‘Come on, you bitch,’ I say to the corkscrew as I yank at it. Pop. Done. Decent job.
I fill my glass, then sit back into my stool and stare at the blurry image of myself again. I often wonder if I stare at this reflection because it hides the lines in my face and makes me look younger. Then I turn my face to notice the time on the oven. 19:50.
What a prick. Why can’t he be home with his family? Then I realise his family aren’t actually here. Ciara’s out too. Where’d she say she was going? I can’t remember. Didn’t she try to hug me? What the hell was all that about? Silly child. She is gone out, isn’t she?
‘Ciara. Ciara.’ I shout it so that I can be heard as far up as the loft. Sometimes she likes to hang out up there. I don’t know what she does be doing.
No answer.
She must be gone out. Probably in Ingrid’s house.
She’d rather be there than here. I don’t blame her.
I envy the Murphys. They’ve got it all together. A proper family, they are. Terry’s as successful professionally as my Michael, but at least he’s man enough to stay loyal to his wife and kids. Even if one of the kids is a bit retarded. I’m not sure what his condition is. I keep forgetting. Some new-age made up mental illness that begins with an ‘A’. I’m sure it begins with an ‘A’.
Maybe it’s easier for Terry to stay at home with his family because he has a mental son. Or perhaps it’s just easier because his wife’s an ex-model. She’s beautiful, is Greta. Tall. Slim. Blonde. I’ll never be tall. Never be slim. I tried blonde once. Just to see if Michael would like it. He tutted. Said I looked like a tart.
The Murphys have invited us to have dinner in their house loads of times over the past few years. They want us to be closer because our girls are best friends. But we’ve never taken them up on their offer. That’d be Michael’s worst nightmare. A double date with the neighbours. Jesus, could you imagine?
Besides, I’m not that keen myself. Even if by some miracle Michael did agree, I can’t really be relied on to do socialising. I’m too… what’s the word… too nervy, too anxious. I’d be over-conscious of my dependence on wine. They probably wouldn’t want Ciara to pal around with Ingrid anymore if they found out I was a borderline alcoholic. And she needs that friendship more than anything. It’s Ingrid who looks after my Ciara. Especially now that Debbie has gone.
I stare at my reflection again and take another sip. Sometimes I swirl the wine around in my mouth to get a sense of whether or not I can taste it anymore. I’m numb to it by now, I think. But I’m not numb to the effect. I need it. I need the alcohol to take the edge off. Couldn’t live without it.
I turn my face to look at the oven again. 19:54.
Where is this prick?
I place one foot down, then the other, holding a hand to the edge of the kitchen island for balance, then I drag my slippers across the tiles again, the swish-swash of them irritating me as if my hangover has settled in already. I find myself in the hallway, picking up the telephone and dialling one; the quick dial for Michael’s office. He has one of those new fancy mobile phones, but the bloody thing is never switched on.
The tone rings. And rings. Then cuts off.
I blink my eyes so I can become more conscious to my thoughts. What time was it when I looked at the oven clock again? Jesus. I can’t remember. I shuffle my way back down the hallway, down the one step that leads to the kitchen tiles and then cock my head so I can see the microwave. 19:56. Yeah. Almost eight o’clock. That’s what I thought. I’m sure he’s still in the office. He’s normally there till ten-ish, even later sometimes. So I shuffle my way back up the hallway and pick up the phone again, dial one and hold the receiver to my ear.
It rings out.
‘Fuck sake!’ I yell, slamming the phone back down on its receiver.
Then I remember.
‘It’s a fucking Sunday, isn’t it?’
I blow out my cheeks and shuffle my way back to the kitchen. Back to the island. Back to my stool. Back to my wine. And back to my blurry reflection.
There was a strange silence in the car, even though energies had somewhat heightened.
Charlie had already felt as if he’d asked too many questions before they even started the engine. Or at least the same question too many times. So he just concentrated on his driving while Helen stared out the side window of the passenger seat as they made their way towards Davitt Road.
