The Things We Know Now

by Catherine Dunne

  Sometimes back then – rarely – Rebecca would join us; far less frequently than she does now. The problem was, I think, that once Adam walked out of her life, our still intact families put Rebecca on the defensive. Any mention of husbands and fathers made her go all stiff and silent. I think she regarded both of us as insufferably smug. Or maybe that’s just how I interpreted her silences. I think I felt it more than Sophie. Sophie tends to keep her own counsel: she is often surprised by my interpretation of things.

  Once, she told me to stop being such a fixer. The thing is, I knew exactly how she meant it, and instead of being hurt or annoyed, I laughed. The three of us are easier together now, although Sophie and I still occasionally meet – just the two of us. Some habits are hard to break. We don’t tell Rebecca, though. I suppose, overall as sisters go, things are good between all of us.

  I worry about the future, too. About my sons, about all our children. Sometimes, when I remember Daniel on the night of his thirteenth birthday, the night he played the violin with such haunting presence, I feel something clutch at my heart. I cannot believe that such a life force has been snuffed out so brutally.

  It makes me hover around Tom and Jack, and I know it drives them nuts. But what can I do?

  Tonight, I’ll also see Sylvia and Edward again. That is always something to look forward to. Such a lovely girl. And Dad and Ella continue to be so kind to both of them.

  That’s what I mean about Dad. About his becoming a kinder person. He once claimed he didn’t believe in altruism. But when Edward began studying for his Leaving Cert, he had a really tough time. His younger brothers drove him to distraction. There was no peace from them, no escape, no quiet places. So he came to Dad and Ella’s instead. He didn’t stay, but he did take over one of the spare bedrooms at their invitation and made it into his study. Edward is a scrupulous student. Serious, hardworking. Dad took him under his wing, quietly, unobtrusively, saying he needed a bit of help now and again in the garden. It gave everyone a dignified solution. Edward hopes to study structural engineering at university – and this delights Dad.

  A fine young man, my father says. The brother Daniel never had.

  Ella

  ELLA IS READY.

  She has watched the slow creep of the legal process over the last three and a half long years, the obstacles put in its way. Although she has never told Patrick this, Ella knows that there have been murmurings locally, flashes of dissension, the occasional declaration that ‘boys will be boys’. It hurts: the manner in which some have intimated that perhaps Daniel had somehow contributed to his own death. That his nature had made him culpable in some obscure way.

  Ella has kept all of this secret from her husband; he has been purposeful again and she does not want to cloud his determination with rage. Instead, she has watched as Rebecca and Patrick together have become a force to be reckoned with. The delays, the false steps, the obstructions: all have been grist to their united and passionate mill.

  She remembers the day when the Guards came to remove the computers from their house. They arrived late, by arrangement, just a woman and a man, in a discreet, unmarked car.

  ‘My name is April,’ the woman said to her, holding out her hand. ‘I’ll be your liaison officer. I’ll keep you up to date with everything that’s happening.’

  Ella accompanied April and her colleague, Mark, to Daniel’s bedroom. She watched as first they bagged his computer, his iPhone, then her and Patrick’s laptops. She felt choked all that night, unable to breathe or speak. Somehow, the clinical nature of tamper-proof bags, and their removal from her home, told her beyond doubt that Daniel was not coming back.

  Ella knew that other houses had been visited in a similar way and their technology removed: the whole town knew that, the news spreading instantly, insistently. During those days, Ella and Patrick stayed close to home. Maryam came and went constantly, bringing meals, shopping, the occasional news update.

  Some days later, April called again. She sat at the table, at Ella’s invitation. Patrick made tea.

  ‘I have something you may wish to hear, or not. It’s up to you.’

  Ella remembers the way that she and Patrick stared at her.

  April touched a folder in front of her. ‘There are several text messages for Daniel on his phone, sent to him after he died.’ Her tone was gentle, ready for their questions. For a moment, the silence in the conservatory was absolute.

  Ella looked at her, not understanding. ‘What do you mean?’

  April took some pages out of the green folder. ‘Teenagers do this. It’s as if they don’t understand the finality of death. They do the same with Facebook pages – send messages as though people who are no longer alive can still receive them.’

  Ella’s stomach shifted. The base of her throat felt sour. ‘What do they say?’ She could see Patrick about to move in her direction, ready to stop whatever might be coming next.

  ‘They are all benign,’ April said at once. ‘All very loving. I’m sorry – I should have said that at the outset. They are from Daniel’s friends: none of the phone numbers of origin matches those of the bullies. I thought you might like to have them.’ She stopped for a moment. ‘Shall I leave them with you, or would you prefer me to take them away?’

  Ella looked over at Patrick. His eyes had filled. There was no question of not having them. ‘Leave them, please. Thank you.’

  They read them together after April left. Ella sometimes wonders whether that was a mistake. The way they broke her husband that day still haunts her.

  But now it is Patrick’s birthday and everyone is waiting. Ella has been happily occupied all day. The children have kept her company, wrapping small gifts and hiding them for the ritual treasure hunt that has always been part of Granddad’s party. She does not want to think about the advancing years, not this evening.

  Patrick will make his announcement tonight. He and she will face the coming weeks together. She will be by his side, always.

  There is nowhere else she wants to be, ever.

  Patrick and Ella

  I WILL BE BRIEF.

  Today is here at last. I know that our guests are expectant, and I will not keep them in suspense. I will not disappoint them. I think, that no matter what happens over the coming weeks, my story has reached its conclusion. Ella agrees.

  Less than a month ago, we received the communication for which we have been waiting for so long. The ups and downs of this exhausting, interminably distressing legal process no longer matter. What does matter is that the director of public prosecutions has finally decided that there is a case to answer. Starting next week, Ella and I will face our son’s tormentors in court.

