There’s No Place Like Here

44

After Jack had left Sandy Shortt’s family home, he drove to the Leitrim Arms, the local bar in the small village. Despite the early hour, the pub was dark, lit by too few dusty wall lights, natural light blocked out by dark burgundy stained-glass windows. The floor was uneven, flagged with stones, and the wooden benches were covered with paisley cushions with foam spilling from the sides. There were a total of three men in the bar; two at opposite ends of the counter, pints in hand, necks craning to see the horseracing on the small television suspended from a bracket from the ceiling. The barman held court behind the counter, arms resting on the taps, head up, eyes glued to the race. There was anxious expectation painted on each of their faces, a monetary interest in the outcome obvious. The commentator’s thick Cork accent speedily documented a second-by-second account of the race, speaking so fast, everybody couldn’t help but hold his breath, adding to the atmosphere of suspense.

Catching the barman’s attention, Jack ordered a pint of Guinness and chose to sit in the quiet snug at the far end of the bar, away from everyone. He had something important to do.

The barman took his gaze away from the television, choosing profession over obsession, and gave his pouring of the perfect pint his complete attention. He held the glass at a forty-five-degree angle close to the spout, preventing large bubbles from forming in the head. He pulled the tap fully open and filled the glass 75 percent full. He placed the pint on the counter, allowing the stout to settle before filling the rest of the glass.

Jack took Donal’s police file out of his bag and placed it on the table before him, spreading out the pages one last time. This was his good-bye. This was the end, the final glance at all he had studied every day for the past year. The end of the search, the beginning of the rest of his life. He wanted to raise a glass to his brother one final time, one last drink together. He ran his eyes over the police reports, the long hours of dedicated police time. Each page reminding him of the ups and downs, the hopes and disappointments of the previous year. It had been long and hard. He laid out the witness statements in a row, the reports from all of Donal’s friends who had been with him that night. The anguish and tears, lost sleep and despair that had gone into trying to remember every last blurred detail of the night.

Jack placed Donal’s photograph on the tall stool opposite him. One final pint with his brother. He smiled across at him. I’ve done my best, Donal; I promise you I’ve done my best. For the first time, he believed it. There was no more he could do. With that thought came great relief. He looked down again at the pages before him. Alan O’Connor’s face stared back at him from the passport photo attached at the corner. Another broken man, another life almost destroyed. Alan was far from reaching the point Jack had arrived at that day. Jack had lost his brother, a brother he didn’t know as well as he should have, but Alan had lost his greatest friend. He glanced at the statement he’d read a thousand times, if not more. Alan’s full detailed account of the doomed night matched the accounts of Andrew, Paul, and Gavin, and the three girls they had met at the fast-food restaurant, though they had trouble remembering the beginning of their night, never mind the early hours of the next morning. The language of the report was awkward, stilted, and foreign. It lacked emotion, relayed only the facts of the matter, times and places, who was there and what was said. No feelings to convey the fact that a group of friends had been torn apart by the incident of this one night. The one night that changed a lifetime of nights.

Andrew, Paul, Gavin, Shane, Donal, and I left Clohessy’s on Howley’s Quay at approximately 12.30 on Friday night. We went to the nightclub The Sin Bin in the same building… Jack skipped the details of what happened inside the club. Andrew, Paul, Gavin, Donal, and I left the club at approximately 2 A.M. and walked two blocks to SuperMacs on O’Connell Street. Shane had met a girl in the nightclub that none of us knew and went home with her…

He skipped a few lines.

All of us sat down in a booth on the right-hand side of the chipper closest to the counter, to eat our burgers and chips. We got talking to three girls who were also in the chipper. We asked them to join us and we all sat in the booth. There were eight of us; me, Andrew, Paul, Gavin, Donal, Collette, Samantha, and Fiona. Donal sat on the outside, on the edge of the seat beside Fiona and opposite me. We made plans to go back to a party at Fiona’s house… Jack skipped to the most important part. I asked Donal if he was going to the party and he said yes and that was the last conversation we had that night. He didn’t tell me he was leaving the chipper. I started talking to Collette and when I turned around Donal was gone. That was at 3 A.M. approximately.

