The House that Jack Built

by Catherine Barry

  When David had had his bedtime story and showed signs of falling asleep, I made my move. On his windowsill was his piggy bank. Jill had given it to him as a christening gift, and it had cost a fair few shillings. It was made of crystal and beautifully decorated. It even had his name and date of birth engraved at the bottom.

  I bit my lip. I turned it upside down and then back up. There was no way of getting the money out. There must be! I shook it, I banged it, I tried slipping a knife in the tiny slit, but nothing came out. There was only one other course of action. I contemplated it. The two voices were competing for first place. I let them battle it out.

  You absolutely cannot and will not break this precious object.

  Break it. It’s only a fucking savings box.

  Jill gave it to him.

  You can buy him another.

  It’s one of a kind and of sentimental value.

  Ah crap! He doesn’t even look at it, most days.

  It’s his money; it contains all the money his family has given him down the years. You can’t.

  You can. You can replace it, and the money, when you have it.

  You have no conscience, girl. You’re going to smash it open for the sake of a few drinks?

  Anyone would want a drink after today.

  Shame on you, you’re despicable.

  Ah fuck you! You don’t know what it’s like!

  Go on then. Break it. Break it!

  I smashed the crystal box against the kitchen wall. It broke easily, its tiny pieces spraying my hand. The coins rolled all over the floor. I picked them up quickly, before I started to think again. My fingers were bleeding and my hand was shaking. I grabbed some kitchen roll and wrapped it around them. Then I put on my coat and checked in on David before I left. I knew it was wrong to leave him alone, but he was fine, fast asleep. Nothing would happen. Besides, I would only be gone for a few minutes.

  I ran to the off-licence and bought some cans. I had enough for some more so I threw in a bottle of Bacardi as well. Then I bought some Coke and cigarettes. I passed the Chinese take-away on the way back home. I was hungry but I was not going to give in. I was not going to go down that road tonight. I was tired of being fat. Besides, I had very little money left. I would need it for tomorrow night. I wouldn’t drink so much if I weren’t so depressed over my weight. I knew I had a problem with my weight. That was my problem. If I could address that, everything else would fall into place. Just for tonight, I was not giving in.

  I arrived back at the flat, breathless and scrambling for my keys. As I let myself in, I could hear the telephone ringing. I rushed to answer it before it woke up David.

  ‘Hello, Jack.’ It was Matt.

  Fuck. ‘Hello,’ I answered coolly. I grabbed a can from the brown paper bag and opened it while I held the phone under my chin.

  ‘What happened, Jack?’

  ‘What do you mean?’ I was determined to play dumb.

  ‘You know what I mean. Why did you leave so quickly last night? I went after you, but you had disappeared. Did I do something wrong?’

  The smarmy fuck. He knew quite well what he had done wrong. Well, two could play at that game.

  ‘Of course not, Matt. I just had to get back quickly, for David and all that.’ I drank between talking.

  ‘Wasn’t he with a baby-sitter?’

  Clever boy. ‘Yes. Yes, he was, but I had to get back to prepare him for bed. If he doesn’t get his night-time story, he becomes very cranky — won’t go asleep without it, you know what they’re like.’ Stick that in your Freudian cap, you pox.

  ‘Funny, you seemed distinctly upset about something.’

  Long pause.

  ‘You know, Matt, I’ve thought about it all day. I’m not sure I want to continue with the course.’

  ‘Why not?’ he said flatly.

  ‘Ah, I’ve done it all before, really.’

  ‘That’s a pity. I really thought you’d enjoy it. You seemed to be enjoying it.’

  Suddenly something dawned on me. Hey, wait a minute! If I don’t continue with this course he’ll know why I quit. That will only give him even more satisfaction. Then he’ll really know how I feel about him. I’d be crazy to stop now. I’ll show the bastard — I’ll finish it. Yeah, just to spite him, I’ll finish the fucking stupid bastarding thing. Why should I let him interfere? I was enjoying it, until Brian had made his remarks.

  ‘Jack, are you still there?’

