Eighteen Kisses

Laura Jane Cassidy Eighteen Kisses

© 2012

For my grandparents:

Paddy and Frances May

Mary and the late Patrick Cassidy

with love

Prologue

Last month I met eighteen people.

I admired seven of them,

I envied two,

I angered four,

I liked three,

I hated one.

And I kissed another.

Chapter 1

Part of me knew I was dreaming, and that part told me to pay attention. I’d been waiting for this. Ever since Sergeant Lawlor had given me the photographs a few weeks ago, I’d been expecting one of the women to contact me. And now it was happening.

We walked behind a red car. It was moving slowly, steadily. The windscreen wiper swung back and forth, sweeping away the pelting rain. I looked around, but I hadn’t a clue where we were. I scanned for landmarks, hoping to see something that might help me to identify this place. I couldn’t let any important information slip away. But I could see nothing apart from the narrow road and the thick undergrowth on either side of it.

She walked right beside me – any closer and our shoulders would’ve been touching. I watched her from the corner of my eye. A Polaroid camera hung from her neck, clinking against the buttons of her polka-dot dress. She wore the same outfit as in the photograph, but she looked even prettier now. She had a small face, full lips, beautiful eyes and deep red hair. She wore fishnet tights and stilettos that clip-clopped on the tarmac. I looked down at my own shoes: torn pink Converse that soaked up the rain. My feet were horribly cold. Looking back on it, this dream was much clearer than the ones I’d had last year. Everything was sharper, much more intense.

I continued to watch her as we walked, but she didn’t look at me. She just stared straight ahead, her eyes fixed on the boot of the car. Someone had tried to cover the licence plate with plastic, but it was starting to fall away. I could see the last two digits – one and eight. You don’t cover your licence plate unless you have something to hide.

I looked around again, storing away every little detail. We were somewhere remote. I could hear no sound except for the hum of the engine, the clinking of the camera, the clip-clop of the heels. There were no road markings, no street lamps. If it hadn’t been for the car lights, we would’ve been in complete darkness. We were on a back road somewhere, probably in the countryside. We followed the car for what seemed like an eternity, but it may have only been for a few seconds. That’s the problem with dreams – you can’t tell how much time has passed.

The car stopped abruptly and we stopped too. There was complete silence.

This was the kind of place where you could hear a pin drop, the kind of place where nobody could hear you scream. The driver’s door opened. The radio was on low – a Cure song was barely audible through the speakers. A man got out of the car. He was wearing denims, a black jumper and a balaclava. I let out a frightened gasp.

I quickly covered my mouth to mute any more sound that might come out. I was shaking all over, but I tried to stay perfectly still. He looked around and glanced straight in my direction. But it soon became obvious that he had neither seen nor heard me. He was oblivious to both of us. He took a torch from his pocket and flicked it on, a blue beam illuminating the ground in front of him. He took another look around, then opened the boot and pulled out a heaving bin bag. He swung it over his shoulder and hurried across the road, struggling a little under the weight. In his haste the bag tore and an arm dropped out, pale and limp, the fingernails painted bright red. I felt panic rise inside me, but I had to stay calm. I took a deep breath. Focus, Jacki, focus. He moved away from the car and over a low stone wall. We followed as he trudged along, occasionally letting out a grunt or a sigh. I couldn’t stop looking at the arm. We walked through unkempt grass for a long time, then the dream seemed to fast-forward – the surroundings suddenly switched, and we were standing beside a barbed-wire fence. The grass was so long that it almost reached my knees. I looked around, but the man was nowhere to be seen.

‘Where’d he go?’ I said. She didn’t reply. She smiled and completely ignored my question, as if I’d never said it. I squinted my eyes, searching for him in the distance, but all I saw was blackness.

‘Let me take your picture,’ she said. This startled me; I hadn’t expected her to speak. Her voice was strangely similar to mine. She looked young too; she couldn’t have been much older than me. She held up the Polaroid camera and I stepped backwards, smiling awkwardly. The flash blinded me, sending little coloured dots dancing in front of my eyes. Then I heard something in the distance, a siren maybe. I suddenly felt dizzy and stumbled a little. Something was wrong. I felt the ground tremble, then the grass started to move under us like waves. I struggled to keep my balance, bracing myself for a fall. This can’t happen, I thought. I had to focus. I looked over at her; she was still smiling. She looked so calm, as if this was completely normal. I started to panic when I stumbled again, my hand narrowly missing the barbed wire. The dream was closing in on itself. The sky plummeted, stars dropping like bombs beside our feet. A sound from the outside was threatening to wake me up. It wasn’t a siren I’d heard, it was my phone alarm. The dream was ending too soon. There was more to come, I was sure of it. I knew I didn’t have long left, so I took one last look around, but everything was in chaos. As it all collapsed around us, she whispered.

‘Careful… You’re standing on my grave.’

Chapter 2

I could hear my phone, but I couldn’t see it. It was getting louder; if I didn’t find it soon it was going to wake Hannah up. It had escaped from under my pillow and was now lost somewhere amidst all the clothes and magazines on Hannah’s floor. I leaned over from the fold-out bed and searched through the clutter, eventually locating the phone and pushing the silence button as quickly as I could. I was so annoyed that it had dragged me out of the dream. But I was happy to be waking up in Dublin. I’d missed the city and my friends there ever since I’d moved to Avarna.

‘Why… so… early?’ groaned Hannah from underneath her duvet. She emerged a few moments later, remnants