He hurried back into his clothes, trying to concentrate on what Shaw was saying about cutting calories and getting exercise. Four hundred and one pounds. The number seemed impossible to come back from. When he was fifteen, his weight had hit two hundred and fifty pounds, an all-new low he had sworn he would never sink past. Over the next several years, five pounds had climbed on top of that, and five more, and five more, till his weight reached three hundred, another number to which he’d sworn he’d never stoop.
Three hundred pounds. That’s when people had started to stare. When he could no longer walk with ease. When he’d stopped fitting in regular clothes and on most chairs. When he was no longer seen for anything but his size. Oh, God. What he’d give to be back there now, though, one hundred and one pounds lighter. When he was three hundred pounds, Michael was still alive.
Shaw placed his hand on Billy’s shoulder. “Go easy, okay? Start small and take it slow and steady. Build from there.”
Billy left Shaw’s office in a daze. He’d known, and yet it had still come as a shock—he was a ticking bomb and if he wasn’t careful, he was going to put his family through another premature funeral.
*
Monday arrived, Billy’s first day back to work in almost six weeks. The return to routine galled him. Damned if he could ever go back to the way things used to be. Could ever even pretend at getting back to some kind of normal. Yet the children had returned to school four weeks ago and Tricia had returned to her part-time job at the chemist’s shortly afterward. It was past time for him to take the plunge.
Before he forced himself into the Corolla and headed to the factory, he walked around the perimeter of his house, sucking at the rain-sprinkled air and goading himself on like his father did the cows. Get up. For the fifth morning in a row, he managed to circle the house twice. Delighted, he pushed himself to brave another lap.
He struggled miserably through the third lap, however, his lungs burning and his breath coming in fast puffs, sending up tiny gray islands. Neighbors rattled past in cars and beeped in greeting, disturbing the stillness of the icy March morning. The low temperatures vicious, even for Ireland. Several passersby looked twice, no doubt stunned. The cattle in his father’s field also seemed to look at him funny, as if they, too, could hardly believe they were seeing Big Billy Brennan on the move, on foot. Despite the sting of his chafed thighs, he pressed on toward the imaginary finish line at his car, fueled by a fresh burst of determination and the echo of Dr. Shaw’s warnings.
*
In his car, the sheer pointlessness of everything stretched out in front of Billy like the hard road. He continued through the village and over the narrow, snaking tarmac toward town. The fields and hills were blanketed in a white frost that might make some think of God’s breath, but all Billy saw was a gloomy, uninviting morning. The landscape seemed to shrink as well. The roads were too narrow, hills too low, and the fields like patches in a quilt. Even his car seemed too compact.
The new, two-story houses with oversized windows and gleaming slate roofs didn’t seem to loom as large, either—state-of-the-art homes built during the country’s all too brief economic boom. The size and showiness of these luxury properties brought scorn from plenty. Naysayers who said they hadn’t let the country’s short-lived upswing affect them. Hadn’t moved into fancy houses or upgraded their homes, cars, or much of anything else. No, they gloated, they hadn’t changed their ways or forgotten their place. Like some. They knew all along the good life couldn’t last. Knew people should never get too big in themselves.
Billy fought the urge to turn the car around and go back to bed. He dreaded having to face everyone at work. Yet he couldn’t shirk the responsibility any longer. Resigned, he steered the car around the final bend, feeling its tilt.
He parked inside the factory yard, his heart exceeding its speed limit. Two more cars joined him, crunching gravel. He reached for the glove compartment and pretended to search its contents. The two drivers, younger men from packaging, entered the factory. Billy took deep breaths, trying to rid himself of the feeling his head was rising off his shoulders. He pushed open the car door and pulled himself free of the wedge of the steering wheel. He wanted the numb feeling back, the shock that had shielded him those first two weeks after Michael, allowing him to believe, if only for a moment, that none of it was real.