I shake those thoughts away and concentrate on the images flickering before me.
“Why doesn’t Da come to the gardens anymore?” Cillian demands. “He used to.”
“That was before,” Sean says.
“Sean,” his mother cuts in from behind the recorder. “That’s enough.”
“What?
“I miss her…”
“Sean!”
His mother’s voice turns cold and even I flinch at the strength in it. The image I have in my head transforms.
I’d imagined a soft, warm woman. Kind eyes and an easy smile. Now, I can see someone else entirely. Her tone has transformed her completely.
She moves the camera to the left and it lands on Cillian.
He’s beneath a low-hanging tree with dozens of massive pink flowers hanging off its stooped branches. He jumps high, trying to catch one.
His face is partially sunburnt, cheeks scoured red from exertion.
But his smile is so beautiful that I pause the video, catching him mid-jump.
I stare at his bright, smiling features for a moment, and then my fingers twitch instinctively.
There’s a writing desk right where I walked in, piled high with papers and pencils. A blank notepad hangs off the edge. I grab it and a fountain pen and sink back into my seat.
My eyes flicker back and forth, from the screen to the pad and back again.
I lose myself in the drawing.
And then I lose myself to time.
* * *
I don’t look up until he’s almost here.
“Shit!” I gasp at the sound of approaching footsteps. I’m panicking like I did something wrong as I stuff the open pad into the side of the lounge chair between the cushions.
The door opens and Cillian strides in.
One glance at his face and I know he’s been looking for me.
He stops short, but it’s not my face that’s captured his attention. It’s the image frozen on the screen.
The image of himself.
“What the hell are you doing?” he demands with an intensity I don’t expect.
I frown. “Um, I was just… looking around.”
He raises his eyebrows. “Looking around? Or snooping around?”
I grit my teeth. “You said I had freedom of the grounds.”
“Doesn’t mean you have the right to invade my privacy and the privacy of my family.”