Chapter Fifteen

Río was busy sewing on nametapes. ‘You can’t go travelling without nametapes on your clothes,’ she told Finn. ‘And because I know you’ll be subsisting on junk food, I’ve packed a lunchbox for you with fresh fruit and cottage pie and a can of Guinness as a treat. Now, just let me answer the phone. It’ll be your father–he promised to send you some money.’ As she reached for the phone by her bed, she half expected it to turn to putty in her hand, the way it always did in her dreams. But the handset was solid, and the voice in her ear real: real and familiar.

‘Ma! Hey, it’s me!’

She was awake instantly, sitting up in bed, clutching the phone to her ear.

‘Finn! What is it? What’s happened?’

‘Nothing, nothing, Ma–no worries. Listen, are you hooked up to satellite in your new gaff?’

‘What? Yes. Why?’

‘Quickly, go and turn the television on.’

‘Oh, oh, hang on.’ Río slid out of bed and grabbed her robe before negotiating the captain’s staircase that would take her down to the main body of her living space. Oh Christ, she thought, struggling with the sleeves. What could be going on? Some disaster–an earthquake, a tsunami, a coup? Where was Finn now? Koh Tao? Or had he left for Bangkok? Casting wildly around for the remote, she finally found it under a cushion. ‘Which channel, Finn? What am I looking for? Sky News? NBC?’ she said in a rush, aiming the device randomly at the screen.

‘No. Go to iSpy’

‘iSpy? Never heard of it.’ After several botched attempts, Río located the channel. ‘What’s up?’ she asked. ‘It’s just an ad break.’

‘Hang on. You’ll be interested in what happened next.’

The jingly music announcing an ad for shower gel came to an end, followed by more jingly music announcing the resumption of a chat show. The bling legend on the screen told Río that she was watching a programme called Celebrity Chat with Charlene.

‘Finn,’ she said tiredly, ‘it’s half-past three in the morning here. Why have you woken me to watch some piece of crap on the telly? Are you buzzing on Thai grass or something?’

‘No. I’ve just come in from an early morning dive and Carl happened to have the telly on. Wait.’

On the screen, the blonde woman called Charlene was smiling to camera with improbably white teeth. ‘And now,’ she was saying, ‘will you please welcome my next guest–star of the surprise sleeper of the season–Faraway’s Mr Shane Byrne!!!’

‘Look, look, Ma! There he is! There’s Dad!’

‘Holy shit.’ Río let the handset drop to the floor. She stood there motionless for a moment or two, watching as Shane emerged from behind a glittering Perspex screen and strolled towards the over-stuffed couch upon which Charlene–all cleavage and legs–sat waiting for him. Then she picked up the phone again. ‘I’ll call you back,’ she told Finn.

Transfixed, Río sank down on the sofa. The camera had panned to the inanely grinning studio audience, most of whom were women, all of whom were cheering and clapping wildly–cheering for Shane Byrne. Shane! Former love of her life and father of her child! How had this happened?

Charlene asked the question for her. ‘What we all want to know,’ she mock-chided him, ‘is how did this happen so suddenly? Where have you been hiding until now, Mr Shane Byrne?’

‘Hiding?’ said Shane, with a quizzical smile.

‘Yeah. You’ve gotta be Hollywood’s best-kept secret. You say you’ve been living and working here for almost two decades. But how come we didn’t hear of you until Faraway burst onto our screens?’

Shane gave a self-deprecating shrug. ‘I’ve always been a very private individual,’ he said. ‘I didn’t go into the business with a view to becoming rich and famous.’ Oh, no? thought Río. ‘I look upon acting as a craft–a vocation–and I’ve been happy right up till now to ply my craft in relative anonymity.’

‘So this overnight success has taken you by surprise?’ beamed Charlene.

‘Absolutely When I was cast in Faraway I never dreamed that it would go beyond the pilot stage–and I don’t mean that as any criticism of the creative team. It just seemed to me that the series was too…I guess the right word is “maverick”, to become mainstream.’

