DEAR BUTTERFLIES,
My darlings. The time has come for you to flap your wings. Secrets never stay buried, and in due time, I will provide the shovels. I won’t lie, I made a deal with a pair of devils: a wolf and a hound. (We were the sheep and their clothing.) And these communications may very well cost a life. But it will be well worth it in the end. I have spent the rest of my life watching, fearful of this very moment. As much as I’d like to deny it, it is happening. I will not sit around and watch history repeat itself. You now have the ability to contact each other. There is safety in numbers. After this letter, you will see a link to a private messaging page. USE IT. I assure you it is secure and cannot be traced. That said, do erase it from your history each and every time. This is essential. I am trying to help, but they are watching me too. I am sorry to tell you this, but you MUST listen: Do not trust strangers. Do not fall for sweet talk or promises—and STAY AWAY from anyone who preaches dogma of any kind. Do not go anywhere alone. You are safe as long as you are carrying your babies. Once you deliver, you are in extreme danger. They won’t hesitate to kill. #Run. #Hide. #Fight. I will try to help, but they are watching me.
Never, ever forget: You are your mothers’ savage daughters.
Butterflies are free!
Love and kisses,
One Who Has Not Forgotten
PS. This email box does not accept replies.
[email protected]: WTF?
[email protected]: You took the letters right out of my fingers. Seriously, WTF?
[email protected]: I am my mother’s savage daughter . . . Is this, like, an advert for Sarah Hester Ross? Love the song but hate being spammed!
[email protected]: I don’t know the song. #Clueless. But it read: You are your mothers’ savage daughters . . .
[email protected]: I got that, but whoever wrote the email is obviously referring to the song.
[email protected]: You sound snippy. Never heard the song. I’m deaf. I was only pointing out the differences. #Facts.
[email protected]: I was being kind of snippy. Sorry, sorry, sorry! Hormones!!!
[email protected]: Is this you, Baby Daddy? If so—this isn’t funny...
[email protected]: Definitely not your Baby Daddy. This is getting weird . . .
[email protected]: Getting weird? It started weird. I’m not falling for this. HOWEVER—I eagerly await my shovel!
[email protected]: Are you pregnant? I’m 7 and a half months.
[email protected]: 7 months. But still not falling for this. I am not DUMB! Deaf people can do everything but hear.
[email protected]: I NEVER said you were dumb. Either you are messing with me, or someone else is messing with US. Should we show the letter to someone?
[email protected]: Like who? We probably both shopped for baby stuff online. #BOTS
[email protected]: I’m from County Kerry—what about you?
[email protected]: I am not giving you any more information. #PeaceOut.
[email protected]: Could we meet? In a public place? (In case one of us is a serial killer?)
[email protected]: Like where? (And I’m totally a serial killer!)
[email protected]: Spring Festival in Dingle is next month. Murphy’s Ice Cream Shop? Noon—first day of the festival? That way, if you stand me up, I still get ice cream.
[email protected]: Still think you’re taking the piss. But whatever. I’ll be there. #You’reBuying #NotScaredOfYou.
[email protected]: Perfect. Let’s have a code word.
[email protected]: Lol whatever Jane Bond!! Like what?
[email protected]: Butterfly.
[email protected]: Okey-doke. Guess we’re flapping our wings. Wonder if we’ll set off a tornado.
[email protected]: I think you mean hurricane . . .
[email protected]: Chill out, Tiger Mom.
[email protected]: It’s hard to convey humor through an online chat. See you there. Don’t forget: Butterfly. Just in case . . . I am deleting this chat.
[email protected]: Fine. Whatever. #MeToo.
JOHN MALONE FACED A DILEMMA. MR. AND MRS. SHEEHAN WERE ON holiday, and they hadn’t been home in a fortnight. On a cruise, no less, some fancy thing destined for Italy. But John only knew this because he heard the missus on the phone the day before they’d left. Breanna Sheehan liked to take her mobile phone into the front garden and chat with her friends—and, boy, did she have a set of lungs on her. They hadn’t been the friendly sort, so it was the only reason he knew anything about them at all. Age discrimination—what else could it be? He was an old man, and she probably assumed he was nearly deaf, but the joke was on them; he’d always had excellent hearing. This was also how he knew that they’d been calling him “the nosy old goat next door.” After that, he never bothered to say hello or even make eye contact. Nosy old goat his arse! He was the one who’d lived here over sixty years. They were the blow-ins; he could count the years they’d been here on one wrinkled hand, and even then, he’d gone out of his way to be neighborly.