There was no doubt Charlie was intimidated by the lanky woman he thought was a Detective from Rathmines Garda station. Yet he seemed somewhat excited. When he was offered the task of looking into the phone calls as if they were legitimate, he assumed he was put in charge of an insignificant case again; the type nobody else in the station could be bothered looking into. It’d be nothing new for Charlie to be doing a whole lot of nothing for his entire shift. But now that he’d been partnered with a Detective from another station, his mood seemed to be shifting. Adrenaline was threatening to pump inside of him.
‘How long you been a cop?’ Helen asks, just as they reach their destination.
Charlie indicates left, slots his car into one of the tiny parking spaces outside the Marble Arch pub and then pulls up the handbrake before answering.
‘Eighteen months.’
Helen stiffens her nostrils.
‘Enjoy it?’
‘I will.’
‘What ye mean you will?’
‘Soon as I’m outta this,’ he says, lifting up the flap of his tie and letting it fall back down.
Helen opens her door, stretches her long legs out, and by the time she has walked around the other side of the car, Charlie has done the same. He’s zipping up his navy Garda jacket when Helen places a hand on his shoulder.
‘What… you want out of uniform already? Wanna be a Detective?’
Charlie nods, then stares down at his clunky black shoes, his jaw clenching. Perhaps he’s said too much already.
‘You got balls, Charlie? You willing to play the game, not the system?’
Charlie’s brow creases. Every time he does this, Helen notices that his nose gets even stubbier.
‘Whatcha mean by that?’ he asks, looking back up at Helen.
Helen doesn’t answer. She steps off the path and, in her own unique stiff way, strides across the road towards the tram stop.
Charlie waits, hands in his pockets, his mind swirling, before he jogs after her.
He observes Helen as she stands still at the tram stop. He’s intrigued, not just by how she seems to be going about her job, but by every nuance of her character. Her coat looks, to him, as if she is trying to dress for a role in a cheesy TV series. And her hair? Well… Charlie could barely keep his eyes off it. Is itching to ask her what colour it is. But there isn’t a chance that question will ever come out of his mouth. He knows that odd face would offer him a strange stare. And no answer.
‘Whatcha looking for?’ he asks, his rural accent thick.
‘See that?’
‘What?’
Charlie’s gaze follows Helen’s. Right up into the corner of the shelter of the tram stop.
‘CCTV.’
Charlie holds his eyes closed, then grinds his teeth. He feels like an idiot. He should have known that’s what she was staring at.
‘Lights are on. It’s working. All along the stop the CCTV seems to be working.’ She flicks her wrist, stares at her watch. ‘It’s eight o’clock. Call was made at six forty-nine you said… over an hour ago.’
Helen huffs out a sigh from her nostrils, then pivots her head left and right, all the way up and down the straight stretch of the Grand Canal.
‘No point in us being here, then,’ she says. ‘We need to go up to the Luas HQ, up to the Red Cow roundabout.’
‘To get the CCTV footage from six forty-nine?’ Charlie asks.
‘Good boy, Charlie.’
He creases his brow again. Then realises Helen is already halfway across the road, heading back to the car. He jogs again to catch up w
ith her.
‘Do you mind if I ask you a question, Detective Brennan?’ he says.
She doesn’t answer as she opens the passenger door and swoops her way inside the car.
When Charlie gets in to the driver’s seat, buckles up his belt and ignites the engine, he turns to her.
‘How did you know the call came from here, from somewhere along the tram tracks between Drimnagh and Inchicore?’
Helen stares straight out the windscreen.
‘You’ve already asked me that… five times.’
Charlie squirms a little before he shoves the gear stick into reverse and pulls out of the parking space.
‘Sirens,’ Helen says.
‘Really?’ Charlie’s brow creases again.
When he doesn’t get an answer, he flicks the button next to the steering wheel that allows a loud blare to sound from the car and suddenly the speedometer jumps from twenty miles an hour to sixty in the space of five seconds.
