Me and You

‘And thirdly,’ Crown goes on, ‘I need to ask you both one or two personal things about her, if that’s OK?’

We nod and sit forward, both on the edge of our seats.

‘You’ve already stated that Kitty Hope doesn’t have any history of drug or alcohol abuse …’

‘Most sober, reliable, upstanding girl you could ever hope to meet,’ I interrupt, to a raised eyebrow from Simon at the sheer outrageousness of the exaggeration.

‘So in cases such as these there’s about a ninety per cent chance that she is, in fact, safe and well. And just for whatever reasons, felt she needed a bit of time out. Was she under severe pressure at work or maybe at the night school she attended?’

We both shake our heads.

‘Well, I mean, she worked long hours and when she wasn’t working, she was always studying,’ I throw in, ‘so the odd time she’d complain about being bone knackered, but apart from that …’ I trail off a bit here. Mainly because the exact phrase Kitty always uses is, ‘These fecking books have my brains turned into baked Alaska.’

‘Was she under any financial strain?’

Again, we tell him no more so than any of the rest of us. No mortgage, low rent, no major credit card debts, no big whacks of cash outstanding to any shady loan sharks, nothing. She earned good money at the restaurant and always said Byrne & Sacetti’s customers were consistently the best tippers in town. Sure, she’d overspend a bit; but then Kitty’s outrageously generous and would often find herself broke and counting days till payday or until some whoppingly generous tip would tide her over. But doesn’t that just make her an ordinary, normal person?

‘Any gambling addictions that either of you know of?’

Almost want to guffaw at that one. I once went dog racing with Kitty (under the misguided impression that it might be good place to meet blokes). I can still remember her roars of laughter, claiming that the mutt of a thing she bet on would probably still be panting towards the finishing post at midnight that night. Said anything she put money on was instantly cursed and doomed to the greyhound equivalent of early paralysis. So that one, single night was the beginning and end of her gambling career.

‘Was there a chance she may have been in the early stages of an unwanted pregnancy?’

An angry flush from Simon at that, followed by a firm no.

Did she appear to be suffering from depression lately?

No, we tell him, stressing what a happy, open person Kitty is naturally.

More questions come thick and fast, as Crown ticks off a long, long list in front of him.

Had she been acting in any way strangely up until the night she disappeared? Was she bringing home large sums of money? Had she recently appeared alienated in any way from her close group of friends? Were a lot of her clothes and personal belongings missing from her house? Any valuable jewellery suddenly gone missing? Or electrical items? Did she have an eBay account? And what about her foster mother, had she been to visit her in the days leading up to Christmas Eve?

We tell him no, a v. firm no to everything.

And finally he finishes writing, closes the file in front of him and sits back, eyeballing each of us in turn. One of those cold, unflinching glares. Serial killer-ish, I find myself thinking a bit nastily.

‘So neither of you is aware of any personal reasons at all why she’d need to take off?’

‘NO!’ we chorus back at him, yet again. Don’t know about Simon, but I’m kind of getting seriously sick of this guy by now. Worse than useless, if you ask me. And if he uses the phrase ‘established set of procedures to follow here’ once more, I’m seriously tempted to reach across the desk and thump him one. We’re not exactly talking about a bloody wallet one of us left in the back of a taxi here!

I want far, far fewer questions and far, far more coppers to burst in, heavily armed and telling us they’re now taking over the whole investigation. And that they confidently expect to have Kitty back home, with not a hair on her head harmed and looking for a shower, a glass of wine and a big feed of chips, in that order.

‘Well, then, in that case,’ Crown shrugs dismissively, ‘the news is not necessarily bad. Rest assured, we’ll do everything we can, but you should know that the chances of her turning up safe and sound are relatively high. In well over ninety per cent of cases like this, the subject is nearly always secure and will inevitably return when they’re good and ready.

‘However, given the worry and upset that Kitty’s causing to all around her, then unfortunately there’s one hard, cold fact that remains. So I’m afraid I’ll need you both to ask yourselves one unpleasant but unavoidable question.’

We both look at him expectantly.

‘Why would she do this in the first place? She must have had a very good reason for wanting to leave. So what do you think it might have been?’

I ask Simon exactly the same question again in car on our way home.

He doesn’t answer me, though, just goes v. quiet and stares out window into the night, completely wrapped up in thought.

By the age of fifteen, she’d already been with a grand total of eight foster homes, which had to have been some class of a record, she figured. They should be giving her a survival medal, like they did in Stalinist Russia, just for lasting this long in their poxy system. And here she was now, on the doorstep of number nine.