Still. His dear late wife would want him to stand on higher ground, and if there wasn’t any, she’d tell him to pull up his wellies like a big lad. And he certainly wasn’t earwigging. But if your one was going to pace outside and holler, he couldn’t not hear it.
Apparently, it was the Sheehans’ twenty-fifth wedding anniversary, and they needed a break from “the whole mess with Fiona.” Breanna said it wasn’t how they imagined becoming grandparents. He had no clue what she was on about, and he’d been disappointed that their lovely grown daughter hadn’t been around in six months. Unlike her parents, she was the friendly sort, and they’d stood by the wall and had a nice long chat the first time she had visited. The lovely angel and the parents had obviously had a falling out, and he was firmly on Team Fiona. What a colleen. Man oh man, if he was forty years younger. Dark hair, light eyes, and that smile! She could bring ships to shore with that smile. Once he heard Fiona was with child, he’d bought a teddy at the shops and had been eagerly waiting her next visit so he could present it to her. But months rolled on, and there’d been no sign of Fiona. He finally put it together that she was an unmarried woman and the Sheehans did not approve. John didn’t approve either, but that was the world now, wasn’t it? And it was still their job to love and support their daughter, regardless of her sins.
And even after the “old goat” comment, John would have been delighted to gather their mail had they only asked. It was no skin off his back. He was long retired, and aside from his weekly shopping and whatnot, and his twice-weekly forages to his local pub, he was a homebody. But his neighbors didn’t ask. And now their mail was falling out of the postbox at the end of their drive, and he had no idea when they would return. He missed the days when neighbors were friendly, because you never knew when you might need a helping hand.
He’d been watching the mail bulge out of the postbox for days, and then he could not take it anymore. The weather was grand at the moment, but rain and nothing but rain was coming in. For days on end they’d been issuing flood warnings.
John retrieved an old tin box from his shed and walked to the end of the road, where their postbox yawned open, envelopes spilling out. He grabbed a handful. They had a load of bills alright. Electric, water, internet, and telly. John was a man still content with the newspaper and the radio. Suitable, perhaps, for an old goat. Their Irish Times subscription needed to be renewed, and it seemed Gary Sheehan received a lot of solicitation from various financial corporations. That explained why he suited up for work every morning and was out before the sun, although John had no idea what line of business he was in. Perhaps he was in banking or an investor. They shouldn’t have any problems paying these bills; if they were past due, it was down to pure laziness. There were no personal cards or notes; he wondered where Fiona lived and if she ever wrote to them.
He opened his tin box, set it underneath the post, and pulled until nearly all their mail tumbled out. He felt a certain satisfaction as the postbox started to empty. Anyone driving by would have seen the over-stuffed postbox and realized they weren’t home. That was a safety concern. For all John knew, he was preventing a robbery. They didn’t have to bake him a cake, but dollars to donuts, they wouldn’t even thank him. Typical. The mail was nearly out now, but there were some odd bits still shoved in the back. John had to strain to reach all the way in.
The top item he pulled out was a flyer—an advert for SuperValue, and given that the coupons would expire in a few days, he tucked that into the pocket of his trousers. No sense letting good coupons go to waste. The next item was a flyer for the Spring Festival he was just on about. The first of its kind, the festival would be held on Strand Street, and apparently it was happening rain or shine. It boasted of arts and crafts and produce—farmers selling eggs and whatnot, he supposed. There was also going to be a petting zoo, of all things. You couldn’t pay him to endure those crowds. He liked it when people talked to him over his fence. Like sweet Fiona. The last bit, shoved way in the back, was the oddest of them all. A mobile phone taped to a sheet of paper. The phone was the old-fashioned flip type. The paper blared a message in bold type. He read it once, and then again, and then a third time, wondering if someone was taking the piss:
A ransom note? Did someone really have poor, dear Fiona? That wasn’t possible. Was it? There was no proof attached. No photo of Fiona holding a newspaper or tied up, and although he was grateful for that, he didn’t know whether or not someone was just messing. His heart thumped louder with each read. It had to be a joke. Some young ones acting the maggot. He hadn’t seen anyone suspicious hanging around the postal box, and he usually had his eye out. The only way someone slipped this past him was if he was at the shops, or the pub, or watching telly, or eating, or sleeping. Who in the world would think this was remotely funny? He wished he had a phone number for Fiona, or even the Sheehans, so he could put his mind at ease straightaway. What kind of neighbors didn’t exchange phone numbers for emergency situations?
