Children in the Morning (23 page)

“Give it to me straight, Doc.”

“And I know he is, shall we say, ‘sensitive’ to otherworldly phenomena, as left-brained as he otherwise appears to be. I suspect he finds Normie’s claims quite credible.”

“I do,” Brennan replied. “There’s a whole lot of codology — foolish-ness — associated with this stuff, but I believe it’s the real thing with Normie. She has the sight, just like the old spook in Cape Breton, her great-grandmother.”

“She comes by it naturally, then! I saw something of it myself, when you were all in New York for the wedding. There we were at the table, and she was able to intuit a great deal about our brother, Francis, including the Irish-language pet name our mother used for him when he was a child. I checked with Mam afterwards, and she was adamant that she had never used the phrase in Normie’s hearing. She hadn’t said it in years. What was it, Bren? It meant ‘child of my heart.’”

“Leanbh mo chroí.”

“Right. Could she have heard that bit of Irish around the Collins household?”

“Not much chance of that. Monty hasn’t had our advantages,
Padraig
.

Never mind that he bears the name Montague Michael Collins. His da obviously banjaxed the job of passing on our ancestral history to his poor, benighted son. Or maybe he did, but the lad wasn’t listening.”

139

ChildrenintheMorning_final_Layout 1 2/1/10 1:37 PM Page 140

“There you go. She’d never heard it before, and she came out with it, and she spooked the hell out of Francis when she did it. So I’ll talk to Normie again, and see what she has to say. Who knows, we may find out she’s seeing events that really happened, or that will happen, and I’ll be able to present a paper to the American Psychiatric crowd after all!”

(Normie)

I was in my bedroom at Daddy’s house. There’s a whole wall that he lets me draw and paint on, which was really fun. Except now I had the wall full of pictures, and I wanted to put more on there and didn’t know where. I was trying to figure it out when I heard footsteps coming up the stairs, and I knew they weren’t Dad’s. There was a knock at the door even though it was open. It’s nice to know some people are really polite.

“Hi, Dr. Burke.”

“Hi, Normie. Would it be all right if I talked with you for a few minutes?”

“Okay.”

He sat in my chair. “I’d like to help you, Normie. I know the things you see are upsetting you.”

“They think I’m crazy! Like the people in the movies who say they’re hearing voices, and everybody looks at each other and makes a face like ‘woooo, this guy’s loony!’”

“Your mum and dad have talked to me, and so has my brother, and they don’t think there’s anything crazy about you at all! They believe what you’re saying, and so do I.”

“Are you sure?”

“Yep. And you know something?”

“What?”

“I work with the kind of people who are sometimes called crazy.

Not a very nice way to talk about them, is it? Especially since it’s not their fault. They are people who have problems, sometimes mental illnesses. And I can tell that you’re not like them in any way.”

“Honest?”

140

ChildrenintheMorning_final_Layout 1 2/1/10 1:37 PM Page 141

“Honest.”

“That’s good.”

“So, Normie, how are you enjoying the choir school? This is your first year, isn’t it?”

“Yes, and it’s great! I love it! We learn a whole lot of regular stuff like math and history, but then we get to sing, in Latin and Italian and French and German. Me and Kim both switched to the choir school this year.”

“So you have your best friend with you?”

“Yeah. She’s kinda scared of Father Burke — well, your brother.”

“You tell him to stop scaring Kim, or I’ll tell our mother on him!

She’ll get him sorted.”

I laughed because he was joking.

“So things are going well at school for you.”

“Yep.”

“And you have Kim for a friend. Other friends, too?”

“Yeah, some from my old school and some at the new school. And some more at Four-Four Time, the music program we do after school with kids from all over the city.”

“Lovely. And you have a big brother who takes good care of you . . .”

“Yeah, Tommy’s a really good brother. He teases me sometimes, but in a funny way, not in a mean way. And he has a really nice girlfriend, Lexie.”

“Good, good. And you have a baby brother. That must be fun.

Are you enjoying being a big sister?”

“Oh, yes! Dominic is so cute. I really love him. I couldn’t stand it if . . .”

