Vera didn’t merely become involved in things. She took ownership of them.

  ‘I called Frank, but he was very weak. His wife was so helpful though, and said they were still major benefactors of the organisation that had taken you under its wing. She made calls for me. She had her people access files. This wasn’t any straightforward legal adoption. Yours had been done between the lines, so to speak, because your father had to bend the rules. You weren’t Canadian so there were channels you had to skip. There were corridors you had to be quickly hurried down. My God, the things that man did for you.’

  Without asking, Vera refilled her glass. ‘Anyhow, Frank’s wife had access to your son’s name, and she was able to trace all the places he’d lived while in Canada until he was eighteen. She was able to contact his last address and received the news that he was now living in Thailand. She even had a number for me to try. I called, but of course he was no longer living there. However, they had another number and I tried that and so on – I was quite the Miss Marple – and eventually I called a number and my grandson picked up.’

  Vera explained that, for a while, she’d called her grandson once a week to offer him abbreviated news from her life. ‘I told him that I don’t use the computer-email thing. Sure, why should I? Anyone who wants to contact me that way, does so through Joan. And, as you know, Joan also takes care of my standard correspondence, picking out the relevant ones for me to scan through. So, letters were also out of the question. Couldn’t have Joan knowing what I was up to. But thank God, he was always there when I called or would get back very promptly. They were wonderful calls – his passion, hearing the proof that he cares so much about what I think and what I believe and how I… how I… I don’t want to say “judge him”, but that too.’

  Jenny stared at her mother, aghast at how she was so pleased with herself, so utterly enthralled with her own efficacious sleuthing; at how the impact of her gross interference in another person’s life did not even register in her thought processes. But all of that was nothing compared with what Vera was about to tell her.

  *

  9.42 pm: Ultan said, ‘Just a week ago, I got a letter delivered to the hotel. From Grandmother. She wanted me to come “home”, as she kept calling Ireland. To meet her. Before it was too late. She’d also included a small but precious gift. A photograph of Mommy.’

  ‘So that’s how you got it,’ Jenny muttered. She didn’t need to look at her phone to see it again. It was imprinted on her brain – a colour shot of an eighteen-year-old Jenny in her final trimester, all swollen like a tick; bulbous pale stomach, protruding belly button, white bikini top, black tracksuit bottoms. She was unsmiling, leaning against a brick wall outside the hospital. A nurse had taken it, as she had made no friends in Toronto. She remembered posting it to her father a few days before giving birth.

  Ultan continued. ‘The timing was almost mystical. Because I’d been thinking for a while… that my life wasn’t washed away by misfortune. Instead, it was destroyed by a person. And suddenly, that photograph made me realise that this person must have a name and address. So, I got a plane to Dublin, just like Grandmother wanted me to. Now, the thing about new cities is that you have to try and learn how to trust strangers, and it never dawns on a lot of people that this might not be a good idea. That’s why I went with Dee, who was going home too. I had her take me here. So I could look at this.’ He gestured grandly to the kitchen, to the house. ‘To look in your windows. To see what you took away from me. To see the value of what getting rid of me was worth to you. And this… this house and everything in it, is what you swapped me for. This house and all its pleasures is what you reckon I was worth.’

  ‘So you think I denied you money? Listen to me – from basically the day you were conceived, I’ve had nothing. There was nothing to give you. Absolutely zilch.’

  ‘Fuck you. This is about my entire fucking life. This is about the shit I’ve lived through. Not fucking money.’

  ‘I left you in good hands.’

  ‘Good hands? I was adopted by religious fanatics who home-schooled me till I was twelve. No wonder I went off the rails when I got to high school. The more difficult I found life, the more distant they became. It was as if they thought mild depression or anxiety were types of airborne diseases. Like swine flu or TB. I needed to place garbage bags on the windows because I had a sleeping problem. I needed white noise because I had an ear problem. I needed booze because I had an anxiety problem. I needed money because I had a living problem. When I was arrested a few times and thrown out of school, my adopted parents couldn’t handle me anymore. They said they were scared of me.’