His stomach twisted with worry as he flipped open the phone. One missed call. Jesus, Mary, and Joseph. What if this was real, like? They’d not only missed the call, but the letter and phone were in the very back of the box, which meant it had been delivered first. Most likely right after they left. That was nearly two weeks gone by. Was Fiona alright? For the first time in John Malone’s life, he wished he had a neighbor on the other side. His panic was so great he probably would have flagged down the nearest vehicle, but this was a quiet road. He was going to have to go to the guards, wasn’t he? The note clearly stated “no guards,” but it was also too late now, wasn’t it? Clutching the ransom note—maybe he should have worn gloves; also too late now—he ran for his truck. God help her, please let this be nothing more than pitiful shenanigans. Minutes later, he was screeching down the road in his truck, headed for the Dingle Garda Station.
SHAUNA MILLS STOOD IN FRONT OF MURPHY’S THIRTY MINUTES PAST the time she was supposed to meet FiFoFum. It was becoming apparent that she had been played. She wasn’t entirely surprised that it had been a trick, but she couldn’t deny the twinge of anger. She’d been a fool. At least she was in front of a delectable ice cream shop. Handmade with milk from Kerry cows, it never failed to satisfy the cravings of her onboard passenger. Now she really needed her dose of mint chocolate chip. She wondered if FiFoFum was a fat lad with thick glasses hiding behind his laptop. Arsehole. At least the day wasn’t an entire waste; she’d get a fat cone and have a wander around the festival. According to weather reports, this was the last day before heavy rains and floods were predicted. The wind was whipping a bit, and the smell of rain was in the air, but for now it was dry. She took a moment to see if there was anyone gleefully watching her get stood up, but it was crowded, and no one seemed to be paying any particular attention to her.
The line for ice cream was long, and so was the line for the jax, and she really had to pee. It seemed all she did now was pee, and it was a struggle to get everything off, and then it was another struggle to get it all back on, even though she was practically wearing nothing but stretchy leggings and maternity tops these days. By the time she finally used the restroom and bought her cone, she was knackered. She was so ready for her onboard passenger to be born, although she was still petrified at the prospect of giving birth. So many things could go wrong. So many things had gone wrong for so many women throughout history. Died in childbirth. Shauna couldn’t help the awful images that assaulted her daily. It wasn’t right, something so large trying to force its way out of such a small opening. What was God thinking? She needed to “redirect” her thoughts, as her doctor had told her many times, but now all she wanted to do was go home and curl up into a ball. Into a fetal position. Ironic. But she had to stick it out; she was due at the Griffins’ in a few hours.
The Griffins. Thinking about them made her take a huge bite of her ice cream, and then she was struck with brain freeze. Jane Griffin was to blame. Lately, she’d been onto Shauna about a natural childbirth, a home birth no less. She’d even researched local doulas without discussing it with Shauna first. No way. Shauna was going to hospital, and they were giving her drugs. All the drugs. She wanted to lie down, then wake up when it was all over. If she could somehow take it all back, she would. Liam insisted to this day that he had not messed with her birth control, but Shauna knew that a few of the pills had been replaced. They had tasted sweet. Like candy.
She was having second thoughts. About everything. Was that why they had invited her over tonight? At first, they bribed her with an offer of supper. Home-cooked meal. But Shauna had learned her lesson that last time. Nothing but soggy green vegetables and plain chicken and a small amount of rice—because she didn’t want to risk gestational diabetes, did she?
