The Mountains Wild

by Sarah Stewart Taylor

  Lisa’s mom answers and when I ask if I can talk to her, Lisa comes to the phone and tells me she hasn’t seen Erin at all. Same with Jess.

  Uncle Danny waits a long time to call the police. He thinks she’s just going to come strolling in, full of apologies and kisses. But finally my mom makes him. They come to the house, interview all of us, ask for her friends’ names.

  The next day I don’t go to school. I wait with my mom and Uncle Danny at our house. My mom makes tomato soup and grilled cheese and we wait by the phone until Uncle Danny says he might as well go to the bar.

  Around eight that night, I hear a horn outside and go to the door to find Chris Fallon and Brian Lombardi in Chris’s Chevy Blazer.

  “Uh, can you help us out with something?” Chris asks when I go to the door. “Don’t tell your parents.”

  “What is it?” I try to keep my voice neutral.

  “I think I know where Erin is, but I need help. I can’t find Jess. Can you come with us?” I’ve never heard Chris Fallon sound so serious. Brian Lombardi doesn’t look at me.

  “Hang on. Let me get my coat.”

  I poke my head in the kitchen.

  “Chris thinks he knows where she is,” I tell my mom. “You can’t tell Uncle Danny, though. I’m going with him. I’ll call you if I need you.”

  “Oh thank God. Why don’t I come, too?” my mom says, but my dad takes a long sip of his drink and says, “Let her go, Mo. She’ll call if she needs us.”

  I don’t ask any questions when I get into the Blazer. Chris gets on New York Avenue, heading toward the station. He’s got Robert Palmer on the tape player.

  Past the train station, he takes a left on a little side street off New York Avenue and pulls up in front of a low ranch house. There are three old cars out front, and kids’ toys littered around.

  “Who lives here?” I ask him.

  He doesn’t say anything.

  “Why didn’t you call the cops?”

  He just raises his eyebrows at me and opens his door.

  Inside, there are too many people. Two older guys, their arms covered in tattoos, are sitting around a low coffee table, smoking. One of them is completely bald. Lisa’s in there, looking exhausted and sick and about twelve years old. “Hey, Maggie,” she says when she sees me. “Can you talk to her?”

  “Erin,” I call out through the door. There’s a crocheted doily hanging on the door with a little purple stone in the middle. “It’s Maggie. Are you okay?” I can hear crying through the door. I try the handle, but it’s locked.

  “Mags,” she whispers. I can hear her, but just barely. “I’m so sorry, Mags. I’m so sorry.”

  “It’s okay,” I tell her. “If you come out we’ll take you home. Chris has a car.”

  “Mags,” she whispers again.

  But she won’t open the door.

  “I’m going to call the cops,” I tell Brian and Chris. “What if she took something?”

  “No way, man, no cops,” one of the older guys says.

  “Well, then you better break that door down right now.”

  “I’m not breaking the door. This is my mom’s house.”

  “Give me the phone,” Brian says.

  “Don’t call the cops, man.” The bald guy looks terrified.

  “I’m not. Give me the phone. I’ve got someone who can get her out of there.”

  Brian takes the phone into the kitchen.

  We wait forever. I keep trying to talk to her through the door. And then headlights sweep across the windows.

  Father Anthony comes in, wearing jeans and a black shirt. “It’s okay, Maggie,” he tells me. “We’ll take care of her.” I’ve never been so glad to see someone in my life.

  He knocks on the door. “Erin, can you hear me? It’s Father Anthony. I’m here to help you, to pray with you if you want.”

  There’s a huge waiting silence in the house. And then the door opens. And as Father Anthony goes in, I can see Erin’s hair and tearstained face for just a second before the door closes again.

  32

  1993

  It was early morning by the time Roly parked Daisy’s brother’s car on Gordon Street and half carried me out. I had slept on the drive back, but I was still drunk when I woke up and I stood for a minute in front of the house and looked around. “Where’s Bernie?”

  “She drove my car back. Come on, now, let’s get you inside. Where are your keys?”

  “In my pocket.” He got them out and opened the door.

