Finding Alison Read online

  ‘Anything?’ Mike Duggan held the receiver with both hands.

  ‘ . . . box . . . nets . . . part of . . . bilge keel . . . nothing . . . ’ The words were strung together with static, her heart shrinking with every one.

  She hadn’t realised that her tears were falling until a hand proffered a tissue. ‘Thanks . . . ’ She held it beneath her nose, her eyes scanning across the water, across the exposed rocks and along each tiny inlet from the harbour to Benvoy. Nothing. She carried her mug to the sink, emptied it, watched the water run into and over it.

  She turned for one last glance through that too familiar window. There were no boats, no helicopter; they were just a memory now. Only the little blue and white punt stationed outside the harbour wall, still, intact, two seagulls riding its stern.

  The search had been scaled down in late November and then called off completely on the 8th of December. Last year. How she had railed at them then – after all their time and effort and support – how she had flung their kindness and their sympathies back in their faces, vowing to prove them wrong.

  There was an almost innocence to the bright May sunshine, she thought now, looking out, a certain naivety in the gentle lapping of the water, the clean-washed sand. The storm of that night, eight months ago now, would rage forever, she knew, somewhere deep inside her. But, it was time to accept she had lost. Sean wouldn’t be coming back to her. Not today. Not ever. She dug her hands deep into her jacket pockets, turned from the sea.

  ‘Ready?’ Kathleen, her smile heavy with sadness, linked her arm, their footfalls on the metal staircase echoing through the emptiness.

  Three Years Later

  One

  Maybe she had consciously decided never to speak again. Maybe she had had enough. Maybe the doctors were wrong when, in the absence of any medical reason, they had put her silence down to ‘the trauma’. Maybe, because they hadn’t known Maryanne before all this, they weren’t taking into consideration the incredible strength and stubbornness of the woman – a woman who could survive all that she had and still find inside herself the courage and determination not only to go on but to find something beautiful about life, something worth living for.

  Maybe, maybe, maybe. Head bowed, Alison retraced her steps along the polished parquet floor. If there was one thing she hated, it was waiting. Waiting for anything: traffic lights, a kettle to boil, life. Folding her arms tight at her waist, she stopped just left of the dining-room door and craned her neck to look inside. Still eating. She could see Maryanne’s back at the top table. Alison’s throat tightened as she took in the slackness in her shoulders, the droop of her white neck, the bow of the paper bib knotted at its nape, a bandage on a wounded swan. She watched a carer spoon-feed the elderly man opposite, her lips mouthing ‘good man’. Alison was struck by the notion of an anti-crèche, a veritable pre-school for death, where people slowly unlearned all that life had taught them. Last Steps. No Steps. She turned, as swiftly from the idea as from the vista, her long legs carrying her quickly back to the chair inside the main door, her every step shadowed by a faint mouldering that the home’s cheap disinfectant didn’t quite mask.

  The cane chair creaked in protest at its abrupt occupation. She swung one knee over the other, the uppermost foot continuing to step in the air, with an added circular flourish. She pulled her cardigan tight across her narrow chest, twisted the silver watch face up on her wrist. Ten to six. Hannah would be home from study by seven, she’d need to get back and fix something for tea. Her eyes strayed along the length of yellow corridor, resting on the wooden plaque on the wall opposite.

  Sea View Care Home

  WELCOME

  She twisted a stray red curl around her index finger. God, what was she doing here? Again. This was becoming ridiculous. Okay, she had planned her visit this morning, but to find herself landed outside in the car park again just now – what for? What was it she expected to find here? Peace? Strength? Some kind of forgiveness? Fingers steepled, she cupped her palms over her nose and mouth, the warmth of her heavy outbreath encouraging her eyelids to fall.

  ‘Back again? You’ll surely have a bed in heaven!’ Kathleen’s soft white shoes made hardly a whisper as she approached.

  ‘Kathleen, God, I was nearly . . . I didn’t see you.’

