A Place Called Here

‘Let’s just say I was an inquisitive child.’

‘Inquisitive indeed.’ She studied me again and I looked away, finding her glare intrusive. ‘Do you know what has happened to everybody’s family here?’ She nodded at the rest of the group.

‘Yes.’ I looked around them all, seeing their parents’ faces in each of them. ‘I made it my life’s work to know. I followed up on all of you every year, wanting to see if anyone came home.’

‘Well, thank you for helping me feel one step closer to it now.’

A silence fell between us, Helena no doubt lost in her memories of home.

Eventually, she spoke again. ‘My grandmother was a proud woman, Sandy. She married my grandfather when she was eighteen years old and they had six children. Her younger sister, who they could never seem to marry off, embarked on a mysterious affair with a man she would never name and to everybody’s shock, gave birth to a baby boy,’ she chuckled. ‘That my grandfather’s face was written all over that child was not lost on my grandmother, nor were the shillings that disappeared from their savings just as the new clothes appeared on the child. Of course, those things are entirely coincidental,’ she said in a singsong voice, stretching her legs out in front of her. ‘There are a great many brown-haired, blue-eyed men in the country and the fact my grandfather had a fondness for drinking would explain the dents in their savings.’ Her eyes twinkled at me.

I looked at Helena in confusion. ‘I’m sorry, Helena, I’m not sure why you’re telling me this.’

She laughed. ‘That you have ended up here with us could be one of life’s great coincidences.’

I nodded.

‘But my grandmother didn’t believe in coincidences. And neither do I. You’re here for a reason, Sandy.’

13 (#ulink_ae7a42dc-ab73-58ef-938f-0a5ec2ce14c3)

Helena added another log to the dying fire and its weight sent a pile of adolescent ashes racing one another down the side of the burning tower. The flames were awakened from the embers and sleepily began to climb up the log, casting out heat to Helena and me.

I had been talking to her for hours, filling her in on all the details of her family life that I knew of. An unusual feeling had stirred within me as soon as I’d realised whose company I was keeping. It washed over me in waves, each wave relaxing me, making my eyes that little bit heavier, causing my mind to tick that little bit slower, and for the tension in my muscles to relax just a little bit more. It was just a little bit, mind you, but it was something.

All of my life people had told me that my questions were irrelevant, that my over-interest in cases of missing persons unnecessary, but right there in the woods every stupid, embarrassing, irrelevant and unnecessary question I had ever asked about Helena Dickens meant the world to her. I knew there had been a reason for my endless searches, my infinite interrogations of myself and of others. And the greatest thing of all was that there wasn’t just one reason for it all; sitting next to me by the campfire there were four others.

Oh, the relief. That’s what the feeling was. The first sense of relief my mind had felt since I was ten years old.

The sky was growing brighter; the tips of the trees that had been burned by the sun by day had been cooled by the night and now shaded the sky a cool blue. The birds that had been silent during the dark hours were now warming their vocal cords, like the idiosyncratic rendition of an orchestra tuning, pre-performance. Bernard, Derek, Marcus and Joan lay asleep in their sleeping bags, covered by blankets and looking how they should have the night of their school camping trip. I wondered, had they slept soundly through that night instead of venturing into the woods, would they have been back in their families’ arms all those years ago, or would the secret door to this world have welcomed them in regardless?

Was it an accident that we were all here? Did we stumble upon a blip in the earth’s creation, a black hole on the surface, or was this just a part of life that was unspoken throughout the centuries? Were we lost and unaccounted for, or was this where we truly belonged and our ‘normal’ lives the original error? Was this a place for those who felt like outsiders in life to belong, to finally feel relief? Despite my own relief, my questions kept flowing. The world around me had changed but some things remained constant.

‘Were you happy?’ I looked around at the others sleeping. ‘Was everybody happy?’

Helena smiled softly. ‘We’ve all asked the question of why, and there is no answer that we know of. Yes, we were happy. We were all very, very happy in our lives.’ She paused. ‘Sandy,’ she broke the silence again, watching me with that amused expression as if enjoying a private joke, ‘believe it or not we’re very happy here too. We’ve spent more years living here than anywhere else. The past is a distant but pleasurable memory for us.’

I looked around the campfire. They had nothing. Nothing but small overnight bags packed with tea bags, unnecessary chinaware and biscuits, blankets and sleeping bags, wraps and jumpers to keep warm, all of which they undoubtedly retrieved from the piles of belongings scattered around us. These five people had slept under the stars, swathed in blankets with a fire and the sun as their only source of light and heat. For forty years. How could they be truly happy? How could they not be clawing their way back to existence, back to material belongings and craving the companionship of others?

I shook my head as I looked around.

Helena laughed at me. ‘Why are you shaking your head?’

‘I’m sorry.’ I was embarrassed at being caught pitying a life they seemed content with. ‘It’s just that forty years is such a long time to settle,’ I looked around at the clearing, ‘well … here.’