  ‘Why did you ask me to do the course, Matt? I’m very interested to know.’ My voice had gone up, without my permission. I was really angry and the alcohol was weakening my defences.

  ‘Because I care about you, why else?’ he said quietly.

  I was gobsmacked. ‘You care about me?’

  ‘Sure I do. Don’t you know that?’

  ‘No, not really.’ Don’t do this to me now. I am angry, do you hear me? I am fucking angry! You zuill not make me cry. God knows you did all those years ago. You bastard.

  I was fanning my rage deliberately; it always masked my hurt. I could recall all my feelings from when I was that innocent sixteen-year-old. I had never had a chance to tell him what I felt. I wanted to so much now. The cans of lager were strengthening my steely resolve.

  ‘I always cared about you, Jack,’ he said. ‘Why else would I bother to be phoning you, even now?’

  I hadn’t thought about that. I was softening again. I had to get off the phone, before I said anything I would regret.

  ‘Look, Matt, I appreciate you calling, but David is awake — I can hear him. Perhaps I’ll give it one more shot, next week. I’ll talk to you then, OK?’

  He heaved a sigh of relief down the phone. I heaved a sigh of relief down the phone.

  It was possible I had mistaken Matt after all.

  The following morning, I awoke to the phone ringing. It was 8am. Who the hell was calling me this early?

  ‘Hello?’ I answered, dehydrated and bleary-eyed.

  ‘It’s Jill.’ I could barely hear her with the noise in the background.

  ‘Jill? It’s eight o’clock in the morning. What’s wrong?’ I asked. Just then, David came running in from the bedroom, clutching the remains of his savings box. My heart missed a beat. Slowly, the previous night’s memories began to surface.

  Jill was chattering away hurriedly. ‘I’m on my way to San Francisco, and I’m passing through duty free. I thought you might want some cigarettes or stuff. I can get them for a steal.’

  David offered me the broken piggy bank. A lone tear rolled down his cheek. Our eyes locked. Can he see the truth?

  I held the phone under my chin and took the broken pieces solemnly. I heard my conscience trying to get through. No. I can’t go there.

  ‘What happened, David?’ the liar asked.

  ‘I don’t know.’ He looked at me, searching for some explanation. A lump was making its way towards my throat. Let me out! Let me out! I swallowed hard. Go away. I refuse to listen.

  ‘It must have been the bogey man,’ the liar answered.

  David stared up at me with his big trusting eyes. ‘The bogeyman?’ he whispered. Now I had terrified him.

  ‘I heard him last night, you know,’ the liar continued. ‘I got the brush in the kitchen and chased him all the way to Clontarf. Then I smacked his arse with it and he ran away begging for mercy.’

  David’s mouth turned upwards. A reluctant smile crept across his face.

  He looked at the broken pieces. I looked at him looking at the broken pieces.

  ‘Jack? Jack, are you listening to me?’ Jill was yelling down the phone.

  ‘I’ll buy you another one, sweetie, OK?’

  He nodded. I watched him turn on his soft soles and ramble out of the room.

  ‘Yes, I’m listening,’ I shouted back to Jill.

  ‘I saw Joe yesterday,’ she said matter-of-factly.

  ‘Did he ask about me?’ I asked.

  ‘No.
Why would he ask me about you?’ she said. ‘Are you OK? You sound a bit funny.’

  ‘It’s too early in the morning for this,’ I said wearily. As soon as I got her off the phone I crawled back into bed. It was the only safe place. Sleep temporarily turned my brain off.

  The little voice, too.

  Chapter 11

  In the days that followed, I studied the handout given to me at the course. I read the instructions: Describe your parents’ background, as much as you know. Give details of your earliest memories of your childhood. It would take me for ever to do this, I thought, but I was determined to do it, now more than ever. I tried to put Matt out of my mind, but it was difficult. Everything was difficult. I desperately wanted to talk to Joe. I knew I could not keep turning to him like a lover. He was not my lover. I wasn’t even sure if he was still my friend. He was certainly unavailable to me, no matter which way I looked at it. At the first opportunity, I took my notepad down to the local library, where I knew there would be little interference. Once I started, I could not stop.

