The night i killed him, p.14
The Night I Killed Him, page 14
‘And yes, that’s his belt, of course. He – he had to wear it because the suit trousers were too big. He wouldn’t wear braces.’
Laura is nodding.
‘Okay, great. Thank you.’ She slides the photos back into the folder without taking her eyes off Gemma’s grief-stricken face. ‘You must miss him terribly,’ she says softly.
Gemma’s body jerks with silent sobs and she presses her fist to her mouth as though she’s terrified of the noise escaping. Laura catches my eye. Time to shift a gear. She seems to be on the brink of a meltdown.
‘He sounds like a wonderful person,’ I say, moving in to pass her fresh tissues and taking the opportunity to pat her shoulders. A bit of physical reassurance is sometimes necessary. I put on the GAA team-talk voice.
‘And how great that you have little Ferdia – he’s a dote!’
She blows her nose and takes some shaky breaths. I repeat the pats and Laura passes her the cup of water. She gulps it down.
‘Look,’ Laura says. ‘We’re going to leave it there for today. You’ve been very helpful.’ She moves towards the camera, ready to switch it off, then turns back.
‘Tell me,’ she says. ‘It’s not important, just for a broader picture, but can you remember if you gave Max something for his birthday? Your parents gave him the cufflinks and the boat, yes? What did you give him?’
She closes her eyes, inhaling deeply. We wait for her to exhale.
‘I – I gave him a penknife,’ she says, the words barely audible. ‘One he’d wanted for ages. I got his name engraved on it.’
She lifts her head to look directly at Laura and tears spill down her cheeks.
‘He loved it.’
31
Gemma
Somehow, he’s heard about Max. I don’t know if it was one of the older kids in school or if he heard something on TV, or maybe Conleth had been talking to him about it, but when I get back from the station, Ferdia is full of questions.
‘Did Uncle Max know how to swim?’ was the opener as soon as I walked in the door. I tell him Uncle Max was a great swimmer. Conleth looks up from his phone, his expression unreadable, and I gather Ferdia into my arms, willing him to calm down before Conleth gets annoyed. I scour his face, searching for signs of tears.
‘But did he forget? Maybe he forgot and that’s why he drownded.’
I feel my gaze slide away from Conleth’s – though I want to scream at him. What has he said? What new terrors has he put in Ferdia’s brain?
‘Well, sometimes the sea is just too strong,’ I say, hugging him even closer. ‘And even really good swimmers can have accidents.’
‘I’m going to learn to swim really good,’ he glances over at his father for approval, ‘so I don’t never, ever have an accident.’
‘That’s right,’ says Conleth. ‘And there’ll be no more nonsense about not wanting to get in the pool for your swimming lessons.’
Later, I bring Ferdia to bed and I steer the talk away from Max and accidents and swimming. I try to channel something of Penny’s calm. So we talk about Eli and Jude, and the Lego fortress and the stunt car with the giant tyres and the raptor which you put on your finger. It takes more than an hour to get him to sleep and, finally, I close the bedroom door and stand outside with my forehead resting against the smooth wood. I don’t want to go back into the sitting room, where I know he’s waiting.
But this is my fate and this is my punishment. If I could change that night – like in those stories where the hero changes one tiny detail in the past, and the whole future is reshaped – oh my God, I would give anything to change it. I wouldn’t fight with my mother over what to wear – she wanted me to wear the pale pink dress. It was – I mean, now I realize it was a classic: boat-necked raw silk with cap sleeves and a full skirt. Perfect for a family party, for a skinny sixteen-year-old – now I know that. But then, I thought I’d never seen anything so ugly in my life. It was a dress for a child.
I’d got a ruched black velvet number in the market in Dún Laoghaire which clung to me, making me look – I believed – sophisticated. French. And that’s what I wore, teaming it with massive heels and about five inches of eyeliner. I had half a naggin of vodka even before the dinner, and I poured in about three glasses of champagne on top of that because when I got there, Conleth and Max were besieged, it seemed to me, by women – grown-up women from the club, and college girls, shiny and polished – sailors and rowers, hockey players and skiers. They glowed with a kind of strength and assurance, with the sheen of money and physical health, while I stumbled around in the heels, sidling up to Conleth at what felt like elbow height, trying to sneak one hand into his pocket or up the back of his shirt.