No! I stopped myself before I started to blurt out anything about Dominic. I figured I’d better not say anything else about him, or all that stuff about Giacomo. Mum didn’t want Daddy to know, so I knew it was supposed to be a secret between Mum and Father Burke, because he was trying to help her save the baby. I probably wasn’t even supposed to know it myself, but I was there when Giacomo came to the house, so I found out about it that way, and by listening in. And I wasn’t supposed to listen in on people, so I really, really didn’t think I should mention it to Dr. Burke, even though he would be a good person to talk to about it.

141

ChildrenintheMorning_final_Layout 1 2/1/10 1:37 PM Page 142

Oh no! I could feel myself starting to cry.

“Are you all right, Normie?” he asked.

“Yes, I was just thinking of . . . a sad song. Talking about the baby, but not just him . . . about Tommy and Lexie, too, and Kim . . . made me think of it.”

“Music can certainly bring our feelings out into the open, can’t it?

Especially if we have something at the back of our minds already.

What song were you thinking of, sweetheart?”

Oh, no, now I had to make up something. “It’s an old song, about, um, somebody going away for the whole summer and being lonesome for their girlfriend and brother and friends. But it’s okay because they all get together again at the end of the summer. So, even though it’s a sad song, it has a happy ending!”

“That’s nice. Because that’s one of the most painful things in life, isn’t it? Maybe even the most painful — being separated from the people we love.”

“But nobody’s going away here! So it’s just a song.”

He nodded his head and didn’t say anything. I wondered if he already knew about Giacomo and the baby. But I couldn’t take the chance of being the one to let out the secret if he didn’t know.

But he talked about something else. “You’ve been pretty lucky with your health, I’ll bet, Normie. You’ve never spent a lot of time in the hospital, I’m guessing.”

“No, never! Except for that big machine. That was scary.”

“I’m sure it was. It’s great how it turned out, though, good results right down the line. But I think everybody expected that. Sometimes you have to have tests just so the doctors can check things off and move on.”

“Yeah, it turned out good at the end.”

“Did you ever have the measles, chicken pox, things like that?”

“I had both of those. Back when I was little.”

“Have you ever been troubled by headaches?”

“Sometimes when I’m seeing all those bad things.”

“Anything else?”

“No, except for having a cold and being sick to my stomach with the flu. I hate being sick.”

“I don’t blame you. I do too! Can you tell me this, Normie? We 142

ChildrenintheMorning_final_Layout 1 2/1/10 1:37 PM Page 143

all feel sad sometimes. How about you? Are there many times when you feel sad?”

“Only when I worry about . . . well, the baby was sick, and I was sad and worried about him. And I feel sad when I hear of people getting killed or beat up, especially when it happens to little kids. I don’t mean it’s okay when it happens to grown-ups!”

“No, I understand. If you were writing a book titled
Normie
Collins: A True Life Story
, would you describe yourself as a happy person?”

“Oh, yeah! Almost always! Except when things happen to upset me. Like these bad dreams. The things I see.”

“Now, about those dreams or visions. We don’t have to wonder whether you’re seeing or feeling these things, because we know you are. Are these kind of like movie scenes that appear in your mind, as if you’re seeing them with your eyes?”

“Yes, I can see what’s going on. Or at least I can see part of it.”

“What about sounds? Do you hear things? Voices, or noise of any kind that you think maybe other people can’t hear?”

“I can hear voices, but I don’t like telling people that. You know why.”

“Oh, I know. But, really, if you’re seeing something happening, it’s probably quite natural that you would hear something too. Would you say so?”

“That’s right. I can hear people yelling and sounding mean.”

“What about this? Do you ever find that things don’t taste the way they should? Or do you notice strange smells? Anything of that nature?”

“No, nothing like that.”

“Why don’t you describe the things you see and hear, so I can try to picture them.”

“But Daddy’s going to be mad at me!”

“Why would you think that, sweetheart?”

“Because . . .”

He didn’t ask me “because what?” He didn’t make a face that said

“I wish she would hurry up.” He just sat there, as if he didn’t have anything else to do for the whole night. It was quiet, and then I felt like talking again. I figured he wasn’t going to get me in trouble.

