Call Me the Breeze

by Patrick McCabe

  Shardless.

  Incident in the Fuck Me Hotel

  That was the day I went around to the Fuck Me, which, as I realized now, was how they referred to the hotel all the time. They never called it the ‘Lakeland Towers’ or even ‘the hotel’. All you ever heard them saying was: ‘I’m off around to the Fuck Me now,’ or ‘Do you fancy a drink in the Fuck Me?’

  It was the first and last time I ever went into it, though. I didn’t know Jacy was working there. In fact, when I saw her behind the bar, I really got quite a shock, and I found myself praying it wasn’t because of me and what I’d done. Her face was pale and her eyes were tired, her once blonde hair lank on her shoulders. I was just coming across the floor, thinking how funny it was, all these smart suits with their laptop computers, demanding ‘decaffeinated’ in the Fuck Me hotel. Except that when she caught my eye, it very soon stopped being funny. I turned on my heel. I made it out into the street, but sweating, you know?

  The next time I saw her was outside the same building, on the day that the Taoiseach visited with a bunch of politico dignitaries. I don’t know what it was about — something to do with financial opportunities for local businesses within the European Community. There were shiny polished state cars parked all the way down the street, and Boyle Henry and his wife were in the back seat of one. Or, should I say, Senator Boyle Henry. I stood in the alleyway and watched the proceedings. He helped her out of the car and held the door open for her, then they all went inside. The Lady Doc was on crutches and had aged quite considerably too. But not so much as Jacy, who was there too, although you wouldn’t have known it from Boyle’s reaction. She might as well not have existed.

  I saw them together another time. A couple of weeks after that, in fact, one wet night on my way home from the shopping centre, chomping on a cheeseburger and fries. It was late, and I was on the verge of running away as soon as I heard voices. They were coming from the entry at the back of Doc Oc’s, and straight away when I heard them I knew who it was. I was on the verge of bursting into tears, to tell you the God’s honest truth, and wanted to get out of there as fast as I could but wasn’t able to help myself. I could hear him whispering: ‘I love you, Jacy!’, and it was then that I heard her crying. Every nerve end in my body was tingling as I edged further into the shadows then saw them there, standing underneath the porch light. Her skirt was bunched up around her waist and he was thrusting into her, in and out. Her head was thrown back and I could see her face — so pale. Her mouth was open and her eyes were empty.

  ‘I love you!’ I heard him say again, before he groaned and collapsed on top of her.

  My heart was thumping as I heard her say — her head was lying on his shoulder now and her cheeks were streaked with tears — ‘I always knew you’d never leave her. I always knew!’

  ‘Ssh, baby!’ I heard him say, and I could smell the smoke of the Hamlet as a wisp of it went drifting by.

  ‘There were times I’d have done anything to be able to make myself leave you!’ she said.

  ‘Don’t talk like that, Jacy!’ he said.

  ‘All the years I’ve been with you, you promised me that!’

  ‘And I will, I promise you! I just can’t do it right now! She’s not been well!’

  ‘Stop it, Boyle, don’t lie any more. I know you’re just using me. That any time you snap your fingers, you know that I’ll —’

  She got all choked up then and he comforted her.

  ‘Please, treat me with some respect,’ she said, and I heard him kissing her. I couldn’t help myself. My head jutted out and I saw him pecking at her neck.

  ‘I love you, Jacy,’ he whispered, ‘and there’s nothing I’d love more than to spend more time with you! You know that! You know that, don’t you?’

  ‘I love you, Boyle!’ I heard her reply. ‘God forgive me, but I love you so much!’

  It broke my heart. I couldn’t bear to listen any more. I went stumbling home in the dark, and time and my name and my place in the world, they meant nothing to me at all. For all of that night and a long time afterwards.

