Ma, Jackser's Dyin Alone

by Martha Long

  ‘Yeah, but, sure, like yourself, I’m used to prowling the early hours of the morning, what with one thing or another. If it’s not one of the children that’s sick and having a bad night … Oh, yeah, many is the night I had to run to the hospital with the son in the middle of the night. He had bad croup as a baby. Jesus! He could hardly breathe! That’s why I got meself a fast car!’ I laughed. ‘So I could get him in there! Ah, don’t bother your head worrying about me, Brenda. I’m well used to it.’

  ‘OK, let me just get rid of this,’ she said, lifting up the teapot and rushing off. ‘It won’t take me two shakes of a lamb’s tail to get you a fresh pot,’ she said, looking back at me from the door. Then she was gone.

  ‘Here we are,’ she breathed, hurrying back in with another tray, as she fastened her eyes on the table. ‘Take that, and some more hot toast! Now sit and eat that straight away,’ she said, sitting me down, fussing, with the pair of us laughing. ‘Eat!’ she ordered, pointing from me to the grub.

  ‘Yeah, yeah!’ I said, pouring the tea, then grabbing up a bit of hot toast. ‘Where did you get the egg, Brenda?’

  She pointed her finger at her nose. No questions asked!

  ‘And a yoghurt! Jaysus, I’m spoilt. That’s it! I’m moving in here.’

  ‘Go on, you chancer! I’m off. See ya tonight!’ she laughed, taking off in a rustle of stiff white skirt and squeaking black laced-up shoes.

  ‘Thanks a million, Brenda!’ I roared after her.

  16

  I looked down at the breakfast, feeling the exhaustion racing through me. I felt like pulling the two chairs together, like Charlie had done. I wonder how he is? I thought, feeling meself worn out. Come to think about it, I bet this is how he feels when many a night he has nowhere to sleep. Oh, bloody hell!

  Right, this is getting you nowhere. OK, eat the breakfast. Take your time, have a break. Then go and pour cold water on yourself and go back in to Jackser. I can’t leave him too long. God knows what might be happening to him.

  OK, might as well have the television on while I’m enjoying my breakfast. I jumped up, rushing over to switch on the box, seeing the news come on, then sat back down, starting on the grub.

  I was just in time to see a newsreader get caught napping. She was primping her hair and examining a spot on her chin through a little compact mirror. Then she slowly turned her head to the camera, with the eyes starting to widen in the head and the face lengthening with the dawning shock. ‘YOU’RE ON AIR!’ I distinctly heard a man whisper. She shot the mirror under the table, grabbing a bunch of papers, then sat up straight, fixing her face into a stony look. That made it worse!

  I roared laughing, because I knew her. I lived in the girls’ hostel with her years ago. When? Half a century ago! She was at university; I was doing my secretarial course. Ah, come on now, Molly! You’re supposed to be a top professional. Tut, tut! Gawd, do I remember you! The nuns threatened to send the bill to her mother for the make-up she used to leave plastered on their sheets and pillowcases!

  The aul kitchen nun, who was in charge of the domestic side of things, came marching into the refectory one evening when we were all having our tea. Straight over she went, banging along in her big cobnailed boots, heading herself straight for Molly Murphy. All the girls sat up, knowing trouble was brewing. We could see the nun had something hidden behind her back. Then she whipped her arm around, sending what was in it flying straight for Molly Murphy. It hit her, blinding and smacking the face off her, landing sheets and pillowcases on top of her head. We all sat stunned, watching Molly sitting like a ghost, or looking like Miss Havisham in Charles Dickens’ novel, waiting for the wedding that never happened! We watched as Molly’s hands and arms flew inside the sheets, trying to wrestle her way out. When her head finally appeared, the hair was plastered to her face, covering the eyes, and the rest of it was still stuck to the sheets. It was the hair stuff she was using. She spat out bits of hair caught in her mouth, shooting out the tongue, letting it dip in and out with the spits flying.

  The mad nun – she was a raving bloody lunatic. Many’s the day I had a run-in with her, the dangerous aul cow. The creep tried to poison me! Yeah, that mad aul fucker baked a cake specially for me, she said. I was the only one running with the scutters all night! I sat groaning through the whole night, stuck on the toilet, shitting me brains out. The silly aul cow! It was because we had one too many fights. I drove her mad. I wouldn’t stop me capers. Well, when you’re sixteen, the world belongs to you.

