The Butterfly State

by Carol Coffey

  Dr Cosgrove had read as much literature as he could on the child’s condition but hadn’t found any of it particularly useful. He knew that some people with this condition could have bouts of rage and in the weeks she had been at the hospital, she had exhibited some aggressive behaviour but her history to date showed no sign of any serious psychiatric disturbance. Apart from her alleged crime.

  “Tess,” he said gently, “if you don’t talk to me and explain why you – why you did what you did to your father, I cannot help you to get better and return to your family.”

  Tess stared at the doctor. He was using too many words, losing her as she was still focusing on the first part of his sentence. What does he want, what’s the question?, she asked herself.

  Martin Cosgrove sighed. He had brought this child to his office almost every day for three weeks and still had not heard her speak. He was tired and frustrated and had no idea how to get through to her. He leant forward, towards the seated child, anxious not to get too close, aware that this made her uncomfortable.

  “Okay, Tess. I’ll make a deal with you. I’m going to have to be direct with you because I know you’ll understand that better. I want to help you. I need to know why you killed your father, to help you get better. I only want to know why you did it, nothing else. So, Tess, why did you kill your father?”

  Silence.

  Dr Cosgrove let out a long disappointed sigh and leaned back in the worn leather chair that had been his predecessor’s.

  “You can go now, Tess. The nurse will take you back to your room.”

  As Tess walked back to her room, only four words that Dr Cosgrove said stuck in her head.

  “You killed your father.”

  When the door of the large dormitory closed, Tess crawled under her bed and hunched there, arms wrapped around herself, humming loudly to drown out the sound of the other children and more importantly Dr Cosgrove’s words. She couldn’t understand why Dr Cosgrove and the police thought she had hurt her father.

  When she finally fell asleep she had the same dream that she had on several nights since that morning at the lake. She could see herself walking through the back door of her home. Seán and Kate looked older and were sitting in the kitchen, the hiss of a boiling kettle the only sound to be heard. Neither looked up as she passed through the house. She could not see or hear the baby. Two large coffins rested on her mother’s bed. She did not know who was in them and walked slowly towards them. But before she could look into the coffins, a hand grabbed her shoulder and spun her around, to face a man she had seen before, someone who had scared her. The dream always ended there. Tess would wake up, frightened, unable or unwilling to go back asleep. She knew that she had seen this man’s face before but did not know where. She knew she was terrified of him but did not know why.

  In the morning, Tess dressed slowly and methodically as the other children stared at her ritualistic behaviour. Tess would carefully unfold each item of clothing, all of which had been placed in the exact same order. Her cardigan would always be at the bottom of the pile, being the last item of clothing to go on. Underwear and socks always sat on top, followed by her shirt, then her skirt or a dress in summer. Shoes were always placed neatly under the bed, facing inwards. Sometimes, when the older children were sure she was asleep, they would climb out of bed and move her shoes so that the heels were facing the side of the bed, or turn her clothes pile upside down so that her cardigan was on top instead of her underwear. When Tess would wake to find her clothes disturbed a deep rage would rise from within her. If the culprits were lucky, Tess would tear and claw at herself, removing skin from her lips or fingers as they watched. Occasionally, Tess would attack children in her room, regardless of their size, scratching faces and pulling hair but the damage to herself was always worse. Eventually Tess was placed in a room on her own. She understood that it was punishment for hurting the other girls – the nurse had explained this to her but she didn’t care. At home, Kate never touched her clothes or other belongings. Kate knew how upset it made her but no one knew her here. If she couldn’t have Kate here in the room with her, she was happy to be on her own.

  Kate Byrne rose early and sat nervously in the kitchen, sipping a cup of tea and staring out into the awful weather. The weeks had passed since Tess had been taken away. A doctor named Cosgrove had written to them, initially asking herself and Seán to give Tess a couple of weeks to settle in before visiting and for this Kate was grateful. She had thought about Tess every waking moment since they had taken her away and dreamt that she was crying, pleading with Kate to take her home. The image broke her heart and she decided that, as hard as it was going to be, she would travel to Dublin today to see her sister. Seán had refused to come with her, saying he couldn’t cope with it and would mind Ben until she returned.

