Sunday
The August sky had cleared of dark clouds, and the sun was out, making me feel woozy as I trawled the Sligo streets, searching for a job to replenish my dwindling funds.
I was tired, and bored of seeing happy tourists breathing in the sights of the town as though they owned them. Seeing couples waltz into posh hotels, wearing big smiles and carrying expensive cases, reminded me of my old life, and I wondered what was going on behind those smiles. Were those women as desperate as I had been?
I’d given myself another massive hangover by drinking myself stupid the night before. It was for the last time, I told myself. Alcohol didn’t solve anything. It never had and never would.
As I rounded a corner, Ella Matthews’ message leapt into my head.
You don’t know me, but I need to talk to you. I think we might be related. Please, please reply to this. I have reason to believe you’re my sister.
The word sister brought Bryony into my head. I pushed her out; forced myself not to think about her.
If this Ella really was another sister, how the hell would she fit into my life? Had Anna and Reagan had another daughter and kept her? I clenched my fist and punched a brick wall, scraping my knuckles. How could they?
As I examined the damage to my hand, the green door of the pub I’d found myself next to opened and a bloke stumbled onto the pavement, stinking of beer.
‘Cheer up, it may never happen,’ he said, giving me a toothless grin.
‘It already has,’ I said. ‘Not that it’s any of your bloody business.’
He stopped and stared. His eyes were kind, and with a hint of sadness in his voice he said, ‘Life can get better, love.’
I raked around for an abusive retort but no words came, and as he went on his way, tears burned my eyelids.
I took a deep breath, my mind back on Ella Matthews. My sister? I bit the inside of my mouth and tasted blood. I had no reason to think her message was anything more than mistaken identity, and part of me regretted my stupid reply.
I looked about me. A rainbow stretched over the river in the distance, which reflected the pale blue sky. It was beautiful here.
I turned back to the pub, and was about to walk on when my eyes fell on a notice on the window: Bar Staff Wanted. I stepped towards the door, Celia’s soft voice nagging in my head. ‘Keep away from sin, Colleen.’ She should have practised what she preached.
Up to the age of five, I’d lived with Celia in a big house in a pleasant tree-lined suburb in Cork. We’d never gone short of anything. My father, or the man I thought was my father, was a kind, well-spoken Englishman, who left early every morning in his grey pinstriped suit, for work in the city. As an adult, I’d never been able to visualise his face, only his dark, neatly cut hair and that pinstriped suit. Celia was attractive back then, small and slim, with hair the colour of chestnuts.
‘Bye, little one,’ the man I called Da would say to me as he left each day, kissing my forehead.
‘Bye, Da,’ I’d say, wrapping my arms around his legs.
When I was five, Terry came to our house to do some odd jobs. He’d arrive when the man I called Da wasn’t there, and ruffle my hair with his big, rough hand. With a wink he’d say, ‘How are you, cutie-pie?’
I would laugh and reply, ‘I’m OK, muscle man.’ I’d heard Celia call him that.
He would always leave before the man I called Da returned.
When I was six, Celia and I moved to Waterford with Terry, and I never saw the man I’d called Da again.
Terry stopped calling me cutie-pie, no longer ruffling my hair and winking, and I stopped calling him muscle man. I resented how much Celia seemed to love him, but at least he’d made her happy – for a while.
I opened the pub door, sucked in a breath and entered. The smell of ale and remnants of a Sunday roast hit me in a wave. Several punters sat at the bar on stools and others around wooden tables. Nobody looked up. A blackboard on the rough brick wall advertised food: sausage and mash, steak and ale pie, fish and chips. Nothing classy. A folk band called The Fox Trotters played there every Friday.
A woman in her fifties with a mass of red hair and a garishly made-up face, smiled from behind the counter as I approached. ‘What can I get you?’
I pointed to the window. ‘You’ve advertised for staff.’
She nodded and smiled again. She had lipstick on her teeth. ‘Have you worked in a pub before?’
