Police are going a step further than we ever did, though. They’re now appealing directly to customers who were at Byrne & Sacetti that night, casual diners who either dropped into the coffee bar on the ground floor or else the cellar wine bar below, to come forward to talk to them. And believe me, given that it was two days before Christmas there must have been hundreds of them. Apparently they’ve been trawling through CCTV footage of inside every vast, sprawling level of the restaurant as well as exterior footage of the street outside. They even managed to find one single, final shot on wobbly stop/start camera that nearly broke my heart.
It was Kitty, striding in that long-legged, athletic, purposeful way that she had, all the way down Camden Street and away from the building at exactly 1.20 a.m., on the morning of Christmas Eve. Time and date were clearly burned onto top right-hand corner of screen; rock-solid proof in black and white that she did actually leave work that night, as normal. And then just vanished into thin bloody air.
Even though the shot of her was taken from, I’m guessing, about two storeys above her and all you really could see was a v. minuscule moving dot, there was still no mistaking our girl. Wearing the fluorescent pink Puffa jacket she loved so much, with jeans and cream furry snowboots, which her cat used to snuggle into whenever she’d abandon them on the floor. And then nothing.
The whole clip was only about fifty seconds long, but we must have watched it for a full hour, over and back again. Studied it like it was the Zapruder film of the Kennedy assassination. I’m not joking, I sobbed like a baby for the rest of day after seeing it. Could barely haul myself out of bed the next morning. Mother Blennerhasset is now getting seriously worried about me, and has started clucking on about getting local GP to prescribe me something ‘just for your nerves, Angela love. No shame in it these days, you know. Sure half the judiciary are on Prozac.’
Can only assume she reckons this might cheer me up.
Simon’s is now about the only voice on the phone that can get me out of the house and ready to face each day ahead. The last person I ever want to hear at night and the first in the morning, ringing me with updates, even if there aren’t any, which there hardly ever are. His voice, or else Crown’s, that is; though to date, only news the latter ever rings me with is unanimously bad.
Getting v. sick of constantly being told by the coppers not to worry. I’m finding it increasingly hard not to snap at them and come out with something like, ‘Yes! Absolutely! Congratulations on cracking the case, Sherlock! I’ll gladly abandon all worry now! Because the chances are Kitty is safe and well and checked into some remote hotel perched on a rock in deepest Kerry, where she can’t be found! And you know what? You’re quite right … Makes utter sense that she wouldn’t give a shit about all the mayhem and anguish she’s causing at home! Case closed, and now let’s all go home and watch Strictly Come Dancing finals, and ring in a v. happy New Year for one and all!’
I’m convinced I must have worn my back teeth down to stubs by now.
During the blackest hours, I consciously have to stay focused on all the positives in this, as Simon keeps reminding me. Not that there’s many, but if I didn’t, I’d lose my reason altogether. One major plus: our gang of mates and a big group of Kitty’s colleagues from work really have been unbelievable. It would gladden your heart to see how committed and dedicated everyone’s being, especially seeing as it’s still the holidays and everyone’s giving up their family time, not to mention precious days off work to help out in the search.
Ever-organised Sarah and her assistant even put in a few extra hours at her family’s sandwich bars’ head office and, between them, printed off thousands of flyers with Kitty’s picture emblazoned on them, along with all the bullet points of relevant info.
MISSING
SINCE 1 a.m. APPROX. 24 DECEMBER
KITTY HOPE
AGED 31 YEARS
HEIGHT: 5 FEET, 10 INCHES
HAIR: BLACK
EYES: HAZEL
BUILD: SLIM
LAST SEEN LEAVING BYRNE & SACETTI’S RESTAURANT, CAMDEN ST.
ANYONE WITH RELEVANT INFORMATION SHOULD CONTACT GARDAI,
AT THE CONFIDENTIAL NUMBER LISTED BELOW.
