The three-hour car journey does nothing to calm his anger, if anything it intensifies. He has time to dwell on all the photos in the press that keep floating to the murky surface each time Laura’s name is mentioned. Laura falling all over the place. Rory laughing. Laughing.

It’s Saturday. He calls Marie to casually ask if Rory’s home. Rory works with his dad, they both still go home to Marie for their lunch. He’s calm, he’s just enquiring, he’s sure she doesn’t notice, he doesn’t say anything about visiting, about being on the road on the way. But she knows him well. When he arrives at the house, his parents, plus brothers Cormac and Donal, are there, along with his sister Cara. The entire welcoming committee sitting at the kitchen table.

‘What’s going on?’ he asks angrily.

Marie looks down at her hands, and then away, with guilt. Then she can’t take his stare any more and crosses the kitchen to fill the kettle. Tea. Distraction.

‘It’s a Solomon anger-intervention,’ Donal jokes, but Solomon isn’t in the mood to laugh. He came here to kick the shit out of somebody, not use words. He’s been waiting for this for days, far too long actually, and he’s been sitting for hours, he has a lot of energy to dispel. He doesn’t want it to go to waste.

‘Where is he?’ Solomon asks, not even bothering to disguise what he’s come here to do.

‘Let’s talk first,’ his dad says.

‘Where is the little fucker?’ he growls. ‘Look at you all, you’re like his bodyguards, always have been. That scared little shit has never had to face up to one of his messes, ever, in his whole life. And look at all the good your protection has done for him. Still at home with Mammy and Daddy, still getting a packed lunch every day. No disrespect, Mam, but he’s a spoiled little shit. Always has been.’

Mam looks pained. ‘He’s so sorry about what happened, love. If you saw him-’

‘Sorry?’ Solomon laughs angrily. ‘Good. Tell me where he is so I can see for myself how sorry the little fucker is.’

Marie winces.

‘Enough,’ his dad says sternly.

‘He’s an idiot, Solomon,’ Donal says diplomatically. ‘We all know that. He messed up, but he didn’t mean it. He’d no idea what he was doing.’

‘Lads,’ he calms himself and looks at them all, tries to make them understand. ‘He ruined her life. On a global level, destroyed her reputation. She had nothing, lived on a mountain, knew no one, no one knew she existed and then suddenly everyone knew she existed. She had a chance…’ The anger rises again and he fights hard to beat it. ‘She’d never even had a drink before. Not one.’

Marie looks upset.

‘He takes her out – to a pub. Then to a club. Some celebrity club, just so he could get in, using her as his ticket. Nothing to do with her, what she wanted – it was all for him. A free trip to Dublin for him, what can he get out of it? At no time did he call me. I would have helped. After being surrounded by photographers, she can barely stand up, and what does he do? He takes her to a party. He lets people take photos of her, throwing up, falling over, passing out. Where the fuck was he? He should have been watching her. She was his responsibility.’

This he says almost to himself. Laura was his responsibility and he knew that. He let her slip away, he let this happen. He will beat the shit out of Rory for his own irresponsibility.

‘I can’t listen to this,’ Rory says suddenly, and Solomon spins around to come face to face with him. ‘What era are you living in? She’s a grown woman, Sol, she doesn’t need minding.’

Solomon closes his fists. Picks a place on Rory’s pretty face to hammer. Takes his time, enjoys the moment. He hears the chairs scrape as they’re pushed against the kitchen tiles. His brothers and Cara standing, readying themselves. He senses them behind him.

‘Rory,’ his dad says. ‘You were wrong and you know it. Admit it, apologise to Solomon and let’s put this behind us. Be men now.’

‘Why should I apologise to Solomon? What’s he to Laura? It’s Laura I should be talking to.’

‘You’re not going near her ever again,’ Solomon growls.

‘Neither are you, I’d say,’ Rory says with a smile.

They stare each other out of it.

Rory looks at Solomon’s fist. ‘What are you going to do, hit me?’ He smiles, a teasing smile. Solomon recalls him as a young boy, mocking his speech impediment. His stutter and his ‘w’s. He feels an uncontrollable anger, a hatred so strong he’s worried about what he could do right now. He wants to hurt him but he thinks about the ways he can without ending him.

‘Say sorry to Solomon now, Rory,’ Marie says sharply and Solomon feels like he’s a child again.

‘I’m sorry,’ Rory says finally. ‘I really am. I had no idea she would get messy like that. The reason I didn’t call you is because she said she didn’t want me to.’