  Despite the late July warmth, it rained heavily and she was soaked by the time she finished the two-mile walk into the village. The early morning bus was not due for fifteen minutes and the village was deserted. Kate stood in a doorway for shelter. Rain had curled her thick black hair and her face glistened. She was worried about how today would go, praying silently that Tess would be all right, would be happy in her new home, but she knew that wouldn’t be the case, she knew Tess would cling to her. Silent tears rolled down her face as she waited in the still pouring rain, glad that there was no one else waiting.

  As the bus pulled up Kate’s heart pounded. There was no going back now. It was empty except for one or two people from neighbouring villages and she chose a seat at the back where the heater was, shivering slightly from the drenching. As the bus rocked and swayed down the narrow country roads towards Dublin she could not get the image of Michael Byrne out of her mind. She did not see him in the morgue, Seán had identified him, but she had built up an image of him in her mind, bloodied and battered by the lake, and could feel herself begin to shake slightly. She couldn’t accept that Tess had done such a thing – but if she did, why? A wave of nausea hit her. She had a slight headache and she was feeling weary. Her shoulders ached as she sat and stared out at the misty grey sky, the equally grey road spinning out before her.

  When the bus finally arrived in Dublin, Kate had a throbbing headache and the nausea had not improved. The rain had stopped and the sun was desperately trying to shine through heavy grey clouds. From the bus station she walked down Abbey Street, stopping off for a cup of tea on O’Connell Street before walking the rest of the way to the hospital, using the time to ease her mind and decide what to say to Tess if she was upset.

  By the time she arrived at the front door of the hospital it had started to rain again. She stood and looked up at the four-story redbrick building whose front entrance was adorned with four large round pillars. She walked up the six stone steps and stood inside the narrow glass door. Dark wooden benches lined the entrance’s long corridor which was covered in large shiny black and white tiles. They looked wet and Kate instantly knew that Tess would be afraid to walk on them. A gulp rose from her throat out of nowhere. She held it back and pretended to look at a list of wards on the left-hand side. A porter stood watching her from a distance, as if he knew it was her first time. A family brushed by her carrying a child of about nine who kicked and screamed. He had a strange helmet on his head, like ones hurlers wear. The porter rushed to their aid.

  “Tried to get away again, Paul, eh?” he laughed jovially as the child’s family members smiled.

  “Oh, on a daily basis,” a female relative replied nonchalantly.

  Kate looked on horrified as the child continued to kick out, nursing staff finally carrying the boy off as the family members slipped quietly out the front door. Kate could hear him scream “Mammy, Mammy!” long after he was out of view. She felt dizzy, the nausea she had felt earlier that morning increasing tenfold. She sat on one of the benches and leant forward, as though she was in pain. Rainwater dripped from her hair and onto her lap. Tears sprang up in her eyes and she lowered her head, hoping no one would notice in the
busy foyer. The porter, who had continued to watch her, smiled sympathetically and walked slowly over to her. He had a kind face and looked at her as though he knew exactly what she was thinking, even before she did.

  “Need some air, Miss?”

  Kate straightened her spine, wiping her face roughly and trying to raise a smile. “Yes, thank you. I think I’ll just go outside for a moment. I’ll be right back.”

  “Grand, so, Miss. When you feel better. We’re always open.”

