The Nightside of the Country

by Meaghan Delahunt

  ✳

  THE TRUTH IS WHAT WE’RE AFTER

  This is the last time, although I don’t know it will be the last time, but when we get close to the house, something is not right. Something is different. I see the men are already there. A hand draws the curtain in the front room as we pull up. A light is on and figures arrange themselves behind the curtain, like a shadow play. This is new. This has me worried. It’s 4 am and there’s extra cars outside the flat. And everything seems unfamiliar. I see the neighbourhood and the new graffiti on the wall opposite and try to work out exactly where I am. I’m disoriented. I look at my cousin, the outline of her face hard in the streetlight. She gives nothin away.

  I start to say the Hail Mary, just to calm myself. I say it in Latin, like the nuns taught us. I say this under my breath as we walk up the path and my cousin says: Our Lady is of no help to ye now.

  And then, I’m inside and it’s the usual. The kettle on. The radio turned low. The Big Man and The Short Man, smoking. Then another Man knocks and lets himself in and I think I’m going to fall or drop through the floor, unable to move and stay there, forever on that floor.

  It’s herself, says X, The Enforcer. He grins as he says this.

  And the power of speech deserts me. We’re face to face. For the first time since and I feel the eyes of The Big Man and The Short Man and my cousin, trying to gauge my reaction. Trying to see if what I’ve said all these months is the truth. Trying, after all this time, to read my body language.

  The Big Man’s voice: At the end of the day, the truth is what we’re after, B, just the simple truth. Just a wee chat now…

  They’re arranging the kitchen chairs. I’m opposite X and they’re all in a line: X, my cousin, the Big Man, the Short Man. There’s my judge and jury right there, all in a row.

  That’s the truth of this moment.

  It’s me in the dock? Now I can’t help myself. You all on one side and me on the other?

  The smartarse, says X, losing it for a moment. The clever clogs. Thinks she’s so fuckin clever…

  Shut up, says my cousin. Just shut up. Let’s get this over with.

  The Enforcer – X – sits there, as if butter wouldn’t melt, starts to talk of his kids and his wife and his nephews and nieces and Father Docherty, as if what he done never happened.

  Come now, says the Short Man. Tell us, B. Your version of events. We’re all ears. At this, the Big Man and my cousin and X all laugh.

  I’ve told you before. Over and over, the same thing I’ve been tellin ye. I bite my lip.

  But this is different.

  I look over at X, The Enforcer. I look him square in the eye. It’s torture, is what it is…I was active in the Youth organisation, I start off, same as always. And I used to babysit for…I cannot say his name. Now, I can’t even look at him. I keep my eyes low.

  And…my cousin prompts.

  Some nights I stayed over. I’d be sleepin on the couch. He’d come in late with his wife…

  So, his wife was there. This is what ye’re sayin…The Big Man takes charge.

  His wife was upstairs. She was often upstairs…

  And ye’re tellin us with the weans and a wife upstairs…

  Yes…

  The Big Man snorts. He leans forward. Ye’re sayin…?

  Yes.

  With four weans and a wife…?

  He’d come for me…

  Just like that? The Short Man says.

  More than once.

  And still ye went back? For the job and all. Even though he came for ye? You expect us to believe…

  He told me what he’d do. To the family. To me…he has a reputation.

  Ah, the young girls. Go daft for a man with a reputation, so they do. This, from The Short Man.

  But The Enforcer, X, is shifting in his seat, he looks off to the left, he looks uncomfortable. I raise my eyes and note all this. And who the hell is checkin his body language?

  Some girls like the attention, The Big Man agrees and X smiles and nods away at him. It’s a well-known fact.

  That it is, says The Short Man, pleased that his observation is confirmed.

  The Big Man snorts.

  Not that kind of attention, I say. And, after the first time, I never worked nights. Thought I’d be safe in the day. But I thought wrong. One time he comes home early from the football and his wife still at the park with the older ones and the wean asleep in the afternoon…

  And ye never cried out or made a sound?

