Now, that knowledge was no longer enough. After all this, I needed to know more about where I had come from. I needed to know about my birth mother, about who she had been before she had been an alcoholic, a diagnosis, a label. The search might take a long time, and wouldn’t be easy on me, I knew. But it would be equally hard on my mam and dad. What I had told them about Deirdre had come as a shock at the start. They hadn’t known that I had a half-sister, hadn’t been told about her by my birth mother. They hadn’t found out either from the social workers during the adoption process. At first, I hadn’t fully believed that, though I hadn’t said anything to them about my doubts. I had gone away and investigated on my own, had asked a colleague who worked in Child Protection about a hypothetical case involving a double adoption, preceded by fostering. She had told me that not only was it possible, it was likely that foster or adoptive parents wouldn’t know about a later sibling. She had said that things like that happened all the time. I had left it at that, tried to get on with things. I didn’t know how long it would take for me to get used to being alive while Deirdre was dead. Maybe I never would.

I went down Cornmarket Street and, as I had often done those long months since November, on to the Coal Quay. Along from the footbridge, at the place where my sister had gone with the river, I looked down into the Lee, its waters still and quiet now. I counted the steps of the stone staircase, exposed to the air by the low tide. But, after a time, I turned my back to the river and leant against the quay wall. Hearing a ping, I checked my phone. It was a message from Davy.

Good news about the trial. Great excuse for me to cancel a couple of yummy mummies. See you at your place around 6.30. OK?

Smiling, I sent him a one-word reply.

Yes.

Acknowledgements