I took a walk as far as Virgin Gemma’s house. Gemma would have a phone I could use and she liked to do a good deed. She opened her door, the sharp points in her face looking sharper than usual even though she didn’t look too disappointed to see me.
Hello, Vir . . . I mean Gemma. I need to speak with Ma.
I haven’t see her, Jason.
She’s in Paris. Can I use your phone? I have some important news for her.
Of course you can.
A talking woman came on telling me Ma’s phone was powered off. I thanked Gemma, told her I’d see her in McMorrow’s for Happy Hour and left it at that.
I called around to Nora McGuinness. I didn’t like the colour of her beauty spot today and was tempted to step away from her door, but Nora reached out an arm and hauled me inside her front room and I tried calling Ma again. Nothing.
I called around to Carmel Brophy, wife of Barty. She was a strange shape of a woman and wearing far too much lipstick.
Hello, Carmel, I need to speak with Ma.
I wish she was here, Jason, I really do. But she isn’t.
She’s in Paris. I need to call her. They’ve pulled the plug on our phone. I need to get an important message through to her.
I’ll try her later, Jason, Carmel said when I couldn’t get through. But I’ll tell you something for free, if I get a hold of her she’ll wish she stayed in Paris when she had the chance. Uh-oh, I thought. She knows all about Ma shoving her fleshy bits in Barty’s face after that fiasco with our blocked radiator. And I knew what Carmel might have in mind as far as Ma was concerned.
OK, Carmel, I said, doing my best to look innocent. It seemed to work too. She started wiggling some of her own flesh at me, just not as effectively as I’d seen Ma do it. Then she bunched up her lipstick mouth and blew her idea of a kiss my way. I ducked just in time.
Fionnuala Quirke lived next door. I tried her next.
My, my, Jason. You’re turning into quite a boy, aren’t you, Fionnuala said before I had a chance to speak a word. Your ma’s not here but you’re welcome to come in. I’ve got two wonderful blueberry muffins with your name written all over them.
No thanks, Fionnuala. I’ve had some blueberry this week.
I’ll make you a passion fruit smoothie.
No thanks, Fionnuala.
How about a lemon meringue?
Save one for me, Fionnuala.
Come by again, Jason. Come by any time.
I was at the gate of Big Beatrice Glynn’s house before I realized I hadn’t even asked Fionnuala for the use of her phone. And I was just about to open Big Beatrice’s gate when I remembered it was her pills I had in my bag. As soon as I turned away, along came the McManus brothers.
Have either of you got a phone I could borrow? I asked them.
What? No-brains growled.
I need a phone. You know. Little gadget that allows you talk to people.
Are you giving me lip, midget? he asked.
Just answering your question, No-brains.
What was that you called me?
You have to admit it, Mark. You’re a bit of feckin’ headbanger. More than a bit.
I was already half way down the lane before he realized what I’d called him. By the time he started to give chase I was well out of sight, buried in the reed grass beside the Swamp. A borrowed telephone would have to wait.
Down town I paused at the window of Oliver Sheehan’s electrical shop. All the televisions were tuned into the same channel. Bits of that missing jumbo jet being pulled out of the Atlantic. Pictures of distraught relatives. Then I saw the date rolling across the bottom of the screen. August 17th. Or was it a 19? Couldn’t make it fully out, my eyesight was blurry, and now the letters and numbers were dancing across the television screen like music notes come to life. And what if it was August 19th?
That meant it was four days since I’d last seen her.
Fock me!
*
It was getting towards that point when day starts to become night. I had walked as far as Station Hill, was looking down at the tracks, at Mellows the signal man mooching about near his cabin, at the empty tracks disappearing into the gathering dark. I was all set to carve a message into my lower arm with the nail I was uselessly searching my pockets for. I looked in my bag and fished out the next box of pills. Pressed a pill – a blue one – out of its foil, held it to my mouth and bit into it. It was chalky and bitter and I popped the rest of it in my mouth and quickly swallowed it before I changed my mind. Then I tried one from the yellow box. It tasted better.
