The Gamal

by Ciarán Collins

  —She was always fucking tapped!

  That’s what Liam Durcan said later, and he pissed out of his head.

  —Didn’t stop you trying to have your way with her a dozen times though did it?!

  —Ha, haa! Doubt ya kid.

  —Durkey boy!

  —The bould Durkey horse!

  And they all laughing mad and slapping their knees.

  —Amn’t I the lucky fucker that she was having none of it. And she a raving fucking headcase.

  The lads nodded in agreement and drank their pints in silence for a second.

  —A standing prick has no conscience!

  So that’s what Liam Durcan said. I fucked off home then. Anyhow you don’t want to be hearing any more of their old shite, and I don’t want to be writing about it or remembering it either.

  What troubled me wasn’t what those eejits were saying about Sinéad. Pigs grunt. Only the way Sinéad was looking around all night like a scared child scared the living shit out of me. I never seen her like that before. Soon she was let go home for good out of the hospital. I used to visit her and put on music for her and she’d say,

  —Thanks Charlie, that’s nice.

  You’d say something to her and then a second later she’d realise you said something to her and then she’d look at you wide-eyed and serious and try and concentrate but the world she was trying to come out of was a bit too hard for her to ignore.

  Of all the upset I been in the most was probably the time I first ever seen Sinéad myself and she right proper crazed out of her outcast mind insane. The whites of her eyes were glassy-white again. She looked more beautiful and alive than any Greek goddess or Egyptian queen. Vivid or something. She spoke and moved and thought but not in the same seconds, minutes and hours as the rest of us. She was operating on a different clock and it didn’t fit our world. And the distress of it was plain as day once you looked behind the fuckyouallness in her eyes. She was after losing her own grip on the person she was. Scared and scary. She talked too fast and too different and she cursed,

  —Jesus Christ Charlie about fucking time for ya I’ve been waiting here for ages I knew you’d be coming cos James came to me in my dream and said you’d be getting the bus home and to warn you walk with me I don’t have all day but I’ve stuff to tell you stuff that will be music to your ears come on will ya I’ve tonnes of shit to do walk faster basically you can stop your grieving cos James isn’t dead at all he is alive very very very much alive. I know isn’t it the best ever?

  Her smile was more like one frozen in a photograph than one in real time. Her eyes didn’t stay long on mine once they saw mine looking back at them.

  —He got word to me and I can’t tell you how but he told me you’re the only one around that I can trust cos all the others were trying to kill him and me too you’re the only one we can trust James is in America.

  —How do you mean he’s not dead? Sure

  —Shut the fuck up will ya keep your voice down.

  Her voice went quieter now and she covered her mouth with her hand.

  —They’ve everywhere bugged everywhere I had to take wires out of my coat and two pairs of shoes and the two remote controls at home so keep your voice down and cover your mouth cos they have lip-readers and obviously you can’t breathe a word of this to a soul so try and continue pretending you’re grieving walk with me will ya.

  I was after slowing down at my house but she was having none of it.

  —We can’t go into your house your parents are more than likely in on it your mother definitely is and probably your father too and even if he’s not you can be sure they’ve your house bugged as well cos they know you’re the closest to James and myself so let’s just keep walking and keep the heads down here comes Mrs Higgins pretend nothing play it cool we’ll just say hello like normal the backstabbing fucking bitch.

  —Hello Mrs Higgins.

  —Hello Sinéad and Charlie how are you both?

  —Ah sure you know, coping the best we can, said Sinéad.

  —I know, goes Mrs Higgins. It must be very hard for you, you poor creatures. Just put your love and trust in the Lord, that’s all we can do. God is good. God is good.

  —He is Mrs Higgins, goes Sinéad, he’s fucking brilliant.

