘We went to Donegal too. They both liked to fish. They’d catch the fish, gut them, cook them. Make fish oils.’
‘So you did get out?’ Bo asks, surprised.
‘They didn’t lock me in the house,’ Laura smiles, delighted by Bo’s surprise. ‘The opposite happened. They let me be free. I could be who I wanted, without anyone judging, or anyone telling me what to do. I don’t believe there were any sacrifices. There were appointments for the alterations, no drop-ins allowed, so we knew I could play wherever I liked until customers came. They came when I was inside doing my schoolwork.’
‘But you never did exams.’
‘Not state exams.’
‘Because the state didn’t recognise you.’
‘They didn’t know I’d been born,’ Laura says simply. ‘There’s a difference. Mum gave birth to me here in the house. She didn’t register my birth.’
‘Why do you think she kept you a secret? Away from the world?’
Back to that question.
‘Mum didn’t keep me away from the world. I’ve been here all along, fully immersed in it,’ Laura says firmly.
Bo takes a moment, slows it all down. ‘So, I asked you a two-part question earlier: when you were younger, why did you think your mum and Gaga kept you a secret. You answered, but I want to ask you the second part. Now, as a grown woman, with Gaga and Mum gone, what is your opinion of why they kept you a secret? Has it changed?’
Laura doesn’t shut down immediately as she had before. It’s the way Bo has phrased it, she has pointed out that Laura is a grown woman, she’s not a child any more, her mother and grandmother aren’t here, she doesn’t need to keep defending them or answer for them. She can give her own opinions now.
She growls, not at anyone in particular, just in general. A threatened kind of feeling. Then there’s the sound of smashing glass. A walkie-talkie sound, static radio. It’s unclear whether she notices she’s made these sounds.
‘At the time I felt they were happy, wary, but content. When I look back, I think they were scared.’
Bo is practically holding her breath.
‘They were afraid that somebody would take me away from them. They were afraid they would be seen as unfit to care for a child. There were … rumours.’ The glass breaking, the same radio static. ‘People talked about them. They were witches, they were crazy. They let them make their dresses or alter their clothes but they didn’t invite them to their parties or their weddings. They were outsiders.’
‘Why was that?’ Bo asks gently.
‘Gaga said she never really fit in, from the moment she arrived. But she loved my granddad so she stayed, tried. But it got worse. The rumours got worse.’
‘When?’
Laura thinks about it. ‘When my granddad died,’ she says, and she closes down.