The Gallaghers of Ardmore Trilogy

that picture in her mind a long time, envying them their freedom and the simplicity of their routine.
    They would walk every day, she imagined. Rain or shine, then go home to tea in some pretty little cottage with a thatched roof and a well-tended garden. The dog would have a little house of his own, but would most usually be found curled at his master’s feet by the fire.
    She wanted to walk those fields with a devoted dog, too. Just to walk and walk until she felt like sitting. Then to sit and sit until she felt like standing. It was a concept that dazzled her. Doing what she wanted when she wanted, at her own pace and in her own way.
    It was so foreign to her, that simple, everyday freedom. Her great fear was to finally find it, nip the silvered edge of it with her fingertips, then bungle it.
    As the road wound and ribboned around the coast of Waterford, she caught glimpses and stretches of the sea, blue silk against the horizon, turbulent green and gray as it spewed against a wide, sandy curve of beach.
    The tension in her shoulders began to slide away. Her hands relaxed a bit on the wheel. This was the Ireland her grandmother had spoken of, the color and drama and peace of it. And this, Jude supposed, is why she’d finally come to see where her roots had dug before being ripped free and replanted across the Atlantic.
    She was glad now she hadn’t balked at the gate and run back to Chicago. Hadn’t she managed the best part of the three-and-a-half-hour drive without a single mishap? She wasn’t counting the little glitch at that roundabout in Waterford City where she’d ended up circling three times, then nearly bashing into a car full of equally terrified tourists.
    Everyone had escaped without harm, after all.
    Now she was nearly there. The signs for the village of Ardmore said so. She knew from the careful map her grandmother had drawn that Ardmore was the closest village to the cottage. That’s where she would go for supplies and whatever.
    Naturally, her grandmother had also given her an impressive list of names, people she was supposed to look up, distant relatives she was to introduce herself to. That, Jude decided, could wait.
    Imagine, she thought, not having to talk to anyone for several days in a row! Not being asked questions and being expected to know the answers. No making small talk at faculty functions. No schedule that must be adhered to.
    After one moment of blissful pleasure about the idea, herheart fluttered in panic. What in God’s name was she going to do for six months?
    It didn’t have to be six months, she reminded herself as her body tensed up again. It wasn’t a law. She wouldn’t be arrested in Customs if she went back after six weeks. Or six days. Or six hours, for that matter.
    And as a psychologist, she should know her biggest problem lay in struggling to live up to expectations. Including her own. Though she accepted that she was much better with theories than action, she was going to change that right now, and for as long as she stayed in Ireland.
    Calm again, she switched on the radio. The stream of Gaelic that poured out had her goggling, poking at the buttons to find something in English, and taking the turn into Ardmore instead of the road up Tower Hill to her cottage.
    Then, as soon as she realized her mistake, the heavy skies burst open, as if a giant hand had plunged a knife into their heart. Rain pounded the roof, gushed over her windshield while she tried to find the control for the wipers.
    She pulled over to the curb and waited while the wipers gaily swished at the rain.
    The village sat on the southern knob of the county, kissing the Celtic Sea and Ardmore Bay. She could hear the thrash of water against the shore as the storm raged around her, passionate and powerful. Wind shook the windows, whined threateningly in the little pockets where it snuck through.
    She’d imagined herself strolling through the village, familiarizing herself with it, its pretty cottages, its smoky, crowded pubs, walking the beach her grandmother had spoken of, and the dramatic cliffs, the green fields.
    But it had been a lovely, sun-washed afternoon, with villagers pushing rosy-cheeked babies in carriages and flirty-eyed men tipping their caps to her.
    She hadn’t imagined a sudden and violent spring storm bringing wild gusts of wind and deserted streets. Maybe no one even lives here , she thought. Maybe it was a kind of Brigadoon and she’d fumbled in during the wrong