Keelin had long been accustomed to watching the men in her life. Every morning she watched Henry, trying to measure the temperature of his mood, twisting her spine so she could mould herself into whatever shape he needed her to take that day. She was always conscious of where her husband was in the room at any given time, counting how many steps he was away from her, estimating how long it would take her to reach the nearest door. She even slept facing him, a trick she had learned during her first marriage, to give herself a head start if she needed to run in the middle of the night.
But she had watched Alex too, from the moment he was born. She would stare at him for hours, looking to see whose face was forming out of his bones, if she would see herself reflected there or Mark. She had been afraid she would find his father in him, that he would become prone to fits of rage, lashing out with his fists. But he did neither. He could be needy, clingy, he was often possessive of Keelin, but he was a gentle boy, most of the time. Ná bíodh imní ort, Cáit would say to her, but Keelin couldn’t help but worry about Alex. He was twenty-seven years of age now, an adult, and still she watched him. Still she worried.
‘Did you order something from . . . ASOS?’ Henry asked her. Keelin was sitting in bed, listening to a podcast called Indestructible, first-person stories about women thriving after domestic abuse, something she would have gladly recommended to her clients, if she had any left. She pressed pause, waiting for her husband to repeat his question. ‘There’s a charge here from a website called ASOS,’ he said, holding up a credit-card statement. ‘We didn’t discuss you buying anything online, did we? I don’t remember giving you my Visa card.’
‘I don’t know what you’re on about,’ she said, taking out her earbuds. ‘Could it have been Evie? She probably wanted something new for the Christmas disco at school.’
‘Evie wouldn’t wear anything like that,’ he said. ‘You know she believes fast fashion is killing the planet. ‘Keelin suspected this altrusim was merely a ploy on her daughter’s behalf to persuade Henry to buy her clothes from Stella McCartney, but she said nothing. He wouldn’t hear any criticism of their daughter, not from her.
‘Anyway,’ he continued, ‘I contacted their customer services and they said the package was delivered on 6th December. Here to the island.’
‘Well, I’m sorry, Henry but it wasn’t –’ She stopped. Alex. ‘Maybe it was a mistake?’ she tried, but her husband pulled a sceptical face. He turned to leave, still clutching the statement. ‘Don’t worry about it,’ she called after him. ‘I’ll get it sorted out.’
She had given up trying to talk to him about her concerns over Alex. You told me you’d find out where he was going, she said. You promised, Henry. But her husband swore there was nothing to ‘find out’, she was just being paranoid. But what then was the reason for the changes in her son – the new clothes in the laundry basket and the haircare products in his bathroom cabinet, his cheery demeanour when she bumped into him in their small gym. ‘Fancy meeting you here,’ Alex joked when she came in, climbing off the exercise bike, grabbing a hand towel from the wicker basket to dab sweat away from his face. ‘Do you want me to adjust the seat for you?’ he asked as Keelin glanced at the screen – he had cycled twenty miles, she saw. Alex, who for so long could barely manage to walk from here to Marigold Cottage, had somehow, without her noticing, built up enough stamina to cycle twenty miles.
‘I think Alex might be seeing someone,’ she confided in Jake later that day. He’d asked Keelin to meet her in Cupán Tae, waving away her objections that her presence might put the other customers off their food. People hate Henry, Jake argued, but you’re from here, you’re one of them. Keelin didn’t know how to explain that sometimes that meant the islanders hated her even more. She took a sip of her coffee, tasting something sour, but she decided against mentioning it to Cormac, who was glaring at her from behind the counter, half-heartedly wiping the display with a grotty rag. At least it was quiet in the coffee shop today, no one to point at her, whispering, There’s your wan from the Big House, where that poor girl was found. That’s Henry Kinsella’s wife.
‘Hey,’ she said, nudging Jake’s foot under the table. ‘Are you listening to me? I said, I think Alex might have a girlfriend.’ A woman had to be the reason for her son’s behaviour. The last time he’d started taking this kind of care with his appearance had been the day Nessa Crowley had arrived at Hawthorn House, schoolbooks in hand.
