There’s No Place Like Here

48

Jack, is everything OK?” Alan asked, as soon as Jack had taken his seat opposite him at the low bar table. Concern was written all over his face and doubt crept in on Jack again.

“I’m fine,” Jack replied, putting down his drink, settling on the stool, trying to keep the anger out of his voice, feeling confused.

“You look like shit.” His eyes dropped to Jack’s leg, which was bouncing away steadily.

“Everything’s OK.”

“You’re sure?” Alan narrowed his eyes.

“Yeah.” He took a slug of Guinness, his mind going back to the memory that had hit him with his last taste. Alan’s lie.

“So, what’s up?” Alan said, back to his usual nature. “You sounded on the phone like there was a fire. Something important to tell me?”

“No, no fire.” Jack looked around, avoiding eye contact, doing everything he could do to stop himself from throwing a punch. He needed to approach this properly, and tried to relax. His leg stopped bouncing, he leaned in to the table, and stared into his pint. “It’s just this past week I’ve been looking for Donal, and it’s brought everything back, y’know?”

Alan sighed and stared into his pint too. “Yeah, I know. I think about it every day.”

“About what?”

Alan looked up quickly. “What do you mean?”

“I mean, what kind of things do you think about every day?” Jack tried to take the interrogative tone out of his voice.

“I don’t know what you mean. I think about the whole thing.” Alan frowned.

“Well, I think about how I wish I’d been there that night, how I wish I’d known Donal better because if I had then maybe…” Jack said, holding his hands up. “Maybe, maybe, maybe. Maybe I’d know where to look, maybe I’d know the places or people he went to for safety or for privacy. Anything like that, you know? Maybe there were some people he was running from, people he got involved with. We didn’t talk much about private things and every day I think about the fact that if I’d been a better brother maybe I’d have found him. Maybe he’d be sitting right here beside us having a pint.”

They both naturally looked to the empty stool beside them.

“Don’t think stuff like that, Jack. You were a good bro-”

“Don’t,” Jack interrupted, raising his voice.

Alan stopped in surprise. “Don’t what?”

Jack looked him directly in the eyes. “Don’t lie.”

Fear and uncertainty entered Alan’s face and Jack knew his intuition was correct. Alan looked around the room anxiously but Jack stopped him. “You don’t need to tell me I was a good brother because I know I wasn’t. Don’t lie to make me feel better.”

Alan seemed relieved by this answer. “OK, you were a shit brother.” He smiled and they both laughed.

“As much as I’ve been giving myself a hard time for not being there that night, deep down I know that even if I’d been there, the same thing probably would have happened. Because I know you had his back; you’ve always had his back.”

Alan smiled sadly into his pint.

“Last time we talked, you blamed yourself for not leaving with Donal that night.” Jack picked up a soggy beer mat and slowly began peeling the outer label off. “I know what it’s like to blame yourself: it’s not good. I’ve been going to see some people, to help sort my head out.” He scratched his head awkwardly. “They told me all this stuff about blaming yourself was normal. I thought it’d be important to tell you that. Over a pint.”

“Thanks,” Alan said quietly. “I appreciate that.”

“Yeah, well…at least you got to have a conversation with him before he left, right?”

Alan’s face showed that he wasn’t sure where this was going, but Jack’s voice was still nonthreatening and he’d managed to calm himself completely now, to ignore what he guessed.

“You’re lucky. The rest of the lads didn’t notice him leave.”

“I didn’t either.” Alan began fidgeting.

“No, you did,” Jack said casually. “You said so last week.” He took another slug of Guinness and looked around casually. “Busy here, isn’t it? Didn’t think it would be, so early in the evening.” He looked at his watch: six P.M. It felt like days since he had met Sandy’s mother, not hours. “Last week you said you wished you’d left with him and you thought he’d be safe getting a taxi down that way.”

Alan looked uncomfortable. “I didn’t-”

“You did, man,” Jack interrupted and laughed. “I may be losing my mind but I do remember that. I was happy to hear it, though.”

“Yeah?”

“Yeah,” Jack said, nodding happily, “because it meant that he didn’t just wander off, you know. He let someone know, and it also makes sense what he was doing walking in that direction. That must make you feel better. The other lads, they’re frustrated with themselves for not noticing. They blame themselves for not seeing him leave. At least you don’t have that on your head.”

Alan was fidgeting. “Yeah, I suppose so.” He took his bag of tobacco out of his shirt pocket. “I’m going outside for a smoke. I’ll be back in a minute.”

“Hang on a minute,” Jack said casually. “I’ll finish off this pint and go out with you.”

“You don’t smoke.”

“I took it back up,” Jack said, though it was a lie. The last thing he wanted was for Alan to disappear. He would only get one chance to do this. “Why is it so busy this evening?” he said, looking around.

Alan relaxed. “I dunno.” He took out the skins and began to sprinkle the tobacco inside. “It’s a Saturday, I suppose.”

“Should we get a taxi down by Arthur’s Quay tonight?” Jack asked casually. “I left the car at home.”