  I smiled, thinking about it, then shook my head, getting back to the picture of Molly. While she sat stunned, still spitting out hair, the kitchen nun erupted.

  ‘How dare yeh, ye dirty filthy creature? Who reared yeh? Was it wit he pigs? Look at hem sheets! Look a he state a me pillowcases! They’re destroyed! Yeh need teh take dhat muck offa yore face when yeh climb into my sheets at night! Don’t be handin he like a hem up teh me again for washing. Go out and buy yourself a trowel an take dhat plaster offa yore face!’ she screamed, letting the culchie voice go full throttle. Then she turned her big fat carcass and steamed off, smacking her way along in the big black boots, making the floorboards rattle and the dishes hop.

  We all stared, our mouths hanging to our belly buttons, watching as she thumped her way back out the door. Jaysus! The place went mad. We laughed for months. Molly never got over it – we wouldn’t let her.

  ‘Oh, excruciating! I can still feel your embarrassment, Molly,’ I muttered, sitting back with a grin on my face, munching on the toast, getting ready to hear what she was going to tell us.

  ‘The government has announced we will soon be lifting out of the country’s economic depression. Jobs will be created, with the hope that an American multinational company will set up here. It would give over one hundred jobs initially. But as negotiations are still in the early stages, it is too soon to say as yet what will happen. However, there is good news. A government spokesman who spoke to our reporter on the ground, Sean-Neen O’Fechel-All, says we should be hopeful! But, as the government say, nothing is settled as of yet.’

  ‘Ah, get stuffed!’ I said, whipping meself up to switch it off, then stood, stopping to watch as a plane came up on the screen. The steps up to the huge Learjet was knee-deep in politicians all waving happily with their free hand, while the other one held on to their duty-free bags. I waited to hear what they were up to.

  ‘The government is sending twenty-three government ministers off on a junket. They will have the first stopover in Paris, then on to the Far East for a fact-finding mission. They wish to explore ways to help lift our economy off the ground. When our reporter asked the minister heading up this task, MeHall O’GrovelAll, how much it will cost to keep our private government jet in the air through this month-long fact-finding mission, he simply said, smiling as we waved us away from the aircraft, “It will be money well spent, well spent! Sean-Neen, we intend to give it our all!”

  ‘Now for the winner of the Tidy Towns competition. The local council say it has been marvellous, with so much support coming from the local residents. It has also been a great boon in lifting the depression of unemployed people who were only too delighted to have an interest outside the home.’

  ‘Ah, sure, it gets us out of the house,’ a fella of about thirty, looking like he was going on fifty, said, nodding his head, trying to give us all a smile, but it never quite reached his eyes. Then he suddenly bucked up as he lifted his back, straightening himself, then puffed out his chest after getting a bright thought in his head. ‘Well,’ he said, sounding very definite, snapping his head with a shake. ‘It has been marvellous for giving my confidence a boost! You see, I have a law degree …’

  ‘Really?’ Sean-Neen interrupted, moving his skinny body in closer, holding the microphone to his face, looking like he was kissing it. Then he said, bending in, shoving the microphone into the Law Degree’s mouth, letting him too get a kiss of it, ‘Tell us more!’ He squeaked in his woman’s voice, flicking the big go
ggle eyeglasses up off the end of his nose, then staring happily now he could see your man better.

  ‘Yes, I got my law degree up in Dublin. I attended UCD, oh, seven years ago now. I decided to stay home when most of my friends hit the Big Apple! New York. That was a bad mistake. But now with this, seeing what I can achieve – just the simple things like getting myself up out of the bed in the morning, even washing and having a shave. I didn’t see much purpose really before this, not when the months dragged into years. In all that time I have never had one job offer in my profession as a solicitor. Well, it is soul destroying. But now I’ve decided to get out! I’m going to head for New York. I have lots of contacts there now; most of them are doing very nicely for themselves. So, better late than never,’ he said, turning to give a big wave to the camera as he said, ‘Nice talking to you, but I better keep moving.’