‘Oh yeah?’ Jake said, picking up the jug of milk and finding it empty. He half stood, raising his hand to get Cormac’s attention, and his T-shirt pulled up to show a flash of taut abs. Keelin saw the two women at the other table looking at him and she had the sudden urge to reach across and yank his shirt down.
‘Thanks, mate,’ he said to Cormac when he brought over a new jug. Keelin smiled hopefully at the older man, but he avoided eye contact with her, retreating to his beloved counter-top as quickly as possible.
‘Have you heard anything?’ she asked, shaking off the snub as best she could.
‘Heard anything about what?’
‘About Alex.’
‘Yeah, nah.’ Jake shrugged. ‘Hey, Noah told me Henry is off to Scotland this arvo.’ What? Keelin’s head snapped up in surprise. This was news to her. Why would Henry be going to Scotland? Was he visiting his parents? Evie? ‘While he’s gone,’ Jake continued, ‘do you want to do the lighthouse trail? I can’t believe I’ve been here over six months and I still haven’t completed the full thing.’
‘I don’t know.’ Why hadn’t Henry said anything to her about leaving the island? He hadn’t gone away since the miserable expedition to London at the end of August. ‘When was Noah talking to him?’ she asked, attempting to sound casual.
‘Yesterday. Noah’s done a couple of interviews with him since, well, you know . . . Henry still refuses to talk to me.’ He grimaced. ‘Makes things a bit awkward.’
‘But you said you weren’t filming as much this week. I thought you were winding down in the run-up to Christmas.’
‘We’ve a few things we need to get done if we’re going to meet our deadline. We’re flying to England next week because we finally got a hold of Miles Darcy – he’s a tough man to pin down,’ Jake said with a laugh. Keelin nodded, trying not to look panicked at the mention of Miles, Henry’s friend from school. Gorgeous, irresistible Miles. What would he have to say about the night of the party? ‘But don’t worry,’ Jake reassured her. ‘I’ll be reviewing all the footage. You won’t be surprised by anything, OK? I’ve got you, Keelin.’
‘Thanks.’ She almost asked him about Johanna then, if her best friend had spoken to them on camera, but she wasn’t sure she wanted to hear the answer. Instead she took her fork and sliced down into the mince pie. It was cold and she looked at Cormac, wavering, but decided against asking him to heat it up, maybe add a dollop of brandy cream. He looked as if he was waiting for any excuse to throw her off the premises, and Keelin wasn’t supposed to eat pastry, not when tomorrow was weigh-in day. What the actual fuck? she imagined Johanna saying if she heard about this, but Jo wouldn’t understand, she’d always been so thin, able to eat whatever she wanted without gaining weight. Keelin was different – she needed Henry’s support with her diet. She couldn’t do this without him. She pictured his face when he jotted down the day’s number on the chart he kept tacked inside her closet, and how proud he would be if she maintained her weight. How good that would feel. ‘To be honest,’ she said, pushing the uneaten mince pie away, ‘this mystery with Alex is keeping me too occupied to think about much else. He keeps sneaking out at night-time and he’s . . . happy.’ It had been a long time since anyone had been happy in their house. ‘Are you sure you haven’t heard anything around the island? You must have interviewed every man, woman and child at this stage.’
The door to the cafe opened, a tinny bell tinkling overhead, and Jake shivered as a gust of wind snuck in, a lick of frost in the air. ‘This weather can do one,’ he said, taking his coat from the back of his chair and pulling it on again. ‘I knew Ireland was going to be cold, but it’s the damp that kills me. It gets into your bones, doesn’t it?’
‘Jake?’
‘And where is the snow? It’s December – surely there should be snow.’
‘Jake.’
‘I’ve never seen snow before,’ he said. He took a bite of his pastry, the steam rising out of it. She cut a resentful glance at Cormac, smirking behind the counter. ‘I’m going to be upset if it doesn’t snow while I’m here.’
‘Jake,’ she said again, ‘why are you avoiding the question? Do you know something that I don’t?’
‘No, I don’t,’ he replied, slamming his tea cup down on the saucer, the teaspoon rattling. ‘I just don’t feel like talking about Alex right now, if that’s OK with you. We’re always talking about him.’
