0:00

I'm Adrian

0:02

Dunbar and this is a story about a time

0:04

in Irish society when nothing was ever quite

0:06

what it seemed. It

0:07

was shock and horror that anything could actually

0:09

happen like that in the Phoenix Park. It was wrong

0:12

and violated, obscene.

0:14

Welcome to obscene, the Dublin

0:16

scandal. There's nothing fires up the imagination

0:18

in a small country more than the idea that someone wandering

0:21

around who's going for anyone. We

0:23

couldn't believe that this culprit for these crimes

0:25

would have been associated with the most senior

0:27

law officer in the country. If this thing is what

0:30

we think it is, it would bring down the government.

0:33

Listen to all of obscene, the Dublin

0:35

scandal first on BBC

0:37

Sounds.

0:40

BBC Sounds. Music, radio,

0:43

podcasts. This episode

0:45

contains themes and strong language which

0:47

some listeners may find upsetting. All

0:50

events are dramatised.

1:00

Hello? Emily?

1:05

Emily? Hello?

1:08

He called the day after my

1:11

surgery. I was still at the hospital, I was

1:13

strapped

1:16

up in what I can only describe as a life jacket. Drew? Fuck

1:20

me. Oh,

1:23

fuck me. No,

1:29

fuck me. Drew. Fuck

1:35

me. Oh,

1:37

fuck me. Oh,

1:40

fuck me. Drew.

1:46

Fuck me. I'm

1:53

sorry. Fuck

1:57

me. Sorry.

2:04

Emily? Yeah.

2:19

I went on medication. We

2:24

had a funeral. I know. I'm

2:27

sorry. I know you're done.

2:29

And then you write me a fucking Facebook. To

2:33

tell me. Oh,

2:37

fuck! Uh,

2:40

I gotta go. His

2:42

voice, he sounds like a parent. He

2:45

went on medication. I asked

2:47

for painkillers. Paul,

2:50

I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm

2:52

sorry. It's been a while. I don't know. It's

2:56

been a while. I don't

2:59

know. It's been a while.

3:02

I don't know.

3:03

I don't know. No,

3:08

God. No, I couldn't eat if you paid me. Show

3:12

off. His humor. So

3:15

where do you think they hide all those titties then?

3:17

Maybe they put them in a garbage bin called

3:19

Babboobs. Toxic

3:21

tits. Wait,

3:25

wait. Junked up

3:27

jugs. There's

3:32

gotta be more. And the

3:33

way he shows he cares. You can talk

3:35

about it as much as you want. Remember, you've

3:37

done it. Now it's with him. Yeah.

3:41

Oh, I got you this. I

3:43

don't know if it's any good. You

3:46

heat it up in a microwave. It smells like my dead grandmother. Sorry.

3:53

Oh, it's lavender. Yeah,

3:55

they say it's good for nausea, so... Thank

3:57

you, Paul.

3:59

Paul drove me home. I'll

4:02

tell Claire if he says he wants to speak to her.

4:04

Well, that makes sense. She

4:07

really likes you. Well,

4:10

I am a charming man. She

4:13

asked if we were a thing. Did

4:19

she now? Yep. Yep.

4:22

And what did you just say?

4:23

I said we're in a celibate cancer marriage of

4:25

convenience. God, that is sexy.

4:30

Well, that's what this is, isn't it? Absolutely.

4:34

And she's convinced that you're into me. Oh,

4:37

wow.

4:42

You had any, like, you know, relationships

4:44

or any things? It's... No,

4:47

I'm a 14-year-old virgin, if that's

4:50

what you're asking, so... Oh, God,

4:52

I would die. Well, I am. Stop

4:54

that. And as we pull up... And

4:57

just so you know, if you would like to

4:59

have, you know, a little date thing,

5:03

then I would be very happy to, you know...

5:07

Paul. What? Stop. You'd

5:10

hate me. I like

5:12

my women the way I like my restaurant

5:14

servers, cold and surly. I

5:16

have no hair. Snap. I have no breasts.

