“Getting stronger,” he said and rubbed his hands together. “Listen, don’t worry. Once you hear something – anything, let me know. Don’t get yourself into any trouble though. It’s not worth it. It’s just something I’m working on.”
“Sounds suspect. You’re not in any- “
“No! Not at all. Listen, you’d better get yourself off. Those patients won’t cure themselves. Call me when you hear something.”
“Will do.” Sheila pulled the cap down tighter over her head, anticipating a battle with the wind. She was about to leave when Regan called out again to her.
“You didn’t see a woman in a black dress at the entrance during the funeral? White trim. Short red hair.”
“Must have just missed her”
“Not to worry,” Regan said and waved her goodbye. “See you soon.”
“No probs. Give my brother a kick for me,” Sheila said and gave a cheeky smile before tucking her slight body into the wind and running across the car park.
SEVENTEEN
Being an altar boy had its perks, Stryker had found. There had to be some reward in it to justify the ridicule, especially at the ripe old age of sixteen. The parish priest who spoke at their school assembly one morning mentioned that it could be a little cream on top of their pocket money. That was the hook. Five years later it was still lodged in his cheek.
Money aside, he was also privy to an occasional confessional secret, turning a bent ear at opportune times when necessity required it. Then there was the annual day out at Barry’s theme park in Portrush. Rollercoasters, ghost trains, fish and chips on the pier – and all of it free! Those outings became stale after a couple of years. The same rides offered little thrills second and third time around, and he found his companions getting younger as he got older.
He wasn’t completely immune to the teachings. As if by osmosis he had picked up soundbites, parables, lessons and worldly advice in the last year. Some of these were rolled into his profile and came out in conversation with certain kinds of models. The vicar’s daughter type in the bible belt of America, where religion was entrenched in everyone’s lives.
It could have been vastly different if he hadn’t decided to volunteer, although there was never really any doubt. Most of the children jumped at the chance. Others, whose parents had become disillusioned with the Catholic Church and no longer attended Mass, decided that their child would serve no such role. Stryker's parents had left the choice solely on his small shoulders and agreed to support him in whatever decision he made. His sister was no help in the matter. Her focus at the time had been surviving University, which she managed, coming out the other end and entering healthcare, a vocation she was to find was poorly paid with long working hours. Stryker wasn’t completely naïve, realising that it could be a future platform to meet her friends, other nurses who sought an antidote to the stress of their careers.
The time commitment being an altar boy was manageable. Usually two hours each week. There were only a finite number of duties that an altar server performed, and he no longer had a favourite. Initially, ringing the bell before Eucharist was fun and he tried to alternate the speed for variety each time to the tune of a TV show or commercial jingle, but the giggling servers prompted Fr Regan to pass the responsibility onto someone else. Then there was the altar girl. One of the first. She was terrified of it. When the time approached, Stryker saw her hand frozen with fear, barely the strength to hold it, let alone ring it. The eyes from the front row suddenly narrowed on her, curious at the silence, until he seized her cold hand and shook it with the bell. The force seemed to waken the stunned girl who continued to ring it even after her experienced partner had let go.
Stryker had seen a lot. Served with over forty different servers; counted eleven fainters, face planting into the carpet floor; attended dozens of weddings, funerals and christenings. Very little changed each time and although he had performed his duties diligently and without incident in recent years, the routine was incredibly boring. The altar servers all sat behind the priest, facing each other and perpendicular to the congregation. They spent most of their time staring at one another, trying to make the other laugh with subtle movements of the eyes or little gestures to see who would crack first.
Had they been facing the parishioners, it would have been infinitely more interesting but perhaps that was the point. Altar servers were there to serve. Not to be distracted. In any case, even the games became tiresome and in his final summer in the parish, he felt himself looking forward to finishing his service.
However, there was a first for everything. The service of Lewis Tighe had just finished and Stryker, perhaps because he wasn't serving that day, could feel the strange atmosphere at the funeral. The death of a young man in the community was new and the shock registered on the faces of all at the ceremony, softening even his hard heart.
After the service ended, he entered the vestry, where the altar servers would normally change out of their robes and hang them up neatly in the closet. His burgeoning frame meant that there was only one robe capable of clothing him and that belonged to Fr Regan. It was rarely used by the priest. Something of a third kit after the home and away strip, Regan supplied him with it and despite being a little oversized to start with, Stryker’s considerable mass and height soon filled it out.
The servers greeted him as he entered. He recognised them as 'old hands' with at least one year’s service under their belt.
“Nice service guys,” he said.
“Thanks.”
They all spoke at once, not glancing up at him. They were too busy trying to shed the clothing as if it had been infected with the decay that touched the body of Lewis Tighe.
Stryker scanned the room as the servers pulled their robes over their heads, slipping them off with considerable effort. The room was spotless, the carpeted floor speck and mud free, despite the gutties of the kids. The lacquered wooden surfaces of the closet were polished and reflected bars of white from the lightbulb above them. The brass handles of the small box fixed to the wall, which housed the wine chalice and cup of bread, sparkled. The room was small and save for a small foldable table and chair in one corner, there were no other furnishings.