Jane had never shown this side of her before. How many times had she spoken with them? How many applications had she poured through? Not that Shauna wanted to keep him. (She just knew she was having a boy; she could feel it.) But she couldn’t provide for a baby. And no matter what he said, neither could Liam. He stayed out drinking too many nights, and he didn’t wash his cereal bowl, and sometimes he didn’t even wash himself. Yes, he was kind, and he worked hard at his handyman job, not to mention overseeing all those rentals, but he was immature, and it wouldn’t be long before the poor baby was taking care of him. And the Griffins had money. Babies needed things all the time. Nappies, prams, outfits, high chairs, bibs, pacifiers, changing tables, toys. Most of Shauna’s possessions could be contained within a few luggage bags, and it had been that way her entire life. The thought of providing everything a baby needed was overwhelming.
It was settled; Jane and David would be much better parents. They were schoolteachers even. He would be smart. But she didn’t want to live near them after the baby was born; she worried it would hurt her heart to see him. She nearly had Liam convinced that they should move to the States. There was a university for the deaf there, and even though they used American Sign Language, and Shauna barely knew a bit of Irish Sign Language, maybe they could teach her. She’d never been around a group of deaf people before, and she wanted to know what that was like. Liam was still resisting, but no matter where they went, it would be somewhere that they didn’t have to see the baby—and he didn’t have to see them. She’d refused the Griffins’ offer of supper, but she said she’d turn up and listen to Jane wax on about a doula. But she already knew what her answer was going to be. No, no, no. Jane had better watch her step.
Shauna pushed past a fat man in a flat cap and sunglasses, lurking on the corner. Eejit. The sun wasn’t even out. She watched his head dip as if he was gazing at her big belly. “Take a photo, fatty,” she said, startling him. “It lasts longer.” She had no idea whether or not he understood her voice, as per usual. But she liked that she’d startled him. He turned his back on her. Laughing, she continued on her way, strolling by the tents, stopping only at ones that weren’t too jammed with folks. How did people have all this money and all this time on their hands? So many people. They were swarming all over the booths, picking up candles and sticking their noses into them, winding colorful scarves around their necks, and molesting handmade soaps. Normally, Shauna kept her head down because, more often than not, when she looked up, there would be a pair of lips flapping at her. Then she would have to either shake her head and point to her ear, or vocalize, “I’m deaf.” This either produced embarrassment on the hearing person’s face or induced them to exaggerate their mouth movements, or suddenly they would expect her to read their lips, despite the fact that she hadn’t understood them in the first place. She wasn’t in the mood for it today.
She’d wasted too many years of her life in speech therapists’ offices, striving to be understood. The speech therapist would clap her hands and grin whenever Shauna spoke, forcing air up, up, up from the diaphragm, hands squeezing the spot. Shauna would try and do what she was asked. Then came the clapping, as if Shauna was a trained seal who had just learned her first trick. And the worst bit was that Shauna would actually feel something like love wash over her from the rare praise. Then she’d try the very same words out in the real world, and instead of claps, she would get eyebrows furled in confusion and blank faces staring at her. Having someone turn his back on her, like the fat pervert had just done, was something new.
And yet they still forced her to practice: Try, try, try. The problem with swallowing other people’s expectations your whole life was that eventually you choked on them. Not today, thank you. It wasn’t deafness that was her disability; it was hearing people. They’d been doing it to her her whole life. She’d grown up in a group home, but instead of placing her in a school for the deaf, they’d put her in a school with handicapped children.
Her entire life had been hearing people sticking labels on her and lying to her face. And now she was supposed to trust these people when it came to pushing a human being out of her fanny? She also didn’t want to watch it happening, and she certainly didn’t want other people to watch it happening. Jane and David Griffin had actually said they wanted to be by her side when the baby was being born! No. Fucking. Way. She wished she could take it all back. And when she said all, she meant all.
