‘Where is he, then?’ asked his mother. ‘He’s not in the toilet, is he?’ ‘I looked in the toilet.’ Mary Buckley turned off the gas under her frying pan, which was crowded with curled-up rashers. ‘I declare you lads are going to be the living death of me one day,’ she told the three boys, who were already sitting at the kitchen table waiting for their breakfast, the two older ones with mugs of sweet tea and Patrick with a glass of milk. ‘I swear to God he’s not there, mam,’ said Patrick, but in spite of that Mary left the kitchen and stamped upstairs and they could hear her crossing the landing and going into Tadgh’s bedroom. They even heard her opening his press and then slamming it shut. ‘Oh yeah,’ said Kevin. ‘He’s really going to be hiding in his press, like, underneath his porn mags.’ ‘I even looked under the bed,’ said Patrick. ‘He stayed out the night, that’s all,’ said Bryan. ‘I’ll bet you money he was poking that Aoife O’Grady.’ ‘Aoife O’Grady?’ said Kevin.