Shane crossed one long leg over another, and draped his arm over the back of the velvet-upholstered couch. Río had to admit that he looked good. He was wearing faded denims and a shirt of soft chamois leather. His hair was a lot longer than when she’d last seen him, and he’d clearly been working out. He was tanned–but not too tanned; and his teeth were white–but not too white. Río wondered if he’d employed a stylist to help him achieve this cool, understated look.

‘You’re already on your way to becoming a major sex symbol,’ Charlene told him, raising a provocative eyebrow. The ladies in the audience yelled their approval, and Shane shook his head and gave them a look from under his eyebrows that translated as Sheesh!‘ I understand that no fewer than seven fan sites have been set up since the first episode of Faraway was aired. What’s the secret of your appeal?’

‘I have no idea,’ replied Shane.

‘Well, we do, don’t we, ladies?’

‘Yesss!!!’ came the enthusiastic response from the audience.

‘Would you like to see a clip of Shane in action?’

‘Yesssss!!!’ This time the reaction verged on frenzy.

With a catlike smile, Charlene gestured to the giant screen behind her. ‘Ladies and gentlemen,’ she said, ‘I give you…Shane Byrne!’

And now Shane was on Río’s television screen in larger-than-life close-up, glowering moodily into the middle distance, green eyes narrowed against an apocalyptic sunset. The camera drew back to reveal him in all his glory, bare of torso with a gleaming six-pack. Some class of a leather kilt was slung round his hips, and his hair fell in dreadlocks to beyond his shoulder blades. His exaggeratedly accented Irish brogue provided the voiceover.

‘In a faraway place, in a faraway time,’ Shane intoned, ‘a great calamity befell the earth. Few humans survived, and those who did were the unlucky ones…’

Río couldn’t help it. She started to laugh. Picking up the phone, she speed-dialled Finn. ‘Is this for real?’ she asked.

‘Yeah,’ said Finn. ‘I’m checking out one of his fan sites as we speak. Well, they’ve got his date of birth wrong, for starters. Dad’s managed to shave four years off his age. Listen to this: “Shane Byrne is a dangerous Scorpio, so to all you besotted ladies out there–watch out for the sting in his tail!” Holy moly It’s weird to think that that’s Dad they’re talking about, isn’t it?’

‘Yeah,’ said Río, smiling at the image of Shane striding across the apocalyptic landscape in his kilt. ‘It really, really is. Send me links to the websites, will you?’

‘Sure,’ said Finn. ‘Hey, whaddayouknow–I’m on here! “It is said that Shane–who is currently single–was involved in a tempestuous relationship early on in his career, which resulted in a love child born in Ireland.” Get that! I’m famous, Ma!’

‘You’d better get on to Hello! mag, and sell your story right away. Oh, look, he’s back shooting the breeze with smarmy Charlene. Talk to you later, Finn, and thanks for the call. It was so worth getting up for.’

Río depressed ‘end call’, booted up her computer, then returned her attention to the television. Who would ever have dreamed that her ex would wind up as a Hollywood player? Admittedly, he had both looks and talent, but he had never had the drive. Like her, he had drifted through life, accepting the good times and the bad as they came in equal measure. She remembered his reaction when she had told him she was pregnant–how solicitous he’d been. He’d even volunteered to marry her! But Río had known that Shane was not the marrying kind any more than she was, and she sensed that he was relieved when she’d declined his very sweet, very generous offer. They had been far too young to marry, anyway. Their union would have ended up on the rocks in jig time.

‘Tell me about your relationship with your co-star, Holly Matthews,’ Charlene was saying. ‘Can you put your hand on your heart and tell me that things are strictly platonic between you?’

Shane didn’t supply an answer to the question. He simply put his hand on his heart and smiled, causing the audience to go, ‘Oooooooh!!!’

