Cecelia Ahern - There’s No Place Like Here

“But what about her car?”

“A 1991 red Ford Fiesta?”

“Yeah.”

“That’s hers, all right. Don’t worry about it; she’s probably around the area checking out the place. The lads say she’s a keen jogger, so she probably parked there and went for a run earlier, or maybe the car wouldn’t start or something simple as that. Anyway, it’s been a little over twenty-four hours since you were supposed to meet. There’s no need to panic.”

“I thought the first twenty-four hours were supposed to be the most important,” Jack said through gritted teeth.

“In missing-persons cases they are, Jack, but this Sandy Shortt isn’t missing. She likes to disappear all the time. I was told that most of the time even her family doesn’t know where she is. They called the guards on three occasions years ago but they don’t bother anymore. She comes back.”

Jack was silent.

“There’s not much I can do. There’s nothing to go on, nothing to suggest she’s in any danger. She’ll probably call you in a few days. According to her ex-colleagues, that’s the way she works.”

“I know, I know.” Jack rubbed his eyes wearily.

“As a word of advice, be careful of those kinds of people. Agencies like Sandy Shortt’s are just out to make money, you know? I wouldn’t be surprised if she’s done a runner. There’s nothing that they can do that we haven’t already done. There aren’t any more places to search that we haven’t already searched.”

Sandy hadn’t asked for a cent, knowing that Jack hadn’t got a cent to give.

“I had to do something.” That was all he could reply. He didn’t like how Graham was referring to Sandy. He didn’t believe she was crooked, he didn’t believe she had gone wandering off on an investigation without her phone, her file, her diary, and her car, or was still jogging at midnight. Nothing Graham said made sense, yet nothing Jack said aloud seemed to make sense either. He was going entirely by instinct alone, instinct that had been affected by Donal’s disappearance and a week of nightly phone calls to a woman he had never met.

“I understand,” Graham responded. “I’d probably do the same myself if I was in your shoes.”

“What about my stuff that’s locked in her car?” Jack bluffed.

“What stuff?”

“I sent her Donal’s file and a few other things, I can see them sitting in the car. If she’s going to take my money and run, I’d at least like my things back.”

“I can’t help you out in that area, Jack, but I wouldn’t be asking any questions if by morning your belongings are back in your possession.”

“Thanks, Graham.”

“Anything at all to help.”

A few hours later, as the sun was rising over the Estuary, casting orange hues on black ripples, Jack found himself sitting in Sandy’s car, leafing through Donal’s file and through all the pages of Garda reports that only Sandy had been able to retrieve through her contacts. Her diary revealed a plan to go to Limerick city the following day to visit one of Donal’s friends, Alan O’Connor, who had been out with Donal the night of his disappearance. Hope returned at the possibility of meeting her there. The cramped car smelled sickeningly sweet of the vanilla-fragrance air freshener that hung from the dashboard mirror, mixed with the tinge of stale coffee from the Styrofoam cup balanced below it. There was nothing about the car that gave him any more clues as to the type of person Sandy was. There were no wrappers left behind, no CDs or cassettes revealing her taste in music. Just an old, cold car with work and cold coffee left behind.

It had no heart; she had taken that part with her.

I awoke, I wasn’t sure how many hours later, to see a little girl with wild, black frizzy hair perched next to me on the arm of the couch, watching me with the same intense black eyes as her grandfather’s.

I jumped.

She smiled. Dimples dented her yellow skin and her eyes softened to a dark brown.

“Hi,” she chirped.

I looked around the room that was now almost pitch-black save for the orange light creeping under the kitchen door, lighting the floor just enough for me to be able to make out my surroundings and the little girl half-lit before me. The sky outside the window over the sink was black. Stars, the same stars I never paid the slightest bit of notice to at home, hung above like Christmas lights decorating a toy village.

“Well, aren’t you going to say hi?” the little voice again chirped happily.

I sighed; I had never had time for children and had even despised being one myself.

“Hi,” I said with disinterest.

“See? That wasn’t so hard, was it?”

“Excruciating.” I yawned and stretched.

She hopped off the arm of the sofa and bounced onto the end, joining me but crushing my feet in the process.

“Ouch,” I moaned, tucking my legs closer to my body.

“That can’t have hurt.” She lowered her head and viewed me doubtingly.

“How old are you, one hundred and ninety?” I asked, pulling my blanket around me tighter as though it would protect me from her.

“If I was a hundred and ninety, I’d be dead.” She rolled her eyes.

“And what a shame that would be.”

“You don’t like me, do you?”

I thought about that. “Not really.”

“Why not?”

“Because you sat on my feet.”

“You didn’t like me before I sat on your feet.”

“True.”

“Most people think I’m cute.” She sighed.

“Really?” I asked in mock surprise. “I don’t get that impression.”

“Why not?” She didn’t seem to be insulted, just more interested.

“Because you’re three feet tall and you have no front teeth.” I closed my eyes, wishing she’d go away, and rested my head against the back of the couch. The throbbing in my head had dissipated but the chirping at the end of the couch would no doubt bring it back in full force.

“I won’t be like this forever, you know,” she said, trying to please me.

“I hope so for your case.”

“Me too,” she said with a sigh and rested her head on the back of the couch, imitating me.

I stared at her in silence, hoping she’d take the hint and go away. She smiled at me.

“Most people’s impression of me is that I don’t want to talk to them,” I hinted.

“Really? I don’t get that impression,” she imitated me, saying the words with difficulty in her toothless mouth.

I laughed. “What age are you?”

She held up her hand displaying four fingers and a thumb.

“Four fingers and a thumb?” I asked.

She frowned and looked at her hand again, her lips moving as she counted.

“Is there a special school kids go to, to learn to do that?” I asked. “Can’t you just say five?”

“I can say five.”

“So what, you think holding up a hand is cuter?”

She shrugged.

“Where is everyone?”

“Asleep. Did you used to have a television? We have televisions here but they don’t work.”

“Bummer for you.”

“Yeah, bummer.” She sighed dramatically but I don’t think she cared. “My grandma says I ask a lot of questions but I think you ask more.”

“You like to ask questions?” I was suddenly interested. “What kind of questions?”

She shrugged. “Normal questions.”

“About what?”

“Everything.”

“You keep on asking them, Wanda, maybe you’ll get out of here.”

“OK.”

Silence.

“Why would I want to get out of here?”

Not such normal questions after all, it appeared. “Do you like it here?”

She looked around the room. “I prefer my own room.”

“No, this village place.” I pointed out the window. “Where you live.”