Although, to be fair, Natalie very much doubted she’d be recognised. That was the beauty of being internet-famous. If she went to a PR event with the usual gang, nervous strangers would constantly approach her. (‘Sorry, you’ll think I’m a total psycho, but I’m actually obsessed with your Instagram account …’) Everywhere else, no one gave a damn. No one even knew there was a damn to give. And who was even here to recognise her? The place was deserted.
The Kiln had a vaulted ceiling that rose high above her, a hopscotch pattern of skylights in it filling the space with natural light. Shelving units were stocked with ceramics and display cases with jewellery, and the walls were hung with an array of colourful, delicate things. It seemed a weird thing to find in otherwise sleepy Shanamore. A destination shopping experience, the website had said, which was a nice way of warning that aside from this, there was sod all here.
Natalie headed for the café, desperate for a coffee after almost all of the last one had ended up splattered on the cottage’s kitchen floor. She chose a table at the very back, by a window that offered a view of the sea in the distance and only fields besides that.
A woman in her early twenties, wearing a white t-shirt and a black apron, followed her to her seat. Natalie ordered a cappuccino and a croissant from her. When the waitress brought them a few minutes later, Natalie had a hand in her bag, ready to pull out the photo of Mike and ask if this woman had seen him here.
But before she could, the waitress said, ‘I’m sorry, you’ll think I’m a right stalker – but I recognise you. You’re Natalie, right? “And Breathe”?’
Natalie cursed silently. But then she thought that, actually, this might be a good thing.
‘Busted.’ She smiled. ‘Hi.’
‘I thought it was you. Did you see your picture out there? By the door? That was me. I made that display. The guy who owns this place is, like, sixty-odd so he didn’t even know what I was talking about’ – the waitress rolled her eyes – ‘but I told him to trust me.’
‘It looks great. Great idea.’
‘Thanks.’ The girl blushed. ‘I’m Orla, by the way.’
‘Nice to meet you, Orla.’
‘Is Mike with you?’
Natalie’s first reaction was a stirring of unease at the idea that a total stranger could use her husband’s name in the same casual way a friend or relative might.
Her second was a surge of adrenalin.
‘He’s not, no. But funnily enough he was here, recently. Did you see him?’
‘No.’ Orla looked disappointed. ‘I don’t think I did.’
‘Maybe you just didn’t recognise him?’
‘But I definitely would.’
‘Perhaps he didn’t come in here … You live in the village?’
Orla rolled her eyes again. ‘Unfortunately.’
‘And you’re here full time?’
‘And then some. I usually end up working six days a week this time of year because there’s no staff. Wait – are you staying up at the cottages?’
Natalie hesitated. ‘Well, yes, but … Actually, I’m sort of hiding away for a few days. So I won’t be posting about it or anything …’
‘No, no, I know.’ Orla held up her hands. ‘I saw your post. Don’t worry, I won’t, like, tweet about this or anything.’ She laughed when she said this but it was that very thing Natalie was concerned she might do. ‘So you’ve met Andrew, then. He’s a bit weird, isn’t he?’
‘Is he? Do you know him well?’
‘Not really,’ Orla said. ‘But I know that that was his family’s land, where the cottages are. He and his mum used to live there. Then she got sick and they decided to sell up. He was renting some bungalow up at the Front Strand for a while, but when the cottages didn’t sell and they changed them into holiday homes, he came back. Got the manager job. It suited him, you see. Nice house and back home, so to speak. His mother’s got Alzheimer’s. She’s in a home in Cloyne. So he has to stay near her. His dad died years ago, and he’s an only child. Doesn’t really have any friends. Doesn’t seem to, anyway. He barely leaves those cottages, if you ask me.’
Natalie raised an eyebrow. ‘But you don’t know him well?’
Orla laughed. ‘That’s Shanamore for you. Everyone knows everyone else’s business.’
‘And what about the caretaker? Richard?’
