‘Em, actually, no, I think I’m going to give them a miss – thanks, Marni. We’re going to have a girly night in, aren’t we, puppy?’ Georgie barked and Marni laughed. ‘Can I text you about next week when I know what my schedule looks like? I think I’m going to be cutting back a bit.’
‘Sure, no problem, we’ll talk. Bye,chérie.’ Marni kissed Georgie and headed downstairs to run the gauntlet of Teresa Daly and her camera.
Shelly and Georgie played puppies for a few more minutes and then it was time for stories and cuddles in the little pink bed.
‘Nighty, night, sweet baby,’ Shelly called as she carefully closed the door just the way Georgie liked it.
‘Night, Mama … Can I tell you something?’
Shelly grinned. This had become her latest bedtime stalling tactic. She usually allowed her three ‘can I tell you something’s before getting serious about sleep time. She knelt down by her pillow so Georgie could whisper to her. Her hot breath tickled Shelly’s ear but the words buoyed her immeasurably.
‘You’re my best friend, Mama!’
After several more whispered somethings, Georgie finally dropped off and Shelly made her way up to the office to tell Amy she wasn’t sure she even wanted to salvage this SHELLY thing anymore.
She found, to her dismay, Amy looking upset in the corner.
‘I’m so sorry, Shelly.’ She looked up. She looked so young with half her make-up cried off and her eyes swollen and red.
‘Amy, oh my god, please stop. SHELLY’s not that important. It doesn’t matter anymore. I promise you.’ Shelly cradled the girl. ‘I was planning to walk in here, sit you down and tell you that I want out!’ Shelly smiled down at Amy but Amy only stared back silently. The fear in Amy’s eyes as she handed over her phone stopped Shelly cold.
On the screen was an email that just said: ‘Shelly is a LIAR.’ The sender was [email protected]
There were images attached – Shelly smiling but with the eyes blacked out. One was from the Daddy Bears’ Picnic – a side-by-side of Dan and the Almost Dan they’d employed for that day with the caption ‘Spot the difference!’ Next up a side-by-side of baby Georgie and the random stock image of a baby that she’d once used when Georgie was tiny and had terrible infant acne. She’d been banking on no one noticing – newborns all look the same, after all. Once again the words ‘Spot the difference!’ were typed over the picture. Someone had noticed. Someone had been noticing and watching for a very long time.
Less than an hour later, Shelly was sitting in the police station. Amy was beside her, drawing a diagram, attempting to explain the ins and outs of the Instagram world to Inspector Fitzgerald. Eventually, he sighed heavily and shouted out the door of the interview room. ‘Bríd, will you come in here? They’re on about selfies and things.’
A younger garda came in, smiling, and introduced herself. ‘Bríd Nolan, I’m in the tech division. We handle fraud and identity theft, online stalking, revenge porn, that kind of thing. What’s been going on?’
Amy handed over the picture Shelly had taken of her and @KellysKlobber on the night of Dan’s meltdown and explained the whole story.
‘So this is the woman you think has been hacking your phone? Though, to be honest, I need to look into whether it’s possible to change the phone wallpaper like that. It’s pretty high-level stuff. There’s no way she was there, is there?’
‘No.’ Shelly sighed. ‘I was on a retreat in Kerry. She wasn’t there.’ She felt utterly drained.
Amy took over then, to Shelly’s relief, sliding printouts across the table.
‘I’ve done some digging,’ Amy explained. ‘I have pretty much everything we need. When I emailed her to tell her to back off, I got an out-of-office. Her address was in the email signature. Idiotic, like. It’s straightforward but we just need you to go and deal with her. This has to stop.’
‘Absolutely.’ Bríd was leafing through the pages. ‘This should be totally straightforward – 90 per cent of these people are just bored and never dream they can actually be easily traced or that we’re going to show up at their door. I’ll update you both as soon as we’ve interviewed her.’
27
‘There are some days that you just know are going to change your life forever.’ Ali beamed up into the phone. The best angle was always from above, she’d learned – like, fully overhead. It accentuated cheekbones and eliminated any double chin. ‘You wake up one person and you go to sleep a completely different one. I just know that today is one of those days. And I can’t believe it’s finally here! It’s a day that I have waited for for a long time now. It’s a day to celebrate and empower Irish women, and I am so honoured to be one of the women being celebrated this evening – and I owe it all to you guys.’
Ali uploaded the video to her Story, adding the hashtag #GlossieAwardsNight, just as the doorbell rang.
Who was that? Liv had already left for college and the make-up artist who was doing her prep for the awards wasn’t due for hours. Ali made her way through the detritus of gifts from various brands. She was coming down with baby gear that she needed to photograph and post about. So much to do. In the hall, the collection of porcelain cats in bonnets still manned the table where the long-defunct house phone sat. Stuck to the front door was a note from Liv. The tone was undeniably cold.
Ali,
I’m submitting a draft of the opening chapters of the thesis. It’s due by COB today so I need you to sign the consent form I’ve left on the kitchen table. It’s giving permission for the images I’ve included from your account that appear in sections two and three. Obviously, I’ve redacted your profiler and name in the pics.
Liv.
Ali screwed up the note and opened the door to find Sam looking cross.
‘Ah, so you’re not dismembered by some hippy freaks in a forest in Kerry. Great.’ He stepped past her into the hall.
