Every Time a Bell Rings. Carmel Harrington

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      ‘Maybe you look like your father,’ Jim says.

      ‘Ooh aah Paul McGrath,’ I joke, but there’s no merriment in my words and they fall flat between us.

      ‘I asked Mrs Reilly for a photograph of him, but she got all weird and did that thing with her voice.’ I say.

      ‘All high, like she’s being squeezed tight?’ Jim asks and I nod. I knew he’d get it.

      ‘She kept putting me off, but then when I pushed her, she told me that they didn’t have a record of who he was,’ I say.

      ‘That sucks,’ he tells me. ‘I don’t know who my father is either. My mam always starts to cry when I ask her about him. I’ve given up trying. Who needs a father anyhow? Losers.’

      ‘Yeah. Losers,’ I agree.

      A tiny bit of me feels jealous of Jim, though. I know his mother is cracked, but at least she comes by every now and then. I think of mine and feel a pain in my heart.

      ‘Does she ever call you?’ he asks.

      I shake my head no. ‘I wrote to her a few times. I was real careful to make sure it was perfect, with no mistakes,’ I say.

      I was so proud of those letters.

      Shame floods me now at how stupid I was.

      ‘You have good writing. Better than mine,’ Jim says. ‘I bet they were great letters.’

      He’s not wrong about his writing. He mixes up his ‘b’s and ‘d’s all the time and his letters are way too big. I’m going to have to give him some lessons, because he’ll get in trouble at school if not.

      ‘I got Joan to put a picture of me in the last letter I sent, so she could see what I looked like now. I put on my best dress and stood in the garden by the rose bush for it. Joan had one of those Polaroid cameras,’ I finish softly.

      ‘What happened?’ Jim asks, his voice so quiet I can barely hear him.

      In our cocoon, made of white-and-blue cotton sheets, I suppose the sound of my silence is his answer.

      He doesn’t break my silence, doesn’t question me any further, but reaches behind him to his stash of treats and hands me his Club bar. I know he’s been saving this one till last; he loves to suck the thick chocolate off. So I push it back towards him. I can’t take it. But he gives it to me again, insistent.

      Neither of us say a word, we just sit there sucking our chocolate bars, lost in our own thoughts of absentee parents.

      For weeks I would run to the postman, check through the piles of letters and when I saw a white envelope my heart would soar in hope. But it was never for me.

      No reply. No card. No phone call. Nothing.

      I look at Jim and hold up Dee-Dee. ‘Until you came, all I had was Dee-Dee. She was my best friend.’

      I take a deep breath. I want to tell him something, but I’m afraid that he might laugh. ‘I’m glad that I have you now.’

      He looks embarrassed and starts to push his Spider-Man truck up and down the walls made of sheets. But he doesn’t laugh and I catch him peeking at me. I think he looks pleased with what I’ve said.

      And even though he doesn’t say it back, I know he thinks it too.

      ‘Why did you leave their house, if it was so good there?’ he asks when he turns back to me a few minutes later.

      ‘I had no choice,’ I admit. ‘Joan and Daniel left Ireland.’

      ‘Oh,’ he says and his eyes are wide.

      ‘I begged them both to take me with them. Daniel had gotten a job in the US, in some place called the Silicone Valley. They said that they couldn’t take foster kids with them,’ I say.

      ‘Oh,’ he repeats and his face is like one of those comic books, when it freezes into a shocked look at the end of a chapter.

      I wonder what he’d say if I told him about how I pleaded with them the night before Mrs Reilly came to take me away. I feel a flush of shame overtake me again as I remember how much I begged and begged, but how it made no difference whatsoever. I still had to go.

       ‘You could adopt me,’ I whisper to them. ‘Then you can bring me with you. I wouldn’t be a foster kid any more. I’d be yours. And I’ll be so good. I promise I’ll be good.’

       I hold my breath as they look at each other. Daniel looks uncomfortable and starts to fidget and Joan won’t look me in the eye.

       I don’t wait for them to answer me, I just get up and walk out of the family room. I know the score. I ignore Joan’s anguished cries that she wishes things were different.

       ‘Our hands are tied,’ Daniel shouts at my retreating back.

       And even though I’m only eight years old, I know already that if they wanted me, if they really did, they could have made it happen.

      Better not to tell Jim all that. And I don’t want him to know about the day Mrs Reilly took me away from them either.

       Joan cries and tells me that she will always care for me. But I don’t answer her. I can see that my silence is hurting her. I know that she wants me to let her off the hook, to tell her I understand why I can’t go with them.

       But I don’t want to make it easier for her. I hate her. I hate Daniel too and I hope that their plane crashes and they die.

       Shame floods my body for thinking such a bad thing. And I know that it is my own fault that they don’t want me.

       Who would want me? My own mother didn’t.

       Mrs Reilly puts me in her car and takes me away. I can feel their eyes watching me as we drive off, but I keep looking forward.

       Maybe they’ll change their minds, Dee-Dee says. But we both know that’s not true. So I move into a new temporary home. One where people keep trying to make me talk and unzip my lips.

       But I am so tired. What good do words do anyhow? No one ever listens to me. They do what they want to do and send me away.

      I turn my back to Jim and pick up my Simon game. I don’t want him to see me cry.

      ‘Why did you speak to me when you saw me on that first day?’ Jim suddenly asks and his voice is gruff. I can’t help it, I look back towards him.

      Because you were the answer to my wish. Because I know that you were in pain and scared and I know what that feels like. Because … Just because.

      ‘I dunno. Felt sorry for you, I suppose. Loser,’ I say instead, joking to try to banish the tears.

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