Awakening the Gods

by Kristin Gleeson

  The door burst open and a couple spilled out on to him, pushing him back a few steps.

  “Sorry, sorry,” said the young lad, his companion nodding in agreement. He held the door open for Smithy. “You’re going in, yeah?”

  “Yeah,” Smithy said. “Thanks.”

  He strode through the door like he’d meant it, like the two lads had collided into him and prevented him from his original purpose. He saw a few familiar faces and nodded to them, studying the crowd as though he wasn’t avoiding looking over at the section where the session attendees usually gathered. It wasn’t an easy strategy, since the section wasn’t too far back from the entrance, but he felt up to the job with the amount of people gathered, glasses lifted and conversation flowing.

  “Smithy!” came a cry from the section his eyes had avoided, and the strategy collapsed for the useless bit of junk it was. Any soldier would have known that. He sighed and inwardly acknowledged his pathetic failure for what it was—a half wish only, to be unseen yet seen, and made his way over the tables, a smile plastered on his face. He gave nods to each one of them. It was a way to progressively discover who was here and who wasn’t.

  “How’s things, how’re you keeping” as well as direct names were given to Liam, Gearóid, Daragh, Aoife and Eilís. No Saoirse or even Maura, though he wasn’t certain if Maura had ever bothered to come to this session. He’d never seen her. He found a stool and pulled it up beside Aoife, who was busy tipping the moisture out of her flute. Daragh was on Smithy’s other side, fiddling with the tuning on a guitar that was so sensitive to the humidity changes he nearly had to tune during any given set.

  “Not seen you for a while there, Smithy,” said Daragh.

  “Yeah, busy with work,”

  “All that smithcraft,” said Aoife, pronouncing the last word with slow emphasis.

  She flipped her mid length fair hair over her shoulder and crossed her legs. It was nearly flirtatious and Smithy looked at her uneasily. Aoife was probably in her mid to late twenties, and grand enough, but Smithy never really saw anything but a good musician who sometimes had good banter. Daragh, on the other hand was interesting. He had pale eyes and face full of earnest concentration in whatever he did and always he did it well. He was a luthier of sorts and Smithy liked that and the conversations that interest prompted. Daragh’s guitar was one of his own and he treasured it like Smithy imagined he would his three-year-old son.

  “Yeah, smithcraft,” said Smithy. “As the name says.”

  “Not a joke, no,” said Aoife and she grinned.

  Smithy gave a small smile. “No.”

  He reached down for his fiddle case and began the job of unpacking it, conscious of Aoife’s regard.

  “Hey now, Smithy,” said Gearóid as he fiddled with the buttons on his concertina. “Have you any new tunes for us this evening? That last one was cracking.”

  Smithy shrugged. “Don’t know. We’ll see.”

  “Ah, surely you have a tune for us,” said Aoife. She nudged Smithy with her elbow. “You know I love learning a new tune from you.”

  “I know that?” asked Smithy. Her tone was playful, but he couldn’t help the edge that had come to his. “Of course I do.”

  She laughed, refusing the edge and re-directing it towards her own agenda. “You’re a dote, Smithy. Of course you have one. No need to be coy.”

  “Smithy has no coy about him, do you me lad?” said Liam. He gave them both an amused look and waggled his bushy white brows suggestively.

  “And none about you, you old lecher,” said Smithy. He forced a laugh and then began the business of tuning his fiddle. The concentration of it, the single-minded dedication to its perfection would surely be evident to all who watched him. And then, by the grace of the land and all that’s holy, someone would strike up a tune and they could get on with the business of playing the music.