  Then the camera turned back to Molly. ‘That is the end of the …’

  I switched it off, then took in a deep breath, looking out at the beginning of an early-morning sun. I could see it rise, starting to soar high up, raising itself into a deep-blue sky, announcing its arrival and the promise to hail in the beginning of a brand-new, glorious day. Not a cloud in the sky, I mused, moving closer to get a look out the window.

  Cars and buses all jostled each other, wanting to get ahead. They were all in a hurry to get going into work. Women walked along looking very jaunty in the sun, wearing nothing but frocks or blouses and skirts, while the men wore shirts and trousers, hanging on to their sandwiches caught under their arms. Everyone was on the move. I could see children making their way slowly to school, pushing and shoving each other, then ducking and diving, going backwards and forwards.

  I watched as a pack of young fellas ran with their mouths open, laughing. Then one of them tripped over the footpath, plunging himself flat on his belly. He wasn’t laughing any more. A young fella who looked like he was shouting for his schoolbag back raced over and bent down, whipping the bag up off the ground next to where the young fella lay. Then I watched as he lifted his foot, giving your man still plastered to the ground a mighty kick up the arse. With that, he took off running for his life, only stopping when he hit the corner. He looked back with a ready grin on his face, only to see your man now on his feet, making straight for him. The young fella got such a shock his head twirled on his shoulders, not knowing which way to run. Then he gripped his bag under his arm, tearing off into the distance, screaming for his mammy. Uh-oh, that little young fella is in for it! ‘Run!’ I muttered, seeing the bigger fella reaching out his arm to grab hold, only missing a grip of him.

  I smiled, shaking my head, thinking, no wonder kids are always late for school, then end up running at the last minute. You can’t trust them to get there on time no matter how early you get them out the door. Still, mine get driven the five minutes it takes to get there. I think they would go into shock if I stopped wiping their arses for them!

  Right! I better get moving. I can’t leave Jackser for too long on his own. I must be here over half an hour. But I still continued looking out the window, beyond into the distance, thinking it was a pity them fucking eegits blew up Nelson’s Pillar! It used to be a lovely landmark in the distance. You could see it for miles then. But it was a throwback to the British rule, they said. We want nothing of them remaining to remind us of their imperial rule! The gobshites! Now look at the city! There’s fuck all to see, bleedin cretins! We real Dubliners couldn’t give a flying fart about the Empire; we liked our pillar! It fuckin belonged te us! Bet it was the fuckin culchies that did it! They’ve nothin to look at but bogs.

  Oh, thinking of that. Today is the first of July! Yes, the anniversary of the first day of the Battle of the Somme! In 1916 it happened. This is a very sad day for those still alive who remember it, especially the ones who went through it. Yeah! It was a day just like today, in Picardy. Except they had the roaring of the guns lasting seven days and seven nights, tearing and blowing the German lines apart, sending them to kingdom come! Then, they finally grew silent. The early morning sun rose, about to climb high into a glorious blue sky. The birds were singing and the heavy scent of the wild flowers blooming in the lovely green fields wafted over the clean fresh air. It was enough to make you believe it is good to be alive. Down all along the trenches, officers waited. The silence was eerie, ominous. The soldiers, especially our very own Dublin Fusiliers, some as young as sixteen, stood pale and wan, at the ready, with bayonets fixed in both hands and heavy backpacks strapped to their backs. Then all down along the line the call went up. ‘Ready!’ shouted the officers, as they stared at their watches nestled in the palm of their open hands. They looked frozen in concentration as they watched the seconds tick by. Then, at 7.30 a.m. sharp, the signal was given. A shrill of whistles blew down all along the lines, shattering the deathly silence, as terrified men held their breath. Then the shout went up: ‘OVER THE TOP! March! Don’t run! Walk! Don’t fire! No need to, chaps, we have the Huns well buried. There’s nothing left alive over there, not even the rats. We have bombed them all to hell!’

  Yes! That’s what the generals thought, but the officers knew better. They tried to tell the overfed, underworked, gout-ridden fool generals – that lot were twenty miles behind the firing lines! Not a clue as to what was really happening on the frontlines. Yes! The Germans were buried all right. But not the way the generals thought. They were so well dug in even the rats couldn’t find them. They had cemented themselves thirty feet under the ground. The only thing getting buried that day was the sixty thousand men who were left lying, blown to smithereens by shells and cut down by machine-gun fire relentlessly mowing out their guts, sending the bits to land in them now unlovely, once green fields of Flanders. All by the time the sun went down. Not a bird to be heard singing after that – the birds had been silenced. The Germans even blew their trees to kingdom come, along with every man and the earth under him who went over the top that beautiful sunny morning.

