Rhino What You Did Last Summer Read online

  ‘Or do I suture the mooscles efter I remove the excess fet?’ San goes. ‘Ees one or other. I can check thees. I heff books – all sort of books. Then I wheel contour and shep your abdomeenal fet ped.’

  I’m there, ‘Actually, I’m having maybe second thoughts about the whole plastic surgery thing? I’m thinking possibly even a beer belly would be better for my reputation.’

  He lifts up my orm and says he’s going to make a small incision in either ormpit…

  I’m there, ‘You’re going to, like, cut my ormpits open?’

  Then he says he’s going to, endoscopically, insert a silicone implant underneath the chest muscles on either side, using, again, sutures to hold them in place.

  ‘Birds of paradise,’ I can hear Trevion in the background going. ‘A dozen. No, two dozen,’ except it’s weird, roysh, because his voice is all, I don’t know, echoey? I feel my shoulders suddenly slump and my knees buckle.

  San says he’s going to slice open my calves and that’s the last thing I remember. I was out of the game by the time the floor came rushing up at me and cracked me full in the face.

  ‘Like, they’re not actually Loubs? Even though they do look like them? They’re actually Gunmetal courts. Red patent. Dita von Teese wore the exact same ones with a floor-length Malandrino to the premiere of Little Miss Sunshine in Malibu. Brittany Snow also wore them with super-bright Mischen and Bulgari jewels and totally nailed it.’

  I don’t know whether I’m asleep or awake.

  ‘Anyway, they give me amazing toe cleavage – probably the best I’ve ever had?’

  Where the fock even am I? Still in the surgery?

  That’s… Sorcha. Yeah, that has to be Sorcha – who else talks like that?

  But who’s she talking to?

  Me?

  ‘Oh my God, so many shops have donated items. You should see the Stella McCortney soft grey, scallop-tiered dress I got. We are going to raise so much money. I’m even hoping that one or two of the magazines are going to, like, cover it?’

  I’m suddenly thinking all these questions. Have I had the operation? Did something go wrong? Have I been in, like, a coma? Has she been here at my bedside for years, trying to talk me out of it, like in loads of movies starring Sandra Bullock?

  How even old am I?

  No, I think. I can’t have been out for long. Because Little Miss Sunshine is only just out and the Malandrino is obviously for the fashion show she’s going to do for the Jolie-Pitt crowd.

  So who is she talking to?

  ‘Tasselled boots,’ Sorcha’s going. ‘Paisley tunics. Patterned silk. Even Arabian carpet bags. Don’t be surprised to see Moho make a comeback – if not this year, then next.’

  ‘Oh,’ another voice suddenly goes, ‘very Marianne Faithfull.’

  Who the fock is that?

  I do a quick inventory of the old bod. My chest. My stomach. My calves. Nothing hurts. San obviously didn’t touch me. So what’s going on?

  ‘Your earrings are amazing,’ Sorcha goes.

  And then I hear it. Her voice.

  ‘Yes, they’re Keselstein-Cord.’

  My eyes just, like, shoot open. I’m like, ‘What the fock are you doing here?’

  ‘Oh, it’s alive,’ she has the actual cheek to go. ‘Back in the land of the living.’

  Sorcha’s there, ‘Hi, Ross. Don’t worry – you just fainted and stuff?’ but it’s, like, her I’m just staring at. ‘I asked you a question,’ I go.

  Sorcha clears her throat, then excuses herself. ‘I’m going to get some tea,’ she goes. ‘They have orange pechoe here,’ and the second she’s gone, roysh, the old dear’s like, ‘I see you’re just as pleasant as ever.’

  I actually laugh at that. And shake my head. I’m there, ‘Why couldn’t you even stay in Ireland?’

  ‘Ross,’ she goes, ‘I was in America long before you arrived.’

  I notice, roysh, that her nose is running and she has to keep sniffing to keep the snot from running all over her face, which is hilarious. I’m there, ‘Aw, you haven’t picked up a cold, have you?’

  She’s like, ‘No, it’s my… my allergies.’

  I laugh, just so she knows that the flowers were no accident. Then I go, ‘Why couldn’t you have stayed in New York?’

  She’s like, ‘I’m doing a coast-to-coast publicity tour.’

  ‘Oh, is that what you call it? Reading out your twisted filth in actual bookshops?’