‘Caretaker?’ She scoffed at the notion, as if Richard was going around calling himself a CEO. ‘Icky Dickie, we call him. Another one of our eligible bachelors. Did he tell you he paints? That’s, like, the first thing he says to everyone he meets. Every woman, anyway. Paddy Picasso, he thinks he is.’
‘He didn’t mention it, actually. What does he paint?’
‘I don’t have a notion. They all look like spill accidents to me.’
‘Do they sell them here?’
‘God, no. You couldn’t give them away at a car boot sale.’
Natalie told Orla what had happened down by the beach.
‘That sounds like him,’ she said. ‘Thinks he’s God’s gift and doesn’t understand personal space. But he’s harmless.’
Natalie didn’t think those two statements could agree, but she didn’t say it. Instead, she asked, ‘Is it always this quiet?’
‘In here?’ Orla nodded. ‘At this time of the year, yeah.’
‘But there’s all those cars outside …’
‘That’s the locals. They park here and hop on the bus up to Cork. Unofficial Park ’n’ Ride. The place would be empty otherwise so we leave them to it.’ She paused. ‘So, how long are you here for?’
‘Um, listen, Orla,’ Natalie started. She’d lowered her voice and the girl leaned down a little as if to hear better. ‘I’d rather you didn’t tell anyone that I’m here, you know? I’m by myself, it wouldn’t be very—’
‘Don’t worry,’ Orla said firmly, straightening up. ‘I understand.’ She winked. ‘Your secret’s safe with me.’
Natalie thanked her.
And didn’t believe her.
_________
A stranger walks into a saloon. The barman sees him first, stops and stares. Then all his patrons slowly turn around to look too. In the same, single moment, any music and all conversation cease entirely, inexplicably. Who is this and who do they think they are, coming in here?
Natalie had always thought those scenes were the reserve of Hollywood movies until she walked into the convenience store attached to the petrol station in Shanamore. There were two men in there already, one behind the counter and one in front of it, and they both fell silent the moment she came through the door. Both then turned to openly stare.
The one she presumed to be a customer was a gruff figure with a bulging belly who took his time looking her up and down. The employee was older, balding and ruddy-faced, and his expression was one of surprise. Natalie realised it then: this wasn’t necessarily a stranger-comes-to-town thing. Approaching customers would normally be signalled in advance by the sound of their car engines. She didn’t have one. She’d walked here. They were probably just wondering where the hell she’d come from. Still, their conversation didn’t resume and she felt them watching as she walked down the aisle, so she didn’t dawdle. She moved quickly, picking things up on impulse.
Back at the cottage, having emptied the contents of her single plastic bag on to the dining table, Natalie wished she’d been more methodical. She’d come back with a bottle of wine, a box of homemade lemon tarts, a frozen pizza and a packet of toffees. And the thing she’d spotted as the guy behind the counter rang up her purchases, tapping the buttons on the register until it whirred and clicked, an aural memory from childhood, long since replaced by the red eyes of barcode scanners and little electronic beeps: a pay-as-you-go mobile phone.
It was a chunk of bright blue entombed in one of those thick plastic cases whose opening seems to demand a power tool. It had limited features, actual telephony only. Calls and texts. The keypad was comically oversized while the screen was a fraction of the a
rea she was used to. It was clearly a device aimed at either children or the elderly, or both, but the packaging promised it came fully charged and pre-loaded with twenty-five euro’ worth of credit.
With the help of a chopping knife, Natalie freed the phone but didn’t turn it on. She left it on the dining table.
She pulled open the drawer where she’d left the poetry book. It was still there, sitting just where she’d left it.
She looked at it, thinking.
Andrew had denied that Mike had stayed here. Orla said she hadn’t seen him. Natalie could still ask around in the pub, but what if she got the same response? And she could spend some time checking around the cottage now, looking under the furniture, in between cushions, that sort of thing, yeah, but she’d hardly turn up anything better than the book.
