The Tick-Tock Trilogy Box Set

by David B Lyons

Ciara

  ‘What the hell is going on here?’ I try to say through my teeth — without moving my lips — as we get into the back of Brendan’s car.

  Ingrid just looks at me and then shakes her head.

  Bleedin’ hell. This is crazy! We’re supposed to be going to Miss Moriarty’s house to say our final goodbye. Not getting a bloody lift home from Brendan. Ingrid better not be changing her mind. I swear to God that if we don’t go through with this tonight, I’ll never be her friend again. She can’t write a pact with me and then not follow through on it.

  ‘Y’okay, girls?’ Brendan says, turning to us in the back. ‘What yis mumbling about?’

  ‘Nothing, Uncle Brendan,’ Ingrid answers, gripping that stupid book to her chest.

  I eyeball her, but she doesn’t turn to look at me.

  ‘When you gonna have time to read that?’ I whisper.

  She shrugs her shoulder.

  ‘Ingrid!’

  She pulls a bizarre funny face at me, then nods her head towards Brendan.

  ‘Shhh,’ she says.

  This is really frustrating. We can’t even talk now. We gotta get out of this car. We gotta talk this out. I knew we shouldn’t have gone to Harriet’s. I knew she would say things that’d make Ingrid change her mind. That bleedin’ book is doing my head in; she’s hugging it as if it’s just saved her life.

  I reach for it, take it from her and then sigh as I open the first page.

  ‘Load of shite,’ I whisper to her.

  She looks over at me for the first time since we got into the car and offers me that tiny half-smile she likes to do every now and then. I’m not sure what she means by it.

  ‘Ingrid,’ I whisper without moving my lips. ‘You’re not planning on reading this bleedin’ thing, are you?’

  She gives me that funny face again, then pushes her lips together to shush me.

  I twist my neck to look out the back window.

  ‘We’re going in the wrong direction, we’re supposed to be going to Miss Moriarty’s,’ I grind through my teeth.

  ‘Jaysus, you two like whispering, don’t yis?’ Brendan says, twisting at his rear-view mirror. ‘What yis talkin’ about?’

  ‘Don’t worry, Uncle Brendan… it’s just girlie talk,’ Ingrid says.

  ‘Talking about me, are yis? Let me guess. Yis heard me in the bathroom. I forgot yis were in Harriet’s room.’

  I laugh. As loudly as I can. So does Ingrid.

  ‘I bloody knew it!’ Brendan says. ‘Listen, a man’s gotta do what a man’s gotta do.’

  When I stop laughing I place my hand on Ingrid’s knee. Then she places her hand on top of mine.

  ‘We all do it,’ I say to Brendan. And suddenly I feel a little bit more relaxed, even though we’re heading in the wrong direction.

  I stare out the side window and recognise where we are. The canal road.

  ‘Brendan… if you don’t mind, can you stop at the garage here at the next bridge, I need to pick up something before we go home?’

  He sighs a little, then smiles back at me through the rear-view mirror.

  ‘Go on… don’t be long,’ he says, clicking his indicator. He turns into the garage and parks up in one of the small spaces around the back.

  I cock my head at Ingrid, telling her to follow me and we both get out and walk slowly towards the garage’s shop entrance.

  ‘What the hell is going on?’ I say when we’re out of sight of Brendan’s car.

  ‘What d’ye mean?’

  ‘I know it’s part of the pact that we can’t ask each other if we’re changing our minds or not… but you just better not be!’

  Ingrid shrugs her shoulder again… then shakes her head.

  ‘No… no, course not,’ she says.

  ‘Well what about this bloody thing?’ I say, holding up the book.

  Ingrid swipes the book from my hand, then stares at the front cover.

  ‘Ingrid!’ I shout.

  She widens her eyes, shakes her head again.

  ‘No, course I’m not gonna read it. I was just being nice to Harriet. She handed it to me… what was I supposed to do?’

  I breathe out a happy breath. She hasn’t changed her mind. We’re still gonna do this. I think.

  ‘It’s just… I got the feeling you were changing your mind. You were all upset and then suddenly we’re all rolling around Harriet’s bedroom laughing our heads off. It frightened me a little. I thought just because your uncle had a shite that suddenly your life got better. I got worried when you took the book and when you accepted a lift from Brendan.’