  ‘And what about you? Shouting at me like a common tramp – after everything we did to make sure you weren’t raised in Sallynoggin. I couldn’t even tell Garcelle Beauvais-Nilon that you were my son…’

  ‘Garcelle who?’

  ‘I said you were some crank I’d never set eyes on before.’

  ‘Of course,’ I go. ‘Deny your own child. Because we’re good at that in our family, aren’t we?’ She’s suddenly all serious. She has no answer to that. ‘I mean, there was the son I never knew I had. The sister I never knew I had. My guess is there’s others. But don’t tell me. I love these surprises.’

  She looks at me with what I would have to describe as total and utter contempt. ‘Do you have any idea what it’s like to lose your mind?’ she goes.

  I throw my eyes up to heaven. She’s looking for sympathy now. It’s no news to me that she’s off her chops.

  She’s there, ‘Have you thought about maybe showing some compassion?’

  Her nose is running like a focking tap. I’m like, ‘Compassion?’

  ‘For the people involved.’

  ‘Hand me my violin there, would you?’

  ‘We’re human, Ross – that’s what you could never accept about your father and me. That’s what you could never forgive.’

  ‘Horseshit.’

  ‘Yes. Imperfect people. And we made all the terrible, terrible mistakes that imperfect people make. But we tried to make the best of the mess we – all of us – created.’

  ‘By letting Erika grow up thinking someone else was her old man? Yeah, rul nice of you. The thing is, I can’t believe you actually stayed with him, even after you caught him dipping the wick…’

  ‘Well, you’re a fine one to talk about that,’ she goes, staring at Sorcha’s empty seat, trying to make a point? I decide to let her have her moment. But not for long.

  ‘He’s back with her,’ I go. ‘As in, Helen? I just thought I’d let you know that.’

  But she already knows. I can’t believe she already knows. Or that she doesn’t seem to care. ‘He loves her,’ she goes. ‘He’s always loved her.’

  ‘So why the fock did you stay together?’

  ‘You don’t know anything about the situation, Ross.’

  ‘So explain it to me. Why don’t you just… explain it to me?’

  She doesn’t say a word for ages. Eventually, roysh, she goes, ‘I knew I got Charles on the rebound. We were both on the rebound. I’d been engaged myself…’

  I’m there, ‘Can I just say, I am actually stunned that there are that many desperate people in the world. But continue…’

  ‘Your father and I met in Sandycove Tennis Club. It was the 1970s. And it was a terrible thing to be in your late twenties and on your own. For a woman anyway. We didn’t love each other. But we liked each other and we had a lot in common. Tennis, for one thing. And maybe in our desperation we hoped that it was enough.’

  ‘So, what, Helen came back from Canada, had a fling with him, got herself preggers…’

  ‘It wasn’t like that. I take my own share of the responsibility…’ She dabs at her eyes. It’s still her allergies. It’s not tears, you can be sure of that.

  I’m there, ‘How?’

  ‘I went through a couple of bad years. Almost lost my mind. My mother went loop the loop when she turned thirty and I was convinced I was going to go the same way. I drove him into Helen’s arms…’

  ‘You still haven’t answered my question – why did he stay with you?’

  ‘Because we had a six-month-old
baby,’ she goes, obviously trying to hang the whole thing on me. ‘And we were married. And Helen was married, too. They were different times. Marriage was a life contract. It wasn’t like switching phone networks.’

  ‘So, what, it suited everyone to pretend it never happened?’

  ‘I’m ashamed to say it, but yes. Your father and I decided to try to hold our marriage together. And I made his having no contact wth his daughter a precondition of taking him back. And I’m ashamed of that now. It was very, very wrong of me. But Helen had decided to go back to Canada. Tim said he’d raise Erika as his own. It suited everyone.’

  ‘As long as no one ever found out the truth.’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘It was the same with Ronan, wasn’t it? Don’t tell Ross he has a kid out there. Nah, just pay off his mother.’

  ‘And that was wrong too…’

  ‘Too focking right it was wrong.’

  ‘You were sixteen. You were still a kid yourself. We did what we thought was right at the time.’

  I sit up and take a good look at her. ‘You sicken me,’ I just go.

