The Girl I Used to Know

by Faith Hogan

  ‘Robyn, what’s going on there, I thought…?’ Amanda heard a girl shriek in the background. God, they were having a party, in her lovely home, in Richard’s house, dread tightened, catching the breath in her lungs, as if it was an arctic vice about Amanda.

  ‘Mum…’ Robyn sounded as if she was moving away from the girl and closer to the throb of base music. Christ, Richard would go ballistic if he knew. Amanda could see it all, in her mind’s eye: teenagers shagging in every dark corner they could find, her lovely newly shampooed rugs covered in cheap red wine or cider, maybe that cloying smell of weed that he’d recognise immediately from long gone free and easy days. Oh, God, it’d take weeks to set the place to rights again, one night wouldn’t be enough time to sort it out. Then, a sickly knot tightened in her stomach, Tess Cuffe would just love holding this one over them. Amanda wouldn’t put it past that woman to call the guards. Could they be prosecuted for abandoning their children on New Year’s Eve?

  ‘Is everything all right?’ Amanda felt a dribble of sweat race down her neck. She imagined it soaking into the unfortunate red satin gown that cost a fortune and still didn’t fit properly. She couldn’t give a fig about the gown now. ‘Is Casper there?’ In some ways, better if they were in Ronan’s house, at least then she could just get them back, and….

  ‘Mum, everything is fine.’ Casper, her sixteen-year-old son, definitely sounded off when he snatched the phone from his sister. ‘We’re here, at home, where you left us. Enjoy your party, there’s nothing to worry about.’

  ‘Have you been drinking?’ Amanda tried to keep the terror from her voice, but feared her lungs might implode between the cocktail of apprehension and the rush of cold night air now she’d opened the taxi window.

  ‘Not exactly.’

  She knew what that meant.

  ‘Is Ronan there?’

  ‘Yeah, he’s here, somewhere,’ Casper’s voice moved away from the phone, in the background, as though looking for the friend she had for so long wished he’d grow out of. ‘Why?’ They both knew why. Ronan’s parents were ‘creatives’ and Ronan smoked weed as other kids chewed gum.

  ‘I’m on my way home, Casper.’ She hung up the phone too mad to keep up a conversation, too scared to put into words what would happen if Richard thought they’d invited a load of kids to party and puke about his trophy home. She needed to make sure that her kids hadn’t burned the house down. Worse, that they hadn’t managed to kill half the kids from school with weed or the contents of the drinks cabinet. Had they pulled the house apart? Were two teenagers that she’d never met, at this moment, making out on her lovely French empire bed, crumpling and soiling her carefully constructed impeccable world? Had they emptied her expensive wine rack, knocking back bottles of prosecco until they were vomiting all over her Persian rugs?

  She became aware of the thrumming again in her chest – it had been happening for months now. Her GP said it was anxiety, which was just crazy. After all, what did she have to be anxious about? Life was good, wasn’t it? Well, she had to tell herself that now; otherwise, she’d go mad. The only thing that was truly hammering through her was the fear of what was waiting for her when she got to Swift Square.

  But there was no party.

  The house was in total darkness when she arrived and that unnerved her more than if there had been a hundred teenagers camped out in the garden. Where were her lovely twinkly Habitat lights? She looked up at the large drawing room window, dead centre above the front door. It was pitch black, as though there wasn’t a soul nearby, never mind a light in the window. Where was her fabulous imported Scottish fir that she had dressed so carefully in Newbridge silver trinkets and candle-effect fairy lights? Amanda took great care with the Christmas decorations. Walking the fine line between generous and gaudy was always tricky, but she thought she managed to get the balance just right. Her decorations all operated off a central timer, but in the event of them leaving the house, she had drilled in the basic safety rules. Unswitch, Unplug and Lock Up. The kids were rhyming it off before they even went to school. Robyn, was fanatical about it, Casper, not so much, but then, he was a boy.

