Wildest of All Read online

  ‘I think I do remember, right enough.’

  ‘Hi Daddy!’ said a sing-song voice. Sissy was relieved to see Emma coming down the corridor towards them, the expression in her eyes a sharp contrast to the sweetness of her voice.

  ‘Sweetheart,’ said Danny, his breath wet and beery. ‘I was just saying about your Uncle Peter. Did I tell you about the time he took on the Gillespie twins for me? Battered them both. They never looked at me again after that. That’s the Donnelly way. Stick together. I hope you and your sister remember that. He was my hero. My big brother and my hero.’

  Emma had slipped beneath his free arm and, with Sissy’s help, began walking him back to the main room.

  ‘Okay, Daddy,’ she coaxed, bright and breezy. ‘Grandma’s just right round this corner, so maybe tone it down a wee bit. We’ll sit you here and get you a coffee. Sissy, will you wait with him till I come back?’

  Without waiting for a reply, Emma darted off to the bar. Sissy sat beside her uncle and wished for Rik or Cam to make an appearance. Maybe they’d gone into the garden for a smoke. A succession of strangers came by with commiserations. She nodded and bared her teeth in an approximation of a smile and gave thanks to each of them. So much gratitude required.

  ‘Ah, here’s my girl,’ said Danny, as Emma made her way back to them with a coffee. ‘Talk about your alpha females, eh, Sissy? No messing with this one. She keeps me in line, don’t you, honey?’

  Emma smiled blandly as she placed the cup down.

  ‘Has she told you what she’s up to, Sissy?’ asked Danny. ‘Has she? Have you?’

  ‘Daddy, I don’t think this is the place,’ murmured Emma with a sigh, sweeping her hair behind her ear and securing it with a clasp.

  ‘Don’t be daft,’ Danny reached across and gripped her knee. ‘She wants to know, don’t you, Sissy?’

  Emma rolled her eyes and shook her head to signal her embarrassment, then confessed she’d been cast in a television drama.

  ‘It’s just a small part,’ she said. ‘It’s no big deal.’

  ‘No big deal,’ said Danny. ‘It’s massive! It’ll be seen all across the US. She’s in two episodes.’

  ‘Wow,’ said Sissy. ‘That’s… surreal.’

  ‘Your Uncle Peter would have been proud.’

  ‘No doubt,’ Sissy continued to smile and nod, like one of those toy dogs you get in the back of cars. ‘Well done, cuz.’

  Later, she found Rik and Cam smoking at the back of the hotel gardens beside the pond, and Cam advised her to get herself some normal relatives.

  ‘Yeah,’ agreed Rik. ‘It’s your dad’s funeral. You should be everyone’s focus, not her. What a knob.’

  The sun was about to slip behind a cluster of trees. The day would soon be over. Suddenly Sissy realised her feet were throbbing. She kicked off the boots and removed her tights. In the function suite, overhead lights came on, prompting people to rise and gather their belongings. She shuffled herself to the water’s edge and lowered her feet into the pond. The coldness of the water was soothing, distracting.

  ‘He looks just like him though,’ she said. ‘I never noticed before.’

  They had no idea what to say, so they removed their socks and shoes and rolled up their trouser legs and joined her in the pond. They smoked and drank and laughed, revelling in the oddity of the situation, and gentle ripples on the water marred their dark reflections.

  No one wanted to leave, surprisingly even Jude. As the place gradually emptied, the presence of Susan’s three energetic boys became overwhelming.

  ‘Come and sit by your grandma,’ Anne urged them, but they could only bear to sit for a moment before the urge to slide across the function suite’s dance floor overtook them.

  ‘Oh, Phil, take them away,’ Susan sighed, and he began the business of rounding them up.

  The family members were at last sitting around the same table, forced together as more and more people left. Lauren had collected Emma and Lucy from the hotel and that, more than anything else all day, had pushed Danny into an unrivalled moroseness. If it weren’t for the fact that his mother needed him to be strong, he might have allowed himself the luxury of tipping over the edge.