  “I don’t think anyone’s home. Here now, leave your coat. Which is yours?”

  “Erin’s,” I told him. “That one is Erin’s room. It’s not mine at all.”

  “Okay.” He got me into the room. “Now, you get into bed. I’m going to get you some water. You’ll definitely want to drink some water.”

  When he came in, I was curled up under the comforter in my clothes. The room was spinning a bit, but not as badly as before.

  “I’m sorry, Roly,” I said. “I know I shouldn’t have done that. It’s just that I thought he could tell us where she is. I thought if he saw me, he’d tell me what happened.”

  “I know. But look here, we don’t have any information that says she came to harm, D’arcy. You need to take a step back from this. You do.”

  “I know. I just … He recognized me, Roly. I know he did. I think he knows something.”

  “We’ll keep an eye on him. Don’t worry about that. There may be a way for us to do some discreet poking around now.”

  “I’m sorry,” I said again. “How did you know where I was?”

  “Bernie got worried after her conversation with you. We checked in with the roommates and they said you’d gone to visit a family friend.” He smiled. “I figured out where you’d gone. We tried another pub before that one. Do you know what could have happened? Those fellas? At the very least you could have gotten into a fight outside a pub and been arrested.”

  “I know. I’m sorry. I’m not … My head’s all messed up right now, Roly. I’m sorry.”

  “It’s all right now, D’arcy.” He sat down on the bed.

  “Can you stay until I fall asleep?”

  “Sure.” He stretched out on the bed and I curled against him. There was something comforting about the solidity of his body. His heart beat beneath the soft fabric of his shirt. After a few minutes I heard his breathing slow and then the faint whistle of air through his nose.

  The room darkened and I was aware of fewer and fewer sounds. Kids playing out in the street, a car horn somewhere, a dog barking far away. And then I was in Wicklow, striding across a stretch of boggy field. Gorse bushes were blooming and the sun was shining overhead in a cloudless blue sky, but in the distance I could see a bank of dark clouds threatening.

  I was walking fast, as though I knew where I was going, but then I saw someone up ahead walking toward me. As I got closer, I realized it was Erin. She walked toward me, but she didn’t seem to know I was there, even when I called her name. There was someone else walking behind her, a tall man with dark hair, in a dark jacket, but he was too far away for me to see his face. I tried to warn her, to get her to turn around and see that he was following, but she couldn’t hear me, or pretended not to.

  As she strode past me, I reached out to grab her arm, but she shook me off and kept going. I followed and suddenly we were at a church, stone outside, with beautiful stained-glass windows and red carpeting inside. The church was empty except for a priest kneeling at the altar, but I couldn’t see his face. Erin went to him and knelt down next to him. I called her name again, but suddenly the church filled with colored light. “Erin!” I called out. “Erin!”

  I was coming awake. I heard a key in the front door and then a voice saying, “Sorry, how long have you been waiting?” I was still half in the dream, my body heavy, paralyzed.

  A phone rang. It was Emer talking. My head was pounding. It took me a minute to wake up. The phone rang again. Someone was opening the bedroom door. �
��I don’t think she’s here,” Emer was saying. “She’s been away. You’re welcome to check if you want—Oh!” And then she gasped and I opened my eyes to find Emer standing there with Conor. The phone was still ringing.

  Sit up. My body responded slowly. Roly’s arm was under my shoulder.

  Conor’s eyes were wide. He looked away. He murmured an apology and turned to the door.

  “Conor,” I started to say. “There’s nothing—” But he was turning and running out of the house, out through the open door and before I could get out of bed to get him, the answering machine clicked on and we were all listening as Uncle Danny’s voice filled the flat.

  “Maggie, baby. I’m so sorry.” He was stammering, nervous, upset. I pushed Roly out of the way, jumping up, going for the phone, but I didn’t make it before we all heard his voice, raspy and devastated. “I wish I didn’t have to do this, but you got to call me, baby. Your dad, he—Maggie, sweetie. He had a heart attack, baby. I’m so sorry. God, I’m sorry. He’s gone, baby. You gotta give me a call.”

