Da got fired on a regular basis, when we were kids, up until people more or less quit hiring him to begin with. Those days were nobody’s favorites, specially since he usually ended up with a week’s wages in lieu of notice. Shay said, “It gets late, he’s still not home. So Ma puts the lot of us to bed-this was when the four of us were all on the mattresses in the back bedroom, before Jackie came along and the girls went into the other room-and she’s giving out seven shades of shite: this time she’s locking the door on him, he can sleep in the gutter where he belongs, she hopes he gets bet up and run over and thrown in jail all at once. Kevin’s whingeing because he wants his daddy, fuck only knows why, and she tells him if he doesn’t shut up and go asleep, Daddy won’t come home ever again. I ask what will we do then, and she says, ‘You’ll be the man of the house; you’ll have to look after us. You’d do a better job than that bollix, anyway.’ If Kev was two, what would I have been? Eight, yeah?”
I said, “How did I know you would turn out to be the martyr in this story?”
“So Ma heads off: sweet dreams, kids. I don’t know what time of night, Da comes home and breaks the door down. Me and Carmel leg it out to the front room and he’s throwing the wedding china at the wall, one bit at a time. Ma’s got blood all down her face, she’s screaming at him to stop and calling him every name under the sun. Carmel runs and grabs hold of him, and he smacks her across the room. He starts shouting that us fucking kids have ruined his life, he ought to drown the lot of us like kittens, slit our throats, be a free man again. And believe me: he meant every word of it.”
Shay poured himself another inch of whiskey and waved the bottle at me. I shook my head.
“Suit yourself. He’s heading for the bedroom to slaughter the whole bunch of us on the spot. Ma jumps on him to hold him back and screams at me to get the babies out. I’m the man of the house, right? So I haul your arse out of bed and tell you we have to go. You’re bitching and complaining: why, I don’t want to, you’re not the boss of me… I know Ma can’t hold Da for long, so I give you a clatter, I get Kev under my arm and I drag you out of there by the neck of your T-shirt. Where was I supposed to take yous? The nearest cop shop?”
“We had neighbors. A whole shitload of them, in fact.”
The blaze of pure disgust lit up his whole face. “Yeah. Spill our family business in front of the whole Place, give them enough juicy scandal to keep them going for the rest of their lives. Is that what you would’ve done?” He knocked back a swig of booze and jerked his head, grimacing, to keep it down. “You probably would, and all. Me, I’d’ve been ashamed of my life. Even when I was eight, I had more pride than that.”
“When I was eight, so did I. Now that I’m a grown man, I have a harder time seeing where locking your little brothers in a death trap is something to be proud of.”
“It was the best bloody thing I could’ve done for yous. You think you and Kevin had a bad night? All you had to do was stay put till Da passed out and I came and got yous. I would’ve given anything to stay in that nice safe basement with yous, but no: I had to come back in here.”
I said, “So send me the bill for your therapy sessions. Is that what you want?”
“I’m not looking for any fucking pity off you. I’m just telling you: don’t expect me to go running off on a great big guilt trip because you had to spend a few minutes in the dark, once upon a time.”
I said, “Please tell me that little story wasn’t your excuse for killing two people.”
There was a very long silence. Then Shay said, “How long were you listening at that door?”
I said, “I didn’t need to listen to a single word.”
After a moment he said, “Holly’s after saying something to you.”
I didn’t answer.
“And you believe her.”
“Hey, she’s my kid. Call me soft.”
He shook his head. “Never said that. I’m only saying she’s a child.”
“That doesn’t make her stupid. Or a liar.”
“No. Gives her a great old imagination, though.”
People have insulted everything from my manhood to my mother’s genitalia and I never batted an eyelid, but the idea that I would diss Holly’s word on Shay’s say-so was starting to get my blood pressure rising again. I said, before he could spot that, “Let’s get something straight: I didn’t need Holly to tell me anything. I know exactly what you did, to Rosie and to Kevin. I’ve known for a lot longer than you think.”
After a moment Shay tilted his chair again, reached into the sideboard and brought out a pack of smokes and an ashtray: he didn’t let Holly see him smoking, either. He took his time peeling the cellophane off the packet, tapping the end of his cigarette on the table, lighting up. He was thinking, rearranging things in his mind and stepping back to take a long look at the new patterns they made.
In the end he said, “You’ve got three different things. There’s what you know. There’s what you think you know. And there’s what you can use.”
“No shit, Sherlock. So?”
