I hardly hear him as I stare at the photo.

I don’t know how it’s possible, but I think I do know what happened to Lily Murphy.

I think I killed her.

2

June 2018

MY PHONE BURNS IN my hand, the screen glowing in the unfolding dusk; the photograph sucking me in, freezing me to the spot.

Lily Murphy. Three years old. Hide and Seek. Never seen again.

Sweet wrappers. Books and notebooks. Foil packets. Little vials. The turn of the key. And her age. My mind is whirring with memories I’ve been pushing away for years. I think I’m about to be sick.

‘I’m going to lock up now,’ Mark says. ‘Are you coming?’

Like a sleepwalker, I move across the cool, dark grass, into our new home. Forever home. Last known address of Lily Murphy.

In the living room, Mark puts on the TV and finds a football match as I open my Mac. My hands are shaking but he doesn’t notice. I need to tell him. But not yet. Not now. And it could be nothing.

A coincidence. My guilty conscience. Her ghost.

I google again, and click into Wikipedia:

Lily Murphy (born 5 May 1982) was a three-year-old Irish girl who disappeared in Rowanbrook, Edenvale, Co. Dublin on Monday 1 July 1985. Lily is presumed drowned but her body has never been recovered.

1985. When I was nine. When she was three. Oh God.

I swallow and keep reading.

Disappearance

Lily Murphy (fair hair, blue eyes, 95 cm) was last seen at approximately 11.30 a.m. on Monday 1 July 1985, near her home in Dublin. She had been playing with friends on a green near where she lived, in Edenvale, Co. Dublin. The children had started a game of ‘Hide and Seek’, moving from a wooded area at the back of the green into a nearby building site. The building site had been abandoned after the construction company, VB Holdings, went into receivership. The building site was only loosely secured and local children had been playing there for weeks (citation needed). Lily Murphy’s mother, Mary Murphy, was nearby, watching the children, along with some other women from the neighbourhood. At approximately midday, most of the children returned from the woods but Lily Murphy did not. A child who had been with Lily brought the group of adults to where they had been hiding, but Lily had disappeared. A search ensued, but the child wasn’t found. Gardaí (police) were called, and the search continued throughout the day, and on into the days and weeks that followed. Officials and locals believe Lily Murphy to have drowned in a shallow river that runs along the back of the woods, but no body has ever been rec—

‘Mum!’ The shout makes me jump as the living room door bursts open. Emily, red-faced and angry, hands on hips. ‘Mum, can you please tell Ben not to go into my room.’

Ben comes thundering down the stairs behind her. ‘I didn’t! But she went into mine and messed up my Minecraft figurines!’