  My mom’s bed has been in the den for the last four months, spring air coming in the open windows. We fill the room with flowers but it still smells like a hospital. My dad can’t take it for long. He sits with her at night, drinking gin and tonics, one right after the other, and watching her sleep. During the day, he goes into the city. I sit with her, read, deal with the nurses, check in every night with my boyfriend back at Notre Dame, a sweet younger guy from Minneapolis named Josh who I will tell not to come out for the funeral and who will be perplexed and hurt when I break up with him over the phone and don’t come back to school.

  The lilacs bloom in May and I am so grateful for that, for the smell of lilacs in the windows. Erin comes a month before my mom dies, on a red eye from LA paid for by Uncle Danny. She comes home with a lot of stuff and I suspect she’s not going back.

  She hugs me when she arrives, and goes to sit with my mom. My mom perks up for a few days after Erin gets home, and Uncle Danny brings her baked ziti from D’Allesandro’s and she eats a little. She asks us to ease off the pain meds and for a few days it’s okay. She sits up and we even take her down to the beach in a wheelchair to sit on the sand.

  One night, I go to take a shower and come back to hear Erin murmuring and my mom’s weak voice answering back. I am washed by a wave of envy that horrifies me. When Erin comes out of the den, she’s crying. She goes out and doesn’t come back that night.

  Uncle Danny is the one to tell my dad he should stay home, that we’re getting close. I don’t know how he knows it, but I am grateful. My dad rises to the occasion, starts sleeping in the hospital bed with her, holds her when she’s afraid. He stops drinking.

  My mom says to me, “I love him like crazy. I always have. It’s so, so clear to me. Your dad. Your dad.”

  But Erin disappears. She comes to the house high, pretending she’s not. Uncle Danny takes her in the other room and I hear them fighting in low voices. Then I hear the front door slam and he’s gone.

  One night, I’m singing to my mom—“Red Is the Rose”—I sang it sometimes in a bar in South Bend and I’ve always loved the tune. She sings along as best she can, her voice weak.

  Come over the hills, my bonnie Irish lass

  Come over the hills to your darling

  You choose the road, love, and I’ll make a vow

  And I’ll be your true love forever.

  My dad is stroking my mom’s hand. His eyes are closed. I know he’s trying to fix this moment in his mind.

  The phone rings and it’s someone from the bar, looking for Uncle Danny. I hear him talking on the kitchen phone. “Where?” he asks. “Is she okay?”

  When he comes back to the den, he whispers to us that Erin’s been arrested for DUI. He’s had a few whiskeys, “to cope,” he says. He doesn’t think he can drive.

  I tell my dad I’ll take Danny. I kiss my mom and then Danny and I drive to Suffolk County Police headquarters on the County Road. They bring Erin out. Her face is dirty and there’s mascara under her eyes. Her arms are covered with scratches, one of them red and bleeding. She reeks of beer.

  “Thank you, Daddy. I’m so sorry. Sorry, Maggie.” She starts crying again, her shoulders heaving. I’m so angry I can’t even look at her. I wait while Uncle Danny signs the papers he needs to sign, while they explain about how Erin will have to appear in court. We drive home in complete silence and drop Erin at Uncle Danny’s house before going back to sit with my mom.

  At the funeral, Erin’s friends sit together in a middle pew. I hug Jessica and Lisa and Brian and ask questions about college and their families. When everyone comes back to our house afterwards, Erin stands off to the side and slips out early.

  The sea is wild that spring. There are strange, unseasonable storms that batter the house and I start going down to stand on the beach, feeling the sting of the rain on my face, the wind whipping my hair. I start running once my dad goes back to work, pounding down the beach at low tide, then heading up into the streets above the beach, running until my muscles shake.

  All that summer and fall, Erin is hardly around. I don’t know where she goes. I start picking up shifts at the bar. She comes in sometimes but we hardly speak to each other. My dad is a mess. I don’t go back to college in September, make arrangements to finish my coursework from home.

  I want to ask Erin what my mom said to her. I want to ask her if she’s sorry. I want to ask her if she’s given up on finding Brenda. I never do.

