The Survivors(40)

Kieran was walking furiously now, the ocean breeze whipping across the cliff path and snatching at his clothes.

When morning had come, Kieran had told Mia to stay in bed and get some sleep. She had blinked awake.

‘We didn’t even offer to walk her home.’ Mia’s eyes were swollen and Kieran wondered if she’d been crying in the night.

‘Who?’ Kieran scrambled to catch up. ‘Bronte?’

Mia nodded against her pillow. ‘At the Surf and Turf on Saturday night. We asked Olivia if she wanted us to wait, but we didn’t ask Bronte. We were going right past her house. We could have walked her home.’

They looked at each other for a long time and finally Mia rolled over. Kieran said he would take Audrey out, and this time Mia didn’t protest, just closed her eyes without saying anything.

Out in the hall, Kieran had heard Verity in the kitchen. Her voice was a low murmur, and she stopped as Kieran entered. She was sitting opposite Brian, rubbing suncream into his arms, the way she had with Kieran when he was little. Kieran wasn’t sure what Verity had been saying, but from the look on Brian’s face, he wouldn’t have bet on him absorbing a word of it.

‘Mia has bruises from last night. She’s hurt.’

Verity frowned. Her palms were slick as she smoothed the cream into Brian’s skin. ‘Badly?’

‘Not badly, but she shouldn’t be hurt at all.’

‘Of course not. I’m very sorry.’

‘Jesus, I’m not looking for an apology.’ Kieran looked at his dad. ‘I’m saying he’s getting out of hand. Mia had Audrey with her.’

‘He wouldn’t have meant it.’

‘I know that, but –’

‘But what?’ Verity said, her voice suddenly hard, her hands still on her husband’s arm. ‘But what, Kieran? He didn’t mean it. Look at him.’ She lifted Brian’s hand. He held it out, obedient and childlike. ‘He doesn’t realise he’s done anything. So what is it you want? Do you think he should be punished? For something he doesn’t even know he’s done? Do you think that’s fair?’

Verity had stared at him until he’d looked away. Brian didn’t move.

Kieran hadn’t given her an answer. He didn’t know what he thought.

He reached a split in the cliff trail now and stopped. To the right lay the track up to the lookout, and to the left he could see the iron gates guarding the back entrance to the Evelyn Bay cemetery. Kieran felt Audrey move and settle against his chest. The walk had soothed her at least, if not him.

He wandered towards the gates. They were open, with a sign screwed to the post informing visitors the cemetery would be locked at sundown each day. Somewhat to Kieran’s own surprise, he stepped inside. The gravel path leading him forward was well cared for, with lush but tasteful shrubs planted alongside. Ash’s handiwork, Kieran guessed. He’d held the maintenance contract for a while now. It all looked different from how Kieran remembered, but then again he hadn’t been there since Finn and Toby’s funeral. He’d meant to come, a few times. He just hadn’t.

Kieran followed the pathway, realising with a stab of shame that he couldn’t remember where his brother’s grave was. He could picture the funeral, parts of it at least, but if he had absorbed any specific details of the burial location, he couldn’t remember them now. He wasn’t even sure where to begin. The cemetery layout was disordered, with generations of Evelyn Bay residents having chosen to see out eternity right there, and all with a slightly different idea of how they’d like to lie. Kieran knew he had made the journey to Finn’s burial with his parents by road, the car ride conducted in mute grief as they followed the hearses, and he turned now towards the main gates to the west.

He didn’t get that far. The entrance wasn’t even in sight when something flapping in the wind caught his eye. He stopped, recognising the colours straight away.

With one hand on Audrey’s back, Kieran stepped off the gravel and picked his way through the neatly mown grass until he found himself standing in front of a grave. A footy scarf in Evelyn Bay’s team stripes had been carefully knotted around the headstone. It wasn’t new, but had the worn clean look of something that had been machine-washed regularly over the years. Kieran reached out and moved the scarf to read the name on the headstone.

Toby Gilroy.

A memory Kieran had forgotten he even possessed shot to the surface, full colour and crystal clear. Liam Gilroy in his box-fresh funeral clothes, draping a football scarf across his dad’s coffin. Kieran wondered now if this was that same scarf, retrieved, washed and returned by Liam for the past twelve years. He involuntarily snatched his hand away, and Audrey whined in protest at the sudden move.

‘Oh. Good. It’s only you.’

Kieran spun around at the sound of the voice, his fingers still tingling from the feel of the wool. It took him a second to find the speaker among the headstones.

Olivia. Her hair was tangled from the breeze and she was wearing jeans and a rust-coloured jumper that Kieran suspected had been borrowed from her mum’s wardrobe.

‘I was looking for Ash and I heard someone.’ She was a little on edge and Kieran remembered the near-empty streets last night, and the waitresses refusing their shifts.

‘Only us,’ he said as Olivia came closer and leaned in to look into the baby carrier.