  Kathleen stepped closer, her smile dimming as she registered the bruise-like shadows under Alison’s eyes, the pinched pale skin making her high cheek bones and narrow chin appear more prominent than ever. ‘You look exhausted.’ She placed a hand lightly on her friend’s shoulder. ‘Shouldn’t you be at home, taking a rest? Maryanne’s not going anywhere.’

  ‘Oh, I just thought I’d stop in and say goodnight.’ She allowed her shoulders to relax with her sigh. ‘I was worried – she just seemed more removed than ever this morning.’

  ‘I know.’ Kathleen nodded her understanding, waves of blonde hair bobbing in consensus around her ears. She touched the tip of her tongue to the groove on her upper lip – a remnant of childhood surgery – a habit Alison had so often seen her employ as she sought for time, for the right words. Bending her knees, Kathleen dropped to a half-squat, her brown eyes meeting Alison’s. ‘But just think of what she’s been through. Imagine at that age – at any age – waking in the dead of night to find some stranger rifling your home. It’d be enough to finish most people off. But you know your mother-in-law better than anyone. Maryanne’s a fighter. She’ll be fine, just give her some time, Alison, you’ll see.’

  ‘But after three months – surely there should be some change. And since she’s come here, I don’t know, it’s as if she’s moving further and further away from us.’

  ‘She’s adjusting, that’s all. You know how fiercely independent Maryanne’s always been. It’s one of the hardest things to lose, you know, your independence. I’ve seen it so often here over the years, patients retreating back into themselves. It’s a kind of protection, I suppose, gives them time to come to terms with things.’

  ‘I just feel like I’m losing her, Kathleen. Losing my last link with Sean and I can’t . . . ’ Alison shook back her head, shook back the tears that had gathered, ready to spill.

  Kathleen took a deep breath. ‘Hey, come on. I’m telling you, that lady is not going anywhere. And while she’s in here – and being very well looked after, might I add’ – her smile was lit with devilment – ‘you need to be looking after yourself. And Hannah.’

  ‘Oh, don’t talk to me about Hannah. Honestly, I’m at my wits’ end with that girl. She’s just constantly angry and sour and ready to jump down my throat and into an argument every time I dare to open my mouth.’

  ‘Hormones! Weren’t we all there once?’ Kathleen squeezed her friend’s shoulder and straightened. ‘At nearly fourteen, the poor girl’s at the very epicentre of it.’

  ‘She’s still hanging with that O’Neill guy.’

  ‘What?’ Kathleen’s eyebrows shot upwards.

  ‘Oh, she swears blind she’s not seeing him, but I’m not a total fool. I see the frantic texting.’ Alison hauled her bag from the floor and pushed herself up by the armrests. ‘And I’ve caught her out more than once with her cock-and-bull stories about being “round at Aoife’s” . ’

  As Alison stood to her full height, a full head and neck above Kathleen, her friend’s nose registered a faint hint of alcohol. They turned and walked in the direction of the dayroom, a mixture of anger and something like pity swelling below Kathleen’s chest. Oh, come on, she scolded herself, when hasn’t any one of us not sought comfort in a few drinks? Alison was strong, capable – look at what she’d come through so far, for heaven’s sake – if anyone was entitled to a few jars, surely it was her? ‘I wouldn’t have given that more than a week. What can he want with a fourteen-year-old? Sure, he must be good on twenty!’

  ‘I can well imagine exactly what he’s after and poor Hannah, you know, maddening and all as she is, there’s still a lot of the child in her. She doesn’t realise she’s so vulnerable. Just
the type to be led . . . Oh God, I dread the thought of the summer, Kathleen, all that hanging around time. I wish I could just get her out of here.’