So why was she still here?
Because he might find a way to explain the book away.
But wasn’t that, in itself, a kind of answer?
The kind I don’t want to have to watch him give me. I need more.
But what if there wasn’t more? How long was she going to stay away? How long was she going to stay here?
Natalie checked the clock on the TV; it was just after two. There was probably a bus to Cork passing through the village at some point in the afternoon. She could leave now and go and wait for it in the pub. She might just go as far as Cork City, back to civilisation, and then she’d decide what to do next.
She climbed the stairs and went into the bedroom to pack the few meagre items she’d brought with her. She threw her cabin-approved trolley case on the bed, flipped it open, and crossed the landing to go into the bathroom to get—
A noise downstairs.
Natalie froze equidistant between the bedroom and bathroom doors.
Held her breath.
Listened.
When the noise came again, she instantly identified it as a screech of furniture legs on a hardwood floor.
It was one of the chairs around the dining table.
Someone is down there.
A bubble of anger rose in Natalie’s throat. If it was that bloody creep Richard, she’d call the goddamn Gardaí on him. But since her only phone was in the kitchen, she’d have to get rid of him first.
She went to the top stair and called out a demanding, ‘Hello?’
Silence.
Louder, more forceful: ‘I said, hello?’
Nothing.
Well, not nothing. No sound, but the air was distinctly charged with the presence of another person.
There was someone down there, she could feel it.
They just weren’t answering her.
And then all of Natalie’s bravado dissipated in an instant, because she felt … She didn’t even know what the word for it was, but she just had the sense, a feeling, that someone was there and that they—
They didn’t want her to be.
She retreated back into the bedroom, closing the door behind her. There was no key in the lock. She turned to put her back to the door, pressing her body weight up against it.
Who would break into a house in the middle of the day?
A noise outside.
After a moment’s hesitation, Natalie left the door and went to the window. Across the road, Andrew was coming out of his cottage. She knocked on the glass as hard as she could. His head turned towards the sound.
There were two small windows inset in the bedroom’s wall of glass. Natalie grabbed the handle of one and yanked it towards her. It didn’t open all the way, but enough to let in a blast of cold air. She put her mouth in the opening and shouted, ‘Andrew!’
Frowning, he started moving down his drive, coming closer.
‘Andrew!’ she called again, hoping that whoever was downstairs would hear it, realise they were about to be caught red-handed and get the hell out of Dodge.
He stopped in the middle of the road, in front of her cottage.
‘Are you okay?’ he called up to her. ‘Your front door …’
‘What?’ Natalie pushed her face into the opening, trying to look down. The angle made it impossible.
‘It’s open.’
‘Andrew, someone’s inside.’
Then Natalie heard a new voice. From downstairs. Or maybe from outside. She couldn’t tell if she was hearing it through the door or the window, and there were no discernible words, only a low mumble. But she definitely heard something and it hadn’t come from Andrew. She was looking at his face.
‘Stay there,’ he said. ‘I’m coming in.’
He disappeared from view.
Natalie went back to the bedroom door and pressed her ear to the gap between the door and the frame to track his movements by sound. She heard footsteps downstairs, moving around the room, then the front door closing firmly. The creak of the stairs as he climbed them. A light, gentle knock on the door.
‘Natalie? There’s no one there.’
She opened the bedroom door and for a moment they both just stood there, facing each other, saying nothing.
Then he said, ‘Come see for yourself.’
Andrew started down the stairs and, after a beat, Natalie followed him.
Although the front door was closed now, the temperature in the cottage had dropped a few degrees.
Andrew stood at the foot of the stairs, arms folded, while Natalie did a circuit of the ground floor.
‘You didn’t see anyone?’ she asked when she was done. ‘Not even outside?’ He shook his head, no. ‘Then who opened my front door?’
‘Is it possible you didn’t close it properly? The wind, maybe …’
‘I closed it.’