‘She’s a very beautiful woman,’ said Charlene, slanting him a meaningful look.

‘Yes, ma’am, she is.’

‘I understand that you and Holly have been approached by Vanity Fair to do a photo-shoot?’

‘Well, yes, that’s correct. But the shoot involves the entire cast of the series, not just Holly and me. There’s no star hierarchy involved in Faraway–we’re just a bunch of jobbing actors who got lucky’

‘So stardom really isn’t important to you?’

‘No. Not at all. I mean, at the end of the day the work is about survival, it’s not about getting up to the top rung. It’s about the adventure of doing different gigs and working with different people. And suddenly I’ve been elevated for something that was none of my doing. It just had to do with circumstance, timing, and somebody’s choice, you know. Suddenly I’m in a hit show, working with a company of twenty-three, twenty-four people–working with an ensemble who are all as astonished by the success of the series as me, and that’s a mind-blower. And then when you finally come to terms with it, you just sit back and think, What a jammy job.’

My God, thought Río. How on earth did Shane get to be so confident, so articulate–so grown up? Did this mean that she was going to have to start taking him seriously?

Charlene turned to the studio audience. ‘I’m sure a lot of you gals have questions that you’d like to ask our guest. Those who do, just put up your hand.’

There was a lot of giggling and squirming as hands were raised, and fingers twinkled to attract attention. ‘Yes!’ said Charlene. ‘The lady in pink angora! What do you have to say to Shane?’

‘Hi, Shane! I’m Candy’

‘Pleased to meet you, Candy’

‘Can you tell us how you like to relax?’

‘Well, I like to ride. It’s always been a dream of mine to own my own horse. And that just may be about to happen. I’m in the process of buying a house with a stable yard and paddocks.’

‘Um. What about indoor pursuits?’

The ‘gals’ in the audience squirmed and giggled some more.

‘I like to play chess,’ said Shane. ‘And I also like to relax with a glass of wine and a good book. I’m currently rereading Ulysses by James Joyce, who was, of course, the most famous writer Ireland ever produced.’

What? thought Río. Riding? Chess? Rereading Ulysses? Had Shane been taken over by an alien?

The questions started coming thick and fast. What’s your favourite kind of music, Shane? Where do you like to go on holiday? What’s your favourite food? Do you enjoy cooking? What, in your opinion, is the best film ever made?

Finally, Charlene took the floor again. ‘Shane Byrne,’ she said, ‘I’m sorry to have to say that our time’s up. It’s been a real pleasure meeting you.’

‘The pleasure was all mine, ma’am,’ replied Shane, returning her meaningful look.

Turning to the camera, Charlene smiled her white, white smile. ‘I’d like to end our chat this evening by playing another scene from Faraway’, she said. ‘And I may mention that this particular scene was specially requested by our audience. Don’t forget, folks, Celebrity Chat with Charlene is where you call the shots and you ask the questions!’

Río reached for her water bottle. The Faraway theme music came thundering through the speakers, and an equally thunderous cheer rose from the studio floor as Shane appeared again, shimmering onto the screen. A woman’s hand came into shot. Shane allowed her briefly to trace the line of his jaw with an index finger, before abruptly grabbing her wrist. ‘No!’ he said in an authoritative voice. ‘You know it is forbidden for us to engage in the act of love, Pandora.’

The next shot was a close-up of Pandora, who Río guessed to be Holly Matthews. Golden of skin and lissom of limb, Holly resembled a young, pre-Baywatch Pamela Anderson.

‘Rules are made to be broken, Seth.’ Seth! Río spluttered on her water. ‘And I, for one, hold in contempt any rule made by the warlord Xerxes.’

‘I could not countenance it if any harm came to you,’ said Shane/Seth.