This, emblazoned with the best photo of Kitty we could find, is now plastered on just about every lamppost in the area round where she lives and works. And when I say we’ve blitzed the place, it’s honestly no exaggeration. Between myself, Simon and the rest of the gang, we’ve practically paper-bombed not only the whole neighbourhood, but most of the city centre too. It’s nigh on impossible even to go into a newsagent’s or pub by now, without seeing Kitty’s unforgettable face and dancing hazel eyes almost flirting back at you; scarily white skin, no blue veins, no imperfections … flawless.
I can vividly remember the night that photo was taken too: it was about a year ago, the night of Kitty’s birthday. She’d lugged the whole lot of us into Pravda bar in town for a karaoke night, then insisted on everyone drinking Black Russians, a.k.a., a hangover in a glass. Can’t be certain, but I think the photo of her was taken after about her third or fourth, but before her seventh, which was around the same time the singing started. Led, of course, by Kitty, who hopped up on a table and started murdering ‘Rumour Has It’ by Adele.
Brilliant, brilliant night, but then it’s impossible to go anywhere with Kitty and not to have a brilliant night. Car keys were lost, credit cards were nicked, heads were held down loos for hours the next day and everyone still reckoned it was the Best Night Ever. But then that’s our Kitty for you. Even sitting on the top of a bus with her is like the best fun imaginable.
It really is an utterly beguiling picture of her, too. She looks like a movie star, even if we did have to Photoshop a full pint of Budweiser out of her hand. I even overheard the Garda liaison officer who’s working on the case wolf-whistling when he saw it, and saying, ‘Now there’s a face I certainly wouldn’t forget seeing in a rush.’
Hard not to smile at that. Kitty’s not even here, and yet she can still provoke the exact same reaction from fellas that she’s been doing ever since the day she first bounced into my life.
Neighbours are truly astonishing as well. I nearly get teary when I see sheer extent of people’s goodness. Kitty’s house is now a bit like Grand Central Station with all the comings and goings, but then, Simon and I have pretty much set it up as our HQ till we find her. And, no kidding, every few minutes, there’s a gentle knock at the door and it’s without fail some lovely neighbour with trays of sambos, giant tureens full of soup or big tray of home-made mince pies for the police.
One of them, Mrs Butterly, a hair-netted, grandmotherly type in her mid-sixties has been particularly magic, and it’s almost starting to feel like she’s moved in here at this stage. We’ve given her a set of keys, and every time Simon and I crawl exhaustedly back to the house after a day of postering and flyer-ing the town, she’ll be standing at the sink washing up, or mopping floors; I even caught her doing the ironing once.
I know she means well, but it’s v. strange the way she’s tidied the whole house beyond recognition. With Kitty around, it always looks like charming but cluttered chaos; now it’s sparkling and shiny, and you can actually see and find things, instead of having to root through mounds of stuffed binliners to find tins of cat food buried underneath.
Didn’t like to say it to Simon, but it’s actually starting to feel like her memory’s slowly being airbrushed away from us. I don’t mean to be ungrateful, though, particularly as Mrs Butterly only means well. Bless her, she even managed to bribe the whole clatter of grandkids she has away from their Christmas telly and their Wii games and Nintendos to help out with stickering Kitty’s poster onto lampposts, bus stops, etc.
‘I’ve no words to thank you,’ I tell her, going to give her a big hug late one evening. Simon and I had just fallen in the door exhausted, and two minutes later she let herself in, weighed down with a cold turkey platter for the pair of us, and a flask of home-made vegetable soup.
‘Least I can do, pet,’ she says warmly. ‘The thing is, I really love Kitty, you know. Best neighbour I ever had. Used to do my shopping for me whenever it got too icy for me to go out, and was always happy to babysit my grandsons, if ever I was stuck. She could referee a fight between the lot of them like no one I’ve ever seen, before or since.’
I nod, able to see scene play out so exactly. Just the sort Kitty was. I mean, is.
Sorry. Hard and getting harder not to start referring to her in the past tense.
To say Simon’s v. up and down is major understatement. It’s like he and I alternate our moods: on my bad days – and God knows, there’ve been a few – he’s an unfailing rock of sense and confidence. Works the other way round too. At times when he’s in the throes of depression and sick with worry, then I’m the one who has to have resolve enough for both of us.