  The ‘Can Do’ Approach

  There wasn’t much cash, of course. In the Youth in Action Creative Arts Awareness Scheme, I mean. But, like I said to Fr Connolly, you don’t get involved in the creative arts for money. Just seeing the excitement on the kids’ faces when you were banging on about ideas — plus the actual projects you managed to see through to fruition — was more than enough reward. I went at it with an energy I didn’t know I possessed. ‘This is the harbour!’ I’d say to myself as I barrelled down the corridor laden down with books and guides and arts brochures, whatever. ‘This is the harbour — it was here all along!’

  The first thing I did was inspect the video studio which, I was informed by my supervisor, Eddie, I would have the use of. The equipment available to me, he told me, apart from the editing console, included three Panasonic AG456 SVHS camcorders, one DV Steadi-Cam, a Lowell and Strand Century light kit, four Olympus digital still cameras, a vast array of microphones, assorted video monitors and a Mackie eight-channel mixer. All I had to do was sign for it with my supervisor and book the studio whenever I needed it. ‘Excellent,’ I said, for I was absolutely delighted.

  I also had at my disposal a small office, little more than a broom cupboard, really, but with laptop computer facilities and a telephone/ fax machine. So, I mean, what more could you ask for? I picked up the phone and went to work straight away. I shuffled my papers, scanning my movie treatment as I waited to get put through to Principle Management. Of course, at first I got the usual old spiel: ‘Bono and the boys are in Miami …’ I mean, they’re still in Miami? Give me a break, you know?

  But, I suppose, what with having a new kind of — what would you call it? — legitimacy, I suppose, it didn’t bother me in the slightest. No, for this was it, the real thing, not like prison where you often felt that even with the best will in the world they were only allowing you to do certain things to take your mind off topping yourself. But here you could tell they trusted you. There was nothing like that on their minds at all. This was a normal, ordinary environment, with people coming and going about their workaday business, where you felt connected to the world as it lived and breathed! And, because of the confidence and trust invested in me — and just that little bit of power, I guess! — I had decided on a whole new way of dealing with things. A ‘can do’ approach as opposed to a ‘Yes! I’ll see that it’s done before Christmas’ type one.

  Which entailed not wasting your time chewing the ass off someone who had no fucking influence, and biding your time — with immense patience and good manners — until you did get through to the head honcho.

  ‘This is Wonderful Pictures here in Scotsfield,’ I’d say. ‘We have currently a number of projects in development and would like to offer a part in one of them to Bono. Also, we’re interested in the use of “Where the Streets Have No Name” on the soundtrack of one of these, provisionally entitled Jellyman!, dealing partly with the political troubles in Ireland in the mid-seventies, and partly a love story. I was wondering —’

  ‘As I said, sir, Bono and the boys are currently …’

  That was the usual line. But I was ready for it. More than ready for it this time, señor …

  ‘We may be approaching Joni Mitchell for the female lead,’ I said without blinking.

  ‘Joni Mitchell?’ you’d hear then. That always got them going.

  When I had all my phone calls made and any other little bits of business attended to, I’d sit down and type up some ideas (you want to see the little laptop! Talk about state of the art! I don’t know how many times I nearly busted it, but I got the hang of it in the end!). All sorts of jazz, including some lightweight stuff too. Because one thing I was beginning to realize was that you couldn’t be writing heavy shit all the time. You needed to give your brain time to ‘chill out’ from all the effort that went into making ‘real art’, or whatever you might like to call it. ‘Scotsfield! An I
nvestigation!’, ‘The Troubles!’, ‘Hell Is … 1976!’, ‘Love’ — those were all very well. But they took a lot out of you. There was nothing more enjoyable than just to sit down and forget about all that stuff. Give it a rest for a while. Write about something else. Your favourite album or whatever. It could be anything. Anything you wanted in this wide world. Such as this little nugget. There is a whole fucking box of them sitting here. I practically wrote the whole college magazine myself, in between filming and other activities. ‘Hot Platters’ was a column I really enjoyed, and ‘Celluloid Round-Up’. The kids enjoyed it too, they were always telling you that.

