Maggie would have slept for the entire journey had she been alone.
But with Daniel sitting beside her, exuding excitement, albeit silent excitement, she found it impossible to erase the fear from her mind.
She opened her eyes and glanced at her forty year old son, who was only short of asking: Are we there yet?
Daniel, on hearing about the news of his maternal grandfather’s demise and his mother’s inheritance, hardly stopped begging her to return to Ireland and claim what was hers. “It’s hardly worth it.” She tried to put him off the whole idea. “It’s only a bit of a house: two up and two down. You’ll be so disappointed. Best you forget all about it. I’ll get an agent to sell it.” But Daniel would not let it go. He insisted that both of them go to Ireland. After all, he argued. I have a right to see my mother’s birthplace. Finally, Maggie relented, agreeing to Daniel’s plea. But then, she rarely denied him anything.
In a way, she was pleased to see her son so excited because, since Jake died six months ago, Daniel had become far too quiet: so unlike his usual jovial self. His father’s death had affected him more than Maggie could believe.
“They had been so close those two,” she had told a friend. The green fields came into view. They were like a big patchwork quilt of different shades of green interspersed with some houses and villages. Daniel was glued to the window, completely mesmerised by the views.
Maggie did not look out at her birth country. She had vowed never to return some forty one years ago.