  Kate looked at him quizzically, unsure what he meant, before walking down the steps and out into the fresh air, breathing it in in huge, hungry gulps. She walked down to the long low wall that ran either side of the hospital’s front entrance, the walls on the other sides being over twelve feet high. She leant her hand on the moss-covered wall as though to sit but it was wet so she remained in this position for a few moments, unaware of how odd she looked in the busy street. She took another deep breath and straightened herself up. She noticed a small park across the road from the hospital. She crossed the road and sat on a wet bench with her back to the hospital, trying to collect her thoughts as the noise of passing traffic blurred into the distance. She put her head in her hands and sobbed quietly into her handkerchief in the deserted park. She had not expected it to be this hard. After what she felt was about an hour, she stood and turned slowly to look back towards the hospital’s entrance. Her sister was somewhere in there, alone and frightened, but she could not bring herself to go back in. She began to slowly walk in the opposite direction. She was glad that she had not told Tess she was coming. She would come back another day when she felt better, she reasoned to herself as she quickened her steps back towards the bus station.

  Dr Cosgrove had thought long into the night about his next session with Tess Byrne and as he approached her he felt energised at the prospect of delving into the mind of this autistic girl.

  “Good morning, Tess. Do you like your new room?”

  Tess nodded, which pleased the psychiatrist. At least it was communication of a sort.

  “Tess, I was thinking today that we could talk in the garden. You must be fed up sitting in my boring office. A change will do us both good.”

  Tess did not answer but followed the doctor through a maze of identical corridors and out into a courtyard, the door to which he opened with a key from a large bunch.

  He had noticed that every few steps she took she moved closer to the wall, hitting her shoulder off it twice before moving into the centre of the corridor again. She repeated this ritual for the entire walk. She also skipped over the black lines of the floor tiles, never once making contact with them. Even though Cosgrove was fascinated by the girl’s ritualistic behaviour, he found her silence put him on edge; many of the children he dealt with had a little too much to say. He looked closely at the girl whose eyes did not give anything away. She looked neither frightened by this change nor excited to be outdoors. Her sister had written to him, telling him of her likes and dislikes, but Tess was in a completely new environment now. He had asked Kate Byrne to visit, the brother too, but as yet they had not responded to his invitation. Maybe it was too soon for them, with the father’s death and caring for their younger brother. He also guessed that they would be feeling angry with Tess at the loss of their father. Dr Cosgrove had no idea just how wrong he was.

  Later that day, Tess stood at the nurses’ station with two young nurses, her punishment for biting another child during dinnertime. She watched as they wrote their reports, occasionally glancing at her through narrow slit eyes and eyeing each other. Tess knew the nurses were a little afraid of her although she didn’t understand why. She would not have bitten the child if he hadn’t torn her drawing and she was being doubly punished because she would not say that she was sorry.

  “Apologise, Tess, and you can go back to your room.”

  Tess scribbled a short note: No.

  “Go on, Tess, you don’t want to sit here with us all evening, do you?”

  Another note: No.

  “Then apologise to Colm, there’s a good girl!”

  Note: No.

  “You’re missing the movie, Tess.”

  Note: I don’t care.

  Both nurses sighed and looked at each other, trying to come up with a different tactic. They couldn’t stand the girl’s staring eyes on them for their entire shift.

  “Tess, do you know what apologise means?”

  Scribble: Yes.

  “Tell me what it means.”

  Scribble: It means sorry but I didn’t do any sorry.

  The nurses sniggered quietly. The child was unusual but she was entertaining at times.

  “Do you think Colm should apologise to you, Tess?”

  Note: Yes.

  “How would you like him to apologise?”

  Scribble: Stick my drawing back together.

  “Well now, Tess, you know that’s not possible. The drawing is in a thousand pieces. Sometimes people just say that they are sorry.”

  Sorry is not enough of apologise, Tess wrote quickly. You have to do something right to make the person better. You have to fix it.

  The younger nurse sighed. She felt sorry for this child but she was extremely stubborn and hard to coax.

  “Tess, sometimes people do things that they cannot fix. Do you understand?”

  Note: Yes.

  “Then will you apologise?”

  Note: No.

  The nurses, knowing they were wasting their time, returned to their reports. It would be a very long evening.