“Shame about Mr. Tighe. Any of youse know him?”
The small group in front of him had now transformed from God's disciples to kids in their football jerseys, scratching and picking at their various holes.
“No, not really. My Da worked with him though.”
The older boy, named Mitchell, had spoken. Self-elected spokesperson for the group, the others looked to him. Although he was a little younger than Stryker, the boy looked older and had a hard, sharp face, cushioned by a furry wisp of hair on his top lip, which Stryker imagined helped him gain access to the bars and nightclubs – a world he was on the cusp of exploring.
Mitchell smoothed a hand back through his mop of hair revealing a small jagged battle scar on his forehead. Stryker glanced at it. It had been carved by a sharp flint, a playground fight years earlier which earned the boy a respectable status even though he came off second best. People had short memories.
“Serious? What was he like? Fruitcake or something?” Stryker asked.
Mitchell laughed as only young people can who haven't yet been touched by the mortality of their own lives. His laugh flashed a row of teeth, the uneven edges of a key.
“Nah! Not really. I dunno. Da was surprised. Good worker and that. Just didn't show up one day. Da thinks he was maybe in trouble with gambling or owed a lot of money.”
They stood for a few moments and Stryker could see they were keen to get out of the place and back home to their Sunday roast dinners, the thought of which made his own stomach purr.
“Fair enough. You're probably right. I saw him too. A few days ago from my bedroom.”
“Were you tossing one off?”
Mitchell chased the comment with a laugh and the others chimed in on cue. Stryker could see in some of the small, young faces no
t yet shaped by puberty that they had no idea what they were laughing at.
“Nah! Just arguing on the street. Pretty strange.”
“Yeah,” Mitchell said. “Probably over money. Someone owed him something. Decided to top himself. The easy way out.”
“Yeah probably.”
“Anyway, I gotta go. You're going to Barry's next month. Your last time out.”
“It is. Someone's got to hold your hand in the ghost train,” Stryker said and laughed.
“Haha, whatever big lad. See you at next weekend’s service.” Mitchell had a way of making questions sound like statements which made dialogue exhausting.
“Yeah I'll be there. See you.”
The small group followed the lead of Mitchell as they filed past Stryker, opening the door beyond and stepping out onto the car park. Natural light flowed in which illuminated the room briefly before it closed again. He was startled when he saw the figure of Fr Regan staring at him from the doorway into the altar.
“Who did you see arguing with Lewis Tighe?”
EIGHTEEN
The funeral service collection purses had been collected and sat at his feet in the small room. Regan erected the foldup table and chair in the centre of the room, put the purses on top and then sat down. A small straw bin sat beside him on the floor, hungry for the inevitable rubbish that the purses collected.
The blue purses, of which there were three, felt heavy under his touch which wasn't always a good sign. It meant people were throwing coins instead of notes into the fat slot, which was supported on either side by slim long handles which made the passing of the collection much easier between the parishioners.
Wrestling with the lids, which were purposely fastened tight lest there be a thief in their midst, Regan managed to pop them open and dumped the contents into a basket. A cursory glance showed silver and copper coins and no banknotes. He picked up the second and did the same. The return, this time, was a little better with more coins and a couple of bank notes. The final collection felt fatter in his hand and after the lid popped he overturned it and raised it upside down. The weight shifted uncertainly until Regan inserted a finger and pulled out a wad of notes that had stuffed the entrance, and, as if removing a stopper, the insides spilled out, filling the wicker basket with a lot more shrapnel. Popping the various lids on their blue bases, Regan lowered the purses to the floor.
As if panning for gold, the priest shifted the baskets weight between his hands and could instantly tell it was a good collection, pleased to see the abundance of notes.
The emptied purses sagged against his feet, bent double as if trying to puke the final few coins from their slot opening. The priest began fumbling through the coin pile and pulling out the banknotes straightening them out in his palm.
Thoughts continued to swim and overlap in his head which made the task of counting difficult.
He groped for a connection between Lewis Tighe, builder and member of the choir, and Larry Doe, the village hermit and drunk. No neural connections fired in his brain to suggest such a connection. At least not a plausible one. Nor could he figure out a reason why they should have been arguing.
Bills collected and counted, Regan reached for an elastic band in one of the pull out drawers by his side. The small stack of ten bills amounted to some £70, a reasonable return, but the band was too big to hold them in place. Using his fingers as knitting needles, Regan wound the band around them until it had shortened in length before wrapping it around the notes.
Finally, he combed the basket again to see if there were any lost notes before counting the fat coins. Foreign objects floated to the surface. Coins he didn't recognise but separated, interested to read the origin and date. A Coke can lever; paper from people's pockets as they hastily grabbed and deposited whatever spare change they had. He'd seen all sorts end up in the collection basket, including lottery tickets, betting slips and even condoms. Sometimes they came back to collect their tickets and slips though he hadn't yet had the pleasure of meeting with the condom throwers.
