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her nose and juts out her chin.
    “Looks good.”
    “Slattery’s?” Ange asks. It isn’t too far from her flat. “You look like a tourist with that thing.” She nods at Abbey’s pack.
    “Yeah? Well, fuck ’em if they can’t take a tourist.”
    They go out through the doors and into the city. The streets full of people, traffic along the quays. Crowds spill out from the pubs onto the sidewalks. A man playing a saw with a fiddle bow nods at the girls as they go by. The eerie sound of the saw, the flex and warp, following them. Abbey shifts gears. The pace in Dublin altogether faster. Angela, walking a few strides ahead, turns around. “Going back to the old codger?”
    They’re heading along the quays and the wind whips up around Abbey’s ears. Her backpack is getting heavy. “Yeah.”
    Ange sticks out her tongue, rolls her eyes. “Christ, Ab, I’ll say it again: you can do better.”
    They walk past Liffey Street in silence. Over on Ha’penny Bridge a group of kids throw their take-away containers into the river. A pop can glints in the light of the street lamp as it drops. Realizing Abbey is too far into it with Dermot, Angela softens, grabs hold of her hand, squeezes. “I should never have introduced you to that useless wanker. Lesson learned.”
    At Slattery’s a doorman stands with his back to the street eying the crowd inside. Looking in through the front window, Abbey can tell the place is full. On the other side of the glass a man carrying three pints wedges his way between two women to a bench that runs along the front of the pub. The bass of the music reverberates off the glass.
    “McDaids,” Angela suggests, pushing her glasses up. And off they go, Abbey holding onto the straps of her pack and flexing her back muscles to relieve the knot that’s set in. Wondering all of a sudden why she felt the need to bring everything, empty the drawer, take both pairs of shoes. Was she trying to scare Dermot? Ange would tell her to leave him, has said so before. And it was tempting, the idea of it. As if all Abbey’s problems, all her aimlessness, would end if she walked away. The Gowans famous for finding the exit, the great revolving “out” door; Frank fond of saying, “Don’t let it hit ya as ya leave.”
    Abbey has tried to leave Dermot before—five months ago, after their first argument. She’d left Dublin to stay in Spiddal for a few days until her next week of shifts started at Connor’s. The bus had dropped her in the village; she’d had to double back to the cottage in the rain. It was seven when she got in and the house was in a state.
    “She deigns to make an appearance.” The smell of whiskey on him. Flagon at Abbey’s hand, licking her fingers.
    Abbey took off her coat and hung it up, walked over to put her bag in the bedroom. Dermot blocked the doorway.
    “You could’ve phoned.” His fingers curled around the lip of the door frame.
    “How about ‘I’m happy to see you?’ ” The words came out louder than she’d intended. There was something about the look of him, a desperation. Like her father.
    “They’ll be waiting for me.” He brushed by her, put on his coat.
    “Who?”
    He turned at the door and stared at her. “You’ll not have it both ways.”
    Abbey flipped on the light and sat down on the bed. Wiped her forehead, raindrops trickling out of her hair. He came into the room a few minutes later. A grown man, his hands twice the size of hers, he put his head on her lap and sobbed. Abbey’s skirt wet from the rain, clinging to her thighs, Dermot pressing his face against them. She’d never seen him like that, didn’t know what he wanted from her, what it was she’d done. Finally she put her hands down onto his head, the mess of greying wisps. She started to say his name, but as soon as he felt her hands on him, he stood up. Like he’d been struck. He stared at her for a minute like he was trying to place her. Then he sat down on the bed beside her, looking