They had all relayed the same story. It was just a normal lads’ Friday night out. Pub, nightclub, chipper, nothing out of the ordinary for them to remember; just the fact that their best friend went missing. Each of Donal’s friends relayed different final conversations, nobody noticed him leave the chipper apart from the girl named Fiona, who was sitting beside him, and she only noticed that he was not beside her when she turned around and saw him walking out. She said he had fallen against the door frame as he left, and a few girls by the door had seen him and laughed. Later, none of these girls could offer any more information than just that. As the place was full of people all thrown out of nightclubs at the same time, the CCTV did not film the booth that Donal had been seated at. The lines forming at the counter and the pockets of people standing around unable to get a table blocked the booths. Still, there was nothing to see but Donal walking out, bumping his shoulder on the door frame as everyone had witnessed. CCTV filmed him at the nearby ATM where he withdrew €30, he was seen again stumbling down Arthur’s Quay, and then his trace was lost.

Jack thought back to the last time he had spoken to Alan and felt guilty for putting him under such pressure to try to remember more. Alan had clearly already been squeezed for every last drop of detail of the night by the Gardaí. Jack had felt that in some way his brother going missing was his fault, that as an older brother there was something that he should have done, was supposed to do to make it right. His mother died feeling that same responsibility. Was there anyone that didn’t blame themselves? He recalled his conversation with Alan, how only a few days ago he had admitted the same.

I hope you find him, Jack. I keep going back over that night again and again, wishing I’d left with him.

On the counter, the creamy head of the Guinness began to separate from the dark body. It was still foggy but was becoming clearer.

I keep going back over that night again and again, wishing I’d left with him.

Jack’s heart caught in his throat. He fumbled through the pages to find Alan’s statement again.

We made plans to go back to a party at Fiona’s house. I asked Donal if he was going to the party and he said yes and that was the last conversation we had that night. He didn’t tell me he was leaving the chipper.

The barman topped off the pint by pushing the tap forward slightly, allowing the head to rise just above the rim.

Jack sat up straight, focused his mind, didn’t lose his head. Thoughts began to rise to the top and he felt close to something. He kept reading and rereading the police report while simultaneously going over in his mind the conversation with Alan from only days ago.

The stout didn’t overflow or run down the glass.

Jack controlled his breathing and kept his fear contained.

The barman delivered the pint to the snug and hesitated at the entrance, unsure of where to put the Guinness with the table a mess of papers.

“Just put it down anywhere,” Jack said. The barman made a circular motion with the pint in the air, trying to decide where to plant it and finally brought it down to the table, rushing back to where the men where shouting at the television, urging their horse on. Jack’s eyes moved down the ruby-black belly of the body of the pint, right down to the base of the glass. The barman had placed it on Alan’s statement, next to the sentence he had read over and over again. Everything was drawing him back to that sentence.

I asked Donal if he was going to the party and he said yes and that was the last conversation we had that night. He didn’t tell me he was leaving the chipper.

Jack was trembling but he didn’t know why. Shaking, he raised the glass into the air and smiled wobbly at his brother’s photo. He put the glass to his lips and took a big slug of the thick liquid. At the same time the warm stout slid down his throat, the memory of Alan’s next sentence fired itself at him.

I really thought he’d be OK getting a taxi down that way, you know?

The Guinness caught in his throat and he began to cough, leaning away from the table to hack it up.

“You OK?” the barman shouted over.

“Yes! Go on, ya boya!” The two men in the bar celebrated the victory of their horse, clapping their hands and cheering, giving Jack a fright.

Jack’s mind ran through a million excuses, defenses, mistakes, and whether he’d misheard. He thought of Sandy’s diary entry to visit written in red capital letters, he thought of the worried face of Mrs. O’Connor. You think he done something wrong? She knew. She had known all along. Chills ran through him. Anger fired through his veins. He slammed the pint down on the table, the white ring left on the inside of the glass. His legs went weak as rage and fear took over his body.

He didn’t remember leaving the pub, he didn’t remember calling Alan, and he didn’t remember driving back to Limerick in record time to meet him. Looking back on those hours there was very little he knew about that night other than what people told him. The one thing he did recall was Alan’s forlorn voice now ringing constantly in his head: I keep going back over that night again and again, wishing I’d left with him. I really thought he’d be OK getting a taxi down that way, you know? The contradicting voice from his statement shouted even louder: I asked Donal if he was going to the party and he said yes and that was the last conversation we had that night.

The last conversation we had.

He had lied. And why would he do that?