I was so desperate for his attention, for any affection – I had no shame. And he kept shaking me off, saying he had to mingle, telling me to sober up. He said if I behaved myself he’d meet me on the boat after the speeches and he’d make it up to me. And I hid his keycard down my bra because there were no pockets in the ridiculous dress, and I plonked myself on one of the velvet banquettes in the bar, so I could watch him flirt and laugh with the college girls and the sailing gang. And I hugged my triumph to myself, that later, he’d be mine. All mine.
If I hadn’t been so drunk that night, maybe I’d have joined the dancing in the clubhouse, the music blasting into the orange-and-gold-speckled Dún Laoghaire night sky.
If I hadn’t been so obsessed with Conleth, maybe I’d have sat with Mum for a little while and let her put my hair behind my ears and said nothing when she shook her head in sorrow at the state of my make-up. Her sister – my auntie Jayne – had only been gone six weeks. I remember that now. How sad she was. How disappointed in me. And I was about to rend her life asunder.
If I hadn’t been so stupid – such a stupid, selfish, self-centred little madam – I would have danced with my dad and laughed at his dad-dance moves, the way he mimed ‘stacking the boxes’ accompanied by a little ‘chu-chu-chuh’ sound.
If
If
Yeah, Gemma. One thing you have learned is that you can’t rewrite history, can you?
‘You baby him far too much,’ says Conleth when I walk in. ‘You’re doing him no favours.’ He fixes me with a stare, waiting for me to disagree. As if I actually would. But I nod.
‘Sorry,’ I say. ‘You’re right.’
I walk past him, intending to sit on the end of the couch. Because this man – I know he has the potential for kindness – I know it. He must have.
And so, when he points at the floor, the part in front of the windows, I freeze. He nods with impatience, and I know that the faster I accede, the faster it will be over.
For this one, he doesn’t want to see my face. This is the one part of the room not tiled in smooth marble. There’s a narrow strip of ridged concrete where the marble ends and the window area begins.
‘Now.’
The cold in his voice turns my hands to ice and my stomach to a swirl of acid, but I know not to keep him waiting. It will be over soon. He’ll get it out of his system. He shoves me between the shoulder blades.
‘Down.’
I can see us both in the glass, me kneeling up with my hands on my head like I’m awaiting execution. I see him raise his knee and, even though I see it before it happens, the kick that lands in the small of my back forcing me face down into the musty fabric of the beanbag is as shocking as it was the first time. It’s like my bones shudder.
I try to breathe, and I press my fingers against my head as he presses his heel into my back, shoving me lower into the fabric, my knees scraping against the floor. He won’t be able to do this for long, I think. There’ll be marks on my knees and shins. He’s careful not to leave marks. That’s one thing to be grateful for. Especially when I’ll be modelling the summer gear in a few days. If that happens.
And I don’t even cry, because what’s the point? I think someone said that the saddest words in the whole of the English language are these two – if only.
If only.
WEDNESDAY
32
Laura
We’re back in the incident room with O’Riordan, Stephen, Tara and a couple of others from the team. And a very tired-looking Senan. He’s probably been here since daybreak. We used to joke that he slept in the cells because, no matter how early Niamh and I got in, he’d be at his desk ahead of us.
‘She’s fragile,’ I’m saying. ‘Gemma, I mean. And there’s definitely something weighing on her mind. I mean, apart from the tragedy itself, and—’
‘People, especially family members, they always blame themselves, don’t they?’ Senan interrupts, with his trademark stating the obvious.
‘But there’s more.’ I keep going. ‘We got some interesting, if conflicting, information. First off, Conleth told us that Max had been using cocaine recreationally, and that a possible motive for his so-called suicide was that he knew he couldn’t provide a clean sample when the Olympic Committee came looking for it.’
‘But?’ O’Riordan looks up. ‘Who says otherwise?’
‘Gemma. She was adamant that Max hated anything to do with drugs. She admitted her own drug use, said she’d got weed from someone in town, but she was absolutely certain that Max disapproved.’