That night I looked out through Ma’s bedroom window. The rowdy bushes. The useless weeds. The lifeless trees. Shadow branches. Skeletal arms reaching for the dark. And the moon. Low over the Swamp, making it look like something out of a postcard collection, which was how it always looked to me anyway. I opened the window. Let in the calm air. The black night. I thought I heard my name in a scream. Faraway and faint. But there.
I must have stayed at the window all night. Lost inside some night-time spell of blue seas and hot sun and the water glistening, and dipping the oars of my boat and pulling hard, all the time steering a course for that island that takes twenty years to find. A pounding at the front door brought an end to all of that. It was loud and persistent and this time I had no intention of answering it.
IN DEMAND
It was Mattie Conlon. What did that scone-selling fruitcake want? His French cookbook? Some uneaten buns? Wait. Gavin McGoldrick was with him. What was up with him? Had he a patched-up rust bucket that needed paying for? Mattie rapped the knocker loudly, while Gavin peered in through the sitting-room window. I didn’t like the look or the sound of this and kept myself upstairs. They weren’t put off so easily, though, and Mattie let the door have it for another few minutes, a wonder the knocker didn’t break off in his hand, so severe was he with the thing. Finally fed up with all of that, he joined Gavin at the front window and the pair of them looked long and hard. Then damn it if the madmen didn’t walk around the back and start gawking in the kitchen window. I was all set to open an upstairs window, pour a pan of boiling jelly down on top of them, watch them melt before my eyes. Then I could hear them stomping away, all huff and tut, and you could just tell that they weren’t going to give up so easily. No sir. As soon as they could, they would be back. Well, let them. Next time I could set the girl on them – if she ever woke up.
Meantime the letterbox was in use again. Bills, demands, pay-up letters shoved through. I could hear Barrabas Diffley and the cheery whistling he was at, as though he was bringing news of winning lotto numbers, instead of all manner of threats from just about everybody it was possible to owe money to. I was going to open the door on him and give him the same message I’d given the witch from the Credit Union. Then I reckoned someone might be lurking, and had second thoughts. I thought of taping up the letterbox like the Slug had done with his place, but I couldn’t find any tape, and no way was I setting foot outside. At least not until after dark and the coast was clear and at that stage shops would be closed, and right now it all seemed like too much effort.
From time to time I plugged the telephone cord back in, who knows, we might have been reconnected. Ma might’ve called and left a message as to what she was up to in Paris. At some point I was sure she would try to get word to me. Hey, Jason, and bonjour from this swell place. Everything they said is true. It’s a super swell place, superbe, as they say over here, so superbe that I have decided enough is enough, I am not coming home. That’s right. You didn’t mishear me. I am going stay right here in this place and stuff that boghole town once and for all. I know, I know. Lots of people over there are going to miss me. The manager of the Credit Union. The rubbish collectors and the ESB. The telephone rental people. And a whole lot more. Well. They are going to have to find a way to survive without me, aren’t they? And don’t you dare say a word about where I am. Until then, I’ll be staying out of radio contact. I’ll be lying low, biding my time, waiting for the best momen
t to get in touch. Oh yes. I could almost hear her speak the words. It’s time to check out of this hotel, kid.
Sit tight, Jason. She’ll get word to you very soon. But every time I plugged in the phone and waited for it to ring and for the messages she wanted to get through to me, all I got was a lot more of absolutely nothing. It was better than a plague of cunthooks and arsebandits getting angrier by the second and wondering why they hadn’t been paid and what did Ma think she was playing at, and them threatening all sorts of warfare if I or somebody didn’t produce some fast cash. Still though. How long had it been now? More than a week? Get in touch, Ma. Please.
Then cop Lawless called around. He parked his squad car and tipped his garda hat at waddling Lily the Nose and he stepped up to the door. He didn’t knock as loudly or for as long as Mattie Conlon, but he knew I wasn’t far away. I even thought about opening the door to him. After all, maybe I could put him to some use. Then I had another thought. It was me he was after. Big Beatrice had noticed her missing pills and remembered me being in Logan’s Pharmacy. Not to mention the boy-racer car the girl and me had taken for a spin. Wait a minute. It wasn’t just me. He was after the girl too! Her da had spotted her missing. Knew where she was. And here was Lawless showing up to take her home and haul me in front of that bastard judge Deeley for kidnapping.