  ‘Where’s Sissy?’ Anne asked, but no one knew. Anne rattled her nails against the table. She didn’t enjoy one of her brood being unaccounted for now that the place was so empty. She didn’t enjoy either that Jude, mother of the missing child, seemed not to mind. She clicked her tongue, only too aware that everyone around her had moved into a state of uncaring exhaustion, and that soon she would be deposited in her house and left alone with her thoughts and grief.

  ‘Andrew, come here!’ Phil’s voice put paid to the giggling that had grown steadily louder and more manic.

  ‘For God’s sake, Susan, can’t you do something about that?’ asked Danny, pinching the bridge of his nose between thumb and forefinger.

  ‘He’s five, Danny. What do you expect?’ said Susan, who rose anyway and went to assist her husband.

  Danny rolled his eyes in Anne’s direction but she was looking past him out into the garden. Out of the shadows emerged three swaying figures. They were all bare-foot and soaking wet up to the waist.

  They struggled with the sliding door, and when they finally managed it, they tumbled laughing into the room, too drunk to notice their audience.

  ‘Cecilia Donnelly!’ said Anne, whose voice had barely risen above a whisper all day but now, powered by indignation, could be heard clearly by everyone. Even the woman drying glasses behind the bar turned around to stare.

  ‘Sissy!’ a young voice cried.

  Sissy whipped herself round in time to see her littlest cousin running and throwing himself at her. She tried to catch him but the surprise of his enthusiasm, combined with her drunkenness on the wet, slippery floor, conspired to knock her over. She landed flat on her back.

  There was a stunned silence, and then a wailing from Andrew, and then came laughter from Rik and Cam, and before she could help herself, she was laughing too. Phil plucked Andrew from the floor and carried him out, and Cam and Rik each took one of Sissy’s hands and pulled her up. The room whirled unpleasantly around her.

  ‘You are a disgrace, young lady. Have you forgotten where you are?’

  Anne had crossed the room and stood now, tiny and ram-rod straight before her granddaughter. Sissy felt herself shrinking beneath her glare. The room was so bright and hot after the cool darkness of the gardens. She closed her eyes and was greeted by a wave of nausea. She immediately buckled and vomited, narrowly missing her grandmother’s pointy shoes. She was distantly aware of voices around her, expressing their dismay.

  Jude and Aleks swooped in and carried her through to their office, while Susan and Danny steered Anne in the direction of a waiting taxi.

  ‘I’m sorry,’ Sissy mumbled. ‘Is Andrew okay?’

  ‘What did he think he was doing running at you like that?’ said Jude, wiping Sissy’s chin.

  ‘He’s just a kid,’ Aleks said. ‘Take it easy.’

  ‘Easy for you to say,’ Jude snapped, and then, ‘sorry. I’m sorry. You’re right. I don’t know what I was thinking.’

  ‘Don’t worry about it,’ he replied. ‘It’s a difficult day.’

  Jude poured water from a jug on her desk and gave it to Sissy. Then she turned to Aleks and said, ‘I need to pay you.’ She reached into her bag for her cheque book.

  Aleks frowned and held his hands up. ‘No. Jude, come on. You don’t pay.’

  ‘Please, Aleks. I must.’

  He stepped towards her and covered her hands with his. He spoke softly. ‘No. No way. Let’s not have this.’

  She leaned back from him, twisting her head round to check on Sissy. A timid knock came on the door and Cam peeked his head in.

  ‘I brought this,’ he said, holding out a red plastic bucket.

  ‘I think that ship has sailed, but thank you,’ said Aleks, taking it from him.

  ‘Sorry,’ Cam said. ‘I
should have been watching her.’

  A derisive snort came from Jude, who was leaning against the desk, feeling none too steady herself. ‘None of us are in best shape, Cam. Not your fault. Come on, Sissy, time to go.’

  She stretched her hand out for Sissy to take and succeeded only in knocking her handbag off the desk. The contents spilled over the floor.

  ‘I will drive you,’ said Aleks. ‘You can’t manage on your own.’