Mind you, Simon’s your typical West of Ireland, strong silent type. I know it would probably kill him to open up, so instead, on his bad days, he just goes totally silent on me. Brooding, intense, staring-morosely-at-the-wall-ahead-of-him type silence. Not altogether easy for other people to be around and only ever opening up to me, no one else.
He’s virtually stopped eating, and in the space of the last few days has taken what the French call a coup de vieux. If possible, the guy physically looks about ten years older now.
Mrs Butterly’s v. concerned.
‘I left that fella in a whole tray of ham and cheese sandwiches last night,’ she mutters darkly to me, when he’s well out of earshot, ‘and I found them all still there this morning, untouched. And it isn’t right, you know. Last grown man who refused one of my ham sangers was my poor husband. On his deathbed.’
11.25 p.m.
Can’t remember ringing in a New Year that I was looking forward to less. The gang’s all here in Kitty’s newly spotless house: Sarah, Jeff, Mags and her husband, Philip, minus the kids. It’s absolutely not any kind of celebration, how could it be? Suspect we just all want to be under same roof to get through this awful milestone together.
V. strange, slightly muted atmosphere. No one’s saying it aloud, but I know we’re all thinking the exact same thing. Where is Kitty now? And though it’s absolutely not something I could ever articulate, but the next, tacked-on worry is invariably, is she OK? And unharmed?
It’s a stomach-churning thought and I have to use the full force of my will to banish it. So I keep reminding myself of what the coppers are constantly reiterating. That she’s highly likely to be one of the ‘voluntarily’ missing. That, unbelievable at it may seem, this was all preplanned. Keep quoting Crown’s one size fits all phrase: in well over ninety per cent of these cases, the subject will eventually come back, safe and well.
And have to admit, as odds go, they’re fairly decent ones.
11.40 p.m.
Local kids on the street outside are having impromptu and, I strongly suspect, highly illegal bonfire and firework display. I’ve left Kitty’s front door wide open and we all keep drifting in and out to watch. To watch, that is, or else to temporarily get away from Philip, Mags’ awful husband, who’s tolerated, (has to be, she’s been our pal for years) though actively disliked by the whole lot of us.
Uncanny, every time Mags drags Philip out somewhere with her, within a guaranteed two minutes of his opening his gob, someone will have taken mortal offence at some of his more ludicrous pontifications. And sure enough, a bare ten minutes after they arrive, Sarah slips into the tiny galley kitchen beside me to have a good bitch about him.
‘I mean, I know it’s New Year’s Eve and everything, but why did Mags have to bring him?’ she quietly seethes into her glass of wine.
‘Why did Mags have to bring him?’ is like a catchphrase that forever follows Philip round, pretty much ever since the day they first met.
‘You already know the answer to this, hon,’ I hiss back at her. ‘Because it’s rare for pair of them to get a babysitter and have an actual proper night out together.’
Sarah doesn’t answer me, though, just grunts into a bag of Doritos she’s just found.
‘Plus,’ I loyally tack on, ‘Mags is our mate and we love her, therefore he must be endured, even if he is an arsehole. All there is to it.’
‘Suppose,’ she mutters sulkily under breath, mouth stuffed full of Doritos. ‘I mean, we all put up with your arsehole of an ex-boyfriend, just ’cos we loved you, didn’t we?’
I smile warmly back at her. Always v. reassuring when your mates are happy to slag off those who richly deserve it. The smile, however, freezes on my face when I get back to the living room, laden down with wine and what’s left of the Doritos, in the nick of time to hear Philip come out with one of his legendary clangers.
‘You know, I’m quite certain there’s absolutely no need to overreact here,’ he’s ticking off Simon, who has the bad luck to be sitting right beside him. ‘All I’m suggesting is that if Kitty has indeed taken off of her own volition …’
That phrase alone nearly makes me want to gag. And sure enough, there’s worse to come.
‘… then surely the police must have more pressing concerns, which their considerable resources could be put to far better use on? After all, they keep constantly reassuring you that she’ll come back when she’s good and ready to, so why not just sit back and let her?’