  And wake the baby?

  X laughs. Wake the baby?

  I wanted it to be over. He knew what he was doing was wrong. I wanted it to be over, I repeat. When I saw him outside, after Mass, in the street, he was nice as pie and I knew it’d always be my word against his and then I got…

  Ye got sent away…

  I got pregnant.

  Ye got sent away. And now ye’re sayin it was his? The Big Man points to X.

  Yes.

  At this, X leans forward: Don’t come the innocent. All them boys sniffin round. We all seen it. No innocent, is what I’m sayin…

  The Big Man laughs. A pretty girl, right enough.

  The Short Man says, A bitch on heat, more like…

  The men laugh. My cousin frowns. That’s enough, she says, sharpish. She doesn’t laugh along with them. There was that boyfriend, Declan, wasn’t it?

  Declan had nothin to do with it.

  The Big Man clears his throat. So’s what ye’re sayin here is – you admit ye were no innocent. But here ye fit up a good man, a family man, to cover for yer own mistake…

  I turn to the Big Man and point to X. He knew what he was doing. There was no mistake.

  Ah. So, it’s rape now, says my cousin in a flat voice.

  I’ve told ye from the start, what it was.

  The Enforcer, X, leans forward, his face red, raises his voice: She tempted me! A temptress, so she is. She’d wait up. I’d be havin a drink or two, who doesn’t take a drink…? and she’d be lyin on the couch, all spread out there and for sure, I’d kiss her on the cheek, a goodnight kiss and a hug, perhaps, like she was my niece or somethin…

  Ha. I almost spit at him. I pity yer poor fuckin niece…

  The mouth on it, says The Short Man and rolls his eyes at my cousin. No feckin innocent…

  X then is up on his feet, leaning over the table, his fist in my face: Fuckin some little liar you. I should’ve strangled ye on the spot…

  Shut up, The Big Man says. Shut up, the both of ye. Sit down, you, he addresses X, who is still up on his feet, his hands balled into fists. Instinctively, I roll myself up in the chair, knees up, away from him.

  It’s her word against mine, says The Enforcer. And ye’re goin to believe that? He points at me in disgust. A wee slut like that?

  My cousin turns around in her chair to face him. So. Let’s get this straight, now. Ye’d take a drink and then come home, the wife’d go upstairs and then ye’d be huggin the baby-sitter here like she was yer niece and then straight to yer bed?

  Most times. That’s about it.

  Not every time?

  Sometimes we’d be sittin and chattin, like. She was soft on me. Young girls can go daft on a fella, an older fella, like. He nods over at the Short Man for confirmation. It’s a well-known fact.

  Is it? says my cousin, sitting back, taking the measure of him, as if for the first time. Is it now?

  No need for the tone, says The Big Man to my cousin. Fair’s fair…

  My cousin holds up a hand, palm out, as if conceding a point. Fair’s fair. It’s an internal matter and we’ve to hear both sides.

  And so the early morning gave way to the afternoon. Then it got dark outside and the lamplight seeped through the curtains and out into the street. The light seeped out of me. And X sat there with his wife and his weans and his close ties with the priest all arrayed in front of him, like medals he could pin on his chest, medals so big he could hide behind. The medals and uniform of The Family Man. The H
ard Man. The Movement Enforcer. But here in that safe house, there he was playing victim. I was to blame, he said. For everything. I led him astray. At the end of it all my cousin drove me home, as usual. Her knuckles were white at the wheel. Her jaw tense. She kept silent all the way.

  As we draw up to the house, as I’m struggling with the seat belt and the car door, after ten hours of questions, with no food or drink, she leans across and helps me with the seatbelt, opens the door handle for me. She’s never done this before. She’s almost solicitous. Almost kind. For the first time in many months I sense she has somethin to say and I steady myself.

  I believe you, she says, looking straight ahead as she opens the car door: I believe all of it.

