The Island of Longing by Anne Griffin

Author:Anne Griffin [Griffin, Anne]
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9781529372021
Published: 2023-05-03T16:00:00+00:00

Not far now, the girl replied.

Just up here.

From then on Hugh’s days were fuelled by sheer determination and utter desperation. Working closely with the guards to organise groups of volunteers to comb every bit of land between Blackrock and Dún Laoghaire and beyond for anything, her phone, her bag, something to push the case on.

They all came: Mammy and Daddy, Michael-Fran, Hugh’s parents, his brother Ely, uncles and work colleagues, Cullie’s friends, pupils and teachers from the school, our neighbours, Billy and Roger from my job, friends I’d made at the school gate, their families, their neighbours, strangers who came from as far afield as Wicklow, and one man who had come all the way from Belfast. They walked every road, every laneway, every cul-de-sac in the area. They spilled out of the Presbyterian church hall, not five hundred metres from our door, which became our HQ, wearing walking boots and runners and shorts and T-shirts and sometimes windcheaters when the forecast turned bad. They listened as Ely told them what locations they were covering that day. It was better to let his brother take the lead, Hugh said. Someone who was one step removed was always more level-headed, less emotional. Hugh’s colleagues in the architect business had made large-scale maps, so he could point out the areas. Each person was assigned a group: A, B, C, D, E, et cetera. I think one day they actually got to O. Ten people in each. One leader apiece, usually a family member or someone we knew well.

Hugh was better with the volunteers than I was. He could talk to them, whereas I was the silent mother, too shocked to speak. Some would come to say hello and commiserate, while others would avoid me. And who could blame them? I could barely raise a smile, let alone an encouraging word. But I did try. Every day, Hugh and I would stand hand in hand beside the map right before the briefing and I might say something like: You have no idea what this means, the time you’re giving us to help bring her home. At least, that’s what I always planned to say because often I would get halfway and stop, sometimes because of tears and sometimes because there was nothing left in me, no energy to finish it off. I’d feel Hugh’s arm tighten around my waist then and I would drop my head and let him finish.

How much they gave. How much those strangers gave.

I’d stand back, watching this machine in full flow, wishing with every cell of me that I was them, an outsider, someone there to help, someone who would do their utmost, upturning every discarded Tesco bag, poking through the empty crisps packets and Club Orange bottles in a lane, leafleting every door, doing my best, my very heartfelt best, to find some clue about this girl whose name I knew was Saoirse.

I didn’t want to be me.

They left in swarms, murmurations of searchers, with lunch packs handed to them as each exited the hallway.

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