‘It’s just… if I wanna be a Detective, I’d love to learn from you,’ he shouts over the sirens.
Helen turns her face and looks him up and down before taking her gaze back through the windscreen. ‘You will,’ she shouts back.
Charlie smiles to himself. His first smile of the day. He’s been frustrated with life. Had become an insurance broker straight from school; working at a small brokers called Fullams before realising he hadn’t one Goddamn care about insurance in any capacity. It took two-and-a-half years for him to realise that. When he noticed the Gardaí advertising for new recruits, he assumed a life solving crime would take him out of the boredom of office work. But after landing a job in Terenure Garda station straight after his graduation, he was longing to be back helping people renew their car insurance policies. He hates being a cop, is sick of every colleague at his station talking down to him. The egos he has come across as a Garda stagger him. He can’t comprehend why those trusted the most to be as impartial as possible in society possess such vanity. But perhaps he was about to catch a break. If he were to assist Helen in solving a case everybody else was poo-pooing, he might buy himself some credibility. Maybe he could become one of them; somebody who didn’t have to wear a fucking tie.
When the siren dies down, so too does Charlie’s smile. He leaps out of the car, fixes his hat to his odd-shaped head and makes his way to the front office of the Luas headquarters without even looking back at Helen. He’s feeling determined now; transfixed on earning that credibility.
He holds the door open for Helen who scoots by him without thanking him. Then she holds an open palm towards the young woman at the front desk.
‘Detective Brennan and Officer…’ she turns around, stares at Charlie.
‘Guilfoyle,’ he says.
‘We need to speak with the person in charge of your CCTV.’
The young woman gulps, eyeballs Charlie’s uniform and then picks up her phone.
‘Can you tell Larry I have two police officers in the reception please.’
‘He’s coming straight away,’ she says to Helen after placing the receiver back down.
Helen takes one step backwards and stands straight and tall as she waits, her arms shovelled deep into her coat pockets. Charlie looks around the pokey reception area and begins to read the work notices on the board. He feels he should look busy, as if he is investigating. He wants to impress Helen. Though he hasn’t one darn clue what he’s looking for. He’s hardly going to solve the mystery of the anonymous phone call by reading staff notices about a new training initiative for tram drivers. After cringing a little, he steps back towards Helen and stands as straight as he can to at least try to match her for height.
‘What the fuck were you doing?’ Helen whispers.
Charlie turns his head sideways, stares at the unusual face beside him and then shrugs his shoulders. The door flying open saves him from his discomfort.
‘Officers, I’m Larry Hanrahan, how can I help you?’ says a tall, skinny bald chap in a purple shirt.
‘We need to view the CCTV footage of your Drimnagh and Goldenbridge stops between six thirty and seven o’clock this evening,’ Helen says.
Larry nods his head once, then holds the door he had just come through open, waving both Helen and Charlie through.
As the three of them pace down an overly warm corridor, Helen taps Larry on the shoulder of his purple shirt.
‘I assume, Mr Hanrahan, judging by the fact that you haven’t said anything, no other officers have come to you today to view this footage?’
Larry’s eyes widen a little.
‘No,’ he says shaking his head. ‘Why, what’s going on?’
‘Police inquiries, Mr Hanrahan. The case is confidential right now, but there are two separate teams looking into the same case today — two different lines of enquiries. So I assume we won’t be the only team calling by this evening.’
Larry purses his thin lips.
‘Whatever you guys need,’ he says. Then he pushes down on the handle of a heavy door and heaves his way through to a tiny room packed with computer screens.
‘Kristine,’ this is eh… this is…’
‘Officer Guilfoyle and Detective Brennan from eh… well, I am from Terenure Garda station, Detective Brennan here is from Rathmines,’ Charlie says.
Kristine stands and stares at Helen as if she was staring a creature from another planet.
‘They need to view footage from the Red line, the CCTV from Drimnagh and Goldenbridge stops please,’ Larry says.