She was about to find a bench to perch on when she came across a booth selling baby clothes. Holding her ice cream cone in one hand, she scrounged around in her pocket to see if she had any euros, but the only thing there was the last email correspondence she’d had with FiFoFum. They hadn’t spoken since this first exchange. The least the woman could have done was message her to cancel. Shauna always checked her messages, so she knew she hadn’t overlooked a cancellation. She had even printed out the message before deleting it. She took it out now and read it one more time. It was rubbish. There was a bin near one of the last tents at the end of the street. The banner read WILDE’S VETERINARIAN CLINIC. Next to it was an enclosure with lambs, and their banner read DOOLEY’S FARM, and just beyond it a parade of Irish wolfhounds. Shauna had always wanted a pet. Any pet. A dog or cat, of course, but she would have settled for a budgie or a goldfish.
The Griffins had an ugly dog, but she wasn’t supposed to say that. Hearing people got so uptight when she called things like she saw them. Somehow it wasn’t nice to call things ugly, or fat, even if they were ugly or fat. That was just lying! And the Griffins’ dog was ugly. He was a hairy little thing that always looked as if he’d stuck his paw in an electric socket. He had bad breath and pointy teeth, and one eye was bigger than the other. He constantly yapped at her, only she couldn’t hear it, so she didn’t care. It was funny, though, watching him flap his gums at her. Maybe once she moved to the States and finished college at Gallaudet University—that’s where she intended on going, even though she hadn’t applied yet—but after she graduated, she would get a good job, and an apartment, and a load of pets. Only hers would be cute.
She was headed for the rubbish bin to throw away FiFoFum when someone bumped into her, sending the paper flying out of her hand and her ice cream cone smashing into her breasts. Fantastic. Someone’s hands were moving toward her, and before she knew what was happening, a tiny woman with white-blond hair and green eyes the exact same color of her mint ice cream was blotting her chest with napkins. Her mouth was moving too, and Shauna caught: “Sorry, sorry, sorry.”
“It’s okay,” Shauna said. “I was finished.” She looked at the paper that now rested at the woman’s feet. There was no way Shauna was bending over. The woman took the dripping, mangled cone out of her hand and pointed in the direction of the ice cream shop. “No, I’m full,” she said, patting her belly and laughing. The woman joined her in laughter, and even though she was clumsy and hadn’t been watching where she was going, Shauna liked her. She started to move on when the woman bent over and plucked the paper off the ground, then held it out to her. Shauna shook her head and continued on her way. It had all been a prank anyway; there was nothing to fear from the letter. All that secret shite about deleting the email and being in danger. It was laughable. Shauna could not believe she fell for it. The tiny woman could throw it away; it seemed a fair exchange for dumping ice cream on her and then pawing at her. Shauna tilted her head back and calmed herself in the skies. Whereas most people would see splotches of gray and the obvious signs of an approaching storm, Shauna saw so much more.
Stripes of hopeful blue peeked out from beneath those gray clouds, interspersed with fluffy white ones. She spotted the shape of an owl, about to take flight. She spotted the face of a beautiful woman. She spotted a newborn baby. Shauna had spent her lifetime watching the skies, learning every trick of light and shapes they had to offer. Endless faces and shifting patterns. The skies talked, and Shauna listened. She considered herself an expert and could accurately forecast storms, if anyone cared to listen. How the hues shifted, light blue sliding into grays and blacks, how the breeze ticked up, how she could smell the rain long before it came. Snow had yet another smell, deeper and earthier than rain, and if the hairs on her arms prickled, there was sure to be thunder and lightning. Some people claimed they could feel the weather in their bones, but Shauna could feel it in her soul. Floods were coming alright. Shauna had told Liam to buy extra food and batteries for the torch, and she was going to be browned off if he didn’t listen. They’d be spending the next few days indoors; hopefully they wouldn’t kill each other. But otherwise she was looking forward to the storm. Shauna relished her relationship with Mother Nature, the only mother she had ever known.
You are your mothers’ savage daughters . . .
What shite! She’d had enough of the festival; hopefully the Griffins wouldn’t mind if she turned up a bit early to use the jax. She turned and continued toward the end of Strand Street; from there it was a left up the hill and then a right to the Griffins. She imagined them all walking to Mass on Sundays, then to a harbor restaurant for fish and chips. Hopefully, they would let him have more than soggy green veggies. The Irish wind picked up as she plodded uphill, and it was not at her back. Her onboard passenger kicked his disapproval, or maybe he was cheering her on. Her lad. Whom she would never get to know. Who would never miss her.
