The opening montage of the news gave way to footage of the strike, the red, white and blue poster that read DUBLIN IS JUST A SUNNINGDALE AWAY an eerie prelude to a photo of a Dublin pavement scattered with twisted metal and tarry with blood. It was a year to the day since a group of electricity supply workers began industrial action to force the dissolution of the power-sharing government that had been functioning for a few months. Businesses and shops began to close. The pubs stayed open at first – an essential service, Fidel had joked as he swaggered about the place – but were soon ordered to shut. Cushla felt rage rise up in her as she watched. Paramilitaries openly parading on the streets; Brian Faulkner, the Chief Executive, announcing the collapse of the government. She rinsed a cloth in soapy water and began slowly wiping her way along the counter, observing the profiles of the regulars as they watched the television. It was so much easier to say nothing than to forget. This is what Cushla remembered.

Leslie coming up the path of their house with milk in a Lucozade bottle that still had the crinkly orange wrapper on it. Gina hugging him, her face a picture of gratitude and welcome. Later, she and Cushla had sat at the kitchen table, darkness sinking around them, drinking tea they had boiled on a Primus, which tasted of glucose. That was decent of him, Cushla said.

He did it to show us that he could, said Gina.

Minty in front of the locked gates of the high school, surrounded by a couple of dozen of its students. Slattery had ignored advice from the police to close, and at three the children left to a chorus of ‘Who’s in Derry? Who’s in Derry? Fuck the Pope and the Virgin Mary.’ A missile came hurtling through the air and landed at the feet of one of the P1s; a crisp bag oozing what looked like a human turd. Cushla strode to the edge of the footpath and opened her arms at Minty, as if to ask him what was going on. He looked away.

And Fidel. One day, Cushla set out with Gina to visit her father’s grave. Just before the entrance to the cemetery, someone had blocked the road with a tractor. The car ahead of Cushla’s was waved through but hers was stopped by two men with tartan scarves tied around their faces, one of whom was holding a shotgun. A third man, in a balaclava, stepped forward and made a rolling motion with his hand. Cushla opened the window and he bent to speak to her.

Gina leaned across Cushla. Fidel, she said. Are you taking the hand out of me?

How did you know it was me? he said, glancing over his shoulder at the other pair, who were now reclining against the front of the tractor, smoking.