  ‘I know,’ she goes. ‘But I’m hoping that one day you’ll find it in your heart to forgive me. Just as you’ll hope your children will forgive you for your awful, awful humanity…’

  I’m thinking about Honor, whacked off her head on coffee, trying to horse that other kid’s orm.

  She goes, ‘I’m hoping that one day you’ll see that, on balance, given the problems we were presented with, we didn’t do all that badly. I don’t want us to go on hurting each other. I want us to be friends.’

  Friends? She must have been at the vodka. ‘You know, looking at you,’ I go, ‘I wouldn’t blame the old man for going elsewhere for it.’

  She smiles at me, roysh, but it’s not a nice smile. It’s, like, evil? ‘And don’t be jealous of my fame,’ she goes. ‘I worked for mine, remember?’ which is about as low as you can possibly go.

  ‘At least I didn’t have to get half my orse fat injected into my lips,’ is what I should say.

  Except, like all the best lines, I didn’t think of it until ages later.

  *

  So who, being honest, could put their hand on their hort and say they ever saw me in, like, a gay bor?

  But I swear to God, roysh, there I am, sat with Harvey in Mother Lode in West Hollywood, the two of us drinking pink drinks with umbrellas and all sorts of accessories sticking out of them and playing a game that he calls P.S. Too? It basically involves watching men and women – because there are birds in there, don’t you worry about that – and trying to decide who’s had Plastic Surgery and who’s, what Harvey calls, Factory.

  So someone’ll walk by, roysh, and I’ll be there, ‘Factory,’ and he’ll be like, ‘You’re kidding me, right? Those tits are, like, so P.S. Ross, they don’t even match her arms!’

  Then we end up getting busted. Some dude overhears us talking about him, walks over to us and goes, ‘Wrong! I’ve had my ears done and a tattoo removed,’ and he storts laughing, then we stort laughing and I can honestly say, roysh, it’s the best craic I’ve had since I came to the States, and that includes all the birds I’ve scored.

  ‘Hey, speaking of plastic surgery,’ I end up going, ‘I’ve decided not to go ahead with the whole body resculpt thing?’

  He’s there, ‘Oh my God, why?’

  They’re all very dramatic, aren’t they?

  I’m there, ‘Bottled it, in fairness. Went for the assessment and the dude storted drawing all over me, telling me all the shit he was going to do – rip this, peel that, chop the other. I ended up sort of, like, fainting?’

  The dude just explodes – it’s like it’s the funniest thing he’s ever heard? He’s there, ‘You fainted?’

  Of course, I end up having to laugh as well.

  ‘Yeah, I was out for, like, five or six hours. But I woke up and told Trevion, fock it, I’m going to keep doing the work in the gym – after that, the public are just going to have to take me as they find me.’

  I ask the borman for two more pomegranate daiquiris.

  Harvey goes, ‘Good for you.’

  I look around the bor. It has to be said, roysh, that if you walked in here off the street, you’d never know there was anything funny about it.

  ‘This place is nothing at all like I expected,’ I go.

  Harvey rolls his eyes, which is another thing a lot of them do. ‘Let me guess, you thought it would be, like, men in denim shorts, leather jackets and handlebar moustaches?’

  I’m there, ‘No,’ even though that’s exactly what I expected.

  ‘I can bring you to one of those bars if you like,’ he goes and I’m quickly there, ‘No!’ which he thinks is hilarious.

  A dude walks by, bursting out of his shirt. ‘Pectoral implants,’ Harvey goes out of the side of his mouth, hordly even needing to look at him.

  I’m there, ‘Do you mind me asking you something? Like, when did you first know that you were… you know?’

  ‘Do you mean gay, Ross?’

  ‘Your word, but yeah.’

  He takes, like, a sip of his drink. ‘Thirteen?’ he goes. ‘Fourteen?’

  I’m there, ‘Wow,’ really meaning it. ‘See, the thing I’m always wondering is, how do you actually know?’

  He’s there, ‘Well, with me, it was when I first started listening to my mother’s Diana Ross CDs.’

  ‘Really?’

  ‘Ross, I’m joking?’

  ‘Oh, sorry.’

  ‘I don’t know when or how I knew. I think I always just knew.’

  I nod.

  ‘Are you actually from, whatever, LA?’

  ‘No,’ he goes, ‘but I’m from California? A town called Barstow? It’s in the Mojave desert, halfway between here and Vegas.’