Helena’s face opened in surprise.

‘Oh, I’m so sorry,’ I backtracked. ‘I didn’t mean to offend you—’

‘Sandy, Sandy,’ she interrupted, ‘this is not our whole world.’

‘I know, I know,’ I backed off. ‘You have each other and—’

‘No.’ Helena started laughing and her forehead crumpled in confusion. ‘I’m sorry, I thought you knew this wasn’t a permanent thing. We go camping together once a year on the anniversary of our disappearance. I thought you would recognise the date. This clearing is the first place we arrived at forty years ago – well, the first area where we realised we weren’t at home any more. We all stay in touch during the year but we live more or less separate lives.’

‘What?’ I was confused.

‘People go missing all the time, you know that. Wherever people gather, life begins, civilisation exists. Sandy, fifteen minutes’ walk from here, the woods end and a whole new life begins.’

I was stunned. My mouth opened and closed but no words would come out.

‘Interesting you should arrive here today of all days,’ Helena said, deep in thought.

I scrambled to my feet. ‘Come on, let’s go now. Show me this place you’re talking about. We won’t disturb the others.’

‘No.’ Helena’s voice was hard and her smile quickly faded. Her hand sprang up to grab my arm. I flinched and tried to pull away, not liking the contact, but this did not rattle her. I couldn’t move; the force of her hold was so strong. Her face was stony. ‘We do not just leave each other like that, we do not disappear from one another. We will sit here until they wake.’

She loosened her grip on my arm and wrapped her pashmina tighter around her body; retreating to the guarded woman she had been earlier in the evening. She watched her friends intently as though on duty and I realised it wasn’t just me that had been keeping her awake all night. It was just her turn.

‘We stay until they wake,’ she repeated firmly.

Jack sat on the corner of the bed and watched Gloria sleeping with a small smile on her face. It was the early hours of Monday morning and he had just returned home. After Sandy Shortt’s no-show he had spent the entire day checking B & Bs and hotels in all the nearby towns to see if she had checked in anywhere. There were so many things that could have prevented her from arriving at the café; he convinced himself her no-show that morning didn’t mean it was the end of their search. She could have just overslept and missed their meeting, or got caught up in Dublin and couldn’t leave for Limerick that night. There could have been a death in the family or a sudden lead in another case that took her away from Limerick. She could be heading towards him now, driving through the night to get to Glin. He had thought of the endless possibilities but not one of those theories was the idea that she could have deliberately let him down.

A mistake had been made, that was all. He would return to Glin later today in his lunch break to see if she had arrived. He had lived all week for that meeting and he wasn’t going to give up now. Sandy had given him more hope in one week during a few phone conversations than anyone else had succeeded in doing over the entire year. He knew from their talks that she wouldn’t let him down.

He was going to tell Gloria, he really was. He reached out to touch her shoulder and shake her gently but his hand stopped mid-air. Maybe he should hold off telling her until he made contact with Sandy again. Gloria sighed sleepily, stretched her body and turned over.

She eventually settled on her side, her back towards Jack and his outstretched hand.

14 (#ulink_b5da270a-f2bf-597b-8fb9-635678b15b9d)

Only a week before the no-show from Sandy, Jack had quietly closed the bedroom door adjoining the living room so as not to disturb a sleeping Gloria. The Golden Pages lying open on the couch stared back at him as he paced the far side of the room, one eye on the phone book, the other eye on the bedroom door. He stopped and traced his finger down the page until he came across the advert for Porch Light, the organisation that helped counsel friends and relatives of the missing. Jack and his sister Judith had tried to convince their mother to talk to Porch Light after Donal’s disappearance, but her old Irish ways of refusing to speak her private thoughts to a stranger held her back. Below the advert was the number for Sandy Shortt’s missing persons agency. He picked up his mobile and switched on the television so as to cover the sound of his voice in case Gloria awoke. He dialled the number he had memorised when he first came across the advertisement. It rang twice before a female answered.

‘Hello?’

Jack suddenly couldn’t remember what to say.

‘Hello?’ The voice was softer this time. ‘Gregory, is that you?’

‘No.’ Jack finally found his voice. ‘My name is Jack, Jack Ruttle. I got your number from the Golden Pages.’

‘Oh, I’m sorry,’ the woman apologised and returned to her original businesslike tone. ‘I was expecting someone else. I’m Sandy Shortt,’ she said.

‘Hello, Sandy.’ Jack paced the small cluttered living room, tripping over the unevenly rolled, mismatching rugs that adorned the old wooden floors. ‘I’m sorry to call so late.’ Get to the point he hurried himself, pacing faster while he watched the bedroom door.

‘Don’t worry. A call at this hour of the night is an insomniac’s dream, pardon the pun. How can I help you?’

He stopped pacing and held his head in his hand. What was he doing?