  Someone took pity on him, because he’d hardly finished the tuning when they took off with a favourite set of polkas with a precision and lilt that eased his tension. He felt it enough that it took him away and even allowed him to wink at Eilís, who was doing her own little flourish on her fiddle. She gave a grin that lit up her round flushed face and her stout foot beat out the rhythm even stronger. He heard a few whoops from the crowd and some had stopped their talk and bobbed their heads instead, beating out time instead of words. This was the feel of it, the craic of it all and his tension eased even further. Thoughts and decisions were put to the side, or even far back in his mind where all the other ones kept company and told jokes at his expense. Ah the pure joy of it, the pure drop of it, he thought as the music flowed and the set moved on. He caught the eyes of some friends and gathered up his nods, thumbs ups and even a few winks until he saw her face and the rest of her hovering uncertainly at the edge of the group. The door, he’d forgotten the door. How stupid to face the door when you could play the music and scan the crowd and know that you had them all in the palm of your hand. Until she stood hovering there uncertainly, so there was no avoiding, no denying she’d come. Saoirse. Saoirse with her hair loose and wild about her, framing her fine-boned face.

  She saw Smithy and her face lit up and that lit him up. Suddenly, he was glad for the heat and the fug that made him as red as he ever could be, so there was no evidence of the effect she had on him. His face must have shown something of the joy that rang through him, because she moved forward and the music stopped. Or rather the set finished, but for him it was as though the music itself recognised this was a moment that should be marked as she moved towards him and greeted him.

  “Smithy, hey.”

  He nodded and found a foolish grin had slapped itself across his face.

  “Who’s your friend there, Smithy?” asked Liam.

  His brow set off on another waggle and Smithy tried to get hold of himself.

  “This is Saoirse. She’s a musician,” Smithy managed to say.

  “We can see the case, Smithy,” said Gearóid, his voice amused.

  “What is it you play?” Liam asked Saoirse.

  “And are you any good?” asked Aoife and then she laughed. Like wasn’t it all a joke, but Smithy felt the darkness of it and suppressed the urge to kick her.

  “Don’t mind her,” said Smithy, forcing a light tone. “She plays no favourites, she’s rude to everyone.”

  “Come sit down and join us, so,” said Gearóid. “There’s another stool there behind Smithy. Smithy, Aoife, make a space for the newcomer.”

  Aoife threw him a glance but shifted her stool and Smithy watched as Saoirse dragged the one behind him up alongside him. She nodded to Aoife, her manner polite, but her arms were close to her side like she wanted to contain herself, or even put herself into the smallest space possible. But the space was there and it overlapped his, to his utter joy and consternation.

  He smiled and nodded at her, trying to give her the encouragement he knew she needed in this strange pub among musicians unknown to her.

  “They’re all grand,” said Smithy in a whisper to her. “You’re well up to their standard and more. Get yourself set up and you’ll see.”

  “Thanks,” she said.

  She smiled again, her hazel eyes wide and filled with gratitude. She took off her jacket and shook out her hair and Smithy was nearly undone all over again. He looked away, and Aoife caught his glance, her face filled with puzzlement and a mixture of other emotions Smithy didn’t even want to contemplate. He took a deep breath and started to twist the pegs of his fiddle. Anything to distract him. Distraction was his current strategy, and it was as effective as a cobweb against a storm. He plucked a string and turned the peg. Pluck, twist, pluck, twist. He mimed the words in his head and couldn’t help but think of others that rhymed. Her scent drifted over and he tried to analyse it, since the distraction approach was obviously abandoned before it had ever really begun, being the failure it was always meant to be. Jasmine? No, she wasn’t one of those types. He thought on. Not musk or flowers, but something el
se and oh, the dead purity of it. The singularity of her scent and he thought, no. It’s the numbers game, so. He started counting prime numbers and as the numbers rose in his mind, so did other parts of his body.

  “Let’s have another tune, then,” said Smithy in desperation.

  “Why don’t you give us one, Smithy,” said Gearóid.

  “Oh, yes,” said Aoife.

  “Yeah,” Liam said. “You know how Aoife just loves it when you give her a tune.” He laughed with his mouth open and Smithy nearly counted all the teeth he’d dearly loved to knock out at that moment.

  “Ah, no,” said Smithy. “There’s nothing that’s come to me now. We should play one we all know. Give Saoirse a feel for the group and then she can join in.”

  “Oh, yeah, of course,” said Liam.