5:19

Snap. I'm

5:21

dying. Well, the more reason to

5:24

live. Claire opens

5:25

the door. She doesn't come out. Paul

5:27

takes my bags in. And

5:30

Drew rings the next day, while

5:32

Claire is at school. I don't want to know anything

5:34

about you. You chose

5:36

to be dead, so I will

5:38

respect that. Okay.

5:41

I'm sure he was reading from a notebook. Yeah.

5:44

Yeah, that makes sense. No, none of this

5:46

makes sense. No, I bet. I mean... Please, can

5:49

you just answer my questions? Okay.

5:52

Are you 100% sure Claire is my child?

5:54

Yeah. I mean, 100%.

5:58

Yeah. And you only just told her about me? Yeah.

6:04

And... What did she think

6:06

before that? She must have asked. Yeah,

6:08

before that, she... she sought her dad... She...

6:12

she thought... she thought her father was...

6:14

was dead.

6:16

Wow. Well

6:18

done for fucking up a teenager, Emily. Just

6:22

the questions. Does

6:24

she want to talk to me on the phone? Yeah.

6:28

Yeah.

6:29

Yeah. Yeah, I think she would

6:31

really love that. Well, we'll call her on Sunday

6:33

at noon. We'll? Yeah. Me and

6:36

my wife. Great.

6:40

We. His wife.

6:43

Lisa. Lisa Shaw. I

6:47

wonder if they trauma bonded over your death. I

6:50

wonder if she wiped Janet's ass and fed her cookies.

6:54

I wonder how they fuck.

6:57

Claire comes home and she sits

6:59

on my bed and hands me a mug of lemon

7:01

tea. And your lavender thing. From

7:04

your boyfriend. Wait. Claire. No.

7:07

I don't want to. I know you don't want to talk to me

7:09

yet, but...

7:12

How would you feel about talking to

7:14

Drew? On the phone?

7:18

He won't want to speak to me. He does.

7:21

I spoke to him. Well,

7:25

sure. I mean, whatever. From

7:29

Wednesday till Sunday, I didn't even think about the fact that

7:31

I have no breasts. I just thought

7:33

about Drew. I drank prune juice.

7:35

I ate toast.

7:35

I

7:39

marveled at the fragility of the human body.

7:43

I'll put it on loudspeakers so you can hear, too. Are you sure?

7:47

And Sunday at noon. Hello? Hi.

7:52

Hi. Is that Claire? Yeah.

7:55

This is Claire speaking now. And you're

7:57

Andrew? True. Oh. Call

8:00

me Drew. Drew, mom

8:02

said it was Drew. Yeah, yeah.

8:05

You doing okay, Claire? Yeah, I'm

8:07

good. Yeah, I just got back from soccer.

8:10

I scored so much. Soccer, wow. Hey, that's

8:12

very impressive. Thank you, I love it.

8:14

I try and breathe and keep my face neutral.

8:18

She asks. Yeah, so what

8:20

do you do in New York? She'd written out questions.

8:24

Well, I've got a restaurant

8:27

called La Mercury, which is in an

8:29

area called Dumbo, which is in

8:31

Brooklyn, and it's French.

8:33

You're a chef. Good for him. Yeah,

8:36

yeah, it's a lot,

8:38

but I love it. Cool,

8:41

cool. And

8:43

are you married? I am,

8:46

yeah, to a wonderful woman called

8:48

Lisa. And we

8:50

have two

8:53

children,

8:54

girls, Wyatt, she's

8:56

three, and Robin,

8:58

she's one.

8:59

Cool, are they my half sisters then?

9:04

Yeah, I guess

9:07

yeah, yeah, they are. Sorry,

9:11

do you mind all the questions? Oh

9:14

no, no Claire, of course not.

9:16

You can ask all the questions you want. But

9:19

today, I maybe have time for just two

9:21

more, and then how about I call you at the

9:23

same time next week?

9:25

And they set up a weekly call of

9:27

questions and answers. Do

9:29

you have pets? No,

9:32

Lisa's allergic. Bruce, I wanna scream

9:34

into the phone. Where's Bruce? Okay,

9:37

last question for today. Okay. Is

9:40

it true that you never sleep in New York?

9:45

And each call I force myself to step a little

9:47

bit further away. Right, okay. This

9:50

bond isn't mine. I

9:53

leave Claire to it. Yellow.