  ‘Scared of you?’ How scared should I be? Jenny noticed the switchblade sticking out of his trouser pocket.

  ‘I never touched them. They were just delusional morons with no concept of reality.’

  ‘I’m sorry. I didn’t know.’

  ‘Oh, that was nothing. I was fostered out to a family hundreds of miles north of Winnipeg where I learned to never underestimate the cold. Up there, you watch the environment disappear; you watch the earth disappear; you watch the ice dissolve like great big aspirins. Up there, I took the measure of my own insignificance and I survived. But that family; they were tough, harsh. They didn’t take no shit from a troubled teen. They made me pray three times a day. Hardcore prayer. There were also little prayers to say before every snack and drink of water. These people were even bigger lunatics than my adoptive parents. Their favourite word was “no”, and their motto was “What use is a parent who cannot prohibit?”ʼ

  ‘I am so sorry.’ Jenny was suddenly amazed at the realisation that she had never thought that her son could have been lost in that labyrinth of horrific crimes committed by the Catholic hierarchy and its institutions. The scandals in the Church had merely confirmed to her that people with absurd beliefs could commit atrocities easily.

  ‘I wasn’t the only one they looked after. That lovely evangelical cult you gave me up to, they just kept feeding them other kids. And we all ran away. To get drugs. To sell ourselves at truck stops. But we always came back because there was nowhere to run to up there.’

  ‘You’ve got to believe me – if I’d known… If I’d had any idea, then I would’ve—’

  ‘That wasn’t my last foster home. I had a whole raft of them when I was sixteen and seventeen. Two were OK. One was just plain old violent. Another was pervy. The last one like a prison camp. I almost starved there. And I learned that those people with the least to be grateful to God for, are those who thank Him the most. But when I turned eighteen, I was gone. I was free. I was going to sign up to the Canadian armed forces… ʼcos, when you’ve been told for your whole life that you’re shit at everything, it’s not hard to miss when you can finally do something really, really well. But first I took a trip to Thailand… and once there, I never left the place until now.’

  ‘But… you’re not the only child who was put up for adoption. And most turn out OK.’ She closed her eyes, embarrassed at how mealy sounding her point was.

  Ultan flicked open another button on his shirt, exposing his chest, which was just more ink and no skin – Thai writing, old gods, guns and knives. ‘Do I look OK? Do you think I was voted most likely to succeed?’

  ‘You’ve made your point.’

  ‘My point? Is that what all of this is to you? Someone making a point? Do you think that I’m a problem that will either be quickly solved or even better – just disappear? Like what happened to Dee? When was the last time you thought of her? You watched her die only three days ago. I bet the memory is fading already. Sinking into the cushions of your life. But I’ll never forget. She was only here because of me. She was just doing me a favour… but like anything that touches you—’

  ‘Fine. You want revenge and I deserve it. For your childhood. For Dee. For everything. But you’ve sent the picture to my husband and ruined my life. Just like I accidentally ruined yours. So, please leave.’

  Ultan laughed. ‘You think I came here to talk? To have a catch-up?’

  ‘What did you come here for?’

  ‘I’ve come to give myself something God never can – justice.’

  ‘What are you going to do?’

  ‘I told you already. By sundown, I’m going to destroy everything that means anything to you. Look outside – your sun has set.’

  ‘You’ve wrecked my marriage. What else is there?’

  ‘Online, Mother, like most people, you’re very disappointing. Your Instagram. Your Facebook. Your blog. You think you’re unique. But then along comes social media to show the rest of us that you’re all the same – going to the same beaches and countries, eating the same food, listening to the same music, walking the same galleries, reading the same books. Living in the same types of houses. See, I know exactly what you love the most. It’s what you traded me for. Grandmother told me too. This. Clareville. Your house.’ He walked around to the other side of the island and picked up a two-litre, green plastic canister. Staring at her, he gave it a shake. Inside, the petrol sloshed about.