  Welcome to my past. A place so vivid that amnesia itself would be unable to erase it.

  Pondering my parents’ beginnings, I found it a good idea to start just there. My father, William Joyce, hailed from a small one-horse town called Ballincullen on the outskirts of Tipperary. It was a remote little place. The Joyces were staunch Republicans. My father’s father delighted in telling them stories from the Brotherhood days. Dad passed them on to us. They lived in an old ex-British Army barracks, complete with courtyard in the back. My father kept us enraptured with yams about the Black and Tans, and the ‘Flying Columns’ hiding in the coal bunker. He left home at the age of sixteen to come and live in Dublin. Shortly afterwards, he went for his first and last interview for a job.

  He ‘worked the bricks’ for Coras lompar Eireann for a total of nineteen years. This was a polite made-up title for the cruder and more honest definition. What he really did was shovel shit from under the train carriages, after they had departed for their destination. Later on, in his mid-thirties, he was given a white-collar job in their offices, and had remained there ever since.

  My mother, on the other hand, was a true blue Dub. She came from Church Street in Dublin city as had all her descendants before her. Unlike Dad, she had plans, ideals, dreams. She wanted to be something and was willing to go to any lengths to achieve it. Christened Margaret, the family soon shortened it to Meta. Meta O’Leary set out in life to be different and ended up the same as everybody else. The only difference with Meta was she did not accept her fate with humility. According to Mam’s testimony, which we heard every Christmas around the dinner-table, the pair met at the Galway Races. Meta had been ‘stepping out’ with a local boy from the inner city. An engagement was on the cards, but nothing had been settled.

  Dad was smitten from the word go. He boldly introduced himself, ignoring her current beau. Meta was flattered. She was delighted to be the centre of attention, the object of rivalry. She was enjoying the game. When they returned to Dublin, Dad pursued her like a bitch on heat. He contacted her again and they commenced a serious courtship. Meta was happy to play one suitor off against the other. Eventually, Dad won. Alas, it was a short-lived victory, for he had won her hand under dubious circumstances.

  The happy couple had spent a night down at the canal, snogging. The snogging must have escalated into a full-scale romp, for some weeks later Meta discovered she had ‘a bun in the oven’. Her predicament was evident. Her parents, on hearing the news, were disgusted and ordered William to do the right thing and marry her immediately. Three weeks later, the couple were married up a side altar, at nine o’clock in the morning.

  They had a cup of tea and my dad went back to work. Mam was sixteen, Dad a year older. I was only a dot, so to speak. A twinkle in the milkman’s eye.

  The new Mr and Mrs Joyce bought a house in Clontarf, compliments of a wedding gift from William’s parents. The house had cost a whopping £2,500 — an astronomical sum in the early 1960s. It was one of forty, tucked away in a small cul-de-sac and surrounded by nothing but wilderness. Had I been able to choose my own home, I would still have chosen Clontarf. I had access to the seafront and the beach, plus St Anne’s Park with its miles of open space, ponds, hills, nooks and crannies. It was a child’s heaven. A paradise in my own back yard.

  Still, all was not well in the Joyce household. The stage had been set for discord and resentment. It was always a case of ‘anger on ice’. Each parent trying their best to keep their broken dreams to themselves.

  Mam had a pretty good singing voice. On the rare occasion when she forgot about herself she would let out a bar or two. Secretly she had wanted to sing in the big showbands that travelled Ireland. Dad had hoped to go back to school, and perhaps even go to college.

  There was no way any of that was ever going to happen now. They had been plunged into parenthood way before their time. Still only teenagers, they were suddenly expected to cope alone, fulfil their marriage vows and take to their new posts like cats do to cream. Their dreams had been shattered beyond repair. My mother was to spend the whole of her life raising children. Sacrificing her every wish and want in order to keep the family going. In those days, mothers were expected to be mothers. Nothing else.

