One Hundred Names

‘She just needs a little encouragement, Pete,’ Bob said, a little firmer then. ‘It’s a daunting task.’

‘Fine,’ Pete said suddenly. ‘We have two weeks until we go to print. Kitty, keep me up to date with how you’re getting on. I’d like daily feedback.’

‘Daily?’ she asked, surprised.

‘Yep.’ He gathered his things and made for Constance’s, his, office.

With Pete’s demand for daily updates, Kitty knew that her suspension from the television network, the vandalism to her flat, her relationship breakdown and the court case loss had just scratched the surface, and now the real repercussions of Thirty Minutes were beginning.

Kitty reluctantly sat behind Constance’s desk in her home office, her hands up in the air as though she was being shot at, afraid to touch anything, afraid to ruin the order of how Constance had placed things, knowing they would never find their way back to their rightful place without their rightful owner to fix them. Last week she had loved the feeling of being there but now she felt like an intruder. Bob had given her free rein in the office; there was nothing she couldn’t read, no territory she wasn’t allowed to examine. The previous Kitty – the Kitty who had Constance in her life and who hadn’t a court ruling against her for irresponsible journalism – would have jumped at the chance to be meddlesome and would have read everything she could get her hands on, whether it was related to the story or not, but now it was different.

She spent the afternoon doing fruitless but time-consuming searches through the filing cabinet, trying to see if any other paperwork matched up to the one hundred names. It was pointless because she had no idea what the names meant and how they could be linked to anything else. She Googled the names but nothing of interest came up; everything led her down deceiving paths.

By the end of day two, after an embarrassing meeting with Pete in which she had nothing to report, she returned home to find her flat with red-paint-splashed toilet paper hanging in strands across the front door as if to mimic a crime scene.

Despite going to bed without an ounce of hope and a blocked toilet from when she’d tried to flush away all the toilet paper at once, she managed to wake up somehow feeling vibrant and full of possibilities. A new day meant a new start to her search. She could do it. This was her moment to redeem herself, to make Constance proud. Her final thought of the night had been that the people on the list could be absolutely anyone – and where else do you find people who could be anyone? Not bothering to get dressed, she retrieved the phone directory and sat at the table in her pants.

She had made various photocopies of Constance’s list, not wanting to damage the original, which she had placed back in Constance’s filing cabinet. Kitty’s own copy was now covered in thoughts, questions, cartoon squiggles and shapes and so she took a fresh copy, a new notepad, the phone book, a fresh mug of coffee – instant, as Glen had taken his coffee machine and fresh coffee beans – took a deep breath and prepared herself. She heard a key in the door and it suddenly opened and she was faced with Glen. Her hands went straight to her naked chest. Then, feeling vulnerable, she folded her legs, opened the phone directory and covered herself more.

‘Sorry,’ Glen said, still frozen at the door, key in hand, staring at her. ‘I thought you’d be at work.’

‘Do you have to keep staring at me?’

‘Sorry.’ He blinked, looked away, then turned his back. ‘Do you want me to leave?’

‘Too late for that, isn’t it?’ she snapped, marching to her wardrobe.

‘Oh, here we go,’ he said, politeness leaving his voice. The door banged and he followed her into the bedroom.

‘I’m not dressed yet.’

‘Do you know what, Kitty, I’ve seen it all before and I really couldn’t care less.’ He didn’t glance at her as he rooted in her drawers.

‘What are you looking for?’

‘None of your business.’

‘It’s my flat, of course it’s my business.’

‘And I’ve paid my half of this month’s rent, so technically it’s mine too.’

‘If you tell me what it is, I can help,’ she said, watching him root. ‘Because I’d really like for you to take your hands off my knickers.’

He finally retrieved a watch from her underwear drawer and strapped it around his wrist.

‘How long has that been there?’

‘Always.’

‘Oh.’

How much more hadn’t she known about him? That’s what they were both thinking: how much more didn’t they know about each other? They were silent for a moment, and then he looked around the room again, more gently this time, placing shoes, CDs and other miscellaneous items he’d left behind into a black bin liner. Kitty couldn’t watch and went to sit at the kitchen table again.

‘Thanks for telling me you were leaving,’ she said as he passed her and made his way around the kitchen. He took the oven gloves, the oven gloves. ‘It was very gentlemanly of you.’

‘You knew that I was leaving.’

‘How the hell did I know that?’

‘How many arguments did we have, Kitty? How many times did I tell you exactly how I felt? How many more arguments did you want to have?’

‘None, of course.’

‘Exactly!’

‘But this wasn’t quite the outcome I was hoping for.’

He seemed surprised. ‘I thought you weren’t happy. You said you weren’t happy.’

‘I wasn’t having a happy time. I didn’t think that … anyway, it doesn’t matter now, does it?’ She was surprised to feel hope in her heart, hope that he would say, of course it matters, let’s fix this … but instead he left a long silence.

‘Why aren’t you at work?’

‘I decided to work from home.’

‘Did the magazine fire you?’ he asked, disbelieving her.

‘No,’ she snapped, tired of being second-guessed. ‘They didn’t fire me. It may surprise you to know that some people still believe in me.’ Which wasn’t entirely true with the way Pete was treating her.

Glen sighed, then walked to the door, bin liner over his shoulder. She looked back down at the directory. Her eyes jumped from one name to the next, unable to concentrate while he was there.

‘Sorry to hear about Constance.’

Emotion flooded her and she couldn’t speak.

‘I was at the funeral, in case you hadn’t heard.’

‘Sally told me.’ She wiped her eyes roughly, annoyed that she was crying.

‘Are you okay?’

Kitty blocked her face with her hands. It was too humiliating to have him stand there while she cried, when before he would have comforted her. She cried about that and she cried for Constance. And she cried about everything else in between. ‘Please go,’ she sobbed.

She heard the door softly close.

With dry eyes Kitty started afresh. She went to the first name on the list, Sarah McGowan. She turned to the McGowan pages in the directory. There were hundreds of McGowans in total. Eighty Mr and Mrs McGowans, twenty S McGowans, eight Sarah McGowans, which meant she would at least have to attempt to call them all if the twenty-eight specific S’s didn’t work out for her.

She began by ringing the Sarahs. The first call was answered immediately.