Solomon’s heart pounds even faster. Everything Rory says is designed to drive Solomon’s fist through Rory’s face. Then Solomon would be wrong and everybody would run to Rory’s aid.

‘She has a name.’

‘Lyrebird,’ Rory rolls his eyes. ‘Lyrebird said she didn’t want me to call you.’

‘Her name is Laura,’ Solomon says through gritted teeth. ‘You don’t even know her fucking name.’

‘I didn’t know where to take her,’ he continues his fake apology. ‘She didn’t want to go to the hotel, she couldn’t go to your place, seeing as you’d had a falling out and she had to leave, so I thought I’d take up a few people on their kind offer to help. The girls at the party were looking after her, I thought she’d be in safe hands with them. I really didn’t know.’

Rory’s demeanour doesn’t match his tone. Solomon feels his brothers near him, just behind him.

‘Of course I’m sure we all know that this wouldn’t be such an issue if Solomon wasn’t jealous because I took Laura out for a drink.’

‘Stop it,’ Marie says.

‘Shake hands,’ Dad says.

Rory reaches out his hand, Solomon takes it. He wants to pull him in, head butt him. Break that fucking nose. Rory’s grip is tight and strong for a little fella, but then Rory always had to resort to other tactics to survive in the family, to get attention, to be seen and heard. Being ganged up against like this is a big deal for him. Even if he’s not showing it right now, even though he’s cool as a cucumber, his ‘I don’t care’ attitude doesn’t wash with Solomon. Solomon realises that this is the worst possible situation for Rory, the entire family forcing him to apologise to Solomon for something he knows he did wrong. Suddenly Solomon enjoys this knowledge, allowing Rory to think he’s getting the better of him, when the reality is that Rory’s weakness is showing. Solomon feels the tension release ever so slightly from his shoulders.

Perhaps Rory realises he’s losing Solomon’s anger, that Solomon is no longer the underdog, because he then scrapes the barrel.

‘She’s a great little ride though,’ he says, to his mother’s dismay and a yell from his dad.

Rory lets go of Solomon’s hand. Solomon’s throat is sticky and dry, his heart pounding manically, a tribal drum calling for war.

Then Solomon sees a fist arc through the air before making contact with Rory’s face. Rory staggers. Surprisingly, it’s not Solomon’s fist, it’s Cormac’s. Big brother Cormac, the responsible one. They all look at him in shock at first and no one makes a move to help Rory, who’s fallen to the floor, but then Cormac’s high-pitched cries move them to action.

‘I think I broke my fingers,’ he squeals.

Rory sits up, holding his head, in agony. ‘Who punches a forehead?’

Cara starts laughing at them all. She holds her camera up and takes photos.

Later that night, the brothers and Cara sit outside in the garden on the round garden furniture table, drinking bottles of beer. Marie is ignoring them all, giving them the silent treatment for their behaviour and their dad is supporting her by doing the same, though they all know he’s dying to join them.

Cormac’s hand is in a sling. Two fingers are broken and the mix of painkillers and alcohol has made him the entertainment of the night.

Rory sits away from Solomon, a lump the size of a quail’s egg protruding from his forehead. The storm clouds have delivered rain but nothing has dried, the landscape is utterly drenched and so they perch on the dry spots for now. One thing is preying on Solomon’s mind: did Rory sleep with Laura? He’s almost sure that Rory made it up to get at him, which he succeeded in doing, but he can’t get it out of his head. Thankfully, Cara comes to his aid.

‘You know Rory, if you did sleep with Laura, you might have to answer some questions from the guards.’

‘What?’ Rory yelps. ‘What are you on about?’

‘There’s such a thing as consent, probably not a word you’re familiar with…’

Cara explains. ‘It requires the woman saying yes. It’s a real thing. Other men actually have sex with women who aren’t locked out of their heads. Women who can see the faces of their lovers. Now I know it’s not usually how you operate, but-’

‘Shut the fuck up, Cara.’

She winks at Solomon. ‘Seriously, we all saw the photographs. The whole world saw them. She couldn’t put one foot in front of the other. If you took her to that party and did what you said you did, then you could be in serious trouble.’

Rory looks at them all, ignoring Solomon. ‘Oh, whatever. Of course I didn’t sleep with her – she could barely remember her own name. She spent the entire night vomiting.’

The relief in Solomon is overwhelming, but his heart breaks for Laura, for what she went through alone.

‘Rory was right about one thing though,’ Cormac slurs.

‘Here we go,’ Donal smirks.

‘Ah now, hear me out.’