  Off we walked up the hill and poor Mrs Higgins looking after us and Sinéad telling me what a sneaky evil fucking bitch she was and how she was sent out to see if she could hear what we were talking about and was going down in behind the post office now cos that’s where the transmitters for the listening equipment and the intelligence agents were and that’s where she’d report to the agents about anything she’d found out from us. She was going on with all this bullshit like the words couldn’t keep up with her brain and having to breathe was an inconvenience that slowed her speech down. When we turned into the churchyard I looked back and could see Mrs Higgins still looking up at us and she looked like she was the mad one and she standing legs apart facing up the hill and her hands joined in prayer. Sinéad didn’t even shut up at James’ grave except when she started crying and I put my arm around her,

  —Good man that’s good pretend you’re crying now too if you can it’s crucial they believe we’re genuine I’m whispering cos there’ll be bugs everywhere here the flowers are nice on the grave aren’t they the fresh ones are from his parents they’re not in on it far as we know but we can’t be certain so they have to suffer on for the moment but all will be revealed in time in all likelihood the first time they realise he’s alive is when they hear us singing on the radio yeah James is in Seattle and he reckons he’s met a few musicians that are perfect for the sound we’re going for one of them was a good friend of Cobain’s that’s really impressive Charlie come here for a hug this looks real as fuck well done real tears and everything James will be delighted when he hears this you’d get an Oscar for this.

  My tears were as real as tears get and her hugging me only made me worse I couldn’t stop sobbing like a baby.

  —OK Charlie, that’s good but we don’t want to overdo it in case they become suspicious. I’m gonna head off now down Bohernavar cos I’ve arrangements to make you’ll be seeing me again soon when we’ve the plan of action completely sorted out and Charlie?

  —Yeah.

  —Trust no one.

  When she left me she gave me a kiss on my cheek. That was something she never did really, and I thought about the moisture from her kiss mixed with my tears and I walking home.

  The pound shop candles are the longest but they burn faster than the dearer ones. Sometimes when I’m tired the candle burns slower. This isn’t just something I think. I’ve timed it and its true I think. I never stop working until the candle’s finished burning and the wax is gone wherever it goes. That’s true as well I think.

  Sitting on the Grotto Wall

  Soon after I heard she was sitting on the grotto wall once across from the garda station staring into blank space and all the lorries were hooting their horns at her because she was only wearing a nightgown and her boobs were showing.

  Detective Crowley put a blanket on her and sat with her until two local women came along and then they took her across to the garda station. It was a Tuesday morning about half seven. I know because my mother was talking to Old Master Higgins’ wife and a woman from the new houses. Told the mother she was singing the Randy Sparks song ‘Today’.

  Yeah so anyhow. That was her. All the lorries and vans were hooting at her and they passing. Her naked boobs were out where they shouldn’t be and her mind was some place else unknown. And out of bounds too, isn’t it?

  More of Sinéad’s Psychiatrist’s Evidence

  —Well the first thing was she showered and dressed herself independently and of her own accord. She began to speak. She started to come to life a bit, so to speak. She began to interact with staff and other patients. Very gradually, but she did. Over a period of about six weeks. But she did make excellent progress. She even sang at a Christmas Mass we had wit
h the patients. Their families and all the staff were there too. It’s something we do every year.

  —Very nice. And was this pre-planned?

  —No, it was quite spontaneous.

  —So she just started singing in the middle of the Mass? Was it not arranged beforehand?

  —No. It was during communion. She just started singing when everyone was going up for communion. There weren’t many at the Mass so people were finished getting communion and she was still singing for a while. The priest just waited at the altar for her to finish. I think he was moved quite a bit by it. Same as everybody else who was there.

  —Could you tell us what it was she sang?

  —Yes, it was a song called ‘If It Be Your Will’.

  —And did anyone try to stop her?

  —From singing? Gosh no. I think everybody thought it had been arranged by somebody and they just hadn’t been informed.

  —You would think though that the staff might have tried to quieten her, as she was a patient with psychiatric difficulties?

