I looked around Dublin's international airport with a sigh. I was here; I was "safe". I knew I should have been excited. I was finally in Ireland! I'd wanted to go there for years, ever since high school choir. I was going to make a career out of studying the country for the Lord's sake. Only…I'd envisioned finally traveling here under slightly different circumstances… I'd imagined myself being happier.

But, I was here and I was here to stay no matter my state of mind.

Overshadowing my already minimal excitement was a decided sense of loss I couldn't shake. It really was stupid of me, especially since I'd just seen them, albeit after I'd lost them for a few months, but I couldn't help how I felt and hadn't since I'd met them. They'd shifted my feelings into fifth gear and never let me look back. All I could do was pray that they stayed safe until they were done. I had to pray that the McManuses somehow kept themselves all safe and alive…

I prayed a lot these days. A lot…

Sighing a final time and collecting myself, I grabbed the handles of my luggage and meandered to the rental car place. I'd been given a supply of starting money for a home, transportation, and new clothes as per the agreement. All I had to my name were my carry-on and one big rolling luggage filled with the books I couldn't part with. I hadn't the faintest idea where I was going to live but I had a bit before fall classes started at the university in Dublin.

That thought did at least make me smile a little. To prolong my moment of happiness, I put my nose to the large black pea coat I always wore. It still smelled of McManus. Not as much as it once did but still enough.

I was going home. As scared as I was at being dropped in a new country all on my own and depressed that they weren't with me, it just somehow felt like I was going home. The only explanation I'd been able to come up with was that I was going to their home.

Everything Connor, Murphy, and Da had told me about their hometown was going to become real. I could see the church they always went to. I could visit their Uncle Siebel's bar, The Anvil, and compare it to McGinty's. I could find out where in the hell that name came from. I could somehow find the courage to go to their house and perhaps even meet their Ma. It would be interesting to meet her. They'd been comparing me to her forever…

I didn't know when I'd started needing them so much, but now I did. Trying to not care was impossible, so I didn't waste the energy. I didn't have the motivation to anyway. My life was scary. I could never go back to my home of Boston. Fuck, I could never go back to the United States in all probability either. Yet, it was strangely enough that I was going to their home. I couldn't have them so at least I could have their past.

I knew I sounded like one of those teenage girls who always had to have a boyfriend to depend on; one that needed a man to define herself. I'd never been like that before—I'd been too shy to talk to a man let alone let one define me—and I still wasn't sure that was what had happened to me. Instead, it was just that no matter all that had happened, the McManuses—Conn, Murphy, and Da—had become my family. They made me feel like myself and they loved me for it.

Reaching the car service, I politely made the attendant repeat himself three times until I finally caught everything he said. Note to self: work on heavy accents. I could understand Murph, Connor, and Da without even noticing the accent most of the time I was so used to it. I even had a pretty native-sounding accent myself when I wanted, certain words having crept into my vocabulary, which was good. I had to be born and bred Irish. It was the heavy accents I reeled at, especially when they talked fast. People I couldn't understand all the time, but thankfully the road signs I could. My Irish Gaelic was fine, not quite fluent but adequate for the time being.

In fact, it was Irish Gaelic that started the whole thing…