Our Love Is on the High Seas

Anabelle has always had a funny way to express herself to probably every single living being on the entire Irish Republic, this being simply because she’s never been anywhere further. Oh, how her mother used to say to her poor Da, “I think ye may well have put somethin funny on me breakfast te day ye snuck in ta me.” But it didn’t stop her from being who she is; a brat, but a beautiful and under rather intriguing personality, nonetheless.

The boys, though only 6 years of age, would’ve said the same thing had they experienced her odd behaviors of interpreting her internal psychological stimuli some 10, 20 years back. But they would rather stay quiet and nod as their mother hauntingly sneaks into their room, no slightest sound made from her rat-munched floral flops to match her dress, carrying the largest mug of home-made hot chocolate on one hand and an even larger mug of brandy in another. She closes the door, but halts its course about 5 inches before it touches the arch, and then sits on Connor’s end side of the bunk bed, right below Murphy’s who is now, with his bangs matted to his forehead, fumbles down the bed ladder to join his brother under the modest but warm quilt blanket she made for the boys’ birthday.

She places the chocolate mug on Connor’s freezing hand – they never had appropriate room temperature despite the snow – and grips the brandy mug in her hand as she snorted and took a woeful look at the boys. Murphy, his head half buried under the blanket, stares at his mother with blinking, sparkling eyes, twitching them back and forth from his mother to her brother and back again. He sensed something strange in the atmosphere, that’s why he came down the ladder; he wanted to know what was going on. He’s always been the one to first notice a situation, quicker than his brother. Connor, mug in hand, stares at Anabelle, unmoving, until Anabelle opens her mouth to let a growl out that surprises both boys.

“Drink up, both o’ ye, I didn’t make that for te cat.”

They quickly shuffle for the first sip that eventually falls on Connor. He drinks, not paying attention to the heat, as Murphy watches in dread before he finally gets his share, which he delightfully slurps slowly and with passion. As the boys settle down, Anabelle looks down on her mug, somewhat shaking. The boys grip each other’s fingers. Something is happening; never did their mother scare them like this before. Connor slaps Murphy in his head when he hears what the dark-haired boy is thinking, she’s goin’ ta have a spasm!

“I want ta tell ye boys a bedtime story.”

That does it. The boys freeze, unable to conceive a word of response. Murphy’s fingers twitch uncontrollably, sending a pulse that runs down Connor’s knuckles, and wrists, all the way to his elbow, shoulder, and then his neck. It wraps him in an undetectable emotion his brother is trying to message him, but something alien is backing it off in its way. Connor’s grip on his brother’s fingers tightens.

‘Tis goin ta be messy, Con.

Jus’ don’t eat yer nails.

Anabelle clears her throat, straightens up, and tries to look, for the first time in many years, like an actual mother. She observes her boys in the deepest, most piercing manner. She waits; after making sure that they won’t say anything, she proceeds.

“Never have I told ye any bedtime story, since that one about the wolf and the baby goat when ye was wee buggers; I took it ye didn’t like it much.”

They boys shiver at the same time. No, they didn’t like that one any bit.

“So I came up with another ‘un, and I’m really hopin’ this one’ll do ye good dreams tonight.”

Connor turns his head to Murphy, who looks as uncertain as he is, which doesn’t do him much comfort. So he turns back to his mother, and slowly rises out of the blanket, followed by Murphy, who pulls the blanket up with him.

Anabelle gulps a big one off her brandy, and looks over to the window positioned exactly between the two bunk beds. It’s showing a beautiful scene of a midnight meadow, in which there is a tree far yonder. The meadow is lonely, and its only friend for the night is the tree, but the tree, too, is lonely, save for one tact leaf, lonely of other leaves. She begins to try weaving the rights words and combining them to the perfect sentences made to lullaby her boys to a sound night sleep.

Her eyes suddenly water. The boys dare not move a muscle, except for the little quiver Murphy makes as he pulls the blanket even further, now covering most of the freckles atop his nose.