  ‘What are you doing?’

  ‘I’m going to burn it all down. Especially the furniture. That was Grandfather’s, right? You cherish that stuff so much. It’s all you have of him. It’s all that’s left of who you were.’

  ‘Wait…’ Jenny was picturing it already – flames bursting out from the windows, sparks from her father’s furniture spiralling upwards like dancing fireflies. For a second, the memory of her mother’s final revelation smashed through her brain.

  ‘Vera hasn’t told you, has she? Her plans for the house. What she’s doing with it.’

  *

  Vera had stood in Shane’s study, wine glass in hand, enthusiastically explaining to Jenny that, ‘Ultan is of the age where he should be at least settling down and thinking about having children. Oh, Jennifer, how I’d love a great grandson – a clear line from my son to grandchild to the next generation, and all within my lifetime. It’s what any mother wants. My plan is for Ultan to first settle into Ireland and create a bond with you. See, I’m really doing it for you, pet. For what is best for us all.’

  As usual, Vera had carefully picked the elements of her past and her present that were true and combined them effortlessly with utter fiction. Jenny’s mother lived in a world where everything must always go her way. Her life and the lives of everyone in it must be exactly as she wanted them to be.

  Vera expounded: ‘At first, I imagined putting him into Hugh’s room. Alas, I quickly realised that that is never going to happen. Every day since Hugh left me, I enter it and open the blinds that I still close every night. And I breathe in, deeply. There are molecules of Hugh’s life floating around in there, you see, and I just want to swim in them. I couldn’t have anyone else in there. So, the only alternative is… well, I think you can guess.’

  *

  9.46 pm: Jenny said, ‘This house isn’t mine. It’s Mum’s. I just rent it. And she’s throwing me out. Know why?’ Across from her, Ultan unscrewed the lid of the canister. ‘She’s throwing me out because she’s giving it to you.’

  Ultan’s eyes narrowed. He was interested once more.

  ‘That’s her big plan. That’s her coup de grâce. That’s what she brought you back for. You – the soon to be stand-in son. She sees you living here, with her portrait on the walls. She sees you marrying and breeding and keeping her lineage alive. She sees you telling her great grandkids about how incredible she was and then, after you’re gone, they’ll inherit the house, and her awesomeness will live forever. So yeah – burn the fucking place down. Do what you want with it. It’s yours, my dear son. All of it. Take it. It’s cursed.’

  He placed the canister lid on the island counter. Ultan was breathing heavily. He licked his upper lip. ‘Back then, you could say and do whatever you liked, because you were you.’

  ‘What does that mean?’

  ‘It means, you could get away with anything because of who you were, because you came from money. You were white. You had great teeth. You went to uni. The list of luck and privilege was endless. And you gave me away because I was going to wreck the life-long party.’

  ‘But it was wrecked anyway. My family disowned me. I lost my inheritance. I lost my family home. I’m about to lose this house. I’m about to lose my husband. So, tell me – just how did my wonderful life continue by giving you up?’

  ‘Fuck you.’ Ultan raised the canister, scanning the far wall for a spot to drench.

  ‘I was eighteen,’ she said sharply. ‘What were you like at eighteen? Huh? I couldn’t look after myself, never mind a baby. I never even wanted to have sex with Otto. Your grandmother never told you that – did she? Of course she didn’t, because she doesn’t know.’

  ‘Did he—’

  ‘No. It wasn’t like that. I was drugged, but not by him. He didn’t know. And he was on drugs himself. It was messy. And it shouldn’t have happened. I didn’t know how to deal with the whole situation. As I keep saying, I was eighteen. If I’d had that baby then, I—’

  ‘That baby?’

  ‘You. OK? You. If I’d had you and kept you then I’d have had to lie to Shane – tell him that you were his, and then watch for the rest of all our lives as Shane lived out my lie. No. I wasn’t doing that. I’d have had more babies because I couldn’t have Shane bringing you up, believing you were his and not actually giving him any of his own.’