By now I was on the upstairs landing, standing on the high-stool Ma had waltzed home from McMorrow’s ages ago, and with the hurley stick, was nudging free the trap-door up into the attic. It gave easily and a moment later I had squeezed my way through the narrow opening, was plonked on a timber beam in the dusty dark, surrounded by cardboard boxes. The place was covered in dust, cobwebs, crawling things. It was tough to breathe. Water plinked. Something scurried, scratched, squealed.
Then I heard the letterbox flapping. And a gruff voice coming through it.
Jason. Are you there, Jason?
Was about to let a holler at him to get lost, then I heard another voice, not-so-gruff this time and coming from somewhere very close to me.
The girl. It was the girl!
Up here, I hissed, and heard Lawless again as I reached an arm down through the open trap-door while she climbed up.
Jason! Are you in there? Is your ma about?
As soon as the girl was through the attic, I bundled her into the dark space beside me.
What the hell, she said.
It’s Lawless. He knows you’re here. I need you to stay quiet while I head him off.
Oh, I get it. You’re trying to be my hero. This is exciting. OK. I’ll stay here. You go down and gut him with your sword.
Nobody’s gutting anybody.
Go to it, Achilles. Take him down.
By the time I climbed down out of there and got as far as the sitting-room window, Lawless had cleared off. He’d be back, though. I knew he would. I would have to think hard about this. Come up with a plan. Otherwise we’d be stuck up in that clammy attic never again to see the light of day.
Watched one or two episodes of the gangster show Ma liked. Figured I would need to toughen up. Acquire some new language. There were some good lines in them. Tony Soprano had a line I liked. You fuck up once, you lose two teeth. And the hoodlums had some really good faces. Later, I stood in front of the bathroom mirror. Traced my finger along the diagonal crack. Snarled my way through some tough talking. Freeze. Screw you, mug. Have a nice life, sucker. Took a good look at myself, too, then frowned when I remembered the things Ma’s friends had said in McMorrow’s during Happy Hour. Cherub cheeks and melting eyes. And what was it the girl had called me? That’s it. Angelface.
I would have to have a think about that. Angelface wasn’t going to cut it any more. No way was it.
BIRTH CERT
Then I started to forget what Ma looked like. Jesus! Whatever about looking for someone I had never met, what would people say to me when I couldn’t even describe the woman I had been living with for the last twelve years? The girl would have a great time with that. Then I thought: Jesus! The girl. I’ve left her in the attic. Tony Soprano wouldn’t be long taking out my teeth if anything happened to her. Fast as I could, I scrambled back up into the dusty space.
Are you there? I called out, pushing boxes aside. There was no answer. I dragged more boxes out of the way, and in my hurry, one or two of them tipped over, sending letters, envelopes, newspapers, out through the open trapdoor. Are you there? I tried again. Still nothing.
You fuck up once, you lose two teeth.
Oh boy.
Where was she?
I shoved another box towards the shaft of light coming through the trapdoor. The box was full of knick-knacks and a red photo album with the words Our Family written in wavy gold lettering. Grabbed the album and flicked it open. Turned the page. And another. Not many of them had photographs. One or two of me. A couple of Ma. A few of her with other women I didn’t recognize. Prised them loose, looked at the back to see if anything was written there. Nothing.
Wait a minute. I was supposed to be looking for the girl. I tossed away the photo album and slid down out of there.
Papers lay scattered about on the landing. Postcards. Letters. Newspaper cuttings. And look. Birth certs. I picked up the first one and saw that it was Ma’s. Then I was clutching the second one and it was my own. Aha, I thought. At long last an answer I’ve been looking for. I grabbed it and scanned the entries. Date of Birth. Yes. Place of birth. Yes. Mother. Yes. Father. No. The box for father had been left blank. There it was. Da was a blank. An empty space. Not even worth a black mark in a square box.
