‘OK … of course. I understand that.’
I hadn’t spoken a lot about it myself, not to many people outside my own family, but I’d had plenty of professional help and I have to say Maureen and my mother had looked after Shannon and me like eggs that might crack at any moment, making sure we had space when we needed it and a shoulder to cry on when the time was right.
‘He doesn’t talk about it much tome, I should say,’ Reverend Campbell explained further. ‘Not to me, no, but he did mention your name once. In fact, he called out for you one night in his sleep, I believe – in a nightmare, one of many – and his mother told me you’d helped each other. It’s nice of you to look him up. Who knows, it might do you both good to have a chat and you know … reconnect?’
I remember how my heart leapt a little when I heard this, because the same thing had happened to me on occasion where I’d wake up in the middle of the night, sweat dripping down my face and my nightwear stuck to my skin as my own mother sponged me down. I’d call for David and for Shannon in my nightmares, and it floored me to think that he had done the same.
‘Yes, I’d really like to – I’d really like to reconnect with him. I promised I’d find him again.’
‘How lovely,’ he replied. ‘It’s important to keep our promises.’
I swallowed back tears and took a deep breath to try and compose the emotion of being so close to David again. I was standing in his home where he’d lived and breathed and cried, and I couldn’t believe I’d found him.
‘So, I was hoping,’ I said with a quiver, ‘I was hoping maybe you could give him my number? And if he doesn’t – if it’s too painful for him to talk to me, I totally understand, but I just had to come here today for my own closure, and in the hope it might help David too. He’s a special person, Reverend Campbell, but then you probably know that already.’
He nodded, acknowledging the compliment towards his own son.
‘He’s a good lad, I suppose, in his own way.’
I handed him a piece of pink lined paper from a notebook I carried around on a permanent basis, another tip from my counsellor, who encouraged me to write down my fears. He took it from me and smiled.
‘How is he?’ I asked. ‘You know, how has he been since?’
David’s father contemplated his answer very carefully.
‘He is struggling,’ he told me with eyes that, despite his kind words, seemed numb to reality. He took the piece of paper from my hand. ‘He is struggling in a way that only you unfortunate souls who were there that day will evertruly understand. We’re finding him all the help we can, but he has shut himself off a lot from reality and he is very, very angry.’
I nodded.
‘And you?’ he asked.
I shrugged my shoulders. It would be my twenty-first birthday in a few days and I too felt so angry at how every milestone and celebration I’d have from now on would be tinged with sadness, ruined by the memories and flashbacks that I feared would never go away.
‘I’m struggling too,’ I told him, looking at the floor. The tiles, black and white and shiny, had little streaks of lilac running through them. I’d never seen such grandeur before in real life, and couldn’t help but try and calculate in my head how many times our house in town would fit inside this one. ‘And I’m very angry still. I would love to talk to David. Maybe we could help each other, just like we did before.’
I noticed his hands were shaking at that moment as he stared at my handwriting on the pink piece of paper and, all of a sudden, the good energy we had shared was sucked from the room. My heart thumped in my chest when he looked up at me, his previous jolly, welcoming and friendly expression gone and a look of disdain replacing the former enthusiasm on his face.
He cleared his throat.
‘You name is KateFoley?’ he said, as if it was a question,even though my name was written in deliberately plain capital letters in front of him. ‘Kate Foley.’
‘Yes,’ I replied. ‘Kate Foley.’
‘From where exactly, Miss Foley?’
‘I’m from – I’m from the Green Park estate, you know, up by—’
‘Yes, I know exactly where it is,’ he said, handing me back my phone number. ‘Your mother is Annie Foley, yes?’
He gestured at me quickly to stand up, telling me my time here was up, then he put his hand on my shoulder and gently steered me towards the door. As I walked, I looked at the floor and bit the side of my cheek, feeling tears spring to my eyes. Then I stopped. I turned and looked him right in the eye.
‘Yes, my mother is Annie Foley. That is correct.’
He raised his eyebrows and sniggered in sheer disbelief and shook his head. I wasn’t going to allow him to steer me any further. I knew what was coming and I would face him head on.
‘Are you a troublemaker like your mother?’ he sneered at me, and I took a step backwards, as though he had punched me in the throat. ‘I’ve spent many years denouncing the likes of your mother in my church. She and I have quite a turbulent history, one might say.’
‘How dare you!’
