Free Tender by Belinda McKeon Page A

had wondered if she was meant to understand it, what was going on between them. Because something was going on. She felt so close to him already by that stage, and the phone calls that followed confirmed it; the way James spoke to her during the phone calls confirmed it. The directness. The openness. That first afternoon in Baggot Street, it had shocked her a little, to hear him talk about how much he was looking forward to seeing Amy and Lorraine again, about how he could hardly wait to see them; outside of television, she had never heard a boy talk so sincerely, so emotionally, before. She had actually squirmed, listening to him. If he had been joking, if he had been being ironic, that would be one thing, but this was not irony; this was a strange, unafraid openness. And now, during their phone calls, it was the same, and again, she felt herself wanting to scuttle away from it somehow; from the way he told her that he missed her, that he wanted to see her, that he wanted to have her company again. Always she listened for the irony, for the trace of mockery, but it was never there; he was serious. He was saying aloud the stuff that, Catherine now realized, she had always thought you were meant to keep silent.
    And of course the real irony was in her own reaction. Because she had wanted this, for so long, or had believed she wanted it; she had spent so long trying to get close to various boys in this way. And now she had it, apparently. Now she had someone who talked like this to her. And what was she meant to do with it? Because James was not her type. The way he talked so much. The way he looked. The red hair, clumped, untamed. The freckles like cowshit spatters. The clothes: baggy jumpers, worn-down Docs, navy socks ribbed and faded, jeans bunched in with a canvas belt. He was grand, he was fun to talk to—but beyond that, no. And yet, she was enjoying him so much, so much more than she had enjoyed anyone before. She felt her brain grow, talking to him. She felt herself wanting to live her life so much more fully. There had been nobody like this for her before. So did that not mean something? After all, what did she really know? Of it, of being with someone, of being—was this what it was?—in a relationship with someone, of actually being in love, instead of just thinking you were? Instead of all the things she was, by now, so accustomed to doing: storing up every sighting of them, counting the moments of eye contact as though they were coins, as though they could get you somewhere, buy you passage to somewhere? This was not how it was with James, and so maybe this, after all, was what it was meant to be like. Maybe she had misunderstood this, as she had misunderstood so many things, all these years. That first night he had phoned her, the excitement and gladness she had felt at hearing his voice had unnerved her, and she had heard it in his voice, too—and something more in his voice, as well: a kind of relief. A relief that she was glad to hear from him. And what did that mean?
      
    It was Lorraine’s birthday, she told her mother, and Amy was throwing her a small party; at “small party,” her mother shot Catherine a look which made clear not just that she did not believe her, but that she was disappointed that Catherine, in lying to her about her reasons for going to Dublin for the weekend, would come up with so pathetic an offering. But getting her mother to believe that she would be staying in Baggot Street until Sunday evening was all that mattered. She left the Leader office at six, and walked to the station, and she watched as the half six train to Dublin departed, and she sat and waited for the one coming in the other direction. As it pulled in ten minutes later, James was standing with his head out the carriage door, waving; Catherine was immediately mortified. He looked insane. He was doing, she knew, some kind of regal wave; pretending to be royalty arriving into Longford. She saw people on the