  FAVOURITE MOVIE (FROM: blag, ISSUE 3)

  A lot of the students on campus often come up to me and say: ‘So hey! What’s your favourite movie then, Joey?’, and my reply always takes them by surprise. ‘What’s my favourite movie?’ I say, looking like I’m gonna spend hours considering, you know, but then giving it to ’em right there and then. My favourite movie? There’s no doubt about it at all. It’s A Walk in the Spring Rain with Anthony Quinn and Ingrid Bergman, I guess because it’s always reminded me of older folks around Scotsfield taking walks out by the reservoir. When they had all their lives ahead of them and shit. Not that it means anything much to you kids, for usually you just go away and start blabbing on about Die Hard this and Tom Cruise that. But I urge you, guys, get out there and rent it now! It’s a really tender piece of work! You got it? Till next time — gabba gabba hey!

  (There are all sorts of diary entries and notes from those first few weeks in the college. I had forgotten just how hectic it was, but when you read them all together they build up a fairly accurate picture, although there were a couple of little incidents I’d gone and completely forgotten about, such as the ‘Ciao’ one with the principal — comprehensively detailed amongst the pages of the ‘Community College Ledger’.)

  Ciao!

  On the way out this morning I met Mrs Carmody, the principal. She is running the place like clockwork. Driving her flash car and wearing a real smart suit — chic businesswoman-type. I had a bit of a chat with her, thanking her for her hospitality and everything, and found her great, I have to say. ‘No, Joseph,’ she said, ‘I’m very much in favour of all the arts. I think that in the past we — actually, not just us, but the education system generally — have been remiss in our attention to them. As well as that, of course, there’s the fact that they generate a substantial amount of revenue in Ireland. I mean, so keep up the good work!’

  ‘Sure, Mrs C.!’ I said, ‘Ciao’ — and she gives me this great big smile, beaming away!

  Eureka!

  I remember being in great humour when I got home that day and still in ‘creative mode’ after working on the mag. So straight away I got out the laptop and started hammering away on it like billy-o! Every so often I’d tilt the shaving mirror so I could get a good look at myself working there with the Hamlet cigar in my mouth — ha! Screw you, Boyle Henry! You’re not the only one who enjoys a cigar! — and the caravan full of smoke like I’m one of those guys out of the movie The Front Page, maybe, or, better still, Ernest Hemingway! Although I wasn’t sure if he had smoked Hamlets — or any cigars at all, in fact.

  But who gave a shit? The thing was that work was being done and that one’s ‘creative muse’ was coming along in leaps and bounds. I couldn’t believe I’d been so fortunate in finding a place like the community college. It was like I’d been put on earth for the sole purpose of going about my business working in that place! I couldn’t stop puffing on the cheroot as I thought that. Then I’d hit the keys! Did I mention that I didn’t eat pies any more? Well, I didn’t! Right now I wouldn’t have been able to remember when I’d last had a pie on a plate. And never would again as long as I lived! For I’d discovered the solution: get that motherfucking head right down and focus on those stories. Which were now coming together great! I mean, there I was, sitting down at the table and writing about Mona, and the next thing you know — the story you want to tell, the story that gets to the heart — !

  Eureka! I almost kicked over the table.

  For it was like you could write anything now. It was like you could write a play. A film script! A novel! It was getting like you could write them all at the same time!

  ‘Easy now!’ I said, and puffed on the Hamlet. Then I calmed down.

  I read what I’d just written about Mona.

  ‘Mona Galligan was in love with my father. She aborted her baby and became an alcoholic sometime in the 1950s. Then she drowned herself in the reservoir. I loved her very much and used to go to her house every day. When my mother would be cursing my father. It was with Mona Galligan that I first experienced the hunger for rebirth into a world transformed. They threw her baby — or what was left of it — into the sea off Howth Head in Dublin. She told me that one time when she was drunk. I don’t think she knew she was telling me. They used to call her the Chivers jelly. Mona Chivers jelly was what they would call her because she shook so much with the gin.’

  That’s all I wrote. Which doesn’t matter because I rolled it up and threw it away. And then got down to the real business. The real hard business of me and Jacy.

