The Oh My God Delusion Read online

  ‘We dinnae see many of yeer kind aroond here,’ the cop goes and by our kind he presumably means streakers. ‘Cannae take the cold, most ae them.’

  He’s pacing the back of the paddy wagon, talking to us – if I’m being honest – like an actual schoolteacher. ‘Ahm just wondering what tae charge ye with – public indecency or looid behaviour.’ ‘Could we at least have … a blanket?’ Fionn tries to go. I notice that the earpiece on one side of his glasses is missing. He’s never been good on the sauce. ‘I mean, aren’t we entitled to one under the … what, Geneva Convention?’ ‘Ahm no sure,’ the dude goes. ‘Ah’ll see is there a copy ae it lying aroond the station. See does it say anything aboot doss bastards coming over here trying tae make an arse ootae the Edinburgh fucken police.’ I laugh. I can afford to? While they’re sat there freezing their National Concerts off, I’m still dressed as Leo the Lion, sweating like a teenage disco. I’m as pissed as one as well. The costume is a long story, which, by the way, I’ll tell in my own time … The cop gives me the serious death rays. ‘Are ye no ashamed or yeerselves? Are ye no embarrassed? What aboot yeer families?’ I tell him he clearly doesn’t know my old pair. Being dragged buck-naked into a police van in front of seventy thousand people wouldn’t even be a topic of dinner conversation in our house. I look at Fionn. ‘But you,’ I go, unable to keep a straight face, ‘I’m surprised at you,’ except he knows what I actually mean is proud. ‘Is this what you meant by letting yourself go?’ He’s grinning like a shot fox. He’s totally off his tits – drinking like a rock star, all night and all day. I hope for the sake of his career that the TV cameras didn’t catching him running starkas bollockas narkas across the field – although, in fairness, what RTÉ usually do is go, in a really snooty voice, ‘Some attention-seekers on the pitch – let’s not indulge them by giving them what they want.’ ‘Are you not worried about getting the bullet?’ I go. ‘Because that’s what’ll happen if McGahy gets wind of this.’ He’s too mullered to even care. He’s been throwing it down his Jeff Beck for, like, fifteen or sixteen hours straight, although, in fairness to him, I was the one egging him on. JP’s sat on the bench beside me, his eyes closed and his mouth open, trashed. ‘Dude!’ I go, shaking him, trying to wake him, but all he does, roysh, is try to snuggle into me, to warm himself off my fur. There’s suddenly all this, like, banging on the side of the van. Outside, we can hear the chants of ‘Legends! Legends! Legends!’ The cop says we certainly seem to have our admirers. Then he finally throws Fionn and JP a blanket. JP’s just lands on his head and he goes on sleeping. My mind keeps drifting back to the match. ‘Johnny Sexton,’ I suddenly go, just shaking my head. ‘He played for Ireland A when I was coaching Andorra. You could see it then. He just has it, the focker …’ I drunk-texted him this morning, giving him the same advice I used to give to Rog before every match. ‘Eat nerves, shit results!’ and he was straight back with, ‘Thanks, Legend,’ probably realizing that there’s still shit he can learn from me. We were sitting in McDonald’s on Princes Street at that stage, the three of us racing the gherkins from our Big Macs down the inside of the window, JP winning because he had the presence of mind to wipe his free of the special sauce, which – you’ll know if you’ve ever played the game – can slow your runner up. I think we were all still hammered from Renords the night before. No sleep was the rule we all agreed on. Fionn, who, like I said, famously can’t take his drink, switched to gin and tonics sometime around midnight. Seeing this as an attempt to, like, wuss out, I made sure every one was a double. Then we were, like, drinking at the airport, drinking on the flight, drinking in the taxi to the match … It was midday and I was so wankered drunk I could have sworn I heard the poor focker ask whether we were going to do a streak across the pitch if Leinster won. I might have went, ‘What?’ ‘I’m serious,’ he went. ‘We fuggen said it, didn’t we? Years ago. It was fff … Oisinn’s idea. We said if Leinster ever won the Heineken Cup …’ I put my orm around him and laughed. ‘Dude, that was back in the days when we couldn’t get out of our focking pool.’ He just pushed his glasses up on his nose. He was like, ‘We still said it.’ I laughed it off, thinking that was the end of it. This bird came out from behind the counter then – her orse like two F50 pistons in those tight little slacks they make them wear – and storted spraying, then wiping down, the shit we’d made of the window. She didn’t say a word to us, just cleaned up our mess, which made us all feel instantly guilty and I was on the point of telling her that she looked like Selita Ebanks when I heard someone shout that Leinster were a man down and they needed a volunteer. I staggered to my feet. It was, like, an instinct thing more than anything? In my totally focked state, I really did think that Sexton had bottled it and that Michael Cheika had sent a minion to Mackey Ds to find a replacement kicker. See, I blame the Dutch for brewing it. I had my hand in the air, roysh, before I even turned to see the old dude in the Leinster blazer, holding a lion’s head in one hand, then what looked like a giant actual Babygro in the other. I’m going to be honest, roysh, I actually got a bit of a fright seeing Leo with the stuffing ripped out of him like that, to the point where JP even felt the need to go, ‘It was never a real lion, Ross? It was just a costume.’ It was eventually explained to us, roysh, that the dude who in normal circumstances would be wearing it today had been turned away by Ryanair because he arrived at Dublin Airport with only his driving licence and no actual passport? The costume was brought over with the training kit and the balls and blahdy blahdy blah. And now they were in the serious shit, he said, because they’d no one to wear it. ‘You’ve just found yourself a saviour,’ I suddenly heard myself go. ‘Go tell Michael Cheika to just focus on the match …’ The thing weighed a focking tonne. And if I storted knocking the beer back a little faster than usual in the hours before kick-off, I would add, in my defence, that it was only out of fear of dehydration. The downside of all that drinking, of course, is that there are one or two blind spots in my memory of what actually happened? I do remember grabbing an Andy McNab to Murrayfield and it ended up having to be one of those wheelchair-accessible jobs, because you couldn’t have squeezed me into anything else in that suit. I remember Fionn and JP cracking their holes laughing at me – more mullered than I was – then taking pictures with their camera phones and saying how they really wished Oisinn was here to see it. Of course the laughter stopped when we arrived at the ground, then three or four Leinster blazers grabbed me and ushered me down to actual pitchside, in front of the stand where Fionn and JP were sitting back in Row focking Z. I could hear them behind me shouting, ‘You’re focking crazy!’ The view I had of the match was as good as sitting on the old Dame Judy. I did have work to do, though. In my horrendified condition, I tried to, like, remember as best I could some of the moves I’d seen the lion do at, like, Donnybrook and the RDS, and the crowd, I thought, responded positively, even if I fell a couple of times, owing to the fockload of drink I’d taken on board. Of course it’s easy to work the crowd when you’re winning. Leinster went 9–3 up, Drico and Sexton with the kind of drop goals that we usually call Saddams – the execution wasn’t the cleanest but who the fock cares? I was giving it loads of fist-pumping, roysh, and running along, a few times in front of the actual Leinster bench, with my orms in the air. Like I said, it was easy like a Sunday morning. Of course then the match suddenly turned. Stan Wright was sinbinned, Ben Woods ended up getting over for a try, then two Julien Dupuy penalties had me – and a lot more Leinster fans, I’d imagine – feeling suddenly, disgustingly, sober. The fight had actually gone out of me. Leicester had scored, like, ten unanswered points and I dare say I wasn’t the only one thinking, that’s us focked. Of course Leo the Lion would never think like that and I got, like, a shorp reminder of that when another one of Leinster’s blazers tapped me on the shoulder, when I was sitting down, taking a breather, and went, ‘Dance, you idiot! Dance!’ That was all I needed to hear. I st
