The Empty Family by Colm Tóibín

know that they were separating, but I did not think so.
    Gráinne seemed to have arranged the table so that there were two places set opposite her, one for Donnacha and one for me. I had imagined that they would sit beside each other opposite me. She obviously wanted us both to look at her, or wanted to make sure that we were both listening to her when she spoke.
    She handed me the wine list.
    ‘We’ve ordered gin and tonics,’ she said, ‘but that might be too strong for you.’
    ‘It’s nice to see country people back in the Clarence,’ I replied. ‘I’m sure the band are delighted.’
    ‘Bono was in the lobby when we came in,’ Donnacha said.
    ‘Give me Larry any day,’ I replied.
    ‘Order the wine,’ Gráinne said.
    Donnacha had not changed. His hair was grey now, but the grey did not make much difference. His face had thickened but not very much. His teeth were still perfect. He was as slim as ever. But none of his physical attributes added up to much – he was not beautiful, or physically striking – and it was something else that made me glad I was not sitting opposite him and would not have to look at him all evening. His aura had not been affected by the years. He was lazily there, easygoing, comfortable, as their drinks came and we ordered our food and our wine.
    ‘I see you are still keeping the old age pensioners on trolleys in the hospital corridors,’ I said.
    He smiled almost impatiently and slowly began to explain how things in his hospital were improving, mentioning in passing several meetings he had had with the Minister and what she had said, and one meeting with the Taoiseach. I had forgotten how much he loved an argument and how rational he was and unwilling to deal with insult and half-thought-out invective. Nonetheless, it was not hard to tell him that the problem began and ended with the doctors and their greed and their arrogance, and that nothing would change until their salaries were halved and they had to clock in like everyone else.
    ‘It’s not as simple as that.’
    I almost said that it was precisely as simple as that when my mother was dying in a public ward over long months in one of the Dublin hospitals, but I did not want to talk about anything personal. I knew that Donnacha’s parents had died, as had Gráinne’s mother. I had not gone to the funerals, nor had they come to my mother’s.
    I noticed that Gráinne, who was facing the main door into the restaurant, paid absolutely no attention to this discussion, instead looked around her like a petulant child. She was behaving like herself, only more so. It comes with age, I thought. Donnacha was thus becoming all reason, all good sense. I was becoming all bored, or maybe all regret. I wished I could tell Donnacha that I had no interest in hospitals or health systems or Ministers or meetings with the Taoiseach, that I was interested in his face and his voice, in the darkness of his eyes, in the growing intensity in his tone as he made his argument.
    In St Aidan’s we had been distantly friendly for the first three years, although Donnacha was always in a different dormitory and was not involved in hurling, as I was then. Thus I never spoke to him much or grew close to him. He had friends from home and he spent time with them. I remember him as part of a group on semi-permanent watch for opportunities to cadge cigarettes, asking for a pull of yours, or a drag, or the butt. I remember that he could be trusted not to horse a cigarette if you gave him a drag, and, if he had borrowed a cigarette, he could be depended on to return it the next day.
    In our fourth year we became friends because we both worked to get on the school debating team. Donnacha started out as a useless speaker but over time the logical, calm way he made points began to have an effect, especially if he was part of a team with other boys who had greater skills at delivery and drama or humour. I could do dramatic openings and endings as long as I could