‘Yes,’ I said. It wasn’t a lie. I’d worked behind a bar when I was seventeen. I’d lied about my age back then. They never questioned me and paid cash in hand.
‘It’s every evening from seven until eleven,’ the woman said, her hand on her hip as she looked me up and down. ‘We’re pretty desperate. When can you start?’
I shrugged. ‘Whenever you need me.’
‘Tomorrow?’
I nodded. ‘Sure.’
‘I’ll just need your details and a couple of references.’
My insides froze, but I managed a casual shrug. ‘I can give you my details. But it’s been a while since I worked.’
‘I’m sorry,’ she said, shaking her head so her hair bounced. ‘We really do need references. I took the last one on trust, and had to sack him for having his hand in the till.’
Tears of frustration flooded my eyes. ‘But I need this job.’
Looking concerned, the woman came out from behind the bar. ‘Are you OK?’ She put her solid arm around my shoulders. I wanted to shake it off, but knew she was just being kind. ‘Alfie,’ she called to a man at the other end of the bar.
He turned and smiled. ‘Yes, Sandra, my darling?’ He looked to be in his thirties, with sandy hair curling over the collar of his polo shirt.
‘Can you take charge for a bit, love?’
He came over. ‘Anything for you, Sandra.’ He had an open face; direct blue eyes behind geeky, dark-rimmed glasses, and a relaxed, confident expression. ‘You’re the boss.’
Sandra ushered me to a tiny office at the back of the pub and gestured for me to sit down on a black swivel chair.
‘So, what’s your name, love?’ she said.
‘Colleen. But I’m fine, honestly,’ I said, drying my eyes with my hand. ‘I really need a job.’
‘Well, Colleen,’ she said, handing me a tissue from a box on the cluttered table. ‘I’m Sandra, as you’ve probably gathered.’ She took my hand, running her fingers over my knuckles, which were grazed and bloody from where I’d hit the wall. ‘Why not tell your Auntie Sandra who you’re running from?’
I wrestled with whether or not to tell her the truth. ‘My husband, Jake,’ I said, making myself look into her pale grey eyes, with their lavishly shadowed lids. ‘He abuses me, uses me as a punchbag.’ I looked down at my hands. ‘I just want to make a fresh start, that’s all.’
I looked up to see Alfie in the doorway, holding a checked tea towel. ‘The pump needs changing,’ he said, and smiled at me with friendly interest.
‘It’ll have to wait.’ Sandra shooed him away with a flick of her hand, and once he’d gone, pinned me down with a direct gaze. ‘I’ll give you a new start,’ she said at last. ‘But first, I’ll get you a nice cup of tea.’
The warming tea, and Sandra’s kindness, made me feel a bit better and I was glad she didn’t press for more information, content to give me a rundown of what my job would entail.
As we headed back into the bar, which thronged with evening drinkers jostling for attention, I allowed myself to believe for a moment that everything would be OK.
‘Be here at ten to seven tomorrow.’ Sandra resumed her place behind the bar, and I nodded and made to leave. ‘Wait, love,’ she added, producing a notebook and a pen. ‘Jot down where you’re staying, and your mobile number, in case we need to get hold of you.’
She thrust the pad towards me, and I felt suddenly uneasy about giving out my contact details. Sandra’s gaze sharpened as I hesitated, so I picked up the pen and wrote my address and mobile number, and handed her the notepad, which she placed by the till. ‘Thanks, love.’
On my way back to the bedsit, I detoured into the internet café, hoping my father had sent another email. He hadn’t. But there was another Facebook message from Ella Matthews:
I was going through my mother’s things and found a photo of her holding a baby, and a wristband with your name and a date of birth. There was a letter too, with an Irish address for someone called Celia, from a man called Reagan. I think he must be your father. My mother – our mother – was called Anna Davis. Her maiden name was Harrison.
My pulse began to throb as I read it again, then a third time. Suddenly there was no doubt in my mind.
I had a sister, and she wanted to find me.