...

Michael tries to imagine what his mother was like when she was his age and lived in Ireland. His father, a New Zealander, had met and married her in Dublin and brought her back to Sumner, near Christchurch. Dad said Bridget was a bit of a hippy then. Well they both were when they met.

Michael thinks of a red caftan that once belonged to his mother, that he later wore as a wise man in a Christmas pageant at primary school. He tries to see a young Bridget, slicing through the rain in the ankle-length scarlet gown, the embroidered mirrors that decorated the bodice partly screened by long auburn hair. She did have long bright hair, Michael knows that, though the only image he can now invoke is Bridget with her head covered in the green scarf she used to hide her baldness.

When Michael thinks of that awful turban he always returns to one particular evening when he got home after swimming. He would have been twelve then. Using no hands, he had ridden his bike up the drive alongside the house, then leaped free just as he headed for the clothes line. The bike slipped agreeably away from him, gliding along the concrete in a slithering hiss of moving wheels.

In the kitchen, Michael’s parents were drinking wine.

‘Sorry about the bike, Dad, I’ll put it away in a minute,’ said Michael, not liking the look on his father’s face.

‘Sit down, old son,’ said Dad, ignoring the comment. ‘We’ve got something to tell you.’

The first page of Coral's short story Dublin Bay, as it appeared
in The Dubliner (October 2001).