orted suddenly giving it loads again, gesturing to the crowd, even pointing to Leicester’s tiger mascot and jokingly making, like, a throat-slitting gesture, which succeeded, it has to be said, in raising the noise levels from the Leinster contingent. I wouldn’t like to claim the credit for what happened next. That’s for other people to say. But with the roars of the crowd in his ears, Rocky Elsom went rampaging downfield and Jamie Heaslip ended up scoring a try. I missed Johnny’s conversion, because I celebrated, roysh, by running thirty yords, then sliding on my stomach, which the Leinster fans loved but which I didn’t attempt a second time because I ended up spewing my ring inside the actual suit, which explains the hum in the paddy wagon now. Just after Johnny kicked what turned out to be the winning points, I wandered over to the stand to try to pick out the goys, mainly to get their reaction. Even from that distance, we’re talking twenty rows of seats back, with my eyes going in all directions at once, I could see that Fionn – Mr Spontaneity for once – had taken his Leinster jersey off and was rubbing what turned out to be Vicks VapoRub all over his upper body. It turns out it helps your body retain heat and makes it difficult for cops and stewards to get a good grip on you. I was thinking, okay, someone stop him before this turns ugly. But when I squinted my eyes, roysh, I could see that JP was doing exactly the same thing. But then the final whistle went and, well, I had more work to do. While the players celebrated on the field, I was stood in front of the Leinster fans, again striking various poses. That’s when, all of a sudden, the noise level went up a notch and two of the whitest human beings I’ve ever seen flew past me in a blinding flash, followed by the whiff of menthol. They were suddenly pegging it across the pitch, both of them, stark Vegas naked – everything hung out for everyone to see. It was pretty focking hilarious watching the Feds and the ground staff trying to grab them. They just kept slipping away and you could see even some of the Leinster players laughing as they waited to collect the cup. I had no original intention of joining them until I saw the Leicester tiger, the sneaky focker, trip Fionn up, then I decided, in my very drunken state, that it would be a good idea for me to go over and deck him. The next thing anyone knew, there was literally fur flying. As everyone I think accepts, there is nothing funnier in the world than two men in giant animal costumes hitting each other. Fionn and JP might have literally slipped back into the crowd had they not copped me thumping the stuffing out of the Leicester tiger and pretty much collapsed with laughter. It was that moment of hesitation that proved fatal. They were on us in an instant. ‘A couple ae weeks in Saughton,’ the cop suddenly goes, ‘that’ll poot manners on you boys.’ Saughton sounds like it could be their Mountjoy? A shithole, no doubt. That’s when Fionn ends up making his plea for, I don’t know, leniency. ‘Ossifer,’ he goes, shivering under his blanket, ‘is there any chance you might just … let us go?’ ‘Let ye go?’ He even laughs. ‘Why would ah dae that?’ ‘I don’t know – because we’re in the middle of a recession …’ ‘What’s that got tae dae wiyit?’ Fionn shrugs. ‘I don’t know. It’s just … We come from a country they used to call the … Singy Pore of … of Europe,’ he goes. I don’t think I’ve ever seen him so off his tits. ‘Hard as that is to believe now, you fff … It’s all redundancies and fucking, I don’t know, repossessions and people losing their … their retirement savings. Shit, it’s a depressing time, isn’t it? But then … then we go and win the European Cup …’ I’m literally wiping away tears with the palm of my hand because what he’s saying is actually true. ‘Taking off our clothes,’ he goes, ‘it just … seemed like the right thing to do … The only thing …’ They’ve storted rocking the van now, the Leinster supporters – and still the chant continues: ‘Legends! Legends! Legends!’ ‘So who are they ooy there?’ the cop goes. ‘The fucking dispossessed?’ Fionn obviously likes this because he sort of, like, smiles and goes, ‘Yeah.’ It’s then, roysh, totally unexpectedly, that the cop’s face suddenly softens. He sort of, like, smiles himself. ‘Ma father,’ he goes, really drawing out his words, ‘he never had a bean. Know what he told me before he died?’ We’re all there, ‘Er, no …’ ‘He said that when Celtic won the European Cup, it mightae been the only day he was truly happy in his whole puff.’ He walks to the back of the paddy wagon. He’s like, ‘Wrap they blankets aroond yeer waists, boys,’ and he suddenly opens the door. There’s, like, a roar from the Leinster fans surrounding the van. ‘Go oan,’ the dude goes, ‘oot tae fock – before I change ma maind.’ Birds who call each other ‘Chicken’ are always out and out bitches – has anyone else ever noticed that? ‘Mrs’ is another one. Sophie and Amie with an ie are giving Chloe plenty of both. It’s like, ‘Are you okay, Mrs?’ every time she moves a focking muscle. Or it’s, ‘Can I get you anything, Chicken?’ Of course, the second she hobbles out on to the balcony for a cigarette, they’re flaying the focking skin off her back. ‘Er, hello?’ Sophie goes. ‘How long is she going to need those crutches?’ Amie with an ie laughs. ‘I know, it’s like – er, it’s only a new hip?’ The three of them called around, like, an hour ago, with a chocolate fondue set as a supposed flat-warming present, even though it’s an obvious regift. The real reason they’re here is to have, like, a nosey at the new gaff. ‘Do you have any, like, neighbours?’ Sophie goes. I’m there, ‘Not yet. I think there’s, like, eight aportments in this block of sixty that are occupied. In fact I’m the only one living above the third floor. Except that’s all about to change. Watch this space!’ Chloe hobbles back in from the balcony. ‘It’s actually a really nice aportment,’ she goes, like I give a fock what any of them think. ‘It could do with some books, though.’ She must cop my reaction, roysh, because she goes, ‘No one’s saying you have to read them, Ross. I’m just saying they make, like, amazing furniture. I’ve got something like twenty in mine. My sister’s in, like, interior design, don’t forget?’ She hobbles back over to the sofa and, like, manoeuvres herself back into a sitting position. Amie with an ie goes, ‘Are you okay, Mrs?’ Chloe just nods. Sophie says her own aportment in Sandyford Industrial Estate – as in the one she’s renting out to that Estonian couple – has gone from being worth €468,000 to being worth, oh my God, €410,000. And the couple are thinking of going back to Haapsalu. ‘Haapsalu!’ she goes. ‘Hello? Who’s even heard of it? That’s how bad things in this country have obviously gone.’ Amie with an ie says if she thinks that’s bad, her mum and dad’s house in Booterstown was worth €860,0000 before the whole Celtic Tiger? Then it went up to, like, €1.3 million. Now it’s worth, like, €860,000, and there’s general agreement among them that this is an actual disgrace. My head is beginning to focking throb. ‘Oh my God,’ Sophie goes, ‘on that actual point – Ross, what is your mum doing?’ I’m like, ‘What?’ ‘Er, the spending?’ I don’t know why I end up defending the woman. ‘It’s her focking money,’ I go, ‘which means it’s her business what she spends it on.’ ‘Well,’ she goes, ‘I actually agree with – I can’t remember which paper, but the one that said she was being unpatriotic.’ It’s at that exact point, roysh, that I hear voices in the hallway outside – and not the kind you’d expect to hear in a development as prestigious as Rosa Parks. They’re the voices of, I think the politically correct phrase to use is disadvantaged people? ‘Ssshhh!’ I go. The girls shut the fock up. I tip over to the door and have a look through the spyhole. There’s two – as Ro would call them – shams outside in the hallway, maybe mid twenties, you know the kind, we’re talking cheap sweatshirts and we’re talking runners that cost the price of a week’s holiday somewhere. It’s immediately obvious, roysh, that they’re trying to break into the vacant aportment next door, probably for the copper piping. I’m there, ‘Sophie, throw me the phone …’ The Feds take their time answering. I’m like, ‘Yeah, I’ve got skobies trying to break into the vacant aportment next door to me – can you send a fleet?’ The dude’s like, ‘Veecant?’ – focking CSI Belturbet. ‘Sure,