  Again, Ultan looked at the wall. Again, he looked back to Jenny.

  She said, ‘And that was only if Shane stuck with me. He was eighteen too, remember. If he didn’t stay with me to bring you up, then by having you I would’ve been stranded at home forever. And believe me, I needed to get out of that bloody house. You have no idea what it was like. All I knew is that there was a sickness in my family home.’

  ‘A sickness?’

  ‘My mother. Nothing like your awful upbringing. But it was psychological. With my teenage years running out I was coming to see who – or what – Mum really was. Then there was my sister, too. The toxicity. The lies. The bitching. And I’d be expected to bring up a child in that atmosphere, with Mum down my throat, trying to replace Hugh with you. God, no – I couldn’t do that. I wouldn’t do that. Not when there were apparently hundreds of loving parents queueing up to give you the life you deserved. That’s what I believed.’

  Ultan rounded the island, canister by his side. ‘You were originally going to abort me.’

  Jenny looked away. I can’t believe Mum told him that. It was something she never revisited because the thoughts that were behind the original decision were thoughts that only occurred in the dark; for the specific reason that they could stay there.

  She said, ‘Even though I was eighteen, I didn’t take that decision lightly. How could I when I was well aware that I was losing my family and all that came with it? Jesus, I was seven years younger than you are now and look at you…’ She reached out and, for a second, touched his cheek. ‘You’re still so young. I had to deal with being pregnant by myself and I’m not saying I did the correct thing but… you’re right – being privileged gave me the power to do things that an eighteen-year-old shouldn’t have been able to do… to make decisions about their future with naïve certainty. Unfortunately, I was too young to realise that there were – that there are – consequences to all my actions.’

  Ultan’s head lowered a little, eyes blinking in thought.

  Softening her voice, Jenny said, ‘The fact is, I’m glad you’re back. I don’t care if you believe me or not. But I’m glad that I’ve been able to tell you the truth.’ Again, she reached out and touched his cheek, but this time allowed her hand to remain a little longer. ‘If the only thing that makes you happy is to burn this house down… then do it. You have my blessing.’

  Slowly, he lowered the canister to the floor.

  Jenny said quietly, ‘Just… if you’re going to hurt me, do it quickly.’

  Stunned, Ultan stared at her. ‘I was never going to hurt you. Not physically.’

  ‘You have a blade.’

  He suddenly looked ashamed as he took the switchblade from his pocket and looked at it. ‘I was never going to… it was just for shaving my beard… I’d kept it for that. To get rid of the old me on the day I finally got closure. I planned it that way. I was never going to…’ His voice trailed off.

  ‘You scared me.’

  ‘I’m… I’m sorry. I’m just so fucking angry. I always wondered who you were and why you did it. Why, why, why. Always asking and no one there to answer. But still… I would never… Look, I know that men hurt women far more than women hurt men. It’s just a truth. But I would never harm you. You’re a woman. And you’re my mother.’

  They held each other’s gaze. A moment passed. And another. She heard a faint noise. From the hallway. It was a specific sound: half groan, half squeak. Between the last step of the stairs and the study was a single loose floorboard.

  Shane said, ‘Do not move.’

  Her husband was standing at the door to the hallway, gun pointing directly at Ultan. Jenny recalled her father’s motto hung behind his desk in his big company office: The very moment they think you’re finished, your success is assured. She stared at Shane, taking in his coldness, his concentration, the tension on his trigger finger. Jenny now understood how they had got to this place. The unthinkable had become thinkable and the thinkable had then become doable. Reaching out her hands imploringly towards him, she shouted, ‘No, Shane…’

  49

  SUNDOWN: Shane’s arm was outstretched. There was a gun at the end of it. It was a nice weight in his hand. With those bullets in the chamber, all he had to do was squeeze the trigger, as easy as squirting toothpaste. It was aimed at Ultan, who faced him with the switchblade in his hand. Next to Ultan was Jenny. Her arms outstretched towards him, pleading.