  She reaches out and rubs her hand up and down my arm.

  ‘It’s not like that, Ciara,’ she says. ‘I just wanted to be polite, y’know. I didn’t want to tell my uncle I wasn’t accepting his lift. And I didn’t want to tell my cousin I didn’t want to read her book. I was just being nice. Just being me.’

  I breathe a happy breath again. I’m so happy; happy that Ingrid hasn’t changed her mind; happy that our lives are nearly over.

  ‘Okay… what we gonna do now?’ I ask.

  Ingrid squelches up her mouth, then shrugs her shoulders again. She’s always been like this; crap at making decisions. I’m pretty sure I’ve made most of the decisions in her life for her.

  ‘We gotta tell Brendan we don’t want a lift home from him; tell him we’ll be okay from here. Then we can catch a bus back towards Miss Moriarty’s house. Here… leave the book in the car with him.’

  Ingrid sucks air through her teeth, then breathes out slowly through her nose.

  ‘Okay,’ she says, ‘I have an idea.’

  22:05

  Ingrid

  It wasn’t the laughing at Uncle Brendan having a poo that was changing my mind. It was before that. It was Harriet talking to me, telling me we don’t need men; telling me that I’d be stupid to allow Stitch to control all of my feelings; telling me that if I read her book then I might not feel stupid every time somebody calls me Fishfingers at school.

  The pooing didn’t change anything. All that did was make me laugh — really, really hard. Harder than I have laughed in ages.

  Then, when the laughing stopped, I still had that pain in my belly; still had the dark thoughts going round and round in my head. That’s the worst of it. When I return to the pain and to the dark feelings after they’ve gone away for a little while, that pain and those feelings always seem to be worse… deeper… heavier. It’s like when I get high from laughing or something, the downer after that is so hard to take. It makes me think that I should never get high; that I should never laugh, never try to enjoy life. Because when I do, I know that coming down from that is painful. I could feel it as I was getting into Uncle Brendan’s car. I was returning to sadness and heartache after laughing non-stop for two minutes. And it hurt. It hurt really bad.

  That’s why I agreed to commit suicide, I think. I can’t even enjoy laughing for crying out loud. Why would I want to be alive?

  ‘C’mon,’ I say, dragging at Ciara’s elbow. We both run into the tiny garage shop. ‘Excuse me, do you have a pen I could borrow?’ I ask the man behind the counter.

  He stares at us, then points towards the Lotto stand at the end of the shop counter.

  ‘Thank you,’ I say. I turn to the tiny desk at the Lotto stand and open the book on top of it before snatching at a cheap pen that’s attached to a small chain.

  Ciara squints her eyes as I write.

  I love you Harriet,

  Ingrid. x

  ‘Okay,’ I say, slapping the book closed. ‘Come on.’

  We race each other out to the car.

  ‘Here, Uncle Brendan, give this back to Harriet,’ I say after I snatch the passenger door open. ‘Tell her I’m sorry. We’re eh… we’re going to make our own way home from here, okay.’

  ‘What… what are you talkin’ about, girl?’ he says.

  ‘I’m sorry, Uncle Brendan; for getting you out of the house. And thank you for the lift this far. But
… we’re gonna go, okay?’ I slam the door shut, then grip on to Ciara’s hand and we leg it out of the garage courtyard as fast as we can.

  ‘Ingrid! Ingrid!’

  I hear Brendan roar after us but I just wave my hand in the air and keep running.

  It’s crazy that I feel happy. I’ve been at my happiest all day when I am certain I want to do it. And the great thing about feeling happy now — just before I kill myself — is that this time I know there’s not going to be a come down. Because I’ll be dead. I know that I am doing the right thing; that we’re doing the right thing. All of this nonsense; the ups and downs, the stresses of school, the bullying, the heartache, the headaches… they’ll all be gone soon. Gone forever.

  ‘Mind if I ask you a question?’ Charlie shouts over the siren.

  Helen removes the tip of her thumb from her mouth.

  ‘Of course.’