  —Well, it was really very beautiful. Quietening her didn’t come into it. I was sitting beside an elderly patient. These things make a difference to people’s lives, you know. Especially people who are confused or in pain. It was quite extraordinary. She sang with such power. She’d become frail by now, you know, on account of her not eating much. But this voice. The strength of it. I mean. I’d barely heard her speak. And here she was. This. Like. It was like this girl who had been dead to the world was being brought to life by her own voice. Raised up by her chest. The music gave her strength somehow. Her powerful voice seemed to give her frail body strength.

  —Let’s fast forward then a little, please. Do you think Sinéad made a full recovery?

  —I do. Insofar as someone could recover, yes, I think she did. She had some very severe setbacks but made an excellent recovery.

  —Could you tell us about her setbacks, please.

  —Yes. She became delusional shortly after her release from hospital. She was in denial about the death of James and she believed he was waiting for her in America.

  Dr Quinn was telling me that some Einstein shrink once said that people are only considered sane by common consent. Majority rules. The odd one out is mad. Public nakedness on the bridge by the grotto in Ballyronan is mad. Sinéad went mad.

  Mad

  Adj. 1. very angry; affected by great displeasure or anger 2. offensive term; an offensive term meaning affected with psychiatric disorder 3. very unwise or rash 4. wildly excited 5. frantic; done with great haste, excitement, or confusion 6. exciting; very exciting or boisterous 7. seized by uncontrollable emotion; overcome with violent emotion 8. passionate about sth.; very fond of, enthusiastic about, or interested in sth.; often to the exclusion of sth. else 9. abnormally aggressive; used to describe an animal that is abnormally aggressive or ferocious 10 rabid [Old English gamaed ‘deprived of reason’, that was formed from gemad ‘irrational’, from, ultimately, an Indo-European ancestor meaning ‘change’ (source of English mutate).]

  Insane

  Adj. 1. psychiat. legally considered as psychiatrically disordered; legally incompetent or irresponsible because of a psychiatric disorder 2. lacking reasonable thought; showing complete lack of reason or foresight [Mid-16thC. From Latin insanus, from sanus ‘healthy, sane’.]

  Reasonable

  Adj. 1. Rational, sensible and capable of rational judgement 2. In accord with common sense [13thC. Via Old French reisun from, ultimately, Latin ratio ‘calculation, thought’.]

  Rational

  Adj. 1. reasonable and sensible; governed by, or showing evidence of, clear and sensible thinking and judgement, based on reason rather than emotion or prejudice 2. in accordance with reason and logic 3. able to reason [Early 18thC. Via French from Spanish racion, from Latin ratio ‘calculation’.]

  Sense

  N. 1. physical faculty 2. feeling derived from the senses 3. ability to appreciate sth. 4. moral discernment; an ability to perceive and be motivated by moral or ethical principles 5. intelligence 6. point; useful purpose or good reason 7. reasoned opinion 8. main idea 9. meaning [14thC. Directly, and via Old French, from Latin sensus ‘feeling, perception’, from sens-, past participle stem of sentire ‘to feel’.]

  Common

  Adj. 1. shared; belonging to or shared by two or more people or groups 2. for all; relating or belonging to the community as a whole 3. everyday 4. widely found 5. non-specialist 6. general 7. ordinary 8. of an expected standard 9. vulgar 10 math. with equal mathematical relationship 11. poetry a syllable that can be either long or short 12. Chr. useful for several religious festivals

