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They both felt and looked like shite. After three solid days of eating, drinking, crying, and more drinking and more crying, Murphy was barely coherent. He could feel the dark circles under his eyes pulsating, the tip of his raw nose burning from wiping it constantly on whatever was handy, usually Connor’s shirtfront.
Murphy stole a look at Connor while their Uncle Seamus stood at the podium up on the altar, making everyone laugh with his stories about Ma at the Anvil. Connor wasn’t laughing though. His eyes were red and puffy from bawling and his nose looked just as raw as Murphy’s felt. Not to mention looking a bit green from a killer hangover.
Connor caught him looking. He leaned over and whispered in Murphy’s ear: “Murph. Brother. I can’t go up there and do it. I’ll fucking fall over and start cryin’ again.”
Murphy looked at Connor in horror. “What do you mean? You don’t expect me to---“
But Connor’s grief-stricken eyes froze him in mid-sentence.
“All right. But I don’t know what the fuck to say!”
Connor pulled a tattered piece of lined notebook paper from his pocket and handed it to Murphy. “These are some notes I wrote. They might help.”
Murphy shoved it in the pocket of his jacket without looking. He stared at the communion rail in front of their pew without seeing it.
Connor elbowed him and he started, looking around to see everyone looking at him. Father Cleary motioned for him to come up.
“Go on, Murph,” Connor whispered hoarsely.
Murphy walked up to the altar, genuflected and crossed himself before climbing the stone steps to the podium. He pulled out the paper that Connor had given him but he suddenly couldn’t see, his vision swimming with tears. He wiped them away angrily.
“Fuck,” he mumbled, and then cringed when the entire church echoed with the obscenity. There were titters among the mourners, but Father Cleary just nodded and smiled, encouraging him to go on.
“My mother-“ his voice broke and he roughly cleared his throat. “We all know my mother was a foul-mouthed drunk.” Everyone shifted uncomfortably and whispered. He looked up to see Connor’s red face, wet with tears.
“But she loved us,” he continued. “Christ knows, she never said it, but she did.” He took a deep breath and suddenly knew what to say.
“One day, when we were still in secondary school, Connor and Ma were having a terrible row about something. I don’t remember what. They were always at it hammer and tongs. Connor and his smart mouth always gettin’ him--us--in trouble.”
Connor smiled at him through his tears and a few people laughed, knowing exactly what he was talking about.
“Anyway, I was sittin’ at the kitchen table trying to eat my cornflakes but I was coverin’ my ears because it was so bloody loud. I was gettin’ annoyed because my cornflakes were gettin’ soggy. Then Connor got fed up and left, slammin’ the door as hard as possible. Ma was still pretty pissed off and she threw a dish right over my head, and it smashed against the wall. She went off, cursin’ and yellin’ the same old shite, how we were useless buggers, makin’ her life a misery, and a disappointment to her.”
There was more shifting and muttering, but Murphy ignored it, looking only at his brother’s face.
“So I asked her, ‘Ma, so you don’t love us? Do you wish we had never been born?’ And she got all quiet for a bit then said, ‘O’course I don’t. You’re my boys.’” Murphy stopped for a moment to wipe his wet eyes, so he could keep Connor’s face in focus. “But you never say it, I told her. ‘Words don’t mean nuthin’’ she said. ‘It’s what you do, and how you show it that matters, not what you say.’
“She raised two hellions by herself, put food on the table, and made sure we didn’t grow up ignorant or stupid, and could take care of ourselves. She did more than enough for her boys.”
***
It was a beautiful day, unlike in the movies where it always rained buckets during burial services. Ma would have laughed at the irony.
The mourners were dispersing from the gravesite and Connor pulled Murphy aside. They shook hands with a few more people and Uncle Seamus and his wife came by to insist the boys come down to the Anvil for lunch.
When everyone was finally gone, they stood silently at Ma’s gravesite. Connor was the first to speak.
“So that’s why you never say it?”
Murphy knew what he meant. He shrugged. “It’s like saying water’s wet.”
A thought struck him. He turned to Connor. “Do ye need me to say it?”
It was Connor’s turn to shrug. “No. I guess not.”
They both looked at the grave some more. Connor pulled out a huge white handkerchief and honked into it. “I never said it to her either. Now she’s dead.”
“She knew, Connor. Just like I know.”
“Do you?”
Murphy looked at Connor closely, worried. He put his gloved hand on Connor’s sleeve and pulled him around to face him. Murphy looked on in astonishment as Connor’s face crumpled and he fell bodily into Murphy’s arms, weeping with abandon. Murphy held him for a while, until Connor stopped sobbing and tried to pull away, but Murphy kept a hand at the back of his neck.
“Connor. Brother,” Murphy told him, wiping the tears from his face with a gloved thumb. “Your face is my heart, and my heart is yours. And water is fucking wet.”
~Fin~