  ‘Sorry to, like, bombord you with questions,’ I go, ‘but I suppose I’m just curious. Like, did you have to come to LA, if you know what I mean?’

  ‘Do you mean was I run out of town for being a homosexual?’

  ‘Er, yeah.’

  He laughs. I think he finds me one of the genuinely funniest people he’s ever met.

  ‘No,’ he goes, ‘I came to LA because Barstow didn’t have much of a gay scene, that’s all.’

  I’m there, ‘So what did your old pair say when you told them you were – exactly – gay?’

  He doesn’t answer, roysh, just stares at his drink. I’m thinking they must have taken it really badly and now I’m suddenly regretting bringing it up.

  So I go, ‘Do you mind me saying something to you, Harve?’

  ‘No, what?’

  ‘I really admire you. And that’s not me being funny or anything? I’ve never met someone so, I don’t know, comfortable in their own skin.’

  He smiles at me and says thank you because, like, he knows I mean it?

  It’s at that exact point, roysh, that my phone rings. It’s, like, a three-five-three number, so I answer it and it turns out to be Fionn, ringing from school. I don’t know if I mentioned, but he’s back working as, like, a teacher again?

  ‘Ross,’ he goes, ‘I’m sorry to ring you so late at night.’

  I’m there, ‘Don’t sweat it, Dude. At this precise moment in time, I’m sitting in – of all things – a gay bor, if that’s okay to say. Would you believe me if I told you I’ve got – and you’ll appreciate this more than anyone – a gay friend…’

  I put my hand over the phone and go, ‘Fionn’s not actually gay? It’s just a thing I’ve always slagged him about.’

  Then I go back on the phone. I’m there, ‘That’s genuine, by the way – I have my first ever gay mate. And I’m completely cool with it, aren’t I, Harve?’

  ‘Except you keep mentioning it,’ Harvey goes, ‘like, every five minutes.’

  ‘He’s not one of the scary ones,’ I go to Fionn. ‘The ones where you’d always be thinking, if I was hammered, could I trust him?’

  ‘Or trust yourself,’ Harvey goes.

>   I’m there, ‘Hear that Fionn? We’re like Will and Jack here when we get going.’

  Fionn’s straight down to business. ‘Is it true,’ he goes, ‘about Erika?’

  I’m there, ‘Depends – what have you heard?’

  He’s like, ‘Ross, don’t give me that. I met her in Dunne & Crescenzi tonight, eating on her own.’

  I’m there, ‘What was she wearing?’

  He’s like, ‘What?’

  I’m there, ‘I mean, did she look well? Or healthy – did she look healthy?’

  ‘Ross,’ he goes, ‘she looked like a broken woman.’

  I’m there, ‘Well, she’s certainly playing the sympathy cord with you lot. And before you say it, I haven’t turned my back on her. To be honest, it’s, er, Sorcha – she’s having serious trouble getting her head around the fact that Erika’s suddenly my sister. As I said to Oisinn, give her time – she’ll come around.’

  ‘Have you told Ronan?’ he goes.

  The simple answer, of course, is no, but I end up getting in a bit of a strop with him? ‘Sorry, how is this any of your beeswax?’

  He’s there, ‘Well, I could say I’m asking you as Ronan’s year head. I have an interest in his welfare. Or I could say that I’m asking you as a friend who actually cares about you.’

  That hits me full in the chest. See, I never give the four-eyed focker the credit he deserves.

  I’m there, ‘Sorry, Dude – it’s just been, you know, a bit mental even trying to get my own head around it.’

  ‘Look,’ Fionn goes, ‘the story’s already all over town. JP saw your old man and Erika’s old dear coming out of the Bedroom Studio in Dalkey the other day.’

  ‘That’s actually revolting.’

  ‘Whether it is or not, Ross, you should tell Ronan before someone else tells him.’

  The dress code, she said in a text last night, was gorden party casual. I just threw on the usual chinos and Ralph, but when she cops me on the other side of the pool, horsing into a plate of zucchini custards with balsamic vinegar reduction, she checks me out, we’re talking up and down, then mouths the words thank you.

  Which is always nice to hear.

  She doesn’t look nervous, even though it’s some turnout. There must be, like, two hundred people here, a load of them seriously rolling in it by the looks of them.