But had she? It might have looked closed, it might’ve just been on the latch. Could she actually remember locking it? No, not the distinct act. But why wouldn’t she have?
‘It could’ve been Richard,’ she said.
Andrew’s eyes widened. ‘Richard? Richard who?’
‘Your caretaker.’
She explained what had happened that morning at the window, and then her later encounter with him down by the beach.
‘I see,’ Andrew said when she was done. ‘I do apologise.’
‘Look, I think I might leave. This afternoon. I know I said on the phone yesterday that I’d probably stay two nights but … Well, my plans have changed.’
Andrew’s expression was unreadable.
‘There was no one here,’ he said.
‘I know.’
‘I’ll have to charge you a cancellation fee.’
Natalie waved a hand. ‘That’s fine.’
‘There was no one here,’ he said again, his tone flat. Then he turned and left, closing the front door firmly behind him.
Natalie went to it, checking it had actually closed.
Then she pressed her forehead to the wood and closed her eyes. Her veins felt fizzy with adrenalin.
Voices outside.
Two of them.
Sounded like … arguing?
She went to the window and looked out. She just caught a glimpse of Andrew as the front door of Cottage No.1 swung closed behind him. There was no one else out there. She cracked open the window but she could hear nothing now except the faint, distant rumble of a car engine.
This place was making her nuts.
Natalie went into the kitchen and took the bottle of wine from the fridge. One for the road. She needed it after that. She unscrewed the cap and poured herself a generous glass, soothed instantly by the glug-glug-glug sound. She took a sip. The weather had done a reasonable job of chilling it on the walk home, so it was cold even though it hadn’t been in the fridge long.
It was when she went to put the bottle back that she saw it.
There was a little magnetic memo pad stuck to the fridge door, adorned with the logo of the Irish tourist board. Natalie had noticed it last night, but last night the top page had been blank.
Now there was something written on it in large, messy, urgent block capitals.
LEAVE.
<
br /> _________
Natalie stared at it uncomprehendingly.
She considered the possible explanations. The last guest had left it, she just hadn’t seen it before now. (Impossible.) It actually said something else, something that would neutralise it from threatening to merely weird. (Unlikely – the letters were blocky and clear. And why would anyone else be leaving a note on her fridge?) It didn’t mean what she thought it meant. (What else could it mean?)
LEAVE.
Well, Natalie thought, that’s exactly what I’m going to do.
What she had been doing, anyway.
She moved around the kitchen flinging open cabinets, pulling on drawers, rummaging through the contents of various shelves. She found what she needed wedged in the plate rack above the sink: a slim, navy ring-binder marked GUEST INFORMATION and covered in faintly sticky fingerprints. She threw it on the dining table and started flipping through.
Page after page of text in Comic Sans, decorated with MS Word clip-art circa 1998 and preserved in plastic pockets. How to work the oven; The Kiln’s opening times; details of local attractions which, since they included the Jameson Distillery in Midleton and Fota Wildlife Park, didn’t seem very local at all. And—
Bingo.
A bus timetable. Ballycotton to Cork, via Shanamore.
But as Natalie traced the list of departure times with a finger, her stomach sank. This couldn’t be the actual timetable. It said there were only two buses out of Shanamore on a weekday, one just before eight o’clock in the morning and another at noon. That was it. Departing from Ballycotton offered an extra option in the evening, but that bus apparently bypassed Shanamore.
The clock on the TV said it was just gone three. There was no bus out of Shanamore until tomorrow morning.
She pulled the timetable out of the pocket and turned it over. On the back was the route in the opposite direction. It, too, only stopped in Shanamore twice on a weekday. The evening arrival time matched her own arrival time yesterday, so it seemed to be up to date. She could get a bus to Ballycotton in a few hours’ time, but what good would that do? The only thing there was a hotel that, according to her newly discovered Guest Information folder, shut up shop in the off-season.
She whipped through the rest of the binder’s contents until she found a small business card taped to the back cover.
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