  The square brooded in an apocalyptic silence that made her panic even more. What was she going to do? Where were her children? She was locked out of her own house and her children were missing? God, but she was a terrible mother, first day of the New Year, what a way to start off? Her eyes trained up towards the first floor. A rustling movement in the shrubbery made her start, breaking the silence shortly about her. Amanda jumped back only to realise that it was just a cat, a big grey thing mooching about in the dark. ‘Shoo. Shoo.’ That cat was a complete menace. Robyn had always wanted a cat, had kicked up a real stink when she was younger to try to force them into getting one. It was out of the question of course, Richard hated animals. The memory made Amanda dislike the cat before her even more intensely. She hissed at it, but it strode past her in no particular hurry, and somehow, she got the impression even it knew that she wasn’t really worth worrying about.

  She paid the taxi driver, tipped him well for his trouble, then ran up the stone steps, heard her heels narrow sounding, as if they might easily crack beneath the weight of her heavy mood. She stopped for a moment before battering the door, knew that her children were not here. Her home was empty. She could feel it as clearly as one does when they know they are completely alone. She wasn’t sure how long she rapped on that door, but she kept going until her tears and panic had mixed so thoroughly that when the door below her swung open, she threw herself down the steps as though Tess Cuffe was the answer to all her prayers.

  Except, Tess Cuffe wasn’t there, it was just her door, left open and swinging on a rogue breeze.

  As if the night could get any worse, she felt the crunch of broken glass beneath her feet. Reaching into her bag, she pulled out her phone again, slid down the menu so she could use it as a torch. The side panel window, as old as the porch itself, was shattered. It lay in smithereens in a splintered carpet, tracing out onto the little paved area before the door. She checked the inside door, it was locked and Amanda was certain that the flat was every bit as empty as her house upstairs. It seemed that everyone wanted to be somewhere else tonight except Amanda.

  With a sudden sobering thought, Amanda knew, it was just as well Tess Cuffe was not at home. This damage could be cleared away in the morning. It was probably the work of some ne’er-do-wells, cutting a short cut through the square as they made their way home, with nothing more to do than throw stones or pitch themselves at doorways. For a fleeting moment, she realised that she hadn’t worried that Tess Cuffe might be in some kind of danger. It seemed to her that Tess was the indomitable type, indestructible no matter what the trouble. Amanda leaned up towards the window, peered through the darkness, but could see nothing. There was no sign of her brown coat at least, hanging in its usual sentry position at the door. The only time that coat left its station was on Tess Cuffe’s back and Amanda could not think of a time she’d seen the woman outside without it. She must have gone away for the holidays, she thought. Well, that was unusual, wasn’t it? When she thought about it, Amanda never gave much consideration to what Tess did for holidays. It wasn’t her concern after all, as she would have been all too quick to tell her so if she asked.

  God knows, if she had been there, Amanda would have happily thrown herself at the woman’s mercy if Tess could conjure Casper and Robyn back safely. Walking up towards her own front door, she pulled out her phone, dialled Robyn again. This time, across the square somewhere; she heard the familiar ringtone of her daughter’s phone. Thank God, she thought as Robyn picked up the call. Thank God.

  ‘We’re here,’ Robyn’s voice came through, normal, calm; it reassured her now, because she knew her worst fears had not played out.

  Then they were standing opposite her and Amanda couldn’t stop crying, but it was with relief as much as anything else. The fact that they’d lied, by omission, seemed so small now compared to the possibilitie
s that had been running through her head earlier. Casper ran up the steps before them, his mood was black, but Amanda didn’t care. Her children were home; she was where she belonged. She wanted cake, she needed cake, but she knew she could not have cake, not until she sorted out Casper and Robyn.

  ‘Seriously, Mum, listen to yourself. It was just a party, everyone was there,’ Casper said before she even got round to mention the lies, she knew he wanted to stomp off, the only thing stopping him was the fear that she might tell their father.

  ‘That’s not the point, you never asked, you never even mentioned it. What if there had been a fire or a…’

  ‘Mum, there’s never going to be a fire. Can’t you see, our lives are so bubble-wrapped we are more likely to drown from the sprinkler system before any fire has a chance to get to us,’ Casper huffed.