“On a quiet evening at the beginning of May, “she begins, “a man walks up to a hill, when he suddenly stops ta hear a young girl singin’ beneath ‘er tears. It was gettin' dark, but the young girl’s still sittin’ there, lamenting somethin’ he hears as, ‘My love is on the high seas.’

“The man waits. His worn boots grippin’ his beaten feet, but still he listens to the girl’s song, sung quietly and peacefully like a June dew, repeating the same chorus over an’ over again, ‘My love is on the high seas.’

“As te day darkens, he can’t stand the beauty o’ the song no more, so he draws himself closer to the young girl. The stars were takin’ place, and as he nears the young girl, the song soothes him more, but oh, how sad a song it is ta hear, ‘My love is on the high seas.’”

Anabelle halts for a moment. Murphy’s nose is now exposed to the cold wind seeping from the window frame, but for once he doesn’t notice as he is enticed to his mother’s voice, twisting and miserable yet containing an indefinable kind of warmth he rarely discerns from her. Connor is already on his elbows on the quilt, clamping both his fingers into one knot, resting his gaping jowl above it. The boys are listening, but Anabelle keeps going without looking at anything but the meadow and the tree and the leaf.

“The man can take no more o’ ‘er singin’; it’s too beautiful ta ignore. She’s at the roof o’ ‘er song as he walks even nearer ta her, noticin’ her brown long hair and an equally pair o’ brown eyes, beautiful, they were. She prays to the King of Heaven, “Protect my love on the high seas.’

“So the man advances his steps, and, stoppin’ by the rock she’s sittin’ on, keepin’ ‘er heart from breaking any further, he takes her hand, feeling her skin on his palm, and says, “Wipe yer eyes, yer love is safe. I’ve returned to you from the high seas.”

The teardrop is a grain of salt to Anabelle’s lips. She endures it as a reminder of a time not long past, still warm in her chest, knocking at her front gate, asking to be let in to her life just once again, because it knows that it makes her happy. She looks at her boys, who are, judging from their ocean blue eyes and almost equally blue faces, holding their breaths. When she lets her smile paint her face, the faces come back being pink again.

Connor feels his freckles joining. It wasn’t the evil, bone-stinging wind or the way Murphy’s gripping his fingers to perish his great desire of nail-munching. It’s the fire burning from every intonation his mother’s voice emitted during the tale, the twirling and binding of the words coming out from her mouth alongside the fog, forming the scenes. There was a genuinity in the tale; it’s not exactly a fairy tale. It didn’t feel like it’s meant for female audience only. He knows now that he’s in the rabbit hole of Anabelle’s pit of thoughts and sentiment. They’re both there. She’s just written an imaginary page of her diary on their minds.

He dares himself and Murphy both to speak.

“That was awfully pretty, Ma.”

Anabelle turned her head slowly to the boys from the tree. It looks vaguely happier now; at least it’s not weeping of forlorn anymore. Maybe her story’s quieted him a bit, and that makes her feel particularly content. She faces both boys, her smile still lingering about her face, coloring it warm pastel colors she once lost.

“No missin’ tails this time, boys.”

“ ‘Tis better without missin’ anythin’,” Murphy declared with a firm nod.

Connor pondered for a moments, and his thought catches Murphy’s nerves. They both adjoined glances for a quick second, quietly deciding if they should utter the question their minds just raised.

Connor swallowed. “Ma?”

Anabelle mumbled in her rush of brandy to the throat. “Aye?”

“Do ye think....Da’s on te high seas?”

Anabelle fell silent. The boys knew this was coming, and scowled at themselves for making it so. She doesn’t move, her eyes fall to nowhere but the holed quilt, not even to the lonesome meadow and the tree and its leaf. She can hear the meadow whispering to the tree, something she can’t make out, and that drowns her even deeper in the dumps. But she somehow lifts her head up, ignoring the dampness of her cheeks and how the sight lights fear and regret in the boys’ hearts, and tries to take her smile’s hand that’s leaving.