  ‘A break would do you both good. Have you thought about a holiday?’ Kathleen’s heart went out to Hannah. That poor girl had been through so much in her short years. She’d been an absolute pet with Sean – his ‘little shrimp’, as he was fond of calling her. Even now, over three years on, Kathleen could feel her throat tightening when she remembered Hannah in those first months: those big lost eyes – Sean’s eyes – staring out into a world that no longer made sense, a world where the carefree magic of childhood had been replaced by loneliness and a terrifying uncertainty. A scrawny little thing for her age, she would follow Alison around like a ghost, constantly watching, wondering, waiting for her mother to come back to her. The poor child might as well have lost them both. Kathleen had done her utmost to distract her with treats and outings, and in time, when Hannah had finally got to a place where she could sleep without the security of knowing her mother was near, she would spend overnights with Kathleen and her son, the child that she had been, slowly, little by little, returning. But no matter Kathleen’s efforts, something had changed in Hannah on that night, had put a kink or a knot in her young spirit, and Alison’s surrender to her own grief had only served to tighten and fix it like a wall between them. They had lost so much more than Sean; they had lost so much of each other too, and it broke Kathleen’s heart to see the distance that continued to grow between them.

  ‘Holiday?’ Alison chided, ‘it’s hard enough trying to live one week to the next.’

  ‘Tell me about it. My hours have been cut back again this week – and they expect us to do twice the work when we’re here! Still, I suppose I should be thankful I have a job at all the way things are going. And I firmly believe that if you prioritise—’

  ‘Prioritise? With what?’ Alison scoffed. ‘Ed Resources informed me last week that they won’t be renewing my proofing contract. Apparently schools just don’t have the funds to invest in books outside of the must-haves on the curriculum. Their business has completely dried up.’

  ‘And what about Chapters? They’ve always been pretty dependable, haven’t they?’

  ‘They’re feeling the pinch, too, taking care of the bulk of the work in-house. The only editing they’re outsourcing at the moment is the more technical stuff – not my area, sadly. The bills, I’m afraid, are the only constant these days.’ Alison’s forced humour only heightened her desperation. ‘And now the bloody mortgage rate is set to rise again.’

  Kathleen’s tongue sought out the groove in her upper lip. She knew only too well the drudgery and constant worry of battling to get by. Her part-time wage as a carer hardly put a dent in her bills. And she still felt the burn of accusation in old Loretta Flynn’s eyes every Thursday when she cashed her single parent payment at the post office. God, you’d think the woman was paying it out of her own pocket, the old witch! She often regretted striking out for independence, shackling herself to a thirty-year mortgage so that Jamie could grow up like other kids, in a house his mother owned, so that no one could point the finger, whisper behind her back about all she had ‘handed to her’. Of course back then she’d presumed that she’d always have as many hours work as she wanted. There’d be a fat chance of her ever getting a mortgage now! Still, she had her home and she had Jamie – her beautiful, healthy, bouncing boy and now, of course, she had Rob too. Rob. She couldn’t keep him out of her mind for more than five minutes! ‘What about an interest-only payment? Lots of people are going for that.’

  ‘I’d say I was first in the queue. And first to be refused. Those banks have an awful lot to answer for.’ Alison halted mid-step, as if every ounce of her energy was needed to fuel the anger in her voice. ‘I called in again about an overdraft last week and it took everything I had in me not to reach across that polished desk and strangle that pompous git of a manager with his own silk tie! He refused, point-blank. Knowing full well that Sean’s life insurance and the mortgage protection are set to come in down the line. Money they’re guaranteed. And meantime they expect me to carry on paying through the nose with money I just haven’t got!’

  ‘That seven-year rule is such a load of nonsense. I mean, what more evidence do they need, for heaven’s sake? There must be some way around it – have you ever thought of talking to a TD? Or maybe asking the insurance company for some kind of interim payment? I mean, surely it’s all the same to them whether they pay out now or—’

  ‘Kathleen? Can you give me a hand to lift Sadie, please?’

  Alison and Kathleen’s heads swung in the direction of the brusque call. Standing a little down the corridor, the nurse’s smile was duck tight, her impatience evident in the curt swing of her hip back through the bedroom doorway.