  ‘You’re a little bit nuts, aren’t ye?’ he says, his smile wide. He’s starting to relax in Helen’s company. Is really beginning to feel as if she’s the one taking him for the ride… even though they’re in his car. He believes she will foster him through to Detective status; help drag him from the dregs of administrative work.

  Helen lifts her head, slowly — taking in what was just said to her — and then eyeballs Charlie, her stare a little hostile.

  ‘Sorry. I mean. What I’m trying to ask is,’ Charlie says, as he shifts awkwardly in his seat, ‘Detectives… they have to be erratic, don’t they? You have to go beyond the line in order to investigate properly, right?’

  Helen squints at Charlie. He turns his face to her, then straight back out the windscreen. He’s desperate to engage her in conversation, but is also juggling his concentration levels with speeding seventy miles per hour down the canal straight.

  ‘Ye know…,’ he says. ‘The way you see on TV all these Detectives who go over the line to get what they want. You eh…’ he takes his hand from the gearstick, scratches at his hair. ‘You eh… you know the way you have kinda gone over the line; throwing the drink in Brother Fitzpatrick’s face… being off duty and being a bit sneaky with your role in this investigation… and when you said to little Audrey back there that she was being arrested for underage drinking when she wasn’t.’

  Helen takes her eyes from Charlie and stares down at her lap.

  ‘You gotta do what you gotta do in this job,’ she says.

  ‘So it is kinda like on TV? Like in The Wire or things like that; Detectives have to bend the rules?’

  Helen sniffs.

  ‘The Wire? Calm down, Charlie,’ she says, her voice loud. ‘All I did was splash a bit of water on a drunk man’s face to sober him up.’

  Charlie stiffens his grip on the steering wheel and holds a blink closed.

  ‘Fuck sake, Charlie,’ Helen roars.

  Charlie swings the car away from a cyclist.

  ‘Shit. Sorry. Sorry,’ he says to Helen.

  ‘Concentrate will you?’ she barks.

  Charlie puffs out his cheeks, then wipes at his brow, using the back of his hand.

  ‘I was just… I was just trying to learn, that’s all. I just really want to be a Detective.’

  Helen wiggles her bum on the car seat into a more comfortable position and then flattens down the seatbelt over her shoulder.

  ‘No harm asking questions, Charlie,’ she says. ‘You didn’t need to call me nuts is all.’ Charlie turns to her, his mouth ajar. ‘Just concentrate on the road for now,’ she says, waving his face away.

  They’re almost there. At Cue. Helen had been thinking about how to play it with Tommy Smith before Charlie started shouting stupid questions at her over the blare of the siren. Tommy’s family and friends didn’t seem like the most welcoming bunch. It’s unlikely he’s going to be any different. The apple very rarely falls far from the tree. She’d been wondering if he’ll want to talk to them at all; she’s still coming to terms with somebody ringing in a suicide warning without giving any names. She was stewing — before Charlie asked if she was a “bit nuts” — the realisation that Tommy is more likely involved with gangland crime than he is some kind of good Samaritan concerned by the welfare of two girls from his school. Still, she isn’t taking any chances. She knows this is the greatest opportunity she’ll ever have of ensuring Scott didn’t take his life in vain. Helen’s awareness of suicide — and how those who commit suicide think — is what gave her the gut instinct to follow the phone calls up as legitimate. If she’s right, and the rest of the Garda force is wrong, she’ll be a hero in a multitude of ways. Her face would probably be splashed all over the newspapers. Might be invited on to The Late Late Show for an interview. Might even be offered her old role as a Detective back until Eddie finally decides to retire and whisk her away for her dream life in Canada.

  ‘Here we are,’ Charlie says, slowing down the car.

  Helen looks out her passenger side window at graffitied shutters. Then she allows her eyes to flitter towards a red neon light above them.

  ‘Cue’, it reads, the ‘e’ flashing.

  ‘Looks like a lovely place,’ she says over the top of the car after they both get out. ‘Kinda place I used to hang out in when I was a kid.’

  Charlie puffs a laugh out.

  ‘Told you you were nuts,’ he says, before holding his hands up in mock apology.

