He closes his eyes. His voice is his again, high and uncertain. ‘Forgive me, girls. Sheila. I let this happen. I’m sorry. Madeline, I’ve tried to reason with Mamó, to bargain, but there isn’t any way …’
His eyes are wide. I incline my head a touch, like she does. Acknowledging.
‘I know you tried. It’s OK, Brian. I’m coping.’
‘And coping very well, fair play to you.’
Mam walks closer to him, puts a hand on his shoulder. For better or for worse. She loves him still. I see it in her face. I’m not sure that she trusts him, but she loves him. Which is just as well. This version of Brian is definitely best kept onside. I’d hate to see that calculated rage turned against me. Every kick timed for the perfect hurt. How did our stepdad get so good at this?
Lon moans; his mouth is gagged, I think it’s stuffed with rags. I’m glad, I think. I don’t want him talking. Catlin’s little hand inside my hand. Her fingernails have almost grown back. I stare at Lon. The thing that killed my sister. I look for my compassion. It isn’t here. I used it up on Catlin, Mam and Brian. The people that he hurt with what he did.
Amanda Shale. Nora Ginn. Bridget Hora. Helen Groarke. Cold bones in rough soil. And all the other names upon the walls. Each one a girl. Each one a person’s life.
Brian takes the sword from Mam. Passes it to Catlin. He strides to Lon, and cuts his feet loose from his hands. Lon is missing several fingers, I realise. They should be bleeding but the soft pink stubs seem to be forming something to replace. What is he? Is he a thing that broke through at the crossroads, in the wake of something big and old? I look at him. His copper penny eyes on mine, wide, pleading.
What did Mamó say to me that night?
Our face on their appetites.
He is a mask, a lie. He would have killed her.
‘Thank you, Brian.’ Catlin walks towards her crumpled ex.
Mam is standing straight, but her face is hollow, caving in.
‘Lon?’ Catlin’s hands brush the side of his face. ‘Lon?’
He makes a creaking sound from his mouth, and my sister tells him, ‘Shh …’
She looks to me. ‘Maddy, can you hold him?’ I venture over. Put my hands around his waist and haul.
He’s very light for somebody so tall. I think of the shadow stretching through the garden. Birds have hollow bones. The swoop of claws. He makes another sound. I curl my fingers tight beneath his ribs. My sister on the bed, her face splayed wide.
‘I forgive you, Lon.’ Catlin’s voice is jarring through my thoughts. ‘I don’t want you to think that I am doing this because we broke up, or out of revenge. After this is finished, I’m going to work really hard on never thinking about you ever again. On turning you into nothing. This is the first step.’ She pushes the tip of the wooden sword towards his chest.
‘Left a bit,’ I say. ‘If you want heart.’
‘Thanks,’ she says, and presses it into his skin. It parts like butter but he does not bleed. I put my hand down to feel where his fingers went missing. I can touch them now, the muscle and the soft nubbed baby growth that moves beneath. The blood on him, I realise, must not be his.
Catlin pushes harder, angling up between two of his ribs. I can feel him tensing and convulsing. His armpits are dry. He mustn’t sweat. I wonder how he regulates his body.
Brian has looped an arm around Mam’s waist. She doesn’t seem to notice. She’s still staring.
‘You broke my heart,’ Catlin says to Lon. Her voice is so, so gentle. ‘You broke my heart. Because I really loved you, till you killed me. I dream about you sometimes, and I cry. Because you warped a lovely thing and turned it into something else entirely. You made me less. And then you ate my face.’
She looks at him, her eyes flashing angry.
‘It is not OK for girls to be your food. We’re not for eating.’
There is a pause. Her face is tense, she’s putting all her weight on the sword but it isn’t budging. Maybe something’s stuck. Who knows where his heart is or if he even has one?
She turns to me, her face twisting against itself.
‘I asked him to stop. I kept on begging, pleading with him to stop. And so he took my tongue. He tried to shut me up. But I am speaking. Mam, I need some help.’
She’s crying now. I feel Lon shrink a little, slump and soften. I wonder, then, how much of her he loved. Brian’s blade in Catlin’s hands and inside Lon, and Catlin crying when a puppy dies on television. Me playing with my doctor dreams. I wanted to save lives, not to take them. I wanted to help people. And maybe in a weird way, this is that.
Mam starts to move towards her struggling daughter. Brian removes his hand, letting her go, stands awkward at the side. The three of us crowding around the lanky awkward half-corpse.
‘It’s not revenge,’ she says. ‘It’s not for me. But it is for someone.’ We all look at the wall. She starts to say their names.
‘Dearbhla, Sibéal, Amanda …’ We join in.
We say their names like prayers.
We wield the sword.
‘… Laoise, Eimear, Laura, Bríd, Sorcha, Bridget, Karen, Gráinne, Julie, Roisín, Gobnait, Violet, Dymphna, Alacoque, Aoife, Fionnuala, Victoria, Elizabeth, Emer, Sinéad, Sally, Ciara, Mary-Ann, Nancy, Susan, Fiona, Delia, Maisy, Laura, Rachel, Caoimhe, Julie, Ava, Sheila, Maria, Antoinette, Cathleen, Martina, Jennifer, Carol, Nora, Lee, Colette, Ellen, Claire, Laurel, Jacinta, Mary-Bridget, Mary, Ann, Marie, Noreena, Savita, Carmel, Sarah, Aoibhe, Scarlett, Dearbhla, Katherine, Cecilia, Lisa, Lillian, Louise, Patricia, Katie, Cliodhna, Shona, Nuala, Shauna, Patricia, Monica, Meabhdh, Jean, Gillian, Elaine, Anna, Sabhdh, Sarah, Adele, Rose, Grace, Joyce, Nicola, Ruth, Frances, Naomi, Elizabeth, Sandra, Dolores, Aisling, Sharon, Lola, Chloe, Helen, Daisy, Megan, Úna, Fawn, Catlin.’
We move our hand and I now understand the expression ‘twist the knife’. It’s because of what a body does, when you curl a blade inside it. We push and worry our way deeper in. And then there is a sigh.
And he is gone.
Catlin starts to cry, and so does Mam. And I can feel a building-up behind the tops of my cheeks but there’s a wall that’s keeping them from flowing and I wonder if what used to push them out of me was in my soul. Maybe now I’ll be a little grey cloud. Never raining. Always full of rain.
I press my face into Catlin’s shoulder so hard that I feel as if when I pull back there should be the imprint of my features in her skin. Me and Mam and Catlin go to put on the kettle. Brian stays back, to safely bury Lon. He’s brought cement.
Button is in the kitchen. Mamó has sewn his eye shut. He looks like a little Franken-cat. He’s still small, but shaped like a cat now and not a kitten. He hisses and he starts when he sees me. He slinks away, back arched.
‘He hates you now,’ says Catlin, looking amused. ‘I wonder why.’
I haven’t told them how he lost his eye. What I was prepared to do, for her sake. I don’t think there’s a need to. I’m not proud.
‘It’s these shoes,’ I say, pointing to my mucky army boots.