‘Right.’ O’Riordan nods. ‘What did we get from Skehan, the coach? Did she mention anything more on the Olympics?’
No one answers, and I catch eyes with Niamh, biting back my frustration. We were talking about this on Saturday – four days ago. Surely someone should have got to her by now. O’Riordan clearly thinks the same thing.
‘Shaw, Darmody, can you interview her as soon as possible?’ he growls. ‘By which I mean today.’
We nod vigorously, familiar with the growls of cigirí. I turn to the next page of my notes.
‘And more conflicting information. Now we have Gemma saying that Conleth walked her home, which was not in her original statement. And he’s corroborating that, of course.’
‘But basically, nobody saw them, and there’s no record of them leaving,’ Niamh chimes in. ‘And we only have their word. Either of them – both of them together, the three of them, even – could’ve gone down to the boat.’
I’m distracted by her pallor. My mum’s phrase green around the gills comes to mind. Something’s up.
‘Although he, Conleth, says he went back to the party and—’ I stop, niggled by something, trying to focus.
‘And proceeded to shift a hot young lawyer,’ Niamh interrupts, grinning. ‘Although that’s not what he called it. “Behaved inappropriately” was the phrase. He should’ve seen Coppers back in the day!’ Her laugh is infectious.
‘And this lawyer that Conleth O’Hara proceeded to, eh, behave inappropriately with – do we have a name for her?’
‘Indeed we do, Cig. He claims he got up close and personal with Fiona Cassidy.’ She waits a beat.
‘The eminent senior counsel?’ says O’Riordan, his eyebrows somewhere near his hairline.
‘The very one. Although she was presumably just a non-eminent law student then.’
‘The point is that we checked this out.’ I pause. ‘And that’s legit. Although I wouldn’t think she wants it to be widely known.’
‘Where was Max at this point?’ O’Riordan furrows his brow.
I shake my head. ‘No sightings of him at all for the later part of the night. O’Hara says he presumed he’d left to go home. Earlier, he’d seen Max deep in conversation with a girl, and he reckoned that what he’d observed might have been them breaking up.’
‘Right. And do we have her name?’ O’Riordan clicks the top of his pen.
Niamh nods. ‘We do. Michelle Byrne.’
McCarthy nearly gives himself a whiplash. ‘The former Olympian?’
‘Yup. All the beautiful people. Mingling. Annieway, Conleth seemed to think that the break-up and the problems with the sample were enough to tip Max over the edge. And, erm, Shaw did an inspired bit of questioning and elicited this gem of info: guess what Gemma gave her brother for his twenty-first?’
She gets to her feet, phone in hand. ‘A penknife. I’ve already emailed Parminter,’ she says. ‘Apparently, it’s a type used by lots of sailors – a brand by the name of Leatherman. He’s – Parminter is checking dimensions and so on, to see if it could be the one we’re looking for.’
‘Great work,’ says O’Riordan.
Niamh is pale, I realize. I watch as she places three fingers flat against her sternum, pressing. She swallows, and it looks as though she’s trying hard not to throw up.
‘Right,’ I say, getting up. ‘We could do with a bit of air, couldn’t we, Niamh? Cig, we’ll go and talk to Skehan.’
Immediately she’s gathering her things together.
I stride ahead of her along the corridor, out into the parking lot. When we reach the car, I pop the locks and turn to face her.
‘When were you going to tell me?’ I say. ‘Or was I meant to just work it out for myself?’
33
Gemma
I kneel in front of him, glad that Ferdia is safely in school. That I’ll have hours to recover. Between us on the stone floor is a plastic basin of freezing-cold water into which he has poured the bleach. Both my bare hands are submerged and the pain thrums through me in waves of stinging, burning cold. I’m clutching a j-cloth because the official version of this punishment is that I didn’t clean the floor properly. I count the stitches on his handmade shoes. Dangerously, I let myself imagine throwing the basin at him. In his eyes. Could I do it? Could I really do it?
‘Here,’ he says.