“What do you mean?”

“That’s where you told Donal to go for a cab, isn’t it?”

Alan snorted and swallowed, cleaning his nostrils, making a sound but not answering the question. He slowly rolled the cigarette between his hands; Jack could see he was thinking. Trying to work it all out in his head.

“It’s probably not such a good idea to recommend it to anyone now,” Jack said a little too angrily.

Alan stopped playing with his cigarette and looked at Jack. “What’s going on, Jack?”

“There are a few things running through my mind.” He scratched his forehead with his thumb and noticed his fingers tremble with anger. Alan looked up and saw them too. His eyes narrowed. “I lost contact with the woman who was helping me look for Donal,” Jack explained, hearing his voice shaking but having no control over it. “And that’s driven me half insane. But mostly what’s bothering me”-he spoke through gritted teeth-“is the fact you told the guards and my family and everyone that would listen that you hadn’t noticed Donal leave. Then last week you told me that you had noticed him leave. In fact, you’d even spoken to him. In fact, you’d even told him which way to go for a taxi.”

Alan’s eyes got wider and wider as Jack spoke. His hands began to fidget more, he moved uncomfortably in his seat and a bead of sweat formed above his top lip.

“It doesn’t make sense, Alan. And it might not even be a big deal, but can you tell me why you lied for an entire year about the fact you told my brother, your best friend, to walk to an area, for a taxi, that would cause him to disappear?” The anger began to rise, and the volume of his voice with it.

Alan started to tremble. “I had nothing to do with it.”

“With what?”

“With Donal going missing. I had nothing to do with it.” He went to stand up but Jack reached out and pushed him down by the shoulder. The bag of tobacco spilled to the carpet. Jack kept his hand there firmly, holding him down.

“Well then, who did?” he said angrily.

“I don’t know.”

Jack dug his fingers into Alan’s shoulder blade. He was just skin and bone.

“Jesus Christ, do we have to do this here?” Alan said in pain, trying to squirm out of Jack’s grasp but failing.

Jack leaned in and said, “Do what here? Is there someplace else you’d like to go? The garda station maybe?”

“I didn’t do anything,” Alan insisted. “I swear.”

“Then why did you lie?”

“I didn’t lie,” he said with big wide eyes, looking like he’d never told the truth in his life. “I don’t exactly have a clean sheet as it is. I thought the guards would think I’d something to do with it.”

Their faces were only inches apart now. “Tell me the truth.”

“I have.”

“He was your best friend, Alan; he was always there for you.”

“I know, I know,” he interrupted, holding his trembling nicotine-stained fingers to his head. Tears began to form in his eyes and he stared down at the table, his whole body shuddering.

“You can either tell me and make me understand, or I go to the guards,” Jack threatened.

It felt like hours before Alan built up the nerve to speak again, “Donal got involved in something,” he said, so quietly Jack had to move his head even closer. Their heads were practically touching now.

“You’re a liar.”

“I’m not a liar,” Alan’s head shot up, and Jack could see for once he was telling the truth. “I was working for these lads-”

“What lads?”

“I can’t say.”

Jack reached across and grabbed his collar. “Who are they?”

“I’m helping you as much as I can, Jack,” Alan croaked, color rising quickly in his face.

Jack loosened his grip slightly, enough for Alan to be able to breathe, and listened.

“They brought Donal in to program some stuff onto their computer. I suggested him as he’d got his degree and all, but he saw and heard a few things he shouldn’t have and they got angry. I told them he wouldn’t say a word but Donal was threatening to talk.”

“About what?” Anger was firing through Jack. He couldn’t believe after one year of searching, the answer was right here at home, the truth resting with his brother’s best friend.

“I can’t tell you that,” Alan said through gritted teeth, spittle spilling from the sides of his mouth. “I couldn’t talk Donal out of snitching. He was trying to get me on the straight and narrow, but he didn’t understand how serious they were. He wouldn’t listen.” His entire body trembled and Jack’s eyes filled as he waited. Alan’s voice broke and the shame was evident as he whispered, “They were only supposed to knock him around a bit, warn him off, give him a scare.”

It was as though red powder fell before Jack’s eyes. The anger pumped violently within him. “And you walked him straight into it.” His voice was hoarse. Jack jumped out of his chair, pushed his hand up against Alan’s throat and forced him off his chair. He fell back against the wall, and the mirror behind Alan’s head smashed with the force. The pub was silenced and people leaped out of the way of the two men. Jack threw Alan’s head hard against the wall again. “Where is he?” he hissed, his face up against Alan’s.

Alan made choking sounds and Jack squeezed his grip tighter. Alan tried to speak and Jack remembered himself and loosened his grip. “Where is his body?”

When he got his answer, he let go of Alan’s throat and backed away, dropping him from his grip as if he were a dirty rag. He allowed Garda Graham Turner, who had been sitting nearby, to take over, and Jack left the pub to find his brother. This time he could say good-bye properly. This time the brothers would both finally be at rest.