  With a word to Gearóid the two of them were off and the others following. Smithy pulled his bow across the strings, joining in with a gusto built of the relief of the music and the pace of the tune. Beside him he could hear Saoirse joining in and then Aoife who managed somehow to get the notes angry and aggressive. Oh, for feck’s sake, thought Smithy. Will she just leave it alone and enjoy the music. The frustration and annoyance were good and he held on to it for a short while before the music and the playing took him over, and it wasn’t the strident notes of Aoife’s flute that wound their way inside him, but the lyrical clear tones of Saoirse’s playing. It joined his fiddle and they danced around together, exchanging bows, circling and swinging like the partners they always were and were always meant to be. It was a tryst of the most flirtatious and bewitching kind. A tryst that you never wanted to end but knew that time and circumstance would part you all too soon.

  Smithy let it happen. At least that’s what he told himself, though he knew deep down inside there was no choice on his part, ever. It was as inevitable as any two things or happenings could be and he could only wonder and hope that it might be even a fraction the same for her. He daren’t look at her to check, the disappointment would be something to unbearable on any day or circumstance, he just blindly stared across the pub, his bowing fluid, the music alive.

  The music wound down, as it would of course, but the dancing and weaving rhythm in his body still moved and twined inside him, coursing like two hares in the madness of March. He took the fiddle from his chin and stared at his feet, trying to breathe. But the breath of him was gone. It was the hand on his arm that brought him to himself.

  “Are you okay?” asked Saoirse, her eyes wide, filled with concern and something else.

  It was the something else that caused him to look away again.

  “I’m grand. Nothing to worry about. ” He made himself look at her and smile.

  “That was great craic,” said Saoirse, her smile widening. Her eyes were sparkling and full of excitement. “Don’t you think? I’ve never experienced anything like it. Like Inchigeela, only better. You were on fire. It was as though our instruments had a mind of their own.”

  “Yeah,” said Smithy. He nodded weakly. “Something like that.”

  “Smithy is a real talent,” said Aoife.

  She reached around Saoirse and squeezed his arm. It lingered there for a moment and Smithy wanted to shake it off.

  “Come on then Eilís, give us a song,” said Liam.

  “Oh, yes,” said Aoife. “You must give us a song.”

  “Does Your Mother Know You’re Out,” said Gearóid. “Give us that one.”

  “You want that song?” said Eilís. She shook her head and laughed. “Really?”

  “It’s a great song,” said Gearóid.

  “It is,” said Daragh. “My own lad is learning it.”

  “Your lad?” said Eilís. “I can’t see that. Who’s making him, you?”

  Daragh laughed. “No, you’re wrong there. It’s school.”

  “No, that can’t be right,” said Eilís.

  “It’s just a song,” said Aoife.

  “It’s local,” said Daragh. “That’s the reason and nothing more.”

  “Come on, now,” said Gearóid. “You sing it well.”

  Eilís shrugged. She closed her eyes a moment to find the note. Once found, she opened her eyes and began the song. It was a lively one, full of humour and innuendo. The pub crowd quieted and listened to it, roaring approval when required and a few whoops to back it up.

  Smithy enjoyed it too. It gave him space to breathe, time to collect his wits and rein in his body which was having too much to say up to this point. He could still feel Saoirse’s presence beside him, and her scent had taken up residence inside him. She held her flute in her lap and her hands played absently with the levers and the more he tried not to think about her fingers, her hands and the flute that she held, busily tapping and fiddling, the more it invaded his consciousness, the traitorous beast that it was. She licked her lips and the fingers kept tapping. She brushed her hair back from her right shoulder. The hair brushed his arm in the process and though he had the cloth of his shirt between his skin and her hair, it was as though every strand was touching him directly.

