“Erin,” I call out through the door. There’s a crocheted doily hanging on the door with a little purple stone in the middle. “It’s Maggie. Are you okay?” I can hear crying through the door. I try the handle, but it’s locked.
“Mags,” she whispers. I can hear her, but just barely. “I’m so sorry, Mags. I’m so sorry.”
“It’s okay,” I tell her. “If you come out we’ll take you home. Chris has a car.”
“Mags,” she whispers again.
But she won’t open the door.
“I’m going to call the cops,” I tell Brian and Chris. “What if she took something?”
“No way, man, no cops,” one of the older guys says.
“Well, then you better break that door down right now.”
“I’m not breaking the door. This is my mom’s house.”
“Give me the phone,” Brian says.
“Don’t call the cops, man.” The bald guy looks terrified.
“I’m not. Give me the phone. I’ve got someone who can get her out of there.”
Brian takes the phone into the kitchen.
We wait forever. I keep trying to talk to her through the door. And then headlights sweep across the windows.
Father Anthony comes in, wearing jeans and a black shirt. “It’s okay, Maggie,” he tells me. “We’ll take care of her.” I’ve never been so glad to see someone in my life.
He knocks on the door. “Erin, can you hear me? It’s Father Anthony. I’m here to help you, to pray with you if you want.”
There’s a huge waiting silence in the house. And then the door opens. And as Father Anthony goes in, I can see Erin’s hair and tearstained face for just a second before the door closes again.
32
1993
It was early morning by the time Roly parked Daisy’s brother’s car on Gordon Street and half carried me out. I had slept on the drive back, but I was still drunk when I woke up and I stood for a minute in front of the house and looked around. “Where’s Bernie?”
“She drove my car back. Come on, now, let’s get you inside. Where are your keys?”
“In my pocket.” He got them out and opened the door.
“I don’t think anyone’s home. Here now, leave your coat. Which is yours?”
“Erin’s,” I told him. “That one is Erin’s room. It’s not mine at all.”
“Okay.” He got me into the room. “Now, you get into bed. I’m going to get you some water. You’ll definitely want to drink some water.”
When he came in, I was curled up under the comforter in my clothes. The room was spinning a bit, but not as badly as before.
“I’m sorry, Roly,” I said. “I know I shouldn’t have done that. It’s just that I thought he could tell us where she is. I thought if he saw me, he’d tell me what happened.”
“I know. But look here, we don’t have any information that says she came to harm, D’arcy. You need to take a step back from this. You do.”
“I know. I just … He recognized me, Roly. I know he did. I think he knows something.”
“We’ll keep an eye on him. Don’t worry about that. There may be a way for us to do some discreet poking around now.”
“I’m sorry,” I said again. “How did you know where I was?”
“Bernie got worried after her conversation with you. We checked in with the roommates and they said you’d gone to visit a family friend.” He smiled. “I figured out where you’d gone. We tried another pub before that one. Do you know what could have happened? Those fellas? At the very least you could have gotten into a fight outside a pub and been arrested.”
“I know. I’m sorry. I’m not … My head’s all messed up right now, Roly. I’m sorry.”
“It’s all right now, D’arcy.” He sat down on the bed.
“Can you stay until I fall asleep?”
“Sure.” He stretched out on the bed and I curled against him. There was something comforting about the solidity of his body. His heart beat beneath the soft fabric of his shirt. After a few minutes I heard his breathing slow and then the faint whistle of air through his nose.
The room darkened and I was aware of fewer and fewer sounds. Kids playing out in the street, a car horn somewhere, a dog barking far away. And then I was in Wicklow, striding across a stretch of boggy field. Gorse bushes were blooming and the sun was shining overhead in a cloudless blue sky, but in the distance I could see a bank of dark clouds threatening.
I was walking fast, as though I knew where I was going, but then I saw someone up ahead walking toward me. As I got closer, I realized it was Erin. She walked toward me, but she didn’t seem to know I was there, even when I called her name. There was someone else walking behind her, a tall man with dark hair, in a dark jacket, but he was too far away for me to see his face. I tried to warn her, to get her to turn around and see that he was following, but she couldn’t hear me, or pretended not to.
As she strode past me, I reached out to grab her arm, but she shook me off and kept going. I followed and suddenly we were at a church, stone outside, with beautiful stained-glass windows and red carpeting inside. The church was empty except for a priest kneeling at the altar, but I couldn’t see his face. Erin went to him and knelt down next to him. I called her name again, but suddenly the church filled with colored light. “Erin!” I called out. “Erin!”
I was coming awake. I heard a key in the front door and then a voice saying, “Sorry, how long have you been waiting?” I was still half in the dream, my body heavy, paralyzed.
A phone rang. It was Emer talking. My head was pounding. It took me a minute to wake up. The phone rang again. Someone was opening the bedroom door. “I don’t think she’s here,” Emer was saying. “She’s been away. You’re welcome to check if you want—Oh!” And then she gasped and I opened my eyes to find Emer standing there with Conor. The phone was still ringing.
Sit up. My body responded slowly. Roly’s arm was under my shoulder.
Conor’s eyes were wide. He looked away. He murmured an apology and turned to the door.
“Conor,” I started to say. “There’s nothing—” But he was turning and running out of the house, out through the open door and before I could get out of bed to get him, the answering machine clicked on and we were all listening as Uncle Danny’s voice filled the flat.
“Maggie, baby. I’m so sorry.” He was stammering, nervous, upset. I pushed Roly out of the way, jumping up, going for the phone, but I didn’t make it before we all heard his voice, raspy and devastated. “I wish I didn’t have to do this, but you got to call me, baby. Your dad, he—Maggie, sweetie. He had a heart attack, baby. I’m so sorry. God, I’m sorry. He’s gone, baby. You gotta give me a call.”
My mom’s bed has been in the den for the last four months, spring air coming in the open windows. We fill the room with flowers but it still smells like a hospital. My dad can’t take it for long. He sits with her at night, drinking gin and tonics, one right after the other, and watching her sleep. During the day, he goes into the city. I sit with her, read, deal with the nurses, check in every night with my boyfriend back at Notre Dame, a sweet younger guy from Minneapolis named Josh who I will tell not to come out for the funeral and who will be perplexed and hurt when I break up with him over the phone and don’t come back to school.