  His words instantly dismantled Jude’s already fragile authority. She collapsed into herself, her shoulders heaving as huge sobs raced out of her. Aleks apologised profusely, taking her in his arms, telling her he hadn’t meant she wouldn’t be able to cope without Peter. Of course she would, she was strong, she was a good mother – all of this in his gentle, Polish-accented, near-perfect English. Neither of them noticed Sissy slide off her chair to gather up the contents of Jude’s bag.

  Cam remained at the door, unsure of what to do. He looked back down the corridor to the reception area where Rik waited for him. Rik’s mother was due to pick them both up and drop Cam home. He took one last look at the tableaux in the office and decided Jude’s boss could manage without him.

  Aleks sat Jude down and urged her to breathe deeply. She tried to catch hold of his words, nodding as she gulped down huge pockets of air. Like a tent in a storm, all her ropes were untethering. She gripped his hands as he knelt on the floor before her, coaxing her back to calmness. When the panic subsided, she looked into his eyes: hazel, flecked through with amber, and brimming with concern. He was asking nothing of her, and yet she had a driving need to get away from him, couldn’t face his kindness. She had no choice but to accept his offer to drive them home. Only thirty more minutes in his company. Count it down.

  Kneeling on the floor behind her was Sissy. She’d packed up the bits and pieces that had fallen out of her mother’s purse and thrown into the wastepaper basket a series of crumpled tissues. Now she stared down at the collection of cards and envelopes that had slipped out along with everything else. One cream-coloured envelope in particular caught her eye. Her brain told her it couldn’t be, but her hand reached forward and picked it up. It was as real as all the others. The rest of the room fell into insignificance as she turned it over with trembling hands. There, in her own forward-sloping handwriting, was the word Daddy, and what came crashing down harder than the monstrous sense of betrayal, was the certain sad knowledge that it was now too late for it ever to be delivered.

  CHAPTER TWO

  A Moment in Time

  Peter hadn’t owned a suit, so he’d been buried in one of Danny’s. Anne stayed with him in the funeral home for as long as they would allow, and prayed over his body, while trying to resist the disturbing double effect of seeing both her sons lying dead before her.

  She felt hollow inside. So many people had been lost over the years, she had barely noticed the loneliness creeping in. Even after her husband Patrick died, Peter and Danny were both such gregarious characters, they papered over the cracks in her existence. She was nearing the end of her seventies, if she wasn’t there already. It was quite possible she’d turned eighty without realising. There had been so many deaths. But surely there could be no future beyond this one.

  She banished the thought as soon as it arrived. Life was a gift. She was blessed, even in her darkest hour. She must not forget this. Hadn’t the Almighty himself sacrificed his own Son so she might live? There was a reason the Good Lord had left her so long and taken the others. There was a plan. There had to be.

  Jude had taken Sissy outside to wait in the car but left behind the scent of alcohol that had followed her like a cloud over the past few days. Anne tried not to judge, but already it was clear their situation was precarious. She worried for Sissy. Jude was in no state to take care of her. Seventeen was such an important age.

  She prayed, and gradually a picture began to emerge, a plan that made sense of everything. She stood up and rested her hand on the chest of her first-born. She leaned over and placed a kiss on his forehead, so strange and stiff now his soul had departed. Then she slipped her hand into his inside pocket and took out the letter Sissy had deposited just moments ago. To save her granddaughter, she had to know everything about her granddaughter. She weaselled her thumb into the corner of the envelope and opened its secrets, then, remembering where she was, she slipped it into her coat pocket to read elsewhere. Peter deserved all of her attention. She prayed for him, and vowed she would take care of his family in his absence. She did not allow the part that was her own grief to overwhelm her. Dignity. Gratitude. He was in the arms of the Lord. No doubt he had found his father in Heaven and they looked down on her now. But what would they see?

  Stifling a cry, she left the room. All the solemn certainty she’d had moments ago vanished in the very ordinary little corridor she now stood in. She might have stepped straight back into the visitation room and returned the letter had the funeral home’s director not greeted her. They’d already stayed open for her long past their regular hours. The only thing she could do was say thank you and leave.