  The song ended, but not the pure agony of his longing. He blinked and looked at the door, willing himself to get up and go outside, have a cigarette that he never smoked and do something to escape all this. All this that he knew was bad. All this that he’d never felt before but was certain wouldn’t end well, because you could never risk something this intense with a mortal. Isn’t that what Smithy knew? Isn’t that what he’d seen others try, only to have it result in a grief that was deep and terrible? He sighed. To have lived this long and only now want it, when he knew all its pitfalls. His pure love for Bríd, the knowledge that he didn’t deserve her, let alone anyone else, had protected him in the past, why not now?

  He looked at Saoirse as if trying to puzzle out what it was that had made it happen now, even when he knew, deep down inside what it was. The flame coloured hair, not exactly like Bríd’s, but close enough. The eye colour was close with its hazel colour, though the shade was darker. Her frame was more slender, less full breasted than Bríd’s. She was tall, but not quite as tall. Her facial features were sharper, the nose wasn’t quite the same. But all in all it was close enough, he supposed.

  Saoirse, catching his glance, smiled at him again, her eyes soft.

  “Thanks,” she mouthed.

  “For what?”

  “For suggesting this. For being so good about it when I came.”

  He nodded, not knowing what else to say. His own stupidity was the reason he’d found himself in this state. Nothing else. He sighed.

  The song finished to the clapping all round and a few shouts of praise. Eilís nodded and smiled and Gearóid beamed like a Fear an Tí who knows his crowd, because it was his idea to sing the song.

  When the clapping died away and the chat resumed, Saoirse leaned across towards Eilís.

  “What a song,” she said. “I’d love to learn it. The humour in it. Perfect. I’d love to sing it up in Dublin sometime.”

  Smithy heard Dublin. He heard the ‘going back’ inference of the speech and again he reminded himself of the sheer stupidity of doing anything with what he was feeling. A feeling that he was about to halt with the getting up. With the walking outside. With the breathing deep and chatting and maybe even that never before cigarette. His feet started to get to grips with the floor. Sure, he could do this.

  “Saoirse, you sing as well?” said Liam. “We’d love to hear you. Come, now give us an air, while the crowd is here and the feeling with us.”

  “No, I don’t think so,” she said, shyly. “You don’t want to hear my songs. Yours are all so pure and local. I’m only a singer off of what I hear on the recording or YouTube, like.”

  “You’re fine, you are,” said Liam. “Sing what you will, it’s grand.”

  “Yes,” said Eilís. “Don’t mind me. I’ve been hearing and singing these songs for longer than you’ve been alive. It’d be nice to hear you, whatever you have to sing.”

  S
mithy halted, torn between what he knew to be best and his absolute desire to hear her, even though he was more than certain it would tear at his soul.

  “Yes,” said Aoife, tightly. “You must sing. Go on away, now.”

  Saoirse glanced at Aoife and her eyes sharpened. Smithy could see the look and understood it meant she would sing, now.

  She looked to the distance to find the note in her head and before Smithy could even prepare himself, put up the guard that must be erected if only for himself and his sanity, she began to sing. He sighed with the first note and as the song unfurled in its aching beauty he went inside himself, to join the music as the haunting melody of An Binsin Luachra wrapped itself around him. He sank into the rhythmic sea of it and even before he knew what he was about, he lifted the fiddle and pulled the bow softly across the strings, weaving the supporting web that carried the melody along—whisper thin, but with a tensile strength.

  By the time the song finished Smithy knew he was lost. He lowered his fiddle and saw that Liam had played the flute as well. The pub was silent, marking the moment with the reverence it deserved and Smithy shook his head. Saoirse tugged his sleeve.

  “Thank you,” she said.

  “It’s me who should be thanking you,” he said. “All of us should be thanking you.”

  The words came out of him, but he really wasn’t noticing. She stared at him, her eyes wide, a small curve on her mouth as though she’d just discovered something that she’d not expected.

  “You’ve no need to be shy about your singing,” said Eilís.

  “You don’t at all,” said Liam. “No, you were grand. You are definitely invited again.”

  They all laughed. Not Smithy though, whose own thoughts would second and third the idea that she might be here again and leave aside the inference that she would return to Dublin. But his heart and soul were otherwise occupied in a war with his mind that kept warning him to get up and take himself outside.