THE LOVED AND LOST
Dizzy now. Head spinning. Around and around and around. I staggered downstairs, bumping off the walls, the banister. Slid down the last few stairs and landed on my backside. Dragged myself to my feet and wobbled into the kitchen. Reached inside Ma’s secret press and grabbed the wine bottle – the full one, the one she’d been keeping for the next happy day in her life. A wonder she hadn’t grabbed the bottle when herself and Mario were taking off. Probably didn’t need it where she now was. She was having plenty of happy days since her fast dash with Mario. What were they up to right now? Still dancing, I bet. In another one of those lamp-lit squares Mario had been banging on about. Going around and around and around. The light of the moon. The old cobblestones. And later, after they’d worked up an appetite, down by the river with all the bread and cheese and grapes. And all the bottles of wine she needed.
Reeling all over the place. Blurry, and wondering exactly what size of a numpty I was. Colossal. Enormous. Or merely gargantuan. Bad enough me not getting a hold of one parent. Now I’d somehow managed it so that I’d lost the other one. I had to laugh. Ha! Ha! Ha! Ha! Ha! Ha! I lurched for the back-yard door, and swaying from side to side where I stood, popped two blues and a yellow. Ha! Ha! Ha! Ha! Ha! Ha! Ha! Ha! Ha! Ha! Ha! Ha! Wading through the wild garden, and the crooked head on Mrs Redihan when I bit into another yellow. Ha! Ha! Ha! Ha! I just couldn’t stop laughing.
Tramping up the back lane. Top of the day to you, Harry and Fergal. Have you met anyone better than yourself, Patrick? Hello, Lily, and did you hear the news? You didn’t, well, you’re missing out on one of the best stories to hit this place in ages. And what story would that be, Jason? For me to know and you to find out, Lily the Nose. A note of caution, though: you fuck up once, you lose two teeth.
Down the dark town I spotted the Slug. Hey, Slug! Is it not past your bedtime? I yelled as I joined him by the courthouse railings and let a hearty laugh out of me. He glared at me and wanted to know what was so funny. So I slurred through my trip into the attic and my little discovery there, and I mentioned Ma taking off to Paris under cover of dark while I was left to look after the fort, and Lawless and the rest of them trying to beat a way through the doors. Five days she’s been gone, Slug. Five days! What do you think of that? But he wasn’t reacting the laughing way I had. No. He was scratching his chin and shaking his head slowly at me. He knew I was a gargantuan-sized numpty. H
e knew I had no idea what I was at. As if to let me know this is exactly what he was thinking, the Slug then let out a long shrill whistle. Then I waved him closer to me, which was a little tricky, what with him still in chains on the courthouse railings. So I leaned into him to ask again why he wasn’t at home in bed. But I couldn’t get a single word to come out of my mouth, sounded like gobbledegook, and I was laughing again and the Slug was looking awfully serious, and the more serious he became the more I laughed. I couldn’t stop. Jesus, Slug, I slurred, waving crazy with the wine bottle. What is the world coming to? Then I hunkered down and bid him join me in a low huddle. Slug, I said, someone is trying to pull the wool over my eyes. Take me for a fool. But the Slug still wasn’t laughing. For all I knew he could have been in on it. He must have been able to see into my thoughts, because before the next words were out of my mouth, he had started into a mild chuckle. At last! That set me off even more and next thing I was asking him for one of his jokes. Come on, Slug, I yammered on. Give me one. For old times’ sake. He’d had enough of me, though, and he batted an arm at me and turned away. I knew how he felt. I gave him a great big slap on the back and continued on my way.
Then I was hanging out by the bridge, queasy and looking down at the crazy river and getting queasier by the minute. The river had a mind of its own, couldn’t even flow in a straight line. It zigzagged round jutting-out rocks, castaway prams, shopping trolleys, rushed away from me and out of our boghole town. Where are you off to, then? I hollered, watching it all the way, as my stomach lurched, once, twice, then spewed up a splendid spongy mess of what I’d been putting inside me for the past few days, and all the time the waves of dizziness coursing through me.
Walking the back lane again. Staggering past the ditch trees and the dandelion weeds. Waving at the nettles. Looking skywards. Well, well, well. Would you look at that? We had our own moon here. Lighting up the way in front of me. Hey, Ma, I said, reaching for another pill. Guess who has the moon in their pocket? And look. I wasn’t alone tonight. The drunks were out, circling their collections of cans. I should pay my respects. Offer them a drink of wine. Pay them back for all the times they’d offered me a slug from their cans.
Ithaca Page 18