  In November she announces she’s moving to Ireland.

  Ireland.

  Ireland.

  33

  THURSDAY, JUNE 2,

  2016

  The wind is whipping dead leaves all around the park. Conor and I stand there just staring at each other for a moment and then he seems to remember the boy and he says, “Adrien, you take Mr. Bean,” and he looks back at me and says, “Maggie?”

  I don’t know what to do. I can’t hug him. I nod and say, “Conor…”

  “I’m surprised to see—” he starts. “It’s good to see you. I don’t quite know what to say. You look just the same. I would have known you anywhere.”

  “It’s good to see you, too.”

  His hair has thinned back toward his crown and it’s half gray, but his eyes are the same and his grin is, too, and the stooping lean of his shoulders and his thin face. His voice.

  “I … Look, my son is … Let me walk him home and maybe we can … Do you have time for a cup of tea?” He’s very flustered now. The boy is holding the dog’s leash and Conor looks at him and says, “Adrien, this is an old friend of mine. Maggie, this is my son, Adrien.” His voice is practically shaking. The boy shakes my hand. He’s tall and thin, but he doesn’t look much like Conor. He’s fairer and his face is rounder, his eyes blue. Bláithín Arpin.

  “I’ll walk home with you and Beanie and then Maggie and I will go and have a chat,” he says.

  The boy nods and we all walk out of the park together and toward the main road. I can’t resist looking at Adrien. Conor’s son. “Why don’t I meet you there?” He points to a bakery and coffee shop on the other side of the road and I nod. “Ten minutes,” he says. “The house is just up there.” I watch him go, my heart pounding, a strange metallic taste suddenly filling my mouth.

  I order a coffee and ask to use the bakery’s bathroom.

  In the mirror over the sink my eyes look lined, bruised. My hair is crazy from the wind and I comb it as best I can. I soak a paper towel with cold water and wet my face, then dry it. I chew some gum and spit it out and put on lipstick, then rub most of it off. It’s a little better, not much. With my coffee, I stake out a table by the window. It’s five minutes before he’s back. I see him coming down the street and I feel my whole body seize up, adrenaline running through my veins. I pretend to be looking at a newspaper someone left on the counter so he won’t see me watching him.

  And then the door is jingling and he’s there. “Hello,” he says. He’s
wearing a black wool overcoat, a green-and-brown tartan scarf.

  “Hi.”

  “Will I get you a tea?”

  “I’ve got coffee.”

  “Okay. Hang on, then.” I stare down at the newspaper while he’s gone. The one time I look up, he’s leaning over the counter, ordering, handing the money over.

  And then he’s here, sitting down and shrugging off his overcoat and I can smell him, soap and deodorant and the outdoors.

  “You look exactly the same. I’m just … It’s very strange seeing you again,” he says. “I’ve seen the stories the last week or so. About the remains in Wicklow. Are you here as part of the investigation?”

  “I am. As you probably saw, it’s not Erin, but there may be some developments in her case, too.”

  “I’m so sorry. I heard about the search in Wicklow and it brought it … it brought that time back.” He looks away and drinks his coffee, then sets it down and looks back at me. We’re staring at each other. We can’t look away.

  “When did you get here?” he asks.

  “What? Last Thursday, I guess. It’s so strange to be back. My old … Erin’s old neighborhood. It’s all so different.”

  “It is. I forget sometimes. But it must look so different to you. All the new buildings. It’s grand, I think, lots of different languages, different people, different countries. Half of my son’s schoolmates come from somewhere else. We’re a better country for it, that part is grand. It was the end of something, you know, when you were here, the nineties. I sound like a proper oul’ fella, don’t I? How are you?”

  “Good. I’m a detective with a big police department on Long Island. Suffolk County. I investigate homicides across the county.”

  He looks away, waits, then grins sheepishly. “I knew that, actually. I saw a story a few years ago, about that case. About what you did. I recognized your name and I wondered. There was a picture, so…” He shrugs. I feel a little thrill. I wondered.

  But I don’t want to go there. I change the subject. “What about you?”