I glance over to Simon, who’s reddening, but staying cool. Though he looks like he’s doing an inner battle to physically restrain himself from punching the git square in the face, for having the barefaced cheek to come out with such a big load of insensitive shite.
‘Oh, just give it a rest, Philip,’ Mags snaps across the room at him, ‘and drink your sherry. The police are doing everything they can, and I for one am bloody grateful for them.’
‘I was speaking merely as a taxpayer,’ Philip tells her glibly. ‘All this effort, not to mention expense, being poured into a possible black hole seems utterly wasteful, in my considered opinion.’
‘In that case, thank God you’re not the only taxpayer in this room,’ Simon says curtly, jaw tightening, twitching slightly. Quietly furious, though you’d never know it if you didn’t know Simon: he’s rock-still.
‘I wasn’t finished,’ Philip answers him, blissfully unaware of the offence he’s causing (and yes, for someone who purports to be intelligent, he really is that thick). ‘I’m merely trying to draw everyone’s attention to the elephant in the room. If Kitty did indeed take off of her own accord … aren’t any of you asking yourselves why? Answer that, and in my opinion, you’ll get to the bottom of all this in no time.’
‘You know, I think I might just go out and look at the fireworks,’ Simon interrupts, rudely, for him. ‘Anyone else coming with me? Angie?’
But he’s already half-way out the door before I even get a chance to answer.
11.55 p.m.
At the impromptu New Year’s Eve bonfire/firework display at the bottom of the street. The local kids are all having a ball for themselves, running around the place, hyper and out of their minds on cakes and soft drinks. Does me good to see it.
‘Hey, missus!’ one of them yells at me, a kid of about twelve, circling round the bonfire on a new-looking bike. ‘Did you find your friend yet?’
‘Not yet,’ I call back at him as cheerily as I can, ‘but don’t you worry, we will!’
‘Gimme money and me and me pals will go out on our bikes and help you!’
Kindness of strangers. Gets me every time. Even if the cheeky fecker did demand payment.
Half the street is out here tonight waiting on the chime of midnight, and I have to scout through the crowd for Simon, but eventually find him, right up close to the bonfire and staring intently into it, arms folded, utterly absorbed and miles away. I inch up close to him, so I’m standing at his shoulder now. Well, my chin is just about level with his shoulder, that is; Simon always towers above me.
‘Pay absolutely no attention to Philip,’ I tell him stoutly.
‘He’s a total git,’ I go on. ‘Always was. And he’s inevitably wrong, too. In fact, if he’d said he wanted to get involved in the search and that he was confident he would find Kitty, then I’d really be worried.’
More brooding silence. Then after a long, long pause Simon turns to me.
‘What annoys me most about that moron,’ he says, ‘is that he actually had a point. Crown asked us the very same thing too, the first night we spoke to him, remember?’
I look back up at him.
‘And believe me, I’ve been racking my brains about it ever since. Look, Angie, if she did have a good reason to disappear on us, then …’ he breaks off here though, and goes back to glaring darkly into the fire instead. But the heat from it’s almost too much now and I can feel my face burning bright red, even though it’s well below zero tonight.
‘Now you just listen to me,’ I tell him as firmly as I can. ‘There is absolutely no chance on earth that Kitty just ran for the hills voluntarily. She just couldn’t have. I’d have known. You’d have known. No one was closer to her than you or I.’
‘Angie, you’re a good person and a loyal friend, and God knows I wouldn’t be getting through all this without you,’ he tells me, voice sounding thick now, emotional. Not like his usual stiff-upper-lip, stoic self at all. ‘But you’re completely missing it. You’re missing the whole thing.’
‘Missing what?’
‘Just suppose there was some piece of the jigsaw that you weren’t aware of,’ he says, totally focused back on the bonfire now. ‘Something that might just make some sense of all this. What then?’
‘You’re starting to worry me now!’ I tell him, tugging at his arm. ‘Would you mind telling me what the hell you’re talking about?’
Me and You Page 10