  Danny had waited to drive her home. She felt the letter in her pocket and was appalled with herself. She wouldn’t read its contents. But she’d felt such assurance as she’d taken it, there could be no denying it was God’s hand that had guided hers. She would pass it on to Jude. After all, a mother needed to know what was going on in their teenager’s mind, even at the best of times.

  CHAPTER THREE

  Into the Woods

  Sunlight streamed in through the window and pulled Jude in from the dark. Disorientated, she turned over on the sofa and saw the lava lamp in full flow on the sideboard; the melted wax, transformed by heat into a bubbling liquid of green and violet, had spent the whole night rising and falling for no one’s entertainment. On the coffee table, the empty bottle and dirty ashtray; in her mouth her tongue, dry and rough as sandpaper. Then the headache, thick and loud and persistent, followed by the crushing recollection of what life was now.

  On the wall above the fireplace hung the family portrait Anne had organised for Peter’s fortieth a few years earlier. They all looked so young, sitting behind each other on the photographer’s white rug, looking down on her inappropriately like a bunch of loons. She’d squirmed through the entire experience, hating every moment of it, but in this one picture the photographer had somehow captured a moment of genuine glee. She wished she could remember what they were laughing at.

  The clink and clatter of mugs and bowls told her Sissy was already in the kitchen. She rubbed her face, stretched out and groaned. The first day of the rest of their lives. Then she heard Sissy coming down the hall towards her; her lightness, her gait, even her breath, all things familiar and customary, learned through the everyday intimacies of having shared a house for years.

  At first she didn’t realise it was a door slam. The noise was so sudden and invasive it jangled her into a protective pose with her arms over her head. But when the walls didn’t fall down and she realised there was a vacancy where Sissy had just been, she moved quickly to the window to see her daughter, dressed in school uniform, moving along the pavement at speed.

  She ran to the front door and down the garden path, the cold hard ground a shock to her stockinged soles. She called out, but Sissy didn’t respond or even look back, and Jude was left in the street wondering what to do. She’d anticipated them having some time alone after the intensity of the past week. So many people coming and going, so much to prepare – she was exhausted. Returning to work was a distant prospect for Jude and she’d assumed the same of Sissy, but she’d always had trouble predicting what her daughter would do or say or think in any given situation. Unlike Peter. Peter and Sissy had a bond she could only envy. He was the bridge between them. Without him, she feared they’d be rendered two little islands, floating in opposite directions until they lost sight of each other completely.

  As Sissy burned her way down the street, her passion was interrupted by the practic
al notion that she should have worn trainers because her smooth-soled school shoes threatened to steal her feet away from under her. Regardless, she picked up her pace, the only objective to put distance between herself and her mother’s voice.

  She caught the earlier bus and sat at the front, away from the other kids, who were already hyped up on sugar, judging by the amount of noise coming from them.

  When they reached their stop, Sissy found herself trapped in her seat, unable to stand, or look them in the eye, much less walk with them the remaining distance to school. They gathered in the aisle beside her, bags jostling, bumping her head and shoulder, and then – was it her imagination? – a hush fell over them as they passed her. Only when the last kid passed the driver did she follow them off.

  Two girls in fourth year had waited for her. They nudged each other until one found the courage to step forward. ‘Sorry to hear about your dad.’ The other one: ‘Me too. Sorry. It’s shit.’

  She hadn’t anticipated this. It made no sense. She’d woken up with such fury and yet now she felt like a fly on a sticky trap. She had no clue how to bring these two separate versions of herself together. She mustered a nod and picked up her pace.

  The Head stopped his morning round of school corridors when he saw her. She’d never actually noticed someone’s jaw drop before. Partly amused to learn it was a real thing, she followed him into his office and listened to his concerns with detached politeness, feigning indifference to his brazen scrutiny. He spoke carefully, studying her for signs of a breakdown. At long last he sighed and let her go to class ‘against his better judgement’.