Initial reaction? Worst one yet. An old lady-type house in the back arse of nowhere, over-heavy with crappy-looking ornaments, family photos and, dear Jaysus help her, knitted tea cosies. And all those do-gooder social workers from Health must have seriously been scraping the barrel when they vetted the aul one, who was to be her new foster parent. This one was fifty if she was a day, with helmet-y hair like a wig, who answered the door to her in an actual suit. Feck’s sake, a suit? Who wore a suit going round their own house, unless you were a complete weirdo?

The care liaison officer had tactfully left, ‘just so you two can get to know each other a little better’, and with a stern ‘you’d better be on your best behaviour’ glare over in her direction, he was gone. Thank f**k. She’d accidentally seen a copy of her own file once and it had been impressed on her that she was lucky to have been homed at all, with her track record. But to hell with that shower of gobshites anyway, she thought furiously. They could feck off, the lot of them.

‘Out of control,’ her file had said. ‘Complaints of a serious nature … shoplifting … swearing … smoking … underage drinking … wild …’ Made her feel proud, though. She didn’t want to fit in; she was sick to the teeth of all their rules and regulations, and being told how lucky she was to be homed at all, like she was supposed to be grateful. All she wanted was to hit eighteen, get out into the world and tell the whole shagging lot of them to go and f**k themselves.

And yet here she was, arms folded defensively, sat sullenly at yet another kitchen table with this Old Dear opposite her. Mrs Kennedy; a widow, this time. Husband probably died of boredom, she thought viciously to herself, taking in the pin-neat house with cushions on the cushions and net fecking curtains. It felt like she’d been through the drill a thousand times. This was the bit where both parties were supposed to be on their best behaviour, tiptoeing round each other, while the house rules were impressed in on her. Don’t this, don’t that, please can you remember to x and y and z.

Mind you, the worst were the foster parents who cheerily told you, ‘This is your home now, so please just try to relax and enjoy!’ Then within hours, she’d find herself hauled over the coals for smoking in her room, or cursing in front of other kids, or any other rule-infraction shite they could think of to throw at her. In other words, we’re saying that this is your home now, except it’s not really and never will be, and we can turf you out on a whim. So don’t you forget it, missy.

Fine, she wouldn’t. In fact, she made a bet with herself, as Mrs Ancient here fussed around her and poured tea and handed her slices of gooey-looking cake. She’d see if she could equal her personal best of getting turfed out of a new home in under a week. Shouldn’t be hard either. By the look of her, if she refused to go to Mass on Sundays, then this one would probably take a heart attack, start calling her the spawn of the devil and she’d be outta here in no time. Problem solved.

‘Now please feel free to call me Kathleen,’ Aul One was saying to her, pouring out tea into dainty china cups that barely held two dribbles and that were covered in a pattern that looked like dead scorpions. Later on, she’d come to recognise this as the good, special occasion china, that only ever got wheeled out at Christmas and Easter, but for now she didn’t give a shite. Would gladly have smashed it, if she could.

‘Whatever,’ she shrugged back, putting her feet up on the chair opposite her. Aul One seemed to notice, but said nothing.

‘And remember,’ Aul One went on, ‘I really do want you to treat this as your own home.’

‘Fantastic. In that case, can I have an ashtray and a lighter please?’

Again no reaction.

‘Smoke all you like,’ Aul One shrugged back at her, ‘but I think you’d better do it outside.’

‘House rule?’ she sneered.

‘Not really,’ said Aul One. ‘I just don’t think it would be fair on the kittens. They’re barely two weeks old and still nursing. I only wanted to keep the air nice and fresh for them, that’s all.’

‘Kittens?’ In spite of herself, she was curious. ‘Where?’

‘In the kitchen, just behind you. Would you like to have a look? They’re the most adorable little bundles you’ve ever seen.’

In spite of herself, she was intrigued. She followed Aul One into the tiny, galley kitchen and there they were, in a warm basket by the door. Eight little balls of the cutest, fluffiest things you ever saw. She picked one up and instinctively cuddled it. It made a tiny, weak little mewling sound, no mistaking it.

‘She’s meowing,’ Aul One smiled down at her. ‘I think she must like you.’

‘Are you going to keep them all?’

‘I wish I could, love, but I can’t. They’re too young to leave their mother, but as soon as they are, I’m afraid they’ll all have to be rehomed.’

‘That’s horrible! They should be with their mother!’

‘I know,’ Mrs Kennedy said sagely, taking her in from head to foot. ‘And I agree. Farming them out is necessary, but awful.’ Then after a half-beat, she added, ‘unless … unless you’d like to keep one? As your own special little pet? You could name it and everything, if you liked.’

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