‘Are we?’ she asked in surprise. She couldn’t recall talking about Alex any more than any other subject, but he was her son; it was only natural she mention him occasionally.
‘Fucking oath we are. Alex, Alex, Alex . . . I’m sick of hearing about him.’ Jake’s voice spiked and the other customers looked over, startled. That was the last thing she needed, people taking note that Keelin Kinsella was having an argument with a man who was not her husband. What would Henry say if he heard about this? She was supposed to be keeping Jake onside; it was her one job.
‘There’s no need to raise your voice.’
‘I’m not raising my voice,’ he snapped. ‘But I don’t want to sit here with someone who is supposed to be my friend –’
‘I am your friend,’ she said, her own voice higher too. She didn’t want to fight with Jake. He wasn’t supposed to get angry with her, the way Henry and Alex did, constantly competing for her love and attention, neither man ever feeling he had gotten his fair due in the end. She couldn’t seem to keep them both happy, no matter how hard she tried.
‘– and then I’m forced to spend hours talking about some ungrateful idiot who doesn’t deserve your—’
‘Hey,’ Keelin said, sitting up straight. ‘Less of the “ungrateful idiot” business, please. That’s my son you’re talking about. And Alex has been through a lot, I thought you of all people would understand that.’
He stared at her incredulously. ‘Are you actually comparing the two situations?’
‘Alex’s father was abusive as well, wasn’t he?’
‘You brought him back to the island when he was a toddler – he can’t even remember any of that. His life was a piece of piss compared to mine.’
‘He might not have been consciously aware,’ she said. ‘But it’s still an adverse childhood experience, and the research shows that—’
‘I don’t care what the research shows,’ Jake said. ‘That’s just an excuse for Alex to not get off his arse and make something of his life. He was allowed to stay on the island, living in a cottage he doesn’t pay a dollar for. He doesn’t need to worry about rent or bills or food. He—’
‘That’s not fair. He was traumatised. He found his grandmother dead in her bed. And . . . and he . . .’ She could hardly say the words. ‘Alex loved Nessa,’ she whispered. ‘What happened to her broke him. He’s never been the same since.’
‘Let me get this straight.’ Jake pinched the bridge of his nose. ‘Are you asking me to feel sorry for Alex? A teenage boy tried to root some chick way out of his league and he got burnt. Boo-fucking-hoo.’
‘Nessa Crowley is dead, isn’t she? It’s not quite your usual teen drama.’
‘You know what else isn’t quite your usual teen drama, Keelin?’ he said her name very deliberately, his eyes narrowed, furious. ‘Waking up for school on a Tuesday morning and being told by your grandpa that he has some bad news, although “bad news” doesn’t quite cover hearing that your mother is dead and it was your father who did it, just like you were always afraid he would. He murdered your two sisters too, but in a more “humane” way, according to the media, by giving them a massive dose of sedatives before slitting their throats. That the reason your father sent you to stay with your grandparents wasn’t because he was worried about your grandma’s dementia, like he told you, but because he had been planning this fucking massacre for months, and he didn’t want his “only son” to be involved, at least that’s what he wrote in the suicide note. And then I had to sit back and watch the tabloids scramble to find a reason for Lucas Taylor’s actions. He had mental-health issues! He was depressed! He’d lost his job and his sense of manhood was threatened! Anything rather than just admitting the man was an evil, misogynistic piece of shit who thought his family were his fucking property and he could do what he wanted with us.’ Jake’s hands were trembling now, but when she went to take them in her own he pulled back from her, curling them into fists in his lap. ‘You can’t expect me to feel sorry for Alex,’ he said. ‘Alex who still has his mother and doesn’t even appreciate her. Alex doesn’t know how lucky he is.’
Keelin could feel her eyes well up. ‘I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have compared you two – that was wrong of me. I don’t know what I was thinking.’