‘No harm can come to me if I am safe in your arms. Hold me, Seth.’ Holly/Pandora wound her beautiful arms around her co-star’s neck, and there was a moment when you could see Shane/Seth engaged in an internal struggle. Then he was returning the embrace, pulling Pandora against his bare chest, crushing her lips with his, tangling his fingers in her hair. The clinch went on for ages before the camera tracked back to include the obligatory blasted landscape, and there–on a cliff top–a solitary caped figure was gazing down upon the star-crossed lovers. That had to be the warlord Xerxes, Río speculated. Well, hell! This was epic stuff!

The sound of an email landing in her inbox distracted her from the Technicolor vision that was Shane. It was from Finn, with a list of links to his father’s fan sites. Río clicked on one at random. Oh! There was a photograph of Shane, gazing straight at her with a mean and moody expression. ‘Welcome,’ she read, ‘to Shane Byrne dot com.’

Río clicked on ‘Welcome’ then scrolled down to find the following: ‘About Shane…Photos & Videos…Fan Fun…The Faraway Quiz…Fans’ Forum…Fans’ Fantasies…’

Fans’ Fantasies? Río had to go there! She clicked on something called An Irish Interlude.

‘“Begorrah, Colleen–and ’tis beautiful you are looking this fine spring day with the shamrock blazing green as your eyes on the heath.” Shane cut a fine figure of a man as he stood on the hummock, looking down upon me as I made my way along the boreen with the milk pails. “Thank you, Master Shane,” I breathe, lowering my eyes. “Let me help you with those pails, lass,” he says, taking them from me without a bother on him. I see the muscles bulging under the fine linen fabric of his rolled-up billowing shirtsleeves—’

Jesus! thought Río. What are these women on?

Another random click produced the following: ‘“Please, Sir Shane, do not harm me!” I cower half-naked on the floor of the dungeon while Sir Shane towers above me, menacing in his leather trews. He raises the hand with the whip in it and growls: “Nay, I will not harm thee if thou grantest me a favour.” I quail. “What mightest that be?” I stammer, trembling. “This,” he says sternly. He unfastens the thong on the crotch of his trews and—’

Ew! Río leaped back to the comparative safety of the home page, where her saturnine ex was eyeballing her, and found herself echoing the question that had been posed earlier on the iSpy Channel by flirty Charlene. How–how–had this happened so suddenly? There was really only one person to ask. Río did some mental calculations and worked out that it was eight o’clock in the evening, LA time. Picking up the phone, she dialled Shane’s number.

‘Shane?’ she said when he picked up. ‘It’s Río.’

‘Río, acushla–love of my life and mother of my first-born! How’s it goin’?’

The intimacy of his voice in her ear had the effect on her that familiar music did. It made her feel warm, syrupy, a little fuzzy round the edges.

‘Mother of your first-born?’ returned Río. ‘Does that mean you’ve had more sprogs since?’

‘Nah. I just love to speak in the flowery lingo of my native isle. What’s up, Río?’

‘I just saw you on the telly.’

‘On Charlene’s gab fest?’

‘Yeah.’

‘But it’s only four o’clock in the morning in Ireland! What has you up and about so early in the day?’

‘Finn rang to tell me. He was watching you in Koh Tao.’

‘So that’s where the gobshite is. Last I heard from him he was in Australia.’

‘That was months ago.’

‘How’s he getting on?’

‘He’s diving. What more can I say?’

‘OK. So he’s in heaven. How about you? Have you moved into your new gaff yet?’

‘Yes. I sent you a change-of-address email, Shane.’

‘Um. Sorry. I haven’t been keeping up to speed lately. There’s been so much going down here.’

‘So it would seem. How does it feel to be a star overnight?’

‘Very, very, very weird. People who wouldn’t normally have looked twice at me in the studio commissary are now suddenly blazing a trail to my table. And actresses are twinkling at me and blowing kisses all over the place. It’s as if—Hey, sweetheart, this is your phone bill! You can’t be wasting your money on calls to LA. Let me call you right back.’

He was as good as his word.

‘Tell me all about you, and life in Lissamore,’ he said.

