Mam asked Tony to hack the Clarinda Park phone but he said the FBI couldn’t hack an iPhone so how could he. He took it away with him. He brought it back three days later and told us he couldn’t do it. He told us that Páraic suggested we take turns guessing the password. It was the only way. Like we needed a secondary school teacher to tell us that. Mam said she already spent hours trying to guess it. Tony said the same. Then they looked at me.

Like I didn’t know his old passcode.

My mam walked across the kitchen and put the phone into my hand. I pressed the home button. Enter Passcode. I put my birthday in. I tried it several ways. It didn’t work.

I took it up to my bedroom and started putting in random passcodes. I texted Holly about it. She said the combinations were probably in millions. Like where does Holly get this information? She said I should try my Dad’s numbers – birthdays, bank numbers, car numbers, telephone numbers. So I started trying any that I knew. Later she texted me that her dad said I should try my friend’s birthdays.

Me: WTF??? My dad doesn’t even remember my friend’s names.

After I sent I remembered I should have said didn’t. I cried of course. I cry ffs what’s new. I missed my dad. Like idk why, he was having a fucking affair, he was hiding some woman’s knickers in his sock, he bankrupted the family idk I shouldn’t fucking care. Sometimes I think I hear him in his office. On the phone he was always half-shouting. He didn’t get discretion even though he was always plotting some stupid deal. Sometimes I wake up at four o’clock in the morning and I can hear someone down there. It might be my mam. She misses him too.

Holly: Don’t shoot the messenger lol.

So I tried Holly’s birthday. It didn’t work. I texted her. Not you anyway.

Holly: LOL didn’t expect. Did you get fourteen out?

Me: Nope. Think there’s a mistake in the book.

We were talking about Maths.