‘Just leave it,’ he said, pulling the sleeve of his jacket over the back of his hand and wiping his nose. ‘It’s just been . . . Noah says I should go home to Sydney, that this is bringing up too much stuff for me. But this is why I wanted to become a journalist in the first place. I wanted to tell these stories in the way they should be told, in a responsible way, not like what happened to my family. And the last doc was explicitly about domestic violence, much more than this one. I don’t know why it’s getting to me.’ He shifted in his chair. ‘Although,’ he said, not looking at Keelin, ‘I think it could be because you remind me a little of her.’
‘Of your mother?’ she said, surprised at how pleased she was by this. It made Jake’s protectiveness of her easier to understand, as well as his dislike of Henry, his barely concealed jealousy of her son. But she had to admit that she hadn’t done anything to discourage Jake’s growing attachment to her, ordering books from Amazon she thought he would enjoy, sending him recipes she found online, quizzing him about his love life over too many glasses of wine at Marigold Cottage, the way she wished she could with her own son. She’d always assumed Alex would bring girlfriends home, cute, smart girls who would address her as Mrs Kinsella no matter how many times she insisted they call her Keelin – Please, Mrs Kinsella reminds me of my mother-in-law. Girls who would make small talk with her until Alex said, Enough, Mam, we’re heading out now. But her son had never been like that. He’d refused to talk to her about his feelings for Nessa, the pages of his diary the only insight she’d ever received into their relationship, and that had been something she had stolen from him; it wasn’t a confidence freely given. Even today, when she suspected there was a new romance in his life, she was afraid to ask Alex outright in case she scared him off. Instead it was Jake she asked questions of, Jake she teased, all the while pretending it was her son to whom she was talking.
‘What a compliment,’ Keelin said. ‘Your mother sounded like an amazing woman.’
‘She was.’
He looked like he needed her to say something else, do something, but she wasn’t sure what it could be. Did he want Keelin to hug him? Would that be inappropriate? She took another sip of her tea, stalling.
‘After all that, I’ll take it you don’t know anything about Alex having a girlfriend,’ she joked, expecting Jake to laugh and change the subject. He would give out about how annoying Noah was, the other man’s refusal to cook, perhaps, or his inability to clean up after himself despite being almost thirty years of age. Or he might tell her about a new documentary he had watched on Netflix, his eyes shining as he explained how brilliant the director was, how provocative the storytelling, how important the subject matter, You have to watch it, Keelin – promise me you will. But he didn’t do any of those things. Instead he stood up, took out his wallet and threw a five-euro note onto the table, and he left without saying another word.
‘Jake,’ she called after him. ‘Jake, come on. I was only messing. I’m sor—’ But the door slammed shut, and he walked away, hunching his shoulders against the gusts of wind.
‘Fuck,’ she swore under her breath. She leaned her forehead against the window, listening to the patter of rain hitting the glass. Why did she always have to say the wrong thing?
Someone was beside her now, clearing his throat. Cormac, cloth in hand, wanting to get rid of her. She ignored him and sat up straight, pulling the ends of her geansaí over her hands to wipe away the condensation on the window, and it was then she saw Noah. It couldn’t have been anyone else. His rain jacket was a wine-and-yellow paisley print, his skinny jeans tucked into wine Doc Martens; there was no other man on Inisrún who would possess such clothes, let alone go outside where the neighbours could see them. He was at the pier, flanked by three islanders, helping a stooped elderly woman with a walking stick down the steps, his Nikon bag slung over his shoulder. Where was Noah Wilson going with that camera of his? Jake said they weren’t going back to the mainland until next week. Cormac coughed again and she stood up, placing a twenty-euro note on top of what Jake had left already. ‘Keep the change,’ she said, knowing full well it would infuriate the man. He would tell the next customer who came into the cafe that Keelin Ní Mhordha was in earlier, bold as brass she was, and she left twenty-five euro for a ten-euro bill. Isn’t it fine for some, she imagined him saying to anyone who would listen, all the money in the world and Brendan and Bríd left in that house, their hearts broken, only two of the Crowley Girls left in this world?
For once, Keelin didn’t care. Let them say what they wanted about her. None of them knew the truth anyway. There were so few people who knew exactly what had happened that night, and one of them was dead.