But what if he did?
You could miss something you never had. Shauna missed a lot of things she never had, especially parents. Which meant she couldn’t give her baby fabulous grandparents either. She couldn’t give him a real home, with a garden and a big kitchen filled with yummy smells, and a grand school down the road. She wanted him to have it all. Loving parents, loads of friends, and a house full of love.
The only person who had tried to talk her out of giving him up for adoption (besides Liam) was the homeless woman who sat on the wall near the group home. She was dirty, her blond hair greasy and always shoved under a red bandana, and she smelled, but she was friendly, and Shauna couldn’t help but like her. She wasn’t like the others. She didn’t frown when she couldn’t understand Shauna’s speech. When she told the woman that her baby was going to have fabulous parents, the woman held up a finger and then jotted something down on the pad they used to communicate and turned it around: You would be a good mother.
Shauna hadn’t expected that. And, for some reason, it made her feel a little stab of pain in her heart. But the woman on the wall was only trying to be nice, and Shauna knew her baby needed a bigger life than she could give him.
By the time she arrived at the Griffins’ semi-attached brick house, her “light” backpack was heavy, and her bladder was about to burst. She passed their lovely front garden and mounted the steps to the front door. But when she went to knock on the door, she could see that it was already open a few inches. She stepped in. “I’m coming in.” She wouldn’t be able to hear their answer, so there was no use stalling. She really, really had to pee, and they had already told her she was welcome anytime, and so she made her way down the small hallway and into the kitchen. A shocking sight greeted her. At first, she couldn’t make sense of what was right in front of her eyes.
Mr. and Mrs. Griffin were sitting in their dining chairs, facing her, eyes wide and terrified. Their mouths were covered with silver tape, rope covered their torsos, and their ankles were zip-tied to the bottom rungs of the chairs. But that wasn’t what had Shauna rooted to the spot, heart thumping, piss coating her thighs. Standing behind the Griffins was a man. He was dressed in a bulky black coat and wore a dark mask. Given that it was made from black and gray feathers, at first she thought he was a bird. But as she continued to stare, she realized the sides of the mask had a very distinct shape. A dark butterfly—or a moth. It covered nearly his entire face, and it was one of the most terrifying things she had ever seen. She thought of the letter. Butterflies are free! Code word: Butterfly. That’s when she knew. He had been waiting for her.
He held up large sheets of white paper and began to shuffle through them in slow motion. Large words in black marker screamed at her:
DIMPNA WILDE STOOD IN FRONT OF INK-LING, DINGLE’S NEWEST—and only, for that matter—tattoo parlor. She was still in shock over the news that her brother Donnecha was not only a budding tattoo artist, but the owner of this little shop. He’d been keeping his new vocation secret for a few years now, and it was only because her son, Ben, had taken his shirt off while helping her clean out the kennels that Dimpna had learned of it. She spotted what she had thought was a smudge on his left triceps. She licked her thumb and tried to wipe it off, which elicited a rare belly laugh from her grown son. It turned out to be a miniature Tree of Life, all in black. She had been about to lecture him when he preempted that with the news that he’d received the tattoo from Donnecha, and that he’d opened his own shop, and that Ben was working there part-time. That little avalanche of information had knocked every other thought out of her poor head. Well played, Benjamin.
A bell dinged as she entered. The shop was so small it was claustrophobic, and it didn’t take long to spot Donnecha. He was hunched over a woman who was lying prone in a chair next to him. The walls were painted a dark orange and covered with images of tattoos. There was a single station, the one now occupied by Donnecha and his client, and a counter with a cash register. The place smelled of ink and stale cigarettes, and overhead a bank of fluorescent lights buzzed and popped. Dimpna felt a pang akin to homesickness. He’d left her out of all of it.
“Busy now, leave your name and digits in the guest book on the counter, and I’ll give you a bell,” Donnecha said, without turning around.
“Lovely,” Dimpna said. “I’m thinking of getting the name of me business tattooed on me arse.” She laughed, imagining their official name: Wilde’s Large and Small Animal Veterinarian Clinic. She was a tiny thing; she doubted he could even fit “Wilde’s” on both cheeks.
The buzzing stopped. Donnecha
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