  ‘Coming!’ Kathleen rolled her eyes. ‘Better go. Look, I’m meeting Rob tonight but—’

  ‘Oh, tell him hello from me!’ Alison’s smile was wide with genuine warmth. Rob, with his big grin and his even bigger heart, was the best thing that had ever happened to Kathleen. She’d been so broken after all that business with Jamie’s father, the light had totally gone out of her. And then, after Sean died, the way she had put aside her own heartache and flung herself into taking care of herself and Hannah. Without her, God only knows what would have become of them. Alison had no great recollection of those first weeks, but in the months that followed, when all the other support had dwindled away, Kathleen had been her one constant. Still was. When others crossed the street, avoided asking her how she was because they had tired of hearing it, Kathleen probed and listened and hugged and healed. When Hannah became too much to handle, Kathleen scooped her away, gave her the love and the nourishment that had withered at its root inside Alison. She had saved them. And even now, having her working here in the home, knowing she would keep a special eye out for Maryanne, was another blessing. Alison owed her so much. Bad as things were, she had a good friend in Kathleen, a friend she desperately needed and if she wasn’t careful she could lose her too – how often had she postponed their plans lately, on several occasions failing to turn up at all. Plus, Kathleen had a life now, with Rob. They were no longer the two singletons united against the world, against men. Alison smiled. It was great to see Kathleen back to her old self. So full of fun and mischief. Rob had brought that spark in her back to life and it literally shone out of her.

  ‘Will do, and listen, give me a shout on your way out and we’ll arrange a time for a proper chat.’ Heaving her hip, Kathleen mimicked the nurse’s smile, turned and was gone. With one arm folded over her chest and a hand clasped over her mouth to hide her mirth, Alison watched her friend quick-step down the corridor, her miniature, tightly packed frame moving with an energy that always put Alison in mind of a playful pup bursting with life. It mightn’t be a bad idea to get Kathleen to have a chat with Hannah, talk some sense into her about that O’Neill creep, Alison thought. Kathleen had always had a way with Hannah, a knack at getting into her space, getting her to open up where Alison would only be met with a stone wall. It’d be worth a try, she sighed to herself as Kathleen paused at the bedroom door, gave one last exaggerated tip of her hip, raised her hand in salute and disappeared inside. Alison took a deep breath, put on her best smile and turned into the dayroom.

  * * *

  William Hayden sat on the storm wall, coffee Thermos in hand. He watched the incoming tide lick and wash the grey rocks in a lavish, languorous foreplay before swallowing them completely, leaving no evidence that they had ever existed. He ran his fingers through his grey hair, squinted towards the west where the sinking sun split a bank of grey cloud like a freshly sliced salmon, setting the horizon ablaze in its dying glory. Life and death. The coming and the going. Nature acted it out every day in a host of different ways and yet, when it came, people so often greeted death with stupefaction, denial, utter disbelief. As if it were the most unnatural and unheard of abomination. As if it had not been their o
ne certainty, the one companion that had walked with them from the womb. A lone gull skimmed the sea’s silver surface, his plaintive call echoing back loudly upon him as he soared to a nook in the high cliff. The night would bring rain.

  William threw what remained of his coffee, cold and acrid now, onto the pebbles below, watched them stain, darken. He screwed the cap back on the Thermos and eased himself from the wall. His left calf and foot felt numb. Leaning his weight on the ball of his left foot, he circled the camper. Already the cold of the rain fingered his chest at his open collar. He would drive on. Best to keep moving, to stop only when he was sure that sleep was finally ready to overtake him.

  Three weeks now he had been on the road, starting out from Dublin, first on to Donegal and then on down the west coast to Kerry, now west Cork. He still hadn’t found that place he was searching for, but something inside him told him he was getting closer. He trusted his inner compass – this guide that he knew nothing of. He had long given up trying to be in control, to influence or change things. He pulled on a jumper and hauled himself into the camper cab.

  * * *

  Alison was conscious of the time. Conscious of Hannah being left to her own devices at home – if she was at home. She patted the liver-spotted hand in hers.