Has Kathleen really just said what I think she said? She’s destroyed Joe’s confession? There’s nothing to show the police? Nothing to help Alex? I feel as if I might be sick.
‘What do you mean?’ I hear Ciara ask as I try to fight the nausea in the pit of my stomach.
‘What I mean,’ Kathleen says, ‘is that I have burned whatever it was my brother wrote about things he said he did in his past.’
‘But why would you do that?’ Ciara asks.
I can hear the disbelief, the pain, in her voice.
‘It’s all very simple,’ Kathleen says.
She’s trying to maintain a façade of cold indifference, but I see that she is trembling.
‘I saw the things he had written. That “confession” of his. And there was no way I was risking anyone else reading that.’
I can’t hide the horrified look on my face.
‘No!’ Ciara says, shaking her head. ‘No, you can’t have done that. You’d no right to do that!’
‘Had I not?’ Kathleen asks. ‘Do you think I want everyone and his mother talking about my brother in that way? I don’t care if he’s dead, I won’t have people saying he was some kind of pervert.’
‘He was more than a pervert,’ Ciara says. ‘He was a monster. He hurt us. Me. Heidi. Abused us. Raped us!’ The last two words are shouted.
Raped us. The words out loud have a powerful effect on me. Like a punch in the stomach but one that releases all the hurt and anger that has just about been contained over the years. My fists clench. Tears run freely down my face, but I don’t care any more. I am not ashamed. I will not be ashamed any more.
And at that moment I see a flicker of something on Kathleen’s face. I can’t miss it. She’s not that good at hiding her feelings. And it all slots into place.
‘You already knew,’ I say, my voice little more than a whisper.
‘What?’ Ciara says. ‘No, she didn’t.’
‘She did,’ I say.
Guilt is written all over Kathleen’s face. People will ask questions. People will want to know how he managed to keep it a secret. Except he hadn’t kept it a secret, after all. One person knew, and that person, rather than confronting him and stopping it all, moved away to England and left me, left us, to our fate.
‘Didn’t you, Kathleen? You knew, all those years ago. You knew and you did nothing to stop it. We were just children and you let him do that to us. You’re as bad as he was.’
Kathleen colours. For the first time the swagger she had when she came into the house leaves her.
‘I … I …’
‘No,’ Ciara says. ‘That can’t be true. ‘She would’ve stopped it, wouldn’t you?’ She’s addressing Kathleen now.
‘I did stop it!’ Kathleen says. ‘Or I tried. I thought he did. I thought I’d got through to him. I told him … told him I knew what he was doing and I’d go to the police. Or worse, I’d get the boys onto him. They’d have sorted him out. He was terrified of that, terrified he’d get his knees done. Or a bullet to the back of the head. Said he’d stop. Said he’d never do it again.’
Ciara’s face is rigid with shock. She sits down, head in her hands. She looks like she might be sick.
‘And you took the word of a liar?’ I ask, but I don’t need her to answer. I know the answer. I know that the fear of a bullet to the head, or years in prison branded a nonce, weren’t enough to stop him and his twisted ‘compulsion’. ‘Maybe if you’d stayed, eh? Maybe if you hadn’t left and gone to England.’
‘You can’t blame me for it!’ she says. ‘That’s not fair.’
‘Not fair?’ Ciara is shouting now. ‘Not fair? Are you serious? You were the only person who had the power to make sure it never happened again and you abdicated your responsibility. So yes, we can blame you and it’s perfectly fair. And more than that, you destroyed evidence that proved what he did! Jesus Christ, Kathleen. Coming in here and talking about fair. You’ve no idea what you’ve done.’
‘I believed he would stop,’ Kathleen says, crying now. ‘He knew he had so much to lose. He knew he was doing the wrong thing. And he was my big brother, and I loved him. I needed to believe in him.’
‘You left him in sole charge of a vulnerable female child!’ Ciara shouts. ‘You knew what he was capable of and you never thought to get Heidi out of there.’
‘Well, neither did you! You knew as well, Ciara. You knew what he did to you!’
‘I was a child myself!’ Ciara shouts again, crossing the room and pointing her finger directly at Kathleen. Jabbing it towards her, pressing it against her collarbone.
I can see her hand curl into a fist. She is trembling with anger.
‘You! You were the grown-up. You were the person with the power. But instead you cleared off. Lived your life without a thought of what might have been going on here. You could just pretend it had stopped because it was easier for you to do that than to face what your brother had done. You’re disgusting,’ she screams, and there is no other word for it, into her aunt’s face.
I see a fleck of spittle shoot from her mouth, landing on Kathleen’s face. Kathleen looks as if she, too, might throw up. She can’t move. She is pressed back against the sofa and Ciara is looming over her. I want to reach out and take Ciara’s hands, the way she stilled mine earlier.
I’ve seen her lose her temper before, but this? This is a whole new level of anger. I’m not quite sure what she would be capable of but I’m determined that Kathleen will not be coming out of this situation as a victim.
She could never be a victim. What she did – or didn’t do – is unforgivable.
It was bad enough what he did. But to have someone who could’ve stopped it, who chose not to? That was a different level of cruelty. I wonder how many times she’d seen me flinch when he stood too close. How many times she’d heard me crying. I wonder what had crossed her mind all those times she had soothed me, told me I had to be brave. Was she making excuses for him? Had she been as complicit in all of this as he was?
‘Ciara,’ I say gently and she looks at me, and it’s as if she is coming out of her trance. Is aware of her position, her anger. Knows how close she is to losing control.
She steps back and I see Kathleen sag with relief that the immediate threat to her has passed.
Ciara takes a deep breath. ‘You stupid, selfish bitch! You let him get away with it then,’ Ciara says, her tone measured but no less intimidating, ‘and by burning his confession, you’re letting him get away with it now. And you’ve taken away the evidence we need to help Alex!’
‘What on earth has Alex got to do with any of this?’ she asks, blinking at us.
‘Alex had the balls to do what you didn’t,’ Ciara says and I crumple at the mention of his name.
My Alex. My husband. Sitting with the police now.
‘Alex made sure he was punished for it. Alex made sure he was dead,’ Ciara adds.
Kathleen blinks in my direction, taking in the expression on my face. She turns her gaze to Ciara.
‘What are you talking about?’ she asks and her voice is heavy with bewilderment.
‘Alex, my Alex,’ I say as evenly as I can. ‘He told us this morning. He was with Joe when he died. He found him unwell and …’ I can’t say the rest. I can’t bring myself to have someone, especially not Kathleen, judge Alex.
‘And what?’ Kathleen asks.
Ciara continues. ‘He didn’t call for help. He chose not to. He saw the diary and he was so upset, so angry, he let my father die.’ Ciara’s voice is devoid of emotion. She is not upset with Alex. She’s not angry with him. ‘He’s with the police now. Making a statement about it all.’
‘They took him away,’ I blurt, thinking of his stricken face as he climbed into the back of the police car.
Kathleen is shaking her head. ‘That’s impossible,’ she says.
‘It’s all too possible. Those two officers, King and Black or whatever their names are. They cautioned him and he left with him.’
Kathleen is still shaking her head. I want to rattle her. To grab her by the shoulders and scream in her face that it’s her fault, just like Ciara screamed in her face.
‘No. Not that. I’m not talking about the police. I’m talking about Joe. It’s impossible he was still alive when Alex went into the room.’
She looks stricken. Panicked for the first time in all of this. Her eyes dart between Ciara and me.
‘He was dead. He was definitely dead when I left the room. I made sure of it,’ she stutters.