  Helen stops walking and stares at the back of Charlie’s head. She’s still wondering how to react to his quip when he spins to her again, his palms back up, his laugh loud.

  ‘Cheeky bugger,’ she says, mock swiping at his face. ‘Jesus, you’ve grown in confidence over the past couple hours, huh? I couldn’t get a word out of you earlier.’

  Charlie’s still laughing when he pushes at a door that provides entry to a narrow, steep staircase. The only light inside is coming from the top of the steps; an eerie bright red bulb that suggests there may be more than a game of snooker on offer upstairs.

  ‘Creepy,’ Charlie whispers as they take the first step. Each of the thirty-one steps creeks under their feet as they climb. When they reach the top, Helen bends down again, her hands on her knees.

  ‘Nobody can say playing snooker isn’t a work out if you’re playing snooker in this kip,’ she says, while trying to catch her breath.

  Charlie laughs again; is really beginning to think this is the best shift of his career so far. He’ll be glad of the experience, regardless of what the outcome is by midnight.

  ‘This way,’ he says to Helen when she stands back upright.

  Charlie pushes at another door and the sound of nineties Brit Pop begins to crackle out of cheap speakers. He pauses at an empty bar, then rattles his knuckles against it.

  ‘Hello?’ he calls out.

  Helen steps to the side, takes in the entire snooker hall. It’s the first time she’s been in one since she was a teenager. She does a quick calculation; two banks of eight tables. Sixteen in all. Yet only two are in use right now. Two middle-aged men playing at the one closest to them. And a group of guys in the back corner. She thinks a couple of them are only teens. But they’re too far away for her to be certain. So she squints up at the black and white monitor over the bar, at live CCTV footage of them, but that gives no clarity on whether a couple of them are young enough to be Tommy Smith or not.

  ‘The guy running the place is down there,’ one of the middle-aged men says to her.

  Helen tilts her chin upwards, acknowledging the heads up. Then she begins to walk, in her own unique way, between the two banks of tables and towards the group.

  ‘This way, Charlie.’

  ‘Oi, oi,’ a man sweeping his hand up and down a snooker cue says as he watches them approach. ‘How can we help you, officers?’

  ‘I’m Detective Brennan. This here is Officer Guilfoyle. We’re looking for a boy we believe hangs out around here.’

  The man takes a step towards them, resting the butt of his cue into the carpet.

  ‘Who?’ he asks.

  ‘To
mmy Smith.’

  The man looks back over his shoulder at the group who are all perched on a bench that runs around the back corner of the hall. When he turns back, his bottom lip is sticking out, his head shaking.

  ‘Never heard of him,’ he says.

  ‘Sir, we believe two young girls’ lives are in grave danger. Tommy Smith can lead us to them. We need to speak with him as a matter of urgency.’

  The man’s cheeks rise high as he produces a fake grin.

  ‘I’m serious, Sir. I don’t want to speak to Tommy about anything other than the fact that he made calls to two Garda stations a few hours ago saying two of his friends are planning on dying by suicide tonight.’

  The man’s eyes narrow. Then he looks back over his shoulder again. Charlie tries to track his line of vision, to see who or what he’s looking at exactly. There are only two in this gang who could possibly be Tommy Smith; only two of them look to be in the appropriate age range.

  ‘Are either of you Tommy Smith?’ he asks, stepping forward.

  The two boys look at each other, then back at Charlie.

  ‘Never heard of him,’ they both say, almost in unison.

  The man with the cue bends over the table, misses a red to the far corner pocket.

  ‘Bollix,’ he says, standing back up. ‘Yis are putting me off my game. Do yis wanna have a game of snooker? Or…’ he rolls his shoulders.

  Charlie swallows, then looks over to Helen for support. He notices that she probably didn’t hear what was said, is too busy sticking her nose into her phone. Then she holds the phone to her ear.

  A ringing sounds out; an annoying tone that sounds more like a crackling vibration than an actual ringtone. It’s coming from one of the teenage boy’s jeans pocket.

  Helen presses at her screen, hanging up the call, then takes a stride forward.

  ‘Tommy, we need to speak with you right now!’ she says.

  Tommy pounces to his feet, races past Helen and through the two rows of snooker tables before reaching the top of the stairs.