  ‘Have you taken something, smoked something or…’

  He sounded different, not like her lovely curly-haired boy. And he had been lovely, all dark curls, rosy cheeks and mischievous smiles.

  ‘I’m bloody sixteen years old,’ he was shouting and she could hear him becoming more and more like his father with every passing moment. ‘What do you bloody think?’ He was standing at the kitchen door, filling the space that so recently had framed him; not so long ago he had looked tiny in its grand surround.

  ‘Casper, you can’t speak to me like that… it’s…’ But her words caught in her throat. Her breath felt like it had trapped somewhere in the bottom of her stomach, so she stood there with her mouth open. Robyn just watched her with pity in her eyes, and then she sighed sadly before disappearing up the stairs. ‘Robyn,’ she called after her daughter, but all she heard was the gentle click of her bedroom door upstairs.

  ‘What is it? Rude? Cheeky?’ Casper brought his face up to hers so she could smell cigarettes on his breath, and for a moment, she wondered if he might hit her.

  ‘It’s not the way we talk in this house,’ and as the words came out she heard them and she knew they made no sense. ‘I mean, I’m not the enemy here, Casper, we’re…’ She stepped back from him a little, felt her voice become smaller, as though it was just about the size of a matchstick against his fearsome teenage anger.

  ‘It was just a party, Mum, everyone was there.’

  ‘So, why didn’t you say that you wanted to go? I would have allowed you, if there was an adult there, someone responsible.’ Of course, if it was in Ronan’s house – the adults had even less sense than the kids.

  ‘Oh, go eat another muffin, Mother, it’s what you do best,’ Casper said and then he ran towards the downstairs loo.

  She heard him, inside, retch pathetically.

  ‘Okay, so I’m drunk, ground, me,’ he said, stalking past her when he’d finished.

  ‘Casper, you can’t talk to me like that,’ she said, ‘what’s the matter with you? Don’t you realise if your father had any idea that you’d come back in this state, he’d…’ Her voice drifted off, because, really, what she wanted more than anything else was for her little boy to throw his arms around her as he’d done so often years before.

  ‘My father? That’s a laugh,’ he shrieked manically, as if he might completely lose his grip. ‘My father couldn’t give a toss about any of us and you’re the only one around here who can’t see it.’

  ‘You’re grounded,’ Amanda shouted, but Casper was already slamming the kitchen door behind him so her voice hardly wafted up the stairs to catch his angry step. Instead, she felt his derision echoing throughout the whole house. She dropped into the uncomfortable Scandinavian designer high stool that Richard picked to go with the distressed kitchen benches. She really couldn’t decide which was worse, Casper’s terrifying anger or the fact that his words had struck some invisible understanding within her.

  Chapter 4

  Forty-eight years ago…

  ‘It’s perfect,’ Tess said and she nudged Nancy in the side. Nancy hadn’t said a word since they arrived on Swift Square. Probably, it was a combination of the decrepit state of the buildings and the poverty pervading even the stringy smoke rising from houses too big to find heat in just one miserable fire. Neither had expected the Ritz. No doubt, it had been grand – once.

  Swift Square was situated on the right side of the city, but a hundred years of tenements and a lack of genuine fondness for the ubiquitous Georgian architecture had laid it prone. It was anyone’s guess whether it would survive to glory once more or limp wounded into the annals of city history.

  Tess loved its faded opulence, the houses, four storeys over basements, hung back like chiselled old men from a placid age. In the centre, a garden, perfectly square, the size of a playing field cut out into allotments, and in the afternoon sunshine, she could see threads of blackberries interlacing through the rusting railings. Reaching up and over, apple trees gravid with this year’s unripe hoard swayed gently on a late summer breeze.

  Tess pulled her eyes back to the tall house that Aunt Beatrice had given them directions to. It was like every other house on the square, a little better, but no worse than most, the only difference seemed to be a small porch reaching out to welcome them on the drive beneath the main front door. It seemed the basement flat Aunt Beatrice had promised them was at ground level, the house built one floor up from the common hordes.