  ✳

  20

  Write clear and hard about what hurts.

  That’s Hemingway, right? B reads the words out loud, turning the page on its side. That’s what ye’ve wrote in the margins. That’s what it says?

  That’s right. You’re a little embarrassed by these scrawls at the edge; these notes to yourself.

  Hemingway? Now ye’re tryin to scare me.

  I’m not trying to scare you, not at all.

  A man with a gun?

  Aimed at himself.

  And a few rhino.

  You laugh. There is that.

  You both stay silent for a while.

  Imagine it now, B says, a faraway look on her face. tapping the page. Today. In the twenty-first century? A famous male writer with a dead animal. A wild animal he’s just shot…all over social media…

  Impossible…

  There’s the Royal Family for that malarkey.

  Exactly. But with that quote, he had a point, you say. He was on to something…

  All very well, B interrupts. All very moving, I’m sure. But could he walk the walk? No. He couldn’t write clear about what hurts. He got trapped – the self-created hard man – there was no way out. And he was queer as they come… that’s the tragedy…

  That’s true. But tell me. Does it still hurt?

  Not so much, she says, and you can see you’ve caught her a little off-balance. When I see it down like that, the story, what happened, in black-and-white. Not so much. And that comes as a surprise.

  So, she believed you, your cousin? After everything?

  Yes, she says. After all that.

  It’s harder when they don’t. Believe you, support you. Women, I mean.

  Because ye expect it from a man, B shrugs. From certain men, at any rate. But from a woman, B shakes her head. Betrayal always comes as a shock – a stake through the heart – somethin like that. But – getting back to the Old Salt. Old Hemingway. At this late stage? It makes me feel… then she brightens up. Maybe he’s the man who comes here, maybe he’s the man who …

  I wish it were that simple, you say.

  After the New York Times article about X, after your own essay about X and The Institution, after all these weeks, your ex-student, the mentee on the programme, still hasn’t responded to any texts or emails. In fact, there’s been no contact since the night you urged against a quote from X for her novel. You acted on intuition and your intuition proved correct. There was more than one woman. And you’ve been worried about your mentee’s silence ever since.

  You had good reason to worry.

  On the day after the call from The Man from HR, you get an email from The Agency. It informs you that your mentee has terminated the contract with you. They give no explanation. You sit there, stunned. You’ve known this ex-student for a decade. You’ve known her longer than X has. You’ve written her countless references, supplied quotes, fully endorsed her work. She is talented and you don’t regret any of the support. But you feel wounded. You feel as if she has run through you with a knife.

  The ex-student had two mentors all this time, something you didn’t quite grasp. You’d underestimated X and men like him. The extent to which X and men like him also use women as human shields, as a cover for their behaviour. Your ex-student has been used as a such a shield, whether she realises this or not. The predator will always act in this manner. First, he parades wives and daughters, female colleagues, female friends. That is the first line of defence. Then he moves out from there. W, for example, cultivated older, more famous women to cover for his assaults on younger, less powerful women. When it comes down to it, your ex-student, like The Man from HR, like The Professor at The Institution, like X himself, is prepared to throw the woman – in this case, you – under the bus. When it comes down to it, your ex-student values the mentorship and support of the predator, the alleged rapist, the harasser – The Man – above anything you can give.

  A driver will always have an accomplice. Sometimes more than one.

  Sometimes, uncomfortable as it is to admit, that accomplice will be a woman. It hurts you to write that sentence. But you understand that there must’ve been times when you’ve also played that role. Unconsciously. But still. Perhaps, inevitably, all women, at some point, collude with men who have power. It’s a survival strategy – the culture rewards such behaviour. You do not blame your mentee. You try to keep your fire directed at X and The Professor and The Man from HR but you struggle. It’s difficult because women are always the easy target. And you’re tempted by the easy target because you’re angry and upset by your mentee’s behaviour. You keep reminding yourself that women are not immune to the broader cultural messages: the man is the genius; the man deserves more; the man knows best.