9:57

I call Paul. Paul, do you care

9:59

that I have no... breast.

10:02

I just looked in the mirror. Do you really

10:04

not care? I have

10:07

no balls. What do you think? Okay.

10:11

What do you ask? I'm just I is my

10:13

daughter is seeing her girlfriend tonight

10:15

and I was just I don't really want to be

10:17

alone. Wow. No,

10:20

this is not Oh, yes, it

10:22

is. It's a day. It's

10:26

just it's it's dinner on

10:28

your sofa and you'll have to feed me.

10:31

It'll be incredibly unsexy feeding you

10:33

on my sofa. Say it is

10:35

a date. I dare you. Would

10:40

you have a date with me or something?

10:42

He picks me up. Twinkly lights around

10:44

his front door. The zag here for the lady.

10:46

It reminded me of those university nights with

10:48

true homemade goats cheese and

10:51

spinach calzones. And just

10:53

as my anxieties loosening its grip just as

10:55

he's giving me a straw to gulp down my glass

10:57

of wine. Mom, he called

11:00

on a Wednesday. Who? Dad. Dad

11:03

called. She

11:05

called him dad. And I told him about the road trip

11:07

when we last spoke. And guess what? He called

11:09

today. I knew what was coming. And he

11:12

said that we can visit. We can drive there

11:14

on our road trip.

11:15

We can. We can see

11:18

it. Wow. Isn't that great? It's

11:20

brilliant, honey. That's great.

11:24

I'll open another bottle. Just put the straw

11:26

straight in. Now we're talking. Emily,

11:30

I will take Claire to Drew. I

11:32

will let Paul hold my hand. I

11:35

will not die a coward.

11:37

No way. Not this time.

11:52

People Who Knew Me. Starring

11:55

Rosamond Pike, Kyle Soller,

11:58

Isabella Sermon, Alfred Enoch,

12:01

Jessica Darrow, Charles Haggerty,

12:04

Daniela Isaacs, and Hugh

12:06

Laurie.

12:07

Other voices, Gippa Winslow,

12:09

Nancy Crane, Joseph Akabase,

12:12

Barney White,

12:13

Jill Winternitz. Written

12:15

and directed by Daniela Isaacs.

12:18

Adapted from the original novel by

12:20

Kim Hooper. Producer

12:23

Joshua Buckingham.

12:24

Executive Producers Faye

12:26

Doorn, Clelia Mountford, and

12:28

Sharon Horgan. Executive Producer

12:31

for the BBC, Dylan

12:32

Haskins. Production Manager,

12:35

Sarah Lawson. Casting Director,

12:37

Lauren Evans. Supervising

12:39

Dialogue Recordist and Editor, Daniel

12:41

Jaramillo. Supervising Sound

12:44

Editor, Sound Design and Mix, Martin

12:46

Schultz. Sound Design and

12:48

Recording by Soundnode. Music,

12:51

composed by Max Perrimant. If

12:53

you've been affected by anything you've heard in this episode,

12:56

details of help and support in the UK

12:59

are available at bbc.co.uk

13:01

forward slash action line.

13:05

People Who Knew Me. Listen first

13:08

on BBC Sounds. It's

13:11

the 11th of March, 2011. A

13:14

massive earthquake measuring 9.1 on

13:17

the Richter scale strikes the east coast

13:19

of Japan. It cripples roads, severs

13:22

power lines, and claims the lives

13:24

of over 18,000 people.

13:26

And then... Mega tsunami

13:28

warning. Repeat, mega

13:30

tsunami warning. The Fukushima

13:32

Daiichi nuclear power plant, still

13:35

reeling from the quake, is struck by a

13:37

tsunami. It crashes

13:39

over the protective sea walls, flooding the

13:41

facility, cutting its power. What

13:44

follows is a full-scale

13:46

nuclear emergency.

13:47

All control facilities

13:50

in the open. Water supply to

13:52

reactor cores cut off.

13:54

Fukushima, an original

13:56

seven-part audio drama series from

13:58

the BBC World South. telling

14:01

the story of how the disaster unfolded

14:03

and of those living with its aftermath. Search

14:06

for Fukushima wherever you get your BBC

14:08

podcasts.