Page 46 of The Elements

While I want nothing to do with the phalanx of microphones and cameras waiting for us outside the courthouse, Robbie marches straight toward them, his parents flanking him on either side, and gives a speech that he must have been working on for weeks, describing how malevolent young women target professional footballers, then cry rape when they realize their target just wanted a good time and not a lifelong commitment.

He criticizes the media for portraying him as a criminal when he, in fact, has been shown to be the real victim.

When asked whether he feels any sympathy for Lauren Mackintosh, he shakes his head.

“I know at times like this people usually say that there are no winners here,” he says.

“But I don’t feel that way. Evan Keogh and I are the winners here.

The jury recognized that this girl was a liar who set out to destroy our lives, and they refused to sanction it.

Justice has been served. We won. She lost.”

As I leave, I see my father marching toward me with his arms outstretched and a wide smile on his face, but I turn away.

There’s no sign of Mam. I hail the first taxi I see and tell the driver to take me directly home and to turn off the radio.

I feel no sense of victory. The last thing I see as we pull away is Rafe, standing on the courtroom steps, watching me with an inscrutable expression on his face.

He will leave me alone now, I think. There will be no consequences, severe or otherwise.

The club issues a statement the following morning saying that it subscribes to the rule of law, so Robbie and I are welcome back to training and, once we’re match-fit again, we will be reinstated in the first team.

It remains solid in the wake of an onslaught of negative social media commentary that condemns it for standing by us.

A march takes place in the city center that weekend dedicated to victims of rape, following a path from the courthouse to the front of the football stadium.

About two thousand people join in, all ages, both sexes, but it passes off relatively peacefully and most of them disperse to the pubs afterward to get drunk and see what the night holds in store for them, because, in truth, they don’t really care.

More worrying, however, is the rally that takes place in Dublin, where more than three times that number march from the Rape Crisis Centre to the headquarters of the Irish Football Association, holding posters of my face with a red line drawn through it, demanding that I be dropped from the national team and play no part in the upcoming World Cup qualification campaign.

Unlike the club, the Irish FA announces that it has no current plans to recall me and that the player who has taken my spot during my absence is a great find who has earned his place.

I feel no regret over this. I don’t want to play anyway. The pay, after all, is shit.

Dad, however, is incensed, and goes on every radio station that will have him—which is most of them—to defend my good name and his.

Newspapers run articles condemning him, condemning me, condemning Mam, condemning the entire football culture.

For weeks I search my name obsessively on social media, reading the abuse and the hatred, which is only marginally less disturbing than the comments of the people defending me.

Something changes in Robbie in the months after the verdict is announced.

Rather than being humbled by what has taken place, he becomes even more self-assured, even more arrogant, and completely invincible on the pitch.

Within six months, his game has improved so much that he’s signed by a Premier League team, finally achieving his dream of playing in the upper tier.

Again, there are protests by people in that city, but they don’t last long, and, by then, the narrative has changed.

New scandals have emerged to replace ours.

My form, unlike Robbie’s, doesn’t change, and when the season break comes I disappear alone to Australia’s Gold Coast, where no one has ever heard of me, and spend a quiet eight weeks there, considering my future.

I think about giving up the game entirely, but I have a good ten years in me still to earn more than enough money to allow me to retire in my mid-thirties and live the life I want without ever needing to return to the island. And so that’s the decision I make.

When the new season begins, the furor dies away quickly and normal life is resumed.

I score goals. We remain mid-table. Dad comes to the occasional match and berates me for missing opportunities, which I always do, deliberately, when he’s there.

Since Robbie is no longer part of the team, I never have to face Rafe again.

Wojciech is dropped by the reserves and goes back to Poland.

This doesn’t bother me. I don’t need sex. Don’t want it. Ever again.

I am a professional footballer.

That is my life.

And one day, that will come to an end and I will be a person without any purpose in the world.

It’s almost two years later before I see Lauren Mackintosh again.

I’m in London for a few days during the Christmas break and am sitting in the corner of a pub in Covent Garden, reading a book.

I’m on my second pint, but the glass of my first remains on the table with a mouthful left at its base.

I hear footsteps approach, and a voice asks whether she can take it away.

I glance up to say yes and realize who I’m looking at.

It takes her a few moments to recognize me in return, but then she’s seeing someone she hasn’t encountered since that last afternoon in the courtroom, when she slumped in her seat, placing her head in her hands, as Juror no.

6 announced the verdict. The moment of recognition lands, and she slowly returns the empty glass to the table.

“You,” she says.

I stare at her, uncertain what to say.

