“Then tell me this and tell me no more: if you’re such a saint and we’re such a shower of shites, why are you using that child for an excuse to come around here?”

I was headed for the door when I heard, behind me, “Sit down.”

It sounded like Da’s own voice again, full and strong and young. It grabbed my inner five-year-old around the throat and shoved me back into my chair before I knew what had happened. Once I was there, I had to pretend it was by choice. I said, “I think we’re more or less done here.”

Giving the order had taken it out of him: he was leaning forward, breathing hard and clutching at the duvet. He said, on short gasps, “I’ll tell you when we’re done.”

“You do that. Just as long as it’s soon.”

Da shoved his pillows farther up behind his back—I didn’t offer to help: the thought of our faces getting that close made my skin crawl—and got his breath back, slowly. The ceiling-crack shaped like a race car was still there above his head, the one I used to stare at when I woke up early in the mornings and lay in bed daydreaming and listening to Kevin and Shay breathe and turn and murmur. The gold light had faded away; outside the window, the sky over the back gardens was turning a cold deep-sea blue.

Da said, “You listen to me. I haven’t got long left.”

“Leave that line to Ma. She does it better.” Ma has been at death’s door ever since I can remember, mostly due to mysterious ailments involving her undercarriage.

“She’ll outlive us all, just out of spite. I wouldn’t say I’ll see next Christmas.”

He was milking it, lying back and pressing a hand to his chest, but there was an undercurrent to his voice that said he meant it at least partway. I said, “What are you planning on dying of?”

“What do you care? I could burn to death in front of you before you’d piss on me to put me out.”

“True enough, but I’m curious. I didn’t think being an arsehole was fatal.”

Da said, “My back’s getting worse. Half the time I can’t feel my legs. Fell over twice, the other day, just trying to put on my kacks in the morning; the legs went out from under me. The doctor says I’ll be in a wheelchair before summer.”

I said, “Let me take a wild guess here. Did the doctor also say your ‘back’ would get better, or at least stop getting worse, if you went off the booze?”

His face curled up with disgust. “That little nancy-boy’d give you the sick. He needs to get off his ma’s tit and have a real drink. A few pints never did a man any harm.”