Michelle and Nick had stayed up late talking about all that had happened. She’d begun by telling him about finding the address for Dr Maurice Davis, and then about going out to the old Davis house, which had led her to Lydia’s mobile home out in Thornton’s field.
He was quiet when she told him that she’d gone out there.
‘What were you hoping to find out?’ he’d asked.
And she knew that he’d sensed her doubts, but she managed to persuade him that it was for his sake, not hers. ‘I wanted to find out what Johnny was really like before any of it happened,’ she told him. ‘Find out what drove him to do what he did.’
Nick had taken her hand, told her that she didn’t have to stay with him.
She’d told him then about Caitlin, and about the meeting she’d managed to set up, and he was too surprised and impressed by the fact that she’d pulled it off to dwell on her visit to Lydia. It was the first step, she told him. Her intention was to get to know everything about Caitlin Davis, and that way allay some of his guilt about the past.
On Friday, Michelle’s article would be published in New Woman, and she decided to impress Caitlin by getting a head start on the article she’d mentioned about interviewing the homeless in the streets. She showed the article to the leaders at the Simon Community and told them about Caitlin’s request for the follow-up with more personal stories. The woman in charge, Clare, had agreed at once, telling her that as long as she didn’t mention any names, and she explained to the people she interviewed exactly what she was doing, she could go ahead – it was the kind of exposure the crisis needed, especially after the death of poor Dan.
Clare sent another volunteer out to work with Conor that evening. Michelle would go with them too, but if she found someone willing to talk to her about their situation, she’d stay behind and catch up with the other volunteers at a later point.
The first person she spoke to told her he’d been on the streets for almost a year. His mother had died and without him knowing had made a will leaving the house he lived in to his brother. The brother had forced him to move out, sold the house and gave him nothing. He’d told him he could stay with him and his wife for a few months until he’d sorted something out, but the man refused. He had his pride, he told her, and the underhand way his brother had convinced his mother to sign the house over to him sickened him so much that he couldn’t even look at him anymore.
Michelle sat down next to the man, listened to him speak. ‘But why did your mother put the house in his name only?’ she asked, gently.
‘Trickery,’ the man said. ‘I used to have my own place – well, my wife’s place. We’d moved into her parents’ house after her mother had passed. Kevin and his girlfriend were renting – throwing away more than a thousand a month on a one-bed flat in Rathmines. He convinced the mother that I was doing well, that I had a roof over my head, no mortgage ’cause Angie’s parents had bought the house. And I was doing well for a while, but sure no one can tell what way the future will go. Angie got sick of me – found a new fella – wanted me out of the house, and so I moved in with the ma. Of course, I had no idea what the brother had done – that he’d screwed me over.’
‘And what about your wife? Does she know you’re living like this?’
‘Agh, we haven’t spoken in two years. She probably thinks I’m still in the mother’s –probably thinks the house came to me – nothing to do with her anyway.’
‘But wouldn’t you be entitled to something from the house you shared with your wife, the house you were both living in?’
The man shook his head. ‘It was her parents, I’d take nothing off her. It’s her inheritance, not mine. And besides, the only thing we could do would be to sell it, and neither one of us could buy anything with half the money. Your man is up there now, instated as if it were his. No shame.’
‘And what about the government? Couldn’t you apply for social housing?’
‘Ha! Do you know how long that list is?’ he said. ‘I wouldn’t even be entitled to the dole because I don’t have a permanent address.’
Michelle nodded sympathetically. She knew all this, knew too that most people would rather be in the street than stay in a hostel. It was safer outdoors, at least safer than being in a room full of junkies.
‘Would you mind me telling your story? I wouldn’t mention your name, of course. Show people that there are plenty of genuine cases, people who shouldn’t be in a predicament like yours.’
‘Sure,’ he said. ‘Doubt it’ll have much effect, no one gives a damn. But you’re good for trying, for doing this. If it weren’t for people like you, like the Simon, we’d be a lot worse off.’
Not everyone Michelle met wanted to talk. There were the ones covered in their sleeping bags that she let be, others were drunk or stoned, and then there were people who just wanted to be left in peace, who had no intention of talking to anyone who wanted to print something about them.
The numbers by which homelessness had increased in the last few years were staggering. The queues that formed outside the GPO every night at the soup kitchen were getting longer.
Michelle looked at her watch. She’d spent a long time talking to the man who’d been tricked in the will. She’d need to talk to at least three others with diverse stories if she were to show the reality of homelessness. She wouldn’t gloss over it. If there was someone with an addiction who was willing to speak, she’d talk to them too. She wouldn’t discount anyone.
The next girl she spoke to was in her twenties. She told her she’d only been on the streets a few weeks. ‘Me whole family are addicts,’ she said. ‘I’m not. I’m not into any of that shite. Me sister’s on heroin – me Da’s an alco – fucked me out ’cause I was getting on to the rest of them. Ah yeah – didn’t want to hear me preaching. Fucks your head up, that stuff, so it does. Now look at me.’
‘Did you go to anyone for help? Your local councillor maybe?’
‘Yeah. Dead nice, he was. Said he’d try to help me get a gaff. Suppose something’ll turn up anyways.’
‘Does your family know you’re sleeping rough?’
The girl shrugged. ‘They couldn’t give a—’ Suddenly, a figure nearby caught her attention. ‘Here Deco, any skins, have ya?’ The tracksuited man turned, raised a hand and started in their direction, but was waylaid by another slouched figure propped up on crutches in a shop doorway.
Michelle straightened and thanked the girl for talking to her. She didn’t like to judge people, but Deco, now coming towards them, didn’t look like someone to mess with. She took a couple of sandwiches from her knapsack, gave them to the girl and moved on.
Leaving the city centre, she walked towards the river where she knew Conor and the other volunteer would be by now. The Liffey boardwalk was a camping ground for the homeless at night. She stepped onto the boardwalk; the river was black under the mock gaslights that lined the bridges. It wasn’t a place she’d usually walk alone. In the river, something bobbed in the water; she saw that there were several objects, glinting silver. Curious, she walked to the railing and looked down. Beer cans floated on the surface, more than a dozen of them. Soon they’d fill with water and sink to the riverbed. Another one whizzed through the air and landed softly. A group of men were congregated on benches further along. One of them was standing smoking. He kept stepping back and forth on the balls of his feet as if in time to music.
‘Hey, could you stop for a sec,’ the man said, as he saw Michelle coming towards him.
‘Sorry,’ she muttered, walking quickly past him, head up. She wasn’t usually afraid in the streets at night, but here by the river the threat was palpable.
Up ahead, she spotted Conor and the other volunteer, a girl whose name she didn’t know, and she hurried to catch up with them.