A fat stubbed paper that had been folded over surfaced from below the sea of silver. More rubbish, Regan thought and plucked it out ready to toss in the waste. But some instinct stopped him. The coin sweat had given the paper a dirty slickness, but he managed to tease it open and almost knocked over the basket of coins when he read the words.
DON’T BELIEVE THEM.
NINETEEN
When the home brews, smelling salts, cold baths and shots of liquor failed to soothe the ills and pain of the residents of Ballygorm, the clinic was on their doorstep in the centre of the village.
The vast majority of patients who visited were over sixty-five. They clung on for dear life, determined to stomp out the flame that doggedly licked at their heels – disease and sickness probing for an entry opportunity to devour them whole. Many treated the clinic as an extension of the Church, visiting weekly. While they could unload their physical worries on one of the two resident doctors, the church catered for their emotional stress, a chance to peel the fingers of Death off their necks.
The physical condition of the older patients was often in such decline that the additional drugs administered, already added to a potent cocktail which numbed any kind of life that they had, prolonging the burden on despairing daughters and sons. The clinic was often a sounding board for their grumbles and gripes, giving voice to their pain, both imaginary and real.
In many cases, the structure that housed their spirit had only been hastily attended to in the last decade. Having fallen into disrepair for most of their life, the caretaker, too busy with other activities to notice, now worked to a feverish pitch in their advanced years. Prayers were laid down, strengthening the walls and floors, adding structure to an already crumbling building. Rosary stacked on rosary. Trips to Lourdes and Fatima, destinations never considered when they were in the flushes of youth, only now entertained when the aches of arthritis and shelf-life of their own bodies became more apparent. Volunteering in the community, giving something back in their twilight years after six decades of selfish thought.
There were the other types that visited the clinic too. The hypochondriacs, of which Ballygorm had its fair share. The elderly certainly fit this bracket confusing indigestion as Death tapping their heart but the real culprits were those, south of middle age who had moved to the village, usually from town. They sabotaged their own health – and continued to do so despite doctor’s orders – preferring a course of pills to the alternative; reversing their own decline through exercise and careful manipulation of their diet.
One such case was Bernie Cameron. Every twinge, swelling and discomfort she felt in her huge frame, no matter how trivial would bring her to the doctor. She wasn’t unique in that respect, but it made the role of the doctor’s more menial, offering advice that fell on deaf ears; anticipating another visit before the medication even had a chance to take effect.
Bernie was obese. Not in a morbid can't-get-out-of-bed obese, but the tipping scales were pointing in that direction. Bernie was nothing if not optimistic. Some would even call her an inverse paranoid – that people were saying good things about her behind her back. Beneath the gentle rolls of fat was clearly a thicker armour deftly deflecting criticism and jeers.
Middling forties now, Bernie was a force of nature. Still single. Something she blamed on the lack of options in the village having moved to Ballygorm from London three years earlier with her young daughter Tanisha.
The change in scenery was a welcome sight and she had quickly found work in a neighbouring town at an assembly line in a cigarette company. It was hard work which had meant standing for most of the day which chafed her inner legs considerably, but being a single mother necessitated some sacrifices. Her daughter would have the life she never had.
With that thought bubbling to the surface, Bernie's big plump hand reached out instinctively and brushed the fine hair of Tanisha sitting beside her in the clinic, before coming to rest back to the glossy ma
gazine. It was propped on her padded knee where she turned the page while waiting her turn to see the doctor.
Tanisha didn't react to her mother’s tender stroke. Her gaze was occupied by the young boy opposite, who was also with his mother. She didn't recognise him which was strange because she thought she knew everyone in the local school. The boy’s flame hair was spiked at the fringe with globules of thick gunk hardened on the surface. The object of his attention was a toy car, which he drove up and down his legs, before leaping onto his mother’s chair where it began to climb her blazer sleeve.
“Behave yourself, Gilroy!”
The boy gave a sheepish smile and looked across at Tanisha who in spite of herself smiled back before looking away. It seemed much longer than fifteen minutes since they had entered, and the little girl looked at the clock face again pinned behind the reception desk. The young receptionist was just out of sight from their angle but they could hear her giggling on the phone in low tones. She had heard those kinds of sounds before. There was usually a boy involved.
Tanisha couldn't be sure it was a boy of course, but it was her best guess. Personally, she detested them and didn't see what the big fuss was about.
Noticing the boy was enraptured again by the little toy, Tanisha began to count the freckles on his ginger face to pass the time. But she was frustrated to find that the freckles spread down his arm too and she lost count at ninety. So instead she came up with a new game, making dot connections. The freckled face would make a good canvas, she reckoned, and she began to chart star constellations there. The dots danced in her mind to construct odd shapes which she gave new names to - Onion Ring, Rocking Horse, and Stiletto. She was pretty sure these weren't actual constellations, but when Ms. Rainey had shown the class shapes on an astrological chart, she couldn't see how the patterns matched the names either.
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