  I was born in Holies Street Hospital. Had I known what lay in store for me, it might have been wiser to have crawled back in. God had other plans, however, and He decided that I should live. My mother coped as best she could. Within weeks she was pregnant again, only she miscarried. Three months later Jason was conceived. He arrived safely too but the reception was less rapturous. Then another miscarriage. Dad was giving her a good run for her money.

  There wasn’t any such thing as contraception and the Church denounced it always. The Church ruled, and that was that. They tried the ‘Billings Method’, she told me much later, but soon another pregnancy was announced. So much for methods. It was pretty obvious from very early on that she was carrying twins. They arrived, half alive, in the seventh month of my mother’s pregnancy. Desmond was pipped at the post ten minutes previously by my sister Rachel. They were equally frail and struggling to hold on to life’s breath. They weighed in at a paltry one pound each — together, the equivalent of a bag of sugar. Their sweetness, however, was erased in the following hours as doctors desperately attempted to keep them alive. Those must have been terrible days for poor Mum and Dad. Both babies were read their last rites shortly after the birth.

  My parents kept a bedside vigil. Neither man nor medicine were expected to prolong those early hours of life. Thirty-six hours later, Desmond passed away. His tiny lungs were unable to sustain him. Rachel’s survival, while miraculous, was hardly compensation. Mam and Dad had created a No Man’s Land between them. The house became a virtual prison. If I could only get out on parole now and again, I would survive, I kept thinking. There were silences that lasted for weeks. Then, like volcanoes, they would sporadically explode, each blaming the other and never actually discussing the real problem. The ‘Desmond’ word was forbidden.

  In our house, everything had a purpose and function. Everything. Except feelings, of course. They were left outside along with the dustbins, for the dogs to piss on. My mother was on fire with resentment. She had not planned to be left alone with three small children. It must have been very difficult for her. She was expected to cope alone with her grief. She fulfilled her obligations in total isolation: asking anybody for help was a direct admission of helplessness — evidence to suggest weakness. So many women suffered like that, in silence. I couldn’t fathom, now, how they did it.

  Contemplating the tragedy I put my pen down. The story seemed like somebody else’s; it was tinged with great sadness but also with misunderstanding. My family had been shrouded in unexpressed grief for years. Now I was feeling the sorrow all over again. The library was quiet and peaceful. As always in moments of peace I felt my old self resurface. I looked around me, hoping for a distraction. The
library assistant was stamping returned books. People moved slowly along the aisles, pausing to browse through a book and then replace it on the shelf. I wanted to stop writing, put my coat on and head over to the chipper. Instead, my inner voice prompted me to continue.

  Suddenly, Desmond hung about me like a damp night air. It was too sad to dwell on. I changed thought formation and went searching for some cheerful childhood memories. I racked my brains for lighter recollections.

  They weren’t long in coming back. I took up my pen again and reapplied myself to the task in hand.

  We never had a single solitary carpet until 1978. We had lino, in our sitting room, hall, and in our kitchen. My siblings and I used to amuse ourselves by stripping down to our stockinged feet. One would stand at the front end of the hall, another at the far end. We would take a dive, run as fast as we could to pick up speed, and slide from one end of the hall to the other, frequently landing on our backsides. Our bedroom floors were covered in ‘Tintawn’ a cheap rough duplicate of the next best thing to real carpet. In our room we had a set of bunkbeds. There was a battle nightly between me and Jason over who got to sleep on the top. I always won, being the eldest. Our younger sister Rachel, the surviving twin, had a room of her own on the other side of my parents’ bedroom. She seemed to cry incessantly. We hated her because she got so much attention.

  Jason and I weren’t particularly close. He had his friends and I had mine. We went to the local National School which was just a short walk from our house. I remember my first day, and standing in ‘An Lina’. The mornings were dark and damp. I wore a bright orange armband and my uniform trailed along the ground. It was supposed to last for a number of years. I looked like a midget wearing a circus tent. I don’t remember being scared, but I was excited. I saw my mother wave goodbye at the railings outside as I took my first steps into the grown-ups’ world.