The Ladies' Midnight Swimming Club(69)

There was no telling how much money had been raised for the hospice, but on the night of the swim, women turned up not only from Ballycove, but also from several of the neighbouring towns too. Lucy saw a few of the female medical reps and even Thea Gilchrist – the locum who’d covered in the surgery before she’d arrived – turned up with a sponsorship card and a fat envelope filled with twenty-euro notes. They had organised for the swim to take place at exactly midnight. Most of the women would just about dip in and quickly out of the water. Lucy knew it was much too cold for many of them to hang about and the fun would be in that first icy blast and then running up and quickly drying off again.

The charity had been good enough to organise a photographer, who was going to take some shots, but promised that, somehow, they’d manage to keep it all very modest.

‘I’ll strategically add in a pink ribbon to cover everyone’s jiggly bits at the end,’ she intoned to the startled Elizabeth as she began to unpack a fairly complex-looking camera. ‘These shots, well, you can see them for yourself when they are done and if everyone is happy, the charity will use them to promote and thank you all.’

‘We’ll see,’ Elizabeth said tightly. Lucy knew that she wouldn’t fancy having her bottom on display for the laughing country man to ogle before his breakfast.

‘Now, will someone say a few words?’ They were standing; almost two hundred women in the sheltered cove, wearing a selection of heavy coats and bathrobes, waiting for the moment when they’d drop cover and make a run for it.

‘Go on.’ Lucy gave Elizabeth a little shove.

‘It was really Jo too.’ Elizabeth held out her hand and brought Jo with her to the centre of the gathered circle. ‘Ladies.’ She cleared her throat, while the chatter died down for a moment. ‘We just wanted to say a quick word of thanks. Thanks to everyone who has made the effort to collect sponsorship and support this worthy cause, but thanks even more so for turning up here and being such good sports. Today’s swim is our way of telling cancer to…’ She paused, seemed to think for a moment, and then looked across at Jo. ‘Well, to bugger off; it’s not going to get the better of us.’

There was rapturous applause and maybe it was as much because of the way the words were delivered as it was the sentiment behind them. It was very obvious from Elizabeth’s tone that words like bugger were not often, if ever, uttered.

‘Jo, Lucy and I swim here every night. Or at least every night for as long as Jo could – so today, on the finest August night in my memory, we’re delighted to invite you all to join the Ladies’ Midnight Swimming Club.’

There was wild applause at this so when Jo cleared her throat, they had to wait for it to die down before she spoke in her soft and delicate voice.

‘I won’t say much… because I can’t.’ She laughed. ‘But as you hit the water, maybe together we’ll all shout it out…’ There was a round of applause from the gathered women.

Bugger off, cancer; you’re not going to get the better of us.

And with that, there was a mass shuffling out of coats and bathrobes, a wild almost riotous roar and nearly two hundred women went scarpering off into the freezing Atlantic waves, with Elizabeth, Jo and Lucy leading them all.





30


Jo


Jo couldn’t quite believe she’d made it. Of course she knew she wouldn’t have, not without Lucy and Elizabeth and even Dan who’d rallied round with that off-roader ride to take her down the beach.

It had been magical; travelling along with Lucy, waving to the many women who’d turned up for what she knew for certain was her final midnight swim. The beach was glorious, lit up with a trail of tall burning lanterns that the men had set up earlier all along their path to the cove. Even the sea, gently murmured its story to her. She loved this place, and no matter what fear woke her in the middle of too many nights to count since she’d learned her prognosis, she always knew that this was where her spirit would remain. She convinced herself the sea knew that too and it whispered its welcome as if she was already part of it.

The cove was resplendent in light. The women who came from far and near were all ages and it seemed to Jo they had only one thing in mind and that was doing something for each other and every woman who came after them.

As she hit the water, she knew that this was the night of her life. It felt as if this is what it was all leading up to. She embraced the water like the old friend it was. Soon, she felt it envelop her with its invisible cold embrace and she was swimming out, far beyond her depths, the waves carrying her further and further into the silky darkness.

‘Mum,’ Lucy called from far behind and something in her voice made Jo stop and turn to see the outline of her daughter in the moonlight. ‘Wait for me,’ she said and Jo was reminded of when she was a little girl and she couldn’t bear her mother to go out of sight for any length of time at all.

‘I’m here, don’t worry,’ Jo whispered and she turned over onto her back to gaze up at the stars overhead. She lay there for some time with Lucy at her side and when she felt tears run down her cheeks she knew that it was the sweetest sadness she could have ever wished for.

‘Oh, Mum,’ Lucy said beside her and then Elizabeth was at their side.

‘It’s time to go back in. Are you ready, Jo?’ Elizabeth asked gently.