  In this overwhelmingly male world, a man’s help and support will always get a woman further than help and support from another woman.

  You know these facts as intimately as you know a punch to the face.

  You wake, distressed, from a dream. Feeling heavy in the chest, sore at the throat. In the dream, you meet up with your ex-mentee again in a restaurant which has only a few tables, across many levels. You’re the only people there. You shake hands with each other, very formally. She has a present for you, she says, handing you a box – the box itself is white – with a lid which glitters black. You open the box and inside are pieces of multicoloured card and tinsel and paper of different shapes. Some of the paper and cards have handwritten messages, which you can’t decipher. You ask, What is it? And she replies: A treasure hunt.

  But there is no treasure, you say to her. You don’t know how you know this.

  There is no treasure, she repeats, smiling.

  She vanishes and you’re left with the pieces of paper and the white box with the black glitter lid.

  When you wake from this dream, you feel bereft. You feel betrayed. This will take some time to get over. This too shall pass, you say to yourself, trying to be philosophical, trying to be Zen. Trying to flow with the wash of your own life, the Tao, even. But anger fizzes through from the dream into waking life: A bloody treasure hunt? What you’re left with is bits of paper and word scraps. A box of things.

  Where is the treasure? you keep wanting to know. Where is the treasure in all this?

  The answer to that particular question proves elusive. But some months later, you realise that you now have the answer to another question, the one you asked yourself, back before you took on X and The Institution and The Professor. What have you got to lose ? The answer comes as a shock: a lot . You’ve lost a friendship and you’ve been mourning that. But there is also an economic cost here. You’ve lost this particular contract, which means you’ve lost money, as a result of X’s actions. He is a millionaire with financial security. You, however, are a self-employed writer who cannot afford to lose any work. You are not compensated for this loss. The Agency assures you that this is a special situation, that of course you are still on their books. They allow you to put your side of the case. You send them the article about X, including a link to the New York Times investigation. In a telephone call, you tell them exactly what happened with X and your mentee. They are sympathetic, but you lose that contract. Two years later, you still do not have another.’

  ✳

>   21

  For several years after the assault, I’m highly anxious. More than that. I suffer breathing difficulties and flashbacks and night terrors. Still now, three decades on, when anxious or under stress, my mind flashes to the assault and I find it hard to breathe or sleep. After The Fall of W; after writing about the Party Leader as predator, and about my own assault; after writing about X and The Institution; after the threat of litigation and the loss of the mentorship, I’m plunged back into those feelings.

  As anyone diagnosed with post-traumatic stress can tell you, the symptoms lie just below the surface, waiting, like objects under ice, waiting for the thaw to reveal all; waiting for the ice to crack. The symptoms can be triggered by something very small or seemingly insignificant: a sign for a guard dog or Neighbourhood Watch for example. Such a sign in French, on the Greek island of Santorini, on holiday, ten years after, for example. The trigger can ruin your (holi) day, your week, your life. I have regular panic attacks for at least five years after the assault and pain around the collarbone and base of the throat. In my mid to late 20s? I develop an eating disorder. As if I could starve and exercise myself away to nothing; make myself as invisible and therefore as invulnerable as possible. For the first few months after the assault I’d start to shake or cry if I saw a lone man walking towards me, or worse, running towards me. Even in daylight. Even on a busy street. It didn’t matter whether or not other people were around. There was always the fear that a lone man in the street would not walk past. A man in the street, like a lone dog in the street, was always unpredictable.

  If I ever found myself on an empty street and saw a man ahead walking or running my way, I’d have to immediately cross over and try to get somewhere safe. If I could not cross the street in time I’d stand still and press myself flat against the nearest wall, or run into the nearest doorway, or press myself up against a shop window, head down, heart heavy, waiting for the threat to pass. I spent years of my life doing this. Still, today, sometimes, I have to fight the urge to run, if I find myself alone on a street with a man walking in my direction.