  As I wrote, I felt like getting up and running away — many times. For I realized now, with each succeeding draft, that I was getting closer and closer to the truth. I remembered reading a piece by James Joyce where he said that, when you write, it’s like what you’re doing is drawing water. You lower the pail into the well of the subconscious and you wait and see what comes up. I was sweating like a pig now and the cigar had long since burnt itself out.

  I could feel what was coming, feel it welling up.

  No sumptuous widescreen Hollywood, no majestic sweeps, no stirring poignancy at all. Just the crisp black-and-white realism of truth. Like a TV documentary from the early seventies. I couldn’t believe my eyes as I read it. I could see the movie in my mind already. This was how it looked:

  The Plan: A Film Treatment by J. Tallon

  We are in a small town in Ireland. It is near the border. There is a lot of excitement in the area today. There has been a constant stream of people arriving since early morning. They have come from all over Ireland and there is talk that some have even come from as far afield as Canada and the United States. Already an RTE camera crew has installed itself in Austie’s Courtyard, in between the old bar and Barbarella’s, where the Peace and Reconciliation Rally is scheduled to take place. Sightings of the major celebrities Mairead Corrigan and Betty Williams, the original founders of the movement, have been enthusiastically reported, but these have not been confirmed for sure. There has also been talk of a well-known BBC commentator arriving, but this also has not been verified as yet. The air of expectation about the place is palpable. Already the burgers and steaks are being ferried in in boxes and stacked up in The Courtyard in preparation for the festivities which will follow the solemn ceremonies. The ‘Poem for Peace’ winning entry has been enlarged and laminated and is on display in the hotel foyer for all to see. Many in the town are proud of what the young girl has written and without reservation share in the sentiments she has expressed, feeling good about it also because it sends out the correct message to the world at large, informing them of the degree of shame which exists in this community as a result of the violence being perpetrated in its name. There are also those who are not only ashamed but also very angry. Especially when news reaches them of another savage murder in Belfast, which has allegedly been committed by a member of the Provisional IRA. Quite a significant percentage of the townspeople harbour a deep animosity towards this organization and, sometimes, perhaps if alcohol has been consumed, they will give vent to these emotions. They will approach well-known people such as Hoss Watson or Sandy McGloin, stare at them for a minute while flicking a cigarette or something, then close one eye and say: ‘So, what’s your game? What is your fucking game? Who do you think you represent?’ Then sometimes there’s a fight, other times there’s not. Hoss might kick back his
chair and snap: ‘No! Who do you represent? I’ve got my war, you’ve got yours! So fuck you! You got yours and I got mine — capiche?’ But whether he does or not there’s a lot of bad blood, you can feel it in the air. Fr Connolly is very proud. Now that the time is drawing near, it makes all those long nights burning the midnight oil seem sort of worth-while. He has been up and down the town all day. Everywhere he goes people stop to congratulate him. ‘It’s a credit to you, Father. A credit to you and a credit to Scotsfield!’ is what they generally say.

  On LLR (Lakeland Local Radio) the DJ is about to interview the Peace People. While he is waiting for them to arrive, he observes that the town could not have hoped for a better day. The temperature right now is close to eighty-three degrees Fahrenheit. Which, he points out, is twenty degrees above normal. ‘Phew!’ he says with a laugh. ‘As I stand here mopping my brow with my handkerchief, folks, I might as well be in Florida it’s so hot down here in Scotsfield!’

  The interview which follows proves to be very moving, and the switchboard is jammed after it. Mairead Corrigan tells him that when she drives from her home outside Strangford to Belfast she often stops to look at an amazing sight: a field! However, it isn’t an ordinary field, she explains, but one covered in rows of a beautiful mixture of blue cornflowers, white daisies and yellow wild flowers. There was nothing she liked more than to stand in the middle of this field and think about the beauty of the flowers, she says, and how wonderful it would be if politicians could see it and perhaps learn from it, thereby giving us something more imaginative and creative to lift our spirits, because the people of Northern Ireland are a beautiful mixture too.