  Chapter 9

  1951

  Saturday finally came around again after another week of wishing her life away: Saturday was the day Maura lived for, the day she saw Éamonn and lived her dream of being his wife, mother of his child. This weekend though would be different. Maura quietly dressed Seán for the journey, anxious not to wake her sleeping husband who had been drinking late into the night. She found Michael more aggressive lately, flying off the handle when the child cried and she found herself more regularly shielding the crying infant with her own body when her husband’s hangover found Seán’s crying too much to cope with. Maura knew that she had to get out of this situation, to take Seán to safety. She had bravely raised the subject with Éamonn in the last few weeks but found him less enthusiastic. He was now in his final year of his degree and he said it would be a shame to waste it by giving it up and going out to a menial job. Maura could see the sense in that. Sure, what would another couple of years matter?

  This week though she found out she was pregnant, expecting Éamonn’s second child. She had worried about this happening. She’d thought she would panic but her mind was calmer than she’d expected. Éamonn would have to take her to live with him now. She could get a job – mind other children or something after the baby was born. She thought that maybe this was the best thing that could have happened – it would force Éamonn’s hand in a way. They would manage; they had each other and what else mattered? Maura packed as many clothes as she could carry as she did not plan on returning. She opened the door and quietly slipped out. As she passed the bedroom window she could hear her husband snoring loudly.

  She made her escape, carrying her two-year-old son and her suitcase the entire two-mile-long journey to the village where she could catch the early bus to Dublin.

  Éamonn smiled as he met her off the bus and carried her case as they walked arm in arm down the quays. They bought bread in a bakery and laughed when Seán squealed as they fed seagulls that flew low over the Liffey. She waited until they reached the Ha’penny Bridge to tell him that she was pregnant. They both loved the bridge and Maura felt it was their romantic spot, often daydreaming about them both standing there, the sun shining on their happy, smiling faces.

  Éamonn stared at her as she broke the news, a look of shock registering on his face.

  “No, Maura, you couldn’t be!”

  His expression frightened the young woman who had come here seeking comfort and reassurance.


  “I’m sure,” Maura replied wearily, Seán weighing heavily in her arms.

  Éamonn stood beside her speechless, staring at her before darting his eyes rapidly from left to right.

  “Are you sure it’s mine?” he asked a little too quickly.

  “Of course, Éamonn, he’s never touched me. Not once. I have to leave. He’ll kill me.”

  Maura was reeling from Éamonn’s implication that he didn’t believe Michael had never had sex with her but decided to say nothing.

  “Maura, I can’t . . . I can’t take you and Seán on . . .”

  “Take us on! You make it sound like you’d be doing us a favour! Seán is your son. You promised you’d see us right, take care of us. We can’t go back there.”

  “You have to, at least for now. You’ll have to – make him think it’s his . . . you know . . .”

  Maura’s mouth dropped open. He wanted her to have sex with Michael! She felt her knees weaken and tightened her hold onto Seán who was starting to cry at the sound of the raised voices. She looked at Éamonn as if he were a stranger to her.

  “Please, Éamonn, you don’t know him.”

  “I’m sorry, Maura. It’s too soon, I have my studies, you know and –”

  “Éamonn!” she said, her voice raised even louder, the sound of desperation audible. “Listen, Éamonn – he’ll kill me, please let me stay!”

  Éamonn stood there, silent.

  Maura stared back at the man she thought she knew. She waited, hoping he would say something, but he stood there, motionless, his eyes now on the ground. When he eventually looked up at her he had a strange expression on his face, an expression Maura had never seen before, one she did not understand.

  “Éamonn,” she began, “it’ll be all right. I can work. We could live with Brigid until we get a place of our own. I know we can’t get married –”

  “No! I can’t take you. I never could. Don’t you get it?” His eyes looked wild, his face red. “This is as much as there’ll ever be – this, weekends, that’s all I have to offer, Maura. Do you understand?”