  Jason MacManus, Jeremy Toolin and James McNamara. Leo Byrne is one of our witnesses. Such ordinary-sounding names. Such innocent vowels and consonants. We want to spare Sylvia and Edward if we can, but they have made it clear that they are ready if needed. I think they both want to do this one last thing for Daniel.

  The sheer weight of evidence against Jason is significant. We have, I believe, a good case. The others I am not so concerned about: it is the mastermind I want to see punished. The one who did what he did simply because he could.

  And Ella was right. She said we would meet with some resistance, here in this community. She has told me of the silence of Leo’s mother, for example, when she collected her son that first evening. The evening when Leo confessed. Ella remembers that there was something in the way the woman looked at her that made her feel her unspoken support. Later, Mrs Byrne sought Ella out, but quietly, discreetly.

  ‘Mrs Grant,’ she said, ‘we’re not from here, and I’ve been told that we don’t understand how things are done.’ She looked at Ella, steadily. Her voice never wavered. ‘I want you to know that we’ve come under some pressure not to speak out, but my son knows right from wrong. I want you to know that.’

  And then she disappeared just as quickly as she’d arrived. We mulled it over afterwards, Ella and I. We never found
out exactly what she meant – and by then it no longer mattered anyway – but we suspected Fintan MacManus’s hand in whatever Mrs Byrne and Leo had suffered. We weren’t surprised – which is not to say that we weren’t extremely grateful to her. It’s hard to put your head above the parapet: in a family, in a school, in a community. I have a fair idea of what that courage must have cost her.

  And so, next month, we’ll go to court. I am ready to hear what I know I must hear, all over again. In recent months, my strength has all but failed me. My courage, too. But Rebecca has kept me going. And Ella, of course. Always Ella.

  As I suspected, Ella has channelled all her energies in a new direction, ever since we lost Daniel. She visits schools, talks to students, trains teachers in the art of discernment. I have seen the way they listen to her: she tells stories that might be of Daniel, or that might not, but all of them illustrate the need to seek out the bully, to stop the torment before it exercises its murderous grip. Her helper in all of this is Maryam. A quiet presence; a woman made of conviction. She has even won over her husband to her new role. I am filled, again, with admiration for all of them.

  Although I feel profoundly tired today, I also feel the distinct creep of new steel into my spine. Getting dressed for this party downstairs, I have just now stood up straighter. I have settled my jacket more firmly around me. I feel my old sense of purpose stalking me, somewhere in this room. I feel that we will meet again, sometime in the coming days. I am ready.

  I fix the cuffs of my shirt one last time.

  The door to the bedroom opens. Ella stands on the landing, smiling. She has already dressed, has already been busy downstairs with champagne and finger food and the surprise parcels that the children like to hide.

  ‘Ready?’ she says. ‘Everyone’s here.’

  I nod. ‘Ready indeed.’ And I stride towards her, upright, confident, determined.

  ‘You look very nice, Mr Grant,’ she says. She kisses me.

  I hold out my arm to her. I bow. ‘Madam,’ I say. ‘Allow me.’ And I escort her down the stairs.

  Ella holds onto his arm as they descend the stairs to the hallway. She is filled with all the resonances of the evening. A beginning, an ending. Her heart is full.

  Earlier that afternoon, she watched the birds get ready to fly south. They were later than usual – maybe the last of the stragglers. Their presence in the garden reminded her all over again of her father, and her son. She remembers, in particular, Daniel’s return from one of his many visits to the bird sanctuary.

  ‘He’s very knowledgeable,’ Patrick had said when they joined her in the kitchen. He laid one proud hand on his son’s shoulder. ‘I’ve promised to take him to Mazamet in the South of France next year, if he’s still keen.’

  ‘I’ll be keen, Dad,’ Daniel had said eagerly. ‘I’ll always be keen. And look, Mum – the notebook you gave me is almost full already.’ He opened the laminated cover of the notebook she had given him for his birthday, showed her the tidy lines of writing, all done in a neat and steady hand. Beside his notes, he’d drawn sketches of the birds he’d seen: quick, darting black lines that seemed to catch each bird in flight.

  That evening, over dinner, she told him all the collective names for birds that she could remember: the same ones her father had taught her, all those years ago. An exaltation of larks. A flight of swallows. A murder of crows.

  An unkindness of ravens.

  She holds tight onto her husband’s hand now and enters the waiting conservatory. Everything is ready.

  Patrick squeezes her hand and draws her with him into that bright circle where their family is waiting.

  ALSO BY CATHERINE DUNNE

  In the Beginning

  A Name for Himself

  The Walled Garden

  Another Kind of Life

  Something Like Love

  At a Time Like This

  Set in Stone

  Missing Julia

  An Unconsidered People

  First published 2013 by Macmillan

  This electronic edition published 2013 by Macmillan

  an imprint of Pan Macmillan, a division of Macmillan Publishers Limited

  Pan Macmillan, 20 New Wharf Road, London NI 9RR

  Basingstoke and Oxford

  Associated companies throughout the world

  www.panmacmillan.com

  ISBN 978-1-4472-3802-7 EPUB

  Copyright © Catherine Dunne 2013

  The right of Catherine Dunne to be identified as the author of this work has been asserted by her in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988.

  You may not copy, store, distribute, transmit, reproduce or otherwise make available this publication (or any part of it) in any form, or by any means (electronic, digital, optical, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise), without the prior written permission of the publisher. Any person who does any unauthorized act in relation to this publication may be liable to criminal prosecution and civil claims for damages.

  A CIP catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library.

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