“Can’t tell. Might be.”

She puts her mug down and leans closer to the boys.

“But I tell ye one thing; if he does come back, he ain’t goin’ ta see me rainin’ me fucken eyes out.”

Murphy pulls the blanket up.

“But ye did pray for him ta come back, didn’t ya?”

Anabelle kills herself trying to restrain the enormous waves of forthcoming saltwater banging at her sockets.

“Every day, love, every damn day.”

The small plastic cuckoo clock on the door strikes 9 pm. She rises, pats her dress of the dust that’s never there, and holds the empty mug of brandy in her plump fingers. She crouches and gives each boy a kiss on the nose and a finger run along their hairs. She takes a good look of each as she departs from the bunk bed. Murphy is so much like her – fiery eyes to match his temper, baby fingers that never sheds off its baby fat, and a challenging glare as if trying to take anyone on a fist fight, not to mention his sharp tongue. He’s always the one to first follow her suit in swearing. But Connor, beneath his copper colored hair and inquisitive air, is an embodiment of the boys’ father; strong little nose and jaws, silent furrows, blazing charisma. Hands that warm as perfectly as a castle furnace, a flowing manner of speech like the river Anabelle used to swim in during summers, the scent of a July sun filling his every pore. But their eyes remind her most of the more beautiful days, when every poppy bloom is a gift, when every goat birth represents miracles, a proof of a life well lived. She doesn’t get much of those, not even pinches of it, but actually being inside the boys’ ocean blue eye drops sounds of the waves into her ears, and it satisfies her to know that she’s going to be sleeping along those sounds tonight.

“G’night boys, and finish the chocolate.”

She turns the light off as she closes the door safe with a thump of the wooden frame. She rests her back to the wall; her back’s already a little hunched, much from the excessive drinking. She walks down the creaking stairs into the kitchen and puts the mug in the sink, leaving the tap and the soap to wash the mug themselves. She wearily opens the heavy door to her room; the kitchen lamp still lit, the tap dripping, beckoning her to tidy up the late dish, and is ignored. She’s in need of an irregularity in the household for tonight.

She’s relieved that her room is so far down, far from the boys’ incredible wolf ears, and she lets herself have the liberty of sobbing into her pillow, every tear that taps her pillow sheet in perfect rhythm with the waves colliding with the sands.



Curled into a ball next to his brother, Murphy opens an eye to ensure whether Connor was asleep or not. He finds him staring directly at his eyes, two identical sets of eyes intertwining into each other’s head.

Murphy searches for Connor’s pinky.

“Con?”

“Aye?”

“Is Da really coming back?”

He rarely lets himself fall under Connor’s self-proclaimed older twin title, but this is one of those moments in which he doesn’t know what to believe.

Connor stares down at his knees, letting Murphy’s fingers grasp his pinky in damp sweat.

“I dunno, Murph. Ma says he is, doesn’t she?”

“Aye, but that was a big glass o’ brandy, that one.”

Connor knows no more of what so say. He looks into Murphy’s eyes, dreaming of his own unsatisfying answers. They’re both in the brink of hope and disappointment, of whether to still keep their distant affection for their father or to let it go with the evening breeze. Connor pulls his pillow closer to his chin, and snuggles into the universe of soft white sheet while trying to close his eyes, keeping the image of their father as close as possible.
“Then let’s hope te brandy’s makin’ her tell us much o’ the truth.”

Murphy stares at the bottom of his bed above him.

They both pull the blanket over their shoulder in union. As Connor turns his back on him, Murphy opens his eyes once again, as if resisting sleeping, questions playing firecrackers in his head.

“Hey, Connor?”

Connor grumbles.

“Hmm?”

“The lass forgot to say ‘O Lord’ in ‘er prayer, did she?”



Anabelle doesn’t sleep that night. She only stares at the image of them both in her mind, amidst the tall grass in the meadow. It was a beautiful sunset.

“O Lord, return My Love from the high seas. “

“Amen.”