Unexpected: Day 3

Word Count: 24,016

Summary of Events:

Hilton left Meinwen alone for all of Wednesday to let her ponder whether she would go to Ireland with him for the weekend, and to talk it over with her grandmum, who was persuaded with her sister's help to consent to her going, as the idea rather appealed to Meinwen, who gave Hilton her answer on Thursday, allowing Hilton to arrange the flight. Unfortunately, Hilton was unable to get them adjoining seats on the flight, and thus was left to muse inwardly as the plane took off late Friday afternoon . . . 

Excerpt of the Day:

A twinge stirred within Hilton as he looked toward the reasonably clear summer sky instead of the ever-lower landscape. Although he wasn’t going to be alone for the first thirty six hours of his trip, the fact that his companion wasn’t Dad was a bit bittersweet to him.

Surely Dad would’ve shown him around to all the places he’d known, from where he was born to where he’d grown up, where his friends had lived, and maybe he would’ve been able to meet his grandparents and any other relations he might have — maybe.

Dad, however, wasn’t here, and couldn’t get here, leaving Hilton to have to track down his relations, and whatever haunts of Dad’s on his own, and since he didn’t believe Dad had been in Ireland for over twenty years at this point, he probably wouldn’t be likely to find all that many people who remembered Dad.

Of course, that was if Dad had ever been memorable. He had no reason to believe Dad had been well-known in Ireland, as Dad hadn’t really been well-known in England, seeing how many times people had presumed Sheahan was Hilton’s first name, not part of his surname — as if he, for some reason, always gave his first name and surname together instead of just his surname — or that it was his middle name.

There was a part of Hilton that wondered if Dad would have been glad to know that he was doing this too. After all, from what Hilton knew, Dad had left Ireland and never gone back. Hilton had no idea if it was because of a lack of opportunity, or a lack of desire.

When Dad had talked about Ireland — which had been only on occasion — he had talked favourably, but he’d never said anything about possibly going there someday; then again, at that point in time, he might’ve deemed it impossible to even hope of going because of his circumstances.

Hilton hoped that Dad would’ve wanted to go back, and that if Dad somehow knew he was going, that Dad would be glad he was. Beyond that, Hilton didn’t know. Would Dad want him to try and find his Irish relations? Would he want him to try and find places that had been familiar to him?

If only he’d thought of asking Dad about it, but he’d never actually thought about the idea of going to Ireland then. It was only that time when Mum had said she was going to visit Aunt Angie in Ireland that it’d suddenly occurred to him and he’d asked to go along, only to be told the brutal truth about Dad’s family in Mum’s typical, insensitive fashion.

The sensation in his wrists prompted Hilton to rub at each one firmly with his thumbs alternately. If it wouldn’t have been for Mum, there would surely have been a lot of things in his life that mightn’t have happened, as well as other things that might’ve — such as his being able to make this trip with Dad.