“What do you want?” she asks, her voice betraying panic. “He’s not with you, is he?”

“No,” I say quickly. “No, I swear. I’m alone. I just came in for a drink, that’s all. I had no idea you worked here.”

She seems to accept this but glances toward the bar, where a tall, muscular man is flirting with one of his customers, as if to reassure herself that she can return to safety if she needs to.

“I’ll go,” I say.

“You have a full beer. Drink it. I’m not frightened of you.”

I nod. A part of me wishes she will walk away; another part wants her to sit down and talk to me. To my complete astonishment, that’s exactly what she does. When I have the temerity to do so, I find myself looking directly into her eyes. She is as strong now as she was when she was giving evidence.

“You moved to London, then?” I say at last, stating the obvious.

“You think I could stay at home?” she asks. “My name was all over Twitter. Anonymous accounts, of course. I couldn’t go to uni anymore because of the abuse I was getting. I had to drop out.”

“I’m sorry,” I say, and she laughs bitterly.

“No you’re not.”

“I am. It’s not what I wanted.”

“What did you want, then?” she asks, but I have no answer to this. She leans forward. “Why did you do it? Why did you lie?”

“I had no choice.”

“You did. A pretty simple choice. You could tell the truth, or you could lie. And you chose to lie.”

“I would have gone to jail.”

“You deserved to.”

“I wouldn’t have survived there.”

“So you destroyed my life instead.”

“I’m sorry.”

“Stop saying that. You’re not.”

I remain silent. How can I disagree?

“It must be so easy,” she says finally.

“What?” I ask.

“Going through life without a conscience.”

I consider this. She’s not wrong.

“Well, you got what you wanted anyway,” she says with a sigh, looking away.

“Did I?”

“You’re still playing, aren’t you? Earning a fortune. While I’ve lost everything.”

“Being a footballer was never what I wanted.”

“No? What was it, then?”

“It doesn’t matter,” I say, shaking my head. “I wasn’t good enough.”

“Well, I was,” she says. “I loved history. I loved studying it. I wanted to be a teacher.”

“You still could be.”

“I can’t even read a history book anymore,” she tells me.

“It’s all tied up in that time. In what you and your rapist friend did to me.

You’ve caused me more pain than you can possibly imagine and have never taken responsibility for any of it.

” She takes a breath, then speaks with remarkable calm.

“I know this sounds like a cliché, but it’s the truth: you and that friend of yours—I won’t say his name—you destroyed my life. ”

I look down at the table. I don’t see it as a cliché at all. I believe her.

“I’m sorry,” I say for the third time, aware how useless my words are.

“Then prove it.”

“How?”

“Tell the truth.”

“Lauren, it was two years ago. It’s over. Everyone’s moved on.”

“It’s only over because you allow it to be over,” she says. “If you mean what you say, if you really are sorry, then tell the truth. There’d be a retrial. I’d be vindicated. I could get my life back. And you and that prick would pay for what you did.”

I shake my head.

“I’m sorry,” I tell her.

“That’s four times you’ve said that.”

“But I can’t.”

“You can,” says Lauren. “You just won’t.”

Then she stands up, picks up the empty glass, and walks away.

I follow her with my eyes as she takes out a towel and wipes down the bar, before smiling at a young woman who’s just walked in, taking her order.

Throughout the rest of my time in the bar, and even when I leave, she never looks in my direction again.

I get very little sleep that night and take an early train home in the morning.

When I return to my apartment, I take a long, hot shower before retrieving the easel that has been sitting in one of the spare bedrooms since I first moved in, along with my paints and brushes, and sit down to paint a picture.

One last picture. It’s not much good. I can see that.

I know I don’t have any talent. Not in my hands anyway.

But still, during those hours, I feel more at peace than I have in a long time.

When it’s completed, I go downstairs and make my way out into the courtyard, toward the area of rough grass in the corner of the apartment block.

Kneeling down, I dig my hands into the earth, and it doesn’t take long for me to retrieve the phone I buried there the morning after Robbie raped Lauren Mackintosh.

It’s muddy, but even if the handset is damaged, the SIM card inside will be fine, and someone who knows about these things will be able to retrieve the footage of the video I shot that night.

Then I walk four miles to the local police station with the phone in my pocket and hand it to the officer behind the reception desk, telling her my name, giving her my address, and suggesting that her colleagues examine its contents.

After that, I go home.

Which is where I am now.

For no good reason I can think of, I’m watching football on television. For the first time in my life, I find the game rather interesting.

And, waiting for the police to show up, which they will sooner or later, I realize the stench of earth has finally cleared from my nostrils.

I can breathe freely at last.