  ‘Yes, it’s…’ Nancy was squinting at the darkened windows. ‘It’ll do just fine, I’m sure.’ She sounded anything but sure. It was nothing like their home in Ballycove – a solid block, double-fronted, with a trailing footpath through the small garden to the road.

  ‘Well, it’s yours for as long as you want it,’ Ted Smith lived up the stone steps, behind the once grand front door. ‘I remember your aunt so well…’ he said, smiling now at Tess. ‘You’re like her; you know that… she was a bonny girl, then.’ He shook his head, as though remembering some long-told joke again. Then he handed them two fat black keys and pointed towards the little door opposite. ‘You’ll find it has everything you need for basic living, nothing fancy mind, but it should keep you going and it’s a roof above your heads at any rate,’ he said, making his way back up the steps.

  ‘Aunt Beatrice could certainly pick them,’ Nancy whispered when he closed the front door with a bang.

  Tess thought the whole place had a faded bohemian look to it, but she decided not to murk the waters of Nancy’s mood with any fanciful notions that might put her off even more.

  ‘Come on, I’m dying to see inside,’ Tess said. She’d never been in a grand Georgian house before and they’d be moving in properly in a week’s time.

  ‘I suppose, we do have things to do,’ Nancy said half-heartedly. Today, their father had sent them on a mission to make a list of what they’d need to turn it into a home. In a few days’ time, he would pack up all they needed in the back of their Ford Anglia and settle them in to their new lives.

  ‘It feels like it hasn’t been opened in a very long time,’ Tess said as they pushed aside the porch door. She inserted her key into the inside lock of a once navy door that had faded to blue and was peeling slowly away.

  ‘Well, we won’t be bored, at least,’ Nancy said and Tess was glad to hear some of her sister’s resolve returning. ‘Before you know it, we’ll have that door looking as good as new,’ she added, smiling at Tess.

  Inside was every bit as dark and dusty as Tess had feared and she hesitated for a moment at the entrance to the main living area. ‘It’s very…’ Then she caught Nancy’s eye and they both laughed.

  ‘It’ll be okay, nothing that a bit of elbow grease can’t fix,’ Nancy said, probably with far more enthusiasm than she felt and Tess loved her even more for it. ‘We’re not going to let a few spiders’ webs finish your career before you even get a chance to start.’

  ‘Oh, Nancy,’ Tess felt for once as though she really was the younger of the pair. ‘It will be great,’ she ducked her head to avoid a particularly thick web. ‘It’s a lovely flat, once you look past the neglect.’ Tess meant it, there wa
s an unexpected homeliness about the place.

  Of two small bedrooms at the front of the flat, one opened onto the main hall, the second into what seemed to Tess a large room that doubled up as a living room and kitchen – she could imagine blazing fires and hot chocolate here in winter, cosy and cocooned from the busy city beyond. At the rear, a small scullery and bathroom that smelled of mould and felt cold and damp, but even that was not enough to quell her pleasure. She walked to the furthest end of the living room and opened up the sash window, it looked out onto a long ribbon of garden, far more generous than their meagre strip at home. Immediately, a wafting fresh breeze began to infiltrate the years of stale neglect.

  ‘Look,’ Nancy called from the little scullery, ‘we can start straight away. There’s enough polish and soap here to clean the Taj Mahal.’ She planted a sweeping brush in Tess’s hands, ‘Come on, you’re not a famous singer yet, you can take the cobwebs from the ceilings and sweep up the floors.’ She was running water across some old cleaning cloths, her eyes bright with the intention of making this little corner of Dublin a new and happy home for both of them.

  They worked hard that day, but they hardly noticed that. They giggled their way through the work and, when the laughter halted, Tess sang whatever tune Nancy called to her. Soon it was almost five o’clock, their first day in their new flat over and so they finished up with barely enough time to make it to the train station.

  ‘Thanks,’ Tess said as they walked arm in arm along the platform, elated but tired from their busy day.

  ‘Oh, don’t be daft,’ Nancy laughed, but then looked across at Tess. ‘You know, this could work out very well for both of us. The last thing I want is our father coming down here and telling us it’s all off because the flat is not suitable.’