‘Come on, Shane! You really want to hear about my boring life in the sticks?’

‘Nothing would give me more pleasure. I mean it. I’m an expat, remember, and ex-pats get awful homesick.’

So Río did. She told Shane all about her new apartment, and her new job, and how life was a lot rosier now than it had been since the last time they’d communicated. That had been a brief flurry of MSN over six months ago, Río realised, before she’d got her life back on track.

‘Is there anything I can do for you, Río?’ he asked. ‘You know, I’m making a fair amount of money now.’

‘No, Shane. It’s sweet of you to offer, but I’m managing OK.’

‘Are you still working in the bar?’

‘Occasionally, if they’re stuck. But now that I’m working for Dervla and I don’t have to fork out for rent, money worries aren’t as pressing.’

‘Still driving?’

‘Again, not as much as I used to. But it suits me now that we’re heading into autumn. I’ve always hated driving in the dark.’

‘I remember how you used to be scared of the dark. I’ll never forget having to comfort you when you woke up from nightmares, calling for the light to be turned on.’

‘Oh! Yes.’

There was a pause over the phone line, and then Río said, ‘Tell me all about your new life, Shane. Do you do all sorts of starry things like strolling up red carpets and signing autographs? And are you really going to do a Vanity Fair photo-shoot?’

‘Yeah.’ From the tone of his voice, Río could tell that the prospect did not fill him with glee. ‘It’ll be one of those wanky pull-out covers where the whole cast poses in character and looks soulfully to camera.’

‘So you’ll have wear your leather kilt?’

‘Yeah. God, it’s embarrassing. I’ve had extras deliberately drop things as they go by so that they can bend down and take a gander.’

‘So what do you wear underneath?’

‘A Victoria’s Secret confection of satin and lace.’

Río laughed. ‘I’ll post that nugget on one of your fan sites.’

‘Oh, no! Don’t tell me you’ve been checking out the fan sites, Río?’

‘Sure have. Finn put me on to them.’

‘Oh, fuck! This whole thing just gets more and more embarrassing.’

‘Take the money and run, Shane. But beware the warlord Xerxes.’

‘He’s actually a transsexual. He used to be a beauty therapist called Suellen.’

‘In real life or in Faraway?’

‘In real life. But don’t tell anyone I told you.’

I could sell that tidbit to the Enquirer!

‘And have Xerxes lose his job next season? That would be uncharitable of you, Río.’

‘So there’s going to be another series?’

‘Yep.’

‘And it really was a complete sleeper? Faraway took you completely by surprise?’

‘Not just me, Río. It took all of LA by surprise. There’s no accounting for the tastes of the great American viewing public’

Río became aware of a faint beeping noise on the line. ‘Hey, you’ve another call coming in, Shane. You’d better take it.’

‘Yeah. I better had. It’s my agent. But listen, Río, it was really good to talk to you. Good to be back in the zone, you know?’

‘The zone?’

‘The bullshit-free zone.’

Río smiled. ‘Take that call, Shane,’ she said. And then she put the phone down, unfurled herself from the sofa, stretched and yawned.

Wandering onto her balcony, she watched the sun climb above the mountains to the east, tracing golden brushstrokes over the topmost peaks. How strange to think that in LA, Shane’s day was about to end–probably with dinner in some nobby restaurant. And on Koh Tao, Finn had already spent half the morning underwater, checking out marine life. What should she do now? Go back to bed? No, she was too wide awake. She’d hit the beach–that’s what she’d do. Four thirty a.m., with the sun rising and the tide high and the curlews calling–there was no better way in the world to greet the dawn than by diving into the Atlantic and emerging under a sky bluer than a teal’s wing.

Down in the lobby, her bicycle was waiting. Río wheeled it through the front door, mounted it, and set off through the village, humming as she went.

It was only when she was in the water, floating on her back and gazing up at a cloud shaped like a dolphin, that she realised that the tune she’d been humming had been the ominous theme from Faraway.