  For some, it was just minutes after they left their trenches for the last time and walked over to meet their terrible death. For others, it was a long hard dying as they lay crying out in no-man’s-land, keening for the mercy of a bullet. Their tortured cries could be heard drifting over from that lonely place by men bruised and shaken but now safely back behind the shelter of a sandbag. Through the long night, they lay listening to the suffering, hearing those awful cries for pity. Some took up the call and, leaving safety, crept into darkness, crawling their way under barbed wire, heading out for no-man’s-land. They followed that cry, tracing it to a shell hole. Only then was there silence, as the agonised man went mercifully home to meet his maker. To this day can still be heard, as blood-red poppies blow in the breeze of that once no-man’s-land, the ghostly whisper, ‘Don’t run, march! You will not have to fire a shot! Walk in straight line formation’, comes that haunting general’s command. Oh! They did for a while, and the Germans picked them off like target practice at a shooting gallery. The British generals made it so easy for them. Yeah! What a waste of human life. Such a waste.

  England would mourn its loss but not its folly, as her finest cream of British manhood lay shattered in a foreign field, all in less than six hours. They erected a statue to that general! He sits now up on his high horse. ‘You Will Come Back To A Land Fit For Heroes’ intoned the solemn promise. They came back to a land of beggars. A maimed man stood on a street corner rattling a tin can, hoping to get enough for a bed for the night. ‘Copper for an old soldier?’ went the whispered plea, as he rested on the stick used to replace the missing limb. Next to him stood the blind, the bothered, the bewildered and shell-shocked, all with the same lonely plea, as the rattle of tin cans could be heard up and down the nation. ‘Copper for an old soldier?’ Three million a day spent to keep the war going, but ne’er a penny for a broken hero.

  I still remember you wandering the Liberty streets of my childhood, the people nodding in pity you were one of our own, but now shell-shock sets you apart. You
r ducking and diving, shouting and screaming, ‘MASKS ON, MUSTARD GAS! RUN! DUCK RIGHT! SHELL COMING FROM THE LEFT! MACHINE GUN AHEAD! DOWN, TAKE COVER!’ sent children screaming for a mammy. The terror in your mad staring eyes frightened. Your missing leg made you an easy target for jeering kids and biting dogs. Nobody understood that glazed stare. They are not with you as you still lie praying, waiting in that shell hole for the bullets, the bombs, the smoke and the deafening roaring noise to clear or God’s mercy to put you fast out of your misery. ‘Yes,’ I whispered. ‘You are my hero, old soldier, because you just kept on going.’

  Why am I thinking like this? What has me feeling so melancholic? I suppose it’s Jackser. I somehow feel the death of something deep inside me, like this is the end of something for me. Jackser is dying and taking it with him. It feels like death is all round me. People die here. I can feel the pain of blurred images and Jackser is in all of them as my mind flies back down through the ages of time. A little girl – she looks like a waif – is there too. I know who she is and I want to back away from her. I can hear her now and sense her presence, sense her young voice as she pleads with me. She is persuasive, desperate.

  I sighed out wearily, feeling myself beginning to get dragged down, pulled into her dark world. I leapt up, not wanting to know. I better move and see how Jackser is. I made for the door but my legs wouldn’t move. Something was holding me back. I walked slowly back in and sat down in the chair. ‘Oh, what the hell. I’ll just have a smoke and sit for another bit,’ I muttered, feeling a terrible dead weight hit me.

  I sat back, sprawling out my legs, and lit up a smoke, dragging it deep down into my lungs, letting myself go with the exhaustion. Without warning, I felt a panic hitting me as a flood of terrible pain gushed through me, making me feel lost and lonely. I want to open my mouth and scream with the loss – Jackser is dying and I’m lost! ‘Oh, Jesus, what’s wrong with me? I’m lost all over again! I can’t take it,’ I groaned, burying my face in my hands as the tears rolled down my cheeks and the sobs poured out my mouth. I closed my eyes, letting it all wash over me. Instantly I was back in time.