I take my hands out, squeezing out the cloth, trying not to cry as the air hits my raw skin. He taps his toe to the left. Three taps – imperious. I scrub the imagined stains he’s pointing out. The heels of his shoes click as he walks across the room. Then the toe tap. ‘And here,’ he says.
He walks behind me and I cringe, because that’s what I do.
‘Then here,’ he says. Another imperious tap. ‘And over there by the door. How can you have let it get like this?’
I shuffle along on my hands and knees like some medieval beggarwoman and my eyes are dry, because why would I shed a tear for myself? I’m despicable and I’m weak. And I’m so self-centred my only concern is that he’ll tire of this soon.
And I’m right, because I hear him walk into the kitchen and then a large cardboard box is dropped on to the floor beside me.
‘There are three dresses and a trouser suit,’ he says. ‘Tidy yourself up and do it soon.’ He jangles the car keys with impatience. ‘What are you waiting for?’
And the woman who a few hours ago was swimming – well, almost swimming, with her friend Penny – that woman is gone. She’s been replaced by a cringing, shivering, weeping excuse for a human who disgusts me. If you hate yourself, it’s easier for others to hate you. I’ve discovered that. The only thing I don’t hate about myself is that, somehow, I managed to give birth to Ferdia. That woman – Ferdia’s mother – is the one who braved the water today.
I run a basin of tepid water into which I pour baby oil. I can’t find my eczema cream anywhere and I realize that he’s taken it away too. Another punishment. But in Ferdia’s swimming bag there’s some E45. My hands are so red I have to rub foundation in with the E45. Then, I do my make-up – low-key, natural. I tie back my hair and I face the camera. In my hands, I hold the clothes, neatly folded.
‘Hi, everyone, I want to thank you for your lovely messages. You’re so kind. Now today, it’s all about trying to find the right outfit for—’ I freeze. What am I meant to say? I delete, smooth some stray strands of hair, and breathe. The room is stuffy. It’s really a glorified cupboard, but it looks cosy in the posts. It looks like I have a walk-in wardrobe.
Three sailors went to sea, sea, sea, I think, and I’m scared, because I keep seeing the same image. Max and Ferdia and me in the bottom of the deep blue sea.
He’ll be checking for a post anytime now. I shake myself out of it.
‘It happens to us all,’ I say, starting over. ‘At some point, we have to go to a funeral. And in these situations, even though you might not feel like planning your outfit, trust me – it’s important. It’s about respect.’ Yeah. The irony is not lost on me.
I show the pile of folded clothes. ‘Today it’s formal wear. And these outfits are from—’ I stop. The company is called Blue Wave. The logo is a floral version of that famous tidal wave painting. A strange, strangled gulp emerges from my throat, like a laugh and a sob combined.
Suddenly it seems like the most outrageous thing. That I’m expected to put on this gear and try it out, three – no, four – different looks to wear to my brother’s funeral. My brother who lay at the bottom of the sea under the waves – and suddenly I’m full-on hysterically laughing, gasping, crying, hiccupping. I collapse on to the carpet in my cami and briefs, clutching the pile of clothes like a life raft. I bury my face in them and I howl for my brother. I never cried for him. There was no way I could, and I know that was another thing Mum and Dad distrusted. But now I sob, and it feels like the tears are burning. Bleach tears that purify and burn.
I’m sorry I’m sorry I’m sorry. I love you, Max. I love you and I’m sorry. I’m galvanized. I jump to my feet and I press record and I stand in front of the camera, in the halo from the circular light. Tears run down my cheeks and I’m still sobbing and gulping.
‘I’m so sorry, everyone. I haven’t been honest with you. I haven’t said a single honest word to you since the dawn of – hiccup – time.’ Be real. Be bloody real, Gemma! ‘Well, here you go. I killed my brother. I killed my own brother, who I loved, no, yes. No, let’s keep saying the truth. I loved him, and I hated him too. I was jealous. And while everything he touched turned to gold, everything I touched tanked. He aced exams. I failed them. He was set to represent his country in the Olympics for sailing. I couldn’t even swim. When he wasn’t sailing, he was studying Medicine in college. I dropped out of school before my Leaving Cert. I wanted to go to art college, but I didn’t even finish school. I—