He approaches Kristine’s desk, scribbles some notes on her yellow post-it pad and then stands back a little. Helen strides forward, standing beside Larry and watches as Kristine stabs her chunky fingers at her keyboard.
‘Kay, so between six thirty and seven, hmmm…’ Kristine mumbles to herself. ‘Right, this screen here,’ she says slapping a monitor to her left, ‘is footage from the Drimnagh stop from six thirty onwards and this one here,’ she slaps at the monitor to her right, ‘that’s Goldenbridge from the same time.’
Helen eyeballs Charlie, then nods her head towards the screen on the right. Charlie steps forward and stares at it. And then Helen does the same on the other side.
‘S’what we looking for, Detective Brennan?’ Charlie asks.
Helen stares at him almost cross-eyed, making him feel like an idiot again.
‘What do you think, Charlie? C’mon, you said you wanted to be a Detective when you grow up. What do you think we’re looking for?’
Charlie’s shoulders shrink. He looks down, straightens his tie, even though it doesn’t need straightening, and then gulps.
‘A eh… a young man making a phone call from a mobile phone?’
‘Bingo,’ Helen says.
19:55
Ingrid
‘Isn’t it mad to think nobody knows where we are, that nobody’s looking for us? I almost feel… what’s-the-word?’
‘Free?’ Ciara says.
I nod my head. Yeah. I think that’s the word I mean. Free. In control. As if we don’t have to answer to anybody for the first time ever. I’m actually enjoying this. But I know I only feel free because of what we’re about to do. If we weren’t gonna kill ourselves in a few hours time then I wouldn’t feel like this. If I had to go back home and wake up and go to school tomorrow then there’s no way I’d be feeling this… what’s-the-word… content. Yeah, that’s it. I feel content. Maybe it’s because I know we’ve made the right decision. I bet that’s why we’ve been laughing and joking a lot. We’re happy with the decision we made.
I turn my face back around and look out the window as the bus shakes its way down the canal road. Ciara just seems to be staring into her lap. She’s gone a little quiet. In fact we’ve both been quiet since we left the chipper about fifteen minutes ago.
‘I feel free too,’ she whispers. I turn to look at her, grab her hand and clench it really tight. Then I bring her knuckles towards my face and kiss them.
‘I love you, Ciara Joyce,’ I sa
y.
She smiles at me.
‘I love you Ingrid Murphy, ye mad thing,’ she says.
We both laugh. And then both sigh after we’re done laughing.
I return my stare out the window and look into the darkness. Stitch keeps coming into my mind, but I don’t want to let him in there. He’s been in there way too long and doesn’t deserve it. The words he said to me last night keep repeating over and over and over. I need to stop thinking. Maybe I should continue talking to Ciara. The silences will just drive me mad. Even if I do only have about four hours left of the madness.
‘It’s only two more stops, isn’t it?’ I ask.
‘Yup,’ she pops out of her mouth,
‘So, do you know what you’re going to say to her?’
Ciara sticks out her bottom lip, then shakes her head.
‘It’s just about… y’know… her realising that I called by to say goodbye, even if I don’t—’
‘Actually say goodbye!’
She huffs out a small laugh, then looks up at me again and smiles. I’m used to this; Ciara’s moods being up and down. I’m never really certain when I knock for Ciara in the mornings before we go to school just what Ciara I’ll be walking to school with. Some days she’s buzzing; laughing and joking all the way there. Other days she just has her chin resting into her chest, staring down at her clunky shoes as she walks. She’s been like that for years. Is never going to change. Some days she’s a cross between both moods; can be buzzing one minute, staring at her shoes the next. I’ve tried to work out what it would feel like to be depressed, but only last night did it really sink in. Then I think of Stitch again and I have to shake my head to get rid of his words.
‘What you shaking for?’ Ciara asks.
‘Nothing. Just eh… just looking out the window here, staring at all these houses.’
The Tick-Tock Trilogy Box Set Page 53