“If you had been stronger all these years, had acted the way you’re acting now, maybe Michael would never have done what he did.”
He felt folded over the electric fences on his father’s farm, the voltage zapping and burning him. He’d known this whole time she’d blamed him. He’d known, and yet he’d hoped. Tears stung his eyes. He wanted to rip out their ducts. See if he’d stand here in front of her crying. “Do you not think for the rest of my days I won’t be wondering that same thing?” His breath seemed as knocked about as the rest of him, unable to enter and leave him straight. He thought to go out to the garage and the other world he was making. Instead, he felt pulled to the empty living room. There, he closed the door behind him and settled on his armchair, Michael’s walnut guitar on his lap.
He strummed, thinking Michael’s fingers had worked these chords, had pressed these very strings in the guitar’s neck. Michael had been here before him, his body curved around the shiny, sturdy instrument, his right hand here, his left hand there. For a long time, Billy sat with the feel of the guitar, of Michael.
*
Over the following days, the regional newspapers picked up Billy’s story and his local paper gave him front-page coverage. To his great relief, the response was overwhelmingly positive. At last people were making a fuss about his efforts. Several strangers recognized him on the street, too, and called out praises. One middle-aged woman went so far as to ask to take her photo with him.
Despite this welcome turn of events, the rush of attention and approval was also unsettling, as if his popularity in the newspapers suddenly gave people permission to support and like him. Hey presto. He couldn’t help but think that without the public fanfare, people would still feel largely indifferent and dismissive of him and what he was doing.
“You’re famous,” Denis gushed.
Great momentum, Adam Simon e-mailed, keep it going.
Lisa phoned, saying she wanted him to know how proud she was. “It’s just a pity what it’s doing to Mam and Dad.”
He didn’t say what it was doing to him that his parents, his own wife, and his now oldest son still couldn’t give him anything close to the support he needed. He also didn’t say how Tricia had admitted she resented the change in him, and the cost of it not coming much sooner. That she blamed him for Michael’s death.
*
A little more than a week after the Independent published his profile, Billy drove alone to Dublin to take part in a radio interview, on All the Talk with Frank Galvin. The show was the nation’s most popular call-in broadcast, every episode drawing upward of four hundred thousand listeners a day. That number alone turned Billy’s legs to rubber, making it almost impossible to work the car pedals. He’d slept badly, too, terrified he would sound stupid on air, or that panic would strike him dumb, or that someone, maybe many, would phone in and hurl abuse. There had been those couple of horrible tweets, calling him opportunistic, and a fat bastard. If only Tricia had offered to go with him, for moral support. But she hadn’t as much as wished him good luck.
He was so nervous he hadn’t eaten breakfast. That was a first. Over the miles, it seemed every ad on the radio conjured nothing but food—jingles and promos about porridge, sausages, chocolates, scones, cheese, and more. His favorite sandwich swam in front of him—ground chicken mixed with mayonnaise, celery, and pepper and salt, till it formed a creamy, tangy spread. Then he’d pile the lot onto a French baguette with butter, lettuce, tomatoes, and Edam cheese. Bliss.
He killed the radio and its ads, and inserted a CD. As the Corolla traveled closer to Dublin, he blared Christy Moore, tapping his hands in time on the steering wheel. He sang along at the top of his voice, not a note on key, but he didn’t care. When the songs got to be too much, lyrics about not being able to go with those who leave us, he turned the radio back on, to the classical station.
*
The contents of the radio producer’s office looked like they’d been spilled out of boxes rather than set down with any care. Black-and-white photographs of celebrity guests littered the walls, every mismatched frame hanging crooked. His desk was an explosion of papers, pens, snacks, mugs with dribbled tea stains, and at least three pairs of reading glasses. Tall plants, in various stages of dying, crowded a corner. Yellowed leaves and rounds of dust littered the floor. Billy’s unease soared.