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starts making her way down the aisle in search of a seat. Closing my eyes, I pretend not to notice her.
    ‘Can you shove over there, love?’ she says, tapping my shoulder.
    Without looking at her, I move in and close my eyes again. Every so often she turns and looks at me: I can tell by the warm tickle of her breath on my face. She keeps shifting about in the seat, and opening and closing her handbag, and blowing her nose, and making silly, pointless remarks like ‘Ah now’ and ‘Sure, that’s how it goes’. She’s distracting me from my dreams.
    ‘Excuse me, girshe,’ she says, digging my ribs, ‘but would you mind opening that window, before I die of suffocation?’
    ‘OK.’ I open it and sit down again.
    ‘Oh, that’s much better,’ she says, taking a deep grateful breath and inspecting my left hand at the same time. ‘You’re not married, are you?’
    ‘Yes,’ I say, touching Aunty Lily’s ring. Even to me, there’s no hint of a lie.
    ‘But, sure, you’re only a slip of a lassie.’ She leans towards me and whispers, ‘A shotgun wedding, was it?’
    I nod.
    ‘Same as me own,’ she says, giving me a wink. ‘Is it just the one babby you have?’
    ‘Yeah.’
    ‘How old?’
    ‘It’s her first birthday today.’
    ‘Ah, they’re little dotes at that age, aren’t they?’
    ‘Mmm,’ I say, imagining her podgy cheeks, big eyes, soft curls. ‘I’m going to Dublin to buy her birthday present.’
    ‘It’s a long way to go just to get a birthday present.’
    ‘I don’t care; I want to get her something special.’
    A couple of miles farther, the driver pulls in at a crossroads bus shelter.
    ‘This is me now,’ the woman says, holding on to the headrest in front of her and hoisting herself up off the seat. ‘Enjoy your shopping trip.’
    ‘Thanks.’
    As she totters down the aisle, I settle back down to my dreams.
    Once I step off the bus in Dublin, I can pretend to be whomever I want to be. And on this day, I want nothing more than to be the mother of my one-year-old daughter. So I am.
    I spend the day wandering from one department store tothe next, picking up baby clothes and toys, checking sizes and prices. I’m in no hurry. I have all day to browse, to consider, to indulge the fantasy.
    ‘Have you this dress in pink?’ I ask one of the shop assistants, making sure she sees Aunty Lily’s ring.
    I stop for coffee; pay the waitress; flash the ring.
    They notice: young mother, young wife.
    I’m somebody. And somebody’s.
    In the end, I buy her a pink rabbit. It’s soft and floppy, beany on the inside, nice to hold.
    On my return home, I find my parents sitting watching TV.
The Late Late Show
is just starting, an owl flying across the screen.
    ‘You’re back,’ my father says.
    ‘I am.’
    He doesn’t ask me where I’ve been.
    My mother hasn’t turned her head. She’s busy clicking her knitting needles, one eye on her stitches, the other on Gay Byrne. She’s knitting a matinee coat for one of the village wives, who’s entitled to have a baby.
    Click click click.
    Upstairs, I put my baby’s bunny into a box in the bottom of my wardrobe and go to bed.
4 October 1999 (after tea)
    I’ve started smoking again. I had to; my head is all over the place. Raking up the past does that to you. The cigarettes help me to focus. Besides, it gives me something to do, something to look forward to. There isn’t much else. I’d forgotten howsatisfying cigarettes can be. I love the way they catch my chest. I’ve just stubbed one out, but I think I’ll have another one. They’re so addictive, so damaging. I’ve always been drawn to what’s bad for me. Like Lesley. I still say she was worth the trouble.
Worth the trouble
    As I skip through the car park towards the dancing hall, I hear singing coming from somewhere behind.
Aunty Mary had a canary
    Up the leg of her drawers.
    She pulled a string and made it sing
    Up the leg of her drawers.
    ‘Who’s that?’ a red-faced woman says,