  I just vomited up my coffee and biscuits. I think it was looking up them words in the dictionary did it to me. It’s disgusting what some words we have say about us isn’t it? And how stuck we are with them and still they all do be talking about freedom. And anything tastes better than puke. Even mustard. I think it’s the height of tiredness. Didn’t sleep at all last night. And last night is more than thirty hours ago cos I never went to bed tonight. My brain feels fizzy. Anyhow the most astonishing thing about my story. The most astonishing thing that I realised about being a human being in the middle of all this is this. We can lose our minds. That’s not normal. We think stuff is normal cos we’re stuck inside in the middle of it. But that don’t make it so. The tears are streaming down my face and I writing this now but I’m going to keep writing cos otherwise I might forget. Madness is nature’s punishment for not fitting in. Cos there was a time when this had to be so. Otherwise the groups would all be splitting and everyone all following all different leaders in all different directions and the group would get weak. Weak is not good. When everyone is pulling together. That’s when the group is strongest. Strong survives isn’t it? Nature made it so that people like that would go mad or be leaders. Never an in between. If people don’t follow them then they destruct themselves. The status quo worked cos people were isn’t it? That was proof that it worked for them. Cos they were. All of them. Madness was essential. Essential. I seen. You know? I seen. Poor poor poor Sinéad. I must tell you. I must tell you before I go back to not knowing. I must show you what happened to her. How it happened. True and slow and sure and tortuous and damaging and relentless. I hope I can. If I could tattoo the feeling, the knowledge my brain has right now about madness I would tattoo it big and bold so I’d be reminded of it tomorrow. Cos I’ll have this knowledge forgotten when tomorrow comes. I know I will. It’s like it’s not for us to know. Like our brains won’t take it. But I’m going to do it. I won’t let sleep mess it all up now like it does with the rest of ye always. If it kills me I still won’t. Nobody is born mad. If only Sinéad could’ve seen that they were only stupid. Stupid monkeys who didn’t even know what they were doing is all they were. They didn’t even mean no harm and couldn’t even see really what it was that they were doing. Sinéad got brain damaged. She got a brain injury. No she didn’t. Actually she got loads of brain injuries. Hurts. Brain strains. And they all built up to be a serious brain injury. There’s muscles in the brain. Tiny muscles. And if they get strained a lot they can snap. A muscle in Sinéad’s brain snapped. That’s the way nature made it happen to people who were different cos we don’t kill people we love so they have to destroy themselves cos difference is too dangerous to the group. The person who undermined the dance of the group put their loyalty to each other at risk. When the group is strong each and every one survives. Nature disposes of troublemakers. Nature saw Sinéad as a troublemaker. I seen it with my own two eyes. Everyone’s always on about how great nature is. I fucking hate nature cos it made us the way we are and we didn’t even have a choice. Like fucking cancer. Maybe cancer is there to kill one of us off at random so that the rest of us will all be friends and work together and not be fighting or every fella doing his own thing. Death brings the people left behind together isn’t it? Nature is the fucking enemy. Our nature. We must fight against our stupid nature isn’t it?
r />   Anyhow it was against all the odds. That Sinéad was kept well. Only thing was the love she got. But then he wasn’t there any more.

  I have to go to sleep now. My body and my brain is closing down. I had a dream once that everyone thought Sinéad was mad cos she wasn’t sticking pencils up her nose. Everyone else was going around with pencils up their nostrils but Sinéad didn’t see the sense of it. She was banished. Anyhow my eyes are fucked and the light from the screen hurts and the tears are stinging so goodnight and sweet dreams.

  Not really sure what all that stuff you just read was about really. Was awful tired last night and was fierce upset and went a bit rambly. Anyhow. Yeah. Sinéad became unwell. Could delete all that stuff I wrote last night but I won’t cos it’s a lot of words and I’ll need them all to make a book if you don’t mind.

  Tell Sinéad

  Sinéad was put back in hospital after her thing at the grotto. I did a lot of thinking then. Whether to tell Sinéad what I knew or not. Or whether to just tell the gardaí. That I found out what happened to her in the toilet in Roundy’s. That the Little Rascal did what he did. That Dinky had known all along. That Dinky had stolen the Afghan scarf to destroy them. That the whole thing was rotten and rigged. I just wanted her to be able to decide what I should do. She deserved the say isn’t it?

  In the end she came back out of hospital after a month or six weeks. I still didn’t know if I should tell her what I knew or not. I was afraid it would be the end of her. Then I was thinking there wasn’t much of her there now anyhow. We sat on the river bank, the two of us, one evening then.

  —But like . . . how could he believe that I’d be capable of doing it? she goes.

  —There was silence for a long time cos I knew no answer. She asked what was going on in his mind. I told her about his sufferings.