what’s the heerm in thet?’ I can’t believe my actual ears. ‘Sorry?’ ‘Is it the builder owns it?’ ‘Er, yeah?’ ‘Sure them builders is the worst criminals of the lot, what they’re after doing to this counthree. It’s them what should be behind bars – them and the banks …’ Then the line just goes dead. And I end up having to take the law into my own hands. ‘Be careful!’ Chloe goes, as I grab, like, an empty JD bottle from the recycling bin, then reef open the front door. Of course the two schnacks don’t even flinch. I go, ‘Just to let you know, I’ve actually already called the Feds?’ They look at each other, totally scoobied. ‘Ah,’ one of them goes, ‘he tinks we’re tryin to break in, so he does.’ The other focker laughs. I’m thinking what’s so funny? ‘We liff hee-er,’ he goes. Now, you can imagine me – my hort pretty much stops in my chest. He’s there, ‘Ine only lookin for me key, so I am.’ I’m still thinking, hoping, that I maybe misheard them? ‘Look,’ I go, ‘take the copper, the lead, whatever you’ve come for …’ ‘Are ye not listenin to me, are you not? We liff hee-er.’ It’s Chloe who ends up asking the question that’s frozen on my lips. ‘Ask them how people like them can afford to live somewhere like this,’ she shouts out into the hall. ‘Because,’ the one who’s looking for his key goes, ‘we’re not payin for it. It’s the fooken soshiddle.’ I’m there, ‘The what?’ in my innocence. ‘The soshiddle welfeer,’ he goes. ‘There’s fooken hudrits of vacant apeertmints in these blocks …’ I’m there, so focking gullible: ‘But it was supposed to become, like, student accommodation?’ He actually laughs at me. ‘Sure the soshiddle’s the only crowd writing out big rent cheques these days …’ I suddenly feel like a focking Guilbaud’s lobster who’s just copped my old man grinning into the tank at him. How could an obvious sap like Ailish stitch me up like this? Of course it’s obvious. It’s called the current economic climate. I watch the two of them continue searching for their keys. Then they eventually find them. One of them sticks out his hand and goes, ‘I’m Tetty,’ though what he obviously means is Terry. I shake it, in a sudden daze. ‘And this is Laddy,’ he goes, in other words Larry, ‘the brutter …’ And to think the old dear said this recession wasn’t going to affect me. Now it’s suddenly living next door. The two boys are loving my, I suppose, discomfort, of course. ‘Nice meetin ye,’ Larry makes sure to go, ‘neighbour!’ ‘What is wrong with you?’ Sorcha practically roars the words at me. I’m sitting in the middle of the shop, feeding Honor an ethical, probiotic yoghurt, looking around me at all these cordboard boxes full of – get this – more new stock? ‘You know what’s wrong with me,’ I go. ‘I moved out of my gaff – I’ve ended up living next door to poor people – just to get the bank off your back and this one back in Pre-Montessori. And you’re still ploughing money into this …’ I even kick a box of Yigal Azrouël dresses, looking for the right word. ‘Ross!’ she goes again. ‘You’re putting that yoghurt all over Honor’s face.’ She pretty much snatches her out of my orms, which is when I suddenly snap out of it. She’s right – poor Honor looks like a bucket of paint with eyes. ‘My point still stands,’ I go. ‘You can’t even sell the shit you have …’ ‘I’ll thank you not to use language like that in front of your daughter. And do you think I’d just go and order in all this stock without having a plan?’ The next thing I know, roysh, she’s looking over my shoulder, going, ‘Hey, Erika!’ and she’s dumping Honor back in my orms. I’m thinking, this kid is heading for a child shrink as sure as her mother’s heading for the focking bankruptcy court. Erika looks incredible and I’m only mentioning that as a statement of fact. I look back at Sorcha, then ask her what’s going on. She says it’s called torgeted morkeshing and I’d know that if I cared about retail and the problems it’s facing at the moment? That evening certificate course she did in the Smurfit Business School has obviously gone to her head. ‘Erika,’ she goes, ‘I’ll be an hour at the very most. Honor, Mommy will be back soon,’ and then she reaches down behind the counter and whips out – I don’t believe it – a focking megaphone. I try to ask her, ‘What the fock?’ but she’s out the door before I can even get the words out. ‘I told her she should just hire Claire to stand outside Bewley’s with a sign,’ Erika goes. ‘Claire would do it too, with this wedding coming up. How else is she going to pay for twenty-two Massamam curries?’ I’m suddenly getting the picture here. ‘Are you telling me she’s heading for Grafton Street with that thing – to, what, drum up business?’ Erika doesn’t answer, although her silence says yes. ‘Why didn’t you talk her out of it? I thought you were on my side in this thing?’ ‘She’s my friend,’ she goes, like that’s ever been an excuse for anything. ‘I might not agree with her standing on Grafton Street advertising her shop through a loud-hailer. I might think that the most sensible thing to do is to just shut it down. But I’m going to be here, Ross, every afternoon for as long as she needs me …’ ‘Well, personally, I think she’s gone mad …’ ‘Mommy’s not mad,’ Honor – totally out of the blue – goes. ‘It’s just the recession, Daddy!’ My mouth just drops open. Erika’s does too, in fairness. Then I end up semi-losing it – I can’t put it any stronger than that. ‘See?’ I go. ‘A little girl of not even four years of age shouldn’t even know a word like that. This is because of what she’s been exposed to in this shop.’ I pick her up in my orms and storm off after Sorcha. It doesn’t take me long to find her. I actually hear her before I see her – her voice going, ‘Eighties style is making a comeback due to the fashion industry’s 25-year-recycling rule – but what I want to tell you here today is that it doesn’t have to be that way …’ She’s standing outside Boodles – the flower-sellers there don’t look like happy rabbits about being forced to listen to her either. ‘There are other retro trends you can follow that don’t necessarily mean cheap. The whole ethnic tribal thing is so in right now – animal prints are getting a total overhaul and belted trenches and safari jackets are going to be huge this year, even stretching into the autumn …’ She’s using all the public-speaking skills she picked up in school – focusing on a particular point in the distance, which seems to be the Never Mind the Recession – Look at Our Prices shopfront opposite her, then every so often glimpsing at these little prompt cords that she’s holding. It’s pretty obvious, though, that people are only stopping to, like, laugh at her, which is difficult for me to just stand there and watch. Obviously, I say fock-all, though, because I don’t want people to think that I know her. ‘Another look that’s going to be – oh my God – huge this year is Disney Chic. Those of you who read Elle and Marie Claire will know that the catwalks this spring have been flooded with crazy-shaped shoes, big bangles and full swishy skirts – and all these trends and more can be found in the exclusive Sorcha & Circa in the Powerscourt Townhouse Centre …’ I’m on the point of walking straight up to her to tell her she’s making a basic tit of me, as well as herself, when – possibly out of frustration at not being listened to – she suddenly storts picking out individuals walking past and basically critiquing what they’re wearing, except it’s not so much critiquing as ripping the piss. It actually storts off, roysh, hormless enough. She’s there, ‘You there, the girl in the leather Members Only jacket with the sleeves rolled up and the Ray-Bans on your head – stacked bangles, which are available in Sorcha & Circa, are a simple way to work a globetrotting trend into that look.’ Which is a reasonable enough thing to say. But then, roysh, it storts to get really personal. ‘That girl over there,’ she ends up going to this totally innocent fat bird who just happens to waddle by, ‘I know the whole Flashdance thing is suddenly back but that sweatshirt and those leggings do absolutely nothing for a girl of your size. If you want to downplay those curves, why not follow Milan’s obsession this spring with delicate layers, wispy fabrics and cascading ruffles, adding ballet pumps to give everything a more ethereal edge. Also, masculine, tailored jackets offer a softer, slouchy twist to the fuller female frame – and
all are available from Sorcha & Circa …’ The bird actually stops, her mouth just flapping there in the wind. The next thing, roysh, Sorcha’s trained her eye on some other poor unsuspecting cow, this one coming out of the Corphone Warehouse. ‘Those colours,’ she goes. ‘Yes, I’m talking about you, in the shocking-pink tank, with the tangy lime T underneath? All they do is draw the colour from your face and highlight – no offence – your bad complexion …’ You can see the bird – she’s rough as guts, roysh, and big-time WC – actually considering going over and decking her. I’m even getting ready to step in. ‘Tone-on-tone neutrals and creams,’ Sorcha keeps giving it, ‘add sophistication to any look and can detract from badly pocked skin like yours.’ The bird turns around to no one in particular and says she’s going to boorst her, the snoppy fooken bitch, and I feel like telling her that people like her shouldn’t even be on Grafton Street. It’s the mobile phone shops that keep bringing them in. Before she can do anything, though, Sorcha has moved on to someone else. ‘Jeans tucked into ankle boots shorten and thicken the lower leg and, as you can all see, add two pounds to the rear …’ I decide, roysh, that I can’t take any more of this and I turn to leave. As I do, Honor goes, ‘Daddy, what’s Mommy doing?’ I just shake my head and tell her she’s trying to earn a living – and the way things are going, we might all be doing it before we’re very much older. ‘Yeth?’ ‘Dont give me yeth,’ I practically roar down the phone. ‘Why haven’t you been returning my calls?’ She’s there, ‘I’m thorry, Roth, I’ve been tho, tho bithy …’ ‘Busy avoiding me, more like.’ ‘The thing ith, I should have thold you thith before – I’m sort of, like, theeing thith other guy – I thought you underthtood, we were never going to be a therious thing …’ I’m like, ‘Whoa, let me give this to you straight. I’ve no focking interest in you. It was a use and abuse situation. End of. My problem is you stitching me up …’ ‘Thtitching you up?’ ‘Er, in a major way? I’ve got skangers living next door to me all of a sudden – it was supposed to be all students …’ ‘Yeth, unfortunately the thtudent thing fell through. Plan B was the thothial welfare …’ I’m there, ‘Horseshit – that UCD thing was obviously never a runner …’ ‘Roth,’ she tries to go, ‘Ethie’s had to thake an enormouth hith – heath loothing a loth of money and the bankth are threatening thoo …’ ‘Don’t give me that. Eddie knew what he was doing. He knew he had to get out of there before he turned the place into practically Ballymun. When you met me you told him you’d found him a sucker. Even though you probably said thucker …’ ‘Thath very hurthful.’ ‘Well, I’m beginning to wonder is that even a real speech impediment you have …’ ‘Whath?’ ‘I’m just saying, obviously nothing’s as it focking seems with you. Maybe it’s just put on, to make yourself sound more stupid – lull people into a sense of blahdy blah.’ ‘How thare you!’ ‘Hey, I worked as an estate agent back in the good old days. I know all the tricks …’ ‘Well,’ she goes, ‘if you thid work ath an ethtate agenth, you’ll know that it wath all legal and above boarth …’ ‘Have you even thought about what Rosa Parks would think of all this if she was alive today?’ ‘Fuck Rotha Parkth!’ I’m left in just total shock. ‘That’s, I don’t know, blasphemy.’ She’s there, ‘Live with ith, Roth – ith called the rethethion!’ I wake up in the early afternoon underneath a bird called Abhlach, a DBS Diploma in Internet Morkeshing student who I met in Dakota and who agreed to come home with me without telling me that it was Dare You week. Oh, I was, like, stripped and ready for action, raiding the old johnny cache and hunkering down for a long night ahead, when I noticed her sitting on the edge of the bed with her orms and legs folded and a face on her like a kicked-in can of Chum – tell-tale signs for an experienced campaigner like me. I was there, ‘Are you saying it’s your …’ She looked at me, shocked, I think, at how comfortable I was talking about, like, women’s issues? She was like, ‘Yeah, I just got it today.’ I just shook my head. ‘I can’t believe you’re perioding me.’ ‘Sorry,’ she went. ‘I should have maybe mentioned it in the taxi.’ I’m thinking, no, you should have maybe mentioned it before I spent a focking Brody Jenner buying you a Cosmo. I don’t think there’s a man alive who’d have blamed me if I’d put her out on the street. And I definitely would have if I’d still been living in The Grange. But Ticknock is miles from anywhere and it’s obviously not safe around here with pretty much Adam and Paul living next door. So I let her stay, which is, again, the gentleman in me coming out. Anyway, where all this is going, is, the next day, we’re talking two, maybe three o’clock in the afternoon, I wake up with her dead weight lying on top of me and someone beating out a morse code message on the focking doorbell. Now, in normal circumstances, I’d just ignore it, but whoever’s outside just keeps pressing it at, like, five-second intervals, which means I end up having to roll Abhlach off me, throw back the old Outlaw Petes and go and see who it is. I’m one hungover grover, by the way. I check the little CCTV screen and I get an immediate fright. It’s Sorcha’s old man and straight away I’m wondering what the fock I’ve done. But then I’m thinking it might not be anything major. Sorcha’s got her thirtieth birthday coming up this summer – maybe he just wants to warn me to stay away, possibly even serve me with papers to that effect? Either way, I decide not to answer it. ‘Who is it?’ Abhlach shouts. ‘Edmund Lalor,’ I go, ‘a prick with ears. He’s the father of the old Bag for Life. I’m going to crack on not to be in …’ Of course what I don’t realize, because I’m not used to this intercom yet, is that I’ve got my finger on the focking speaker button. Jesus, I’m so slow sometimes, they could put deckchairs on me and call me a focking cruise ship. He puts his face right up to the camera lens and goes, ‘Let me in, you little tidemark,’ which is a thing he’s always called me. I’m there, ‘Er, cool – just, er, push the door there, Mr Lalor. It’s, like, the ninth floor.’ Maybe sixty seconds later, I hear the elevator go, then in he walks, no greeting, no pleasantries, nothing. I bring him into the kitchen. ‘She’s just a friend in there,’ I go, flicking my thumb in the direction of the bedroom, ‘just in case you’re wondering …’ But he doesn’t give a fock. He gets straight down to business. ‘Why is my daughter standing on Grafton Street like some carnival barker?’ I actually laugh. ‘Whoa, that’s straight out of left field,’ I go. ‘I thought this was going to be about her thirtieth. Where’s she having it, by the way – has she decided yet?’ ‘A colleague of mine from the Law Library rang me at lunchtime. He said he saw my daughter standing outside Bewley’s, using a megaphone to try to drum up custom for that shop of hers. I said, no way – couldn’t have been her. My Sorcha would never stoop so low. I said I’d have to see it with my own eyes. So I went to Grafton Street myself …’ ‘And did it turn out to be her?’ I go. I don’t know why, maybe just playing for time. ‘Sorcha’s grandmother has coffee in Bewley’s every Friday morning. What would she think if she saw her like that?’ ‘Well,’ I go, ‘she’d certainly be wondering is that all a UCD education is worth these days …’ He takes a step closer to me – he’s in no mood for my bullshit – and he sticks his finger practically in my face. ‘You better tell me what the fuck is going on?’ ‘Okay,’ I end up having go, ‘her shop’s in trouble.’ ‘Trouble?’ he goes, looking genuinely bewildered. I’m there, ‘Yeah. Er, financial trouble?’ ‘That can’t be true. No, she told me herself that she was meeting the challenges of the new economic paradigm head-on.’ I nearly laugh – that’s obviously more Smurfit School horseshit. I’m there, ‘Dude, take it from me – the girl couldn’t sell Johnny Hayes a dummy pass.’ He’s seriously pissed off, of course, that I know all of this shit and he doesn’t? ‘I’m sure she would have told me if it was as bad as you say.’ I laugh. I’m like, ‘Dude, she ended up nearly losing the house,’ bad and all as I feel for telling him. ‘The house?’ ‘Yeah, she couldn’t make her loan payments and the banks were going to turf her out
on to Newtownpork Avenue – until I stepped in, of course, as the last-minute hero.’ ‘Why didn’t she tell me any of this? We’ve never had secrets?’ ‘Look,’ I go, mainly to try to make him feel better, ‘you know Sorcha – she’s, like, really proud and blah blah blah. She didn’t want her precious daddy to find out what kind of shit she was actually in.’ You can see his little mind working overtime, trying to think of a way of blaming me for it. ‘You let her get into this kind of trouble.’ ‘Whoa, horsy! I’m the one who’s been telling her to shut the shop down.’ ‘Well, obviously not firmly enough. If you had …’ but then he suddenly loses his train of thought, distracted by something. ‘What’s that … awful noise?’ ‘It’s Christy Moore Live at the Point. I’ve got poor people living next door …’ He doesn’t know how to respond to this information. ‘It’s “Nancy Spain”,’ I go, ‘thirty times a focking day. And that’s all because I traded down, to make sure your daughter and granddaughter didn’t end up living in a focking bus shelter …’ Again, he can’t bear the thought of me being the man of the moment. He smiles, but not in a good way, then pretends to be interested in a photo on the sideboard of me standing next to Declan Kidney, giving him the