143

ChildrenintheMorning_final_Layout 1 2/1/10 1:37 PM Page 144

“Because . . . sometimes I think Mr. Delaney is bad!” There, I said it! I hadn’t even said it to myself before.

“Maybe he is,” Dr. Burke said.

What? I couldn’t believe it! He said it as if it was normal! Maybe it was okay to think it: Mr. Delaney could be bad.

“But he can’t be! Daddy says he didn’t do it. Didn’t kill Mrs.

Delaney. And besides, he’s Jenny and Laurence’s dad! They are really good kids and they’re my friends. None of my friends’ dads are bad!”

“Well, you and I know some people are bad. Just a few of course, in any large group. And some of those bad people have kids. So it could be that you’re right, even if you don’t want to be right.”

“But I must be wrong. Mr. Delaney is always really nice to his kids, and he’s nice to me, too. If he was bad, I’d know!”

“Maybe you do know. Maybe that’s what your feelings are telling you.”

“Do you think he’s bad?” I asked Dr. Burke.

“I’m kind of stuck for an answer because I don’t know him. I’ve never met him. But I’ll bet you can help me figure him out. When is the last time you saw him?”

“I think it was a couple of weeks ago, at our other house. Our house with Mum.”

“How did you feel that day?”

“I was okay when I was with Mum and Father Burke, but after I went up to my room and fell asleep and then woke up again, I had pictures in my head. Like a dream but it seemed more real.”

“Was Mr. Delaney in those images?”

“I don’t know! I never know. There was a baby. Sometimes it’s a baby and sometimes a little kid. And he’s scared and sad and sometimes he’s hurt really bad. He screams and cries. That night when Mr.

Delaney was there I saw a spooky old building that had words on it.

One was ‘Vincent,’ and . . .”

“And?”

“Uh . . .”

“Something else?”

“I forget.”

Dr. Burke didn’t say anything for a long time, so I thought I’d better tell him more about it, without saying the word
asylum
. “And 144

ChildrenintheMorning_final_Layout 1 2/1/10 1:37 PM Page 145

there’s other people in the room. The people in robes.”

“Oh, I see, and what kind of robes are they, Normie?”

“Long black ones.”

“Many people?”

“A few anyway. Sometimes it seems like more.”

“Can you tell if they are women, or men? Or are both men and women there?”

“I always think they’re men. But I really can’t tell, so maybe there’s both.”

“Are they doing anything?”

“I can’t see it that clearly. I just know it’s awful, it’s horrible, and

. . . and it seems to me as if somebody I know is one of them! And I keep thinking maybe it’s Mr. Delaney. I don’t see him exactly, but the dreams only started happening after I met him and his kids.

Sometimes it’s the people in robes in that building, and sometimes it’s people in another place, a room, and I hear them talking or yelling in a mean way. But, no matter where it happens, there’s always a little kid.”

“So let’s see if I have it straight. There are two different kinds of dreams, or pictures. One involves the old building and the long robes. The other does not.”

“Right.”

“When these things are happening, how do you feel yourself?”

“I get upset, as if I’m right there and I’m not doing anything to help!”

“When you reflect on these experiences, Normie, what do you think they mean?”

“I think some grown-ups did something bad to a little kid, and maybe to a baby. Or it might be something that’s going to happen later. Way in the future! And that may be even worse because I already know, but I don’t know how to stop it!”

“And when you see Mr. Delaney, you feel . . . what? How would you describe it?”

I didn’t think I’d better blame Mr. Delaney any more, in case it wasn’t really him, so I didn’t answer.

Then Dr. Burke said: “Does he make you feel uneasy? As if something’s wrong? Or nervous maybe?”

145

ChildrenintheMorning_final_Layout 1 2/1/10 1:37 PM Page 146

“Yeah, kind of like that.”

“Normie, if there’s ever anything you want to talk about, you just get hold of me, okay? If you want to do that, I’ll be happy to help you. And of course happy just to hear from you any time!”

“Okay.”

“This is my card, with my phone numbers at work and home. I’m going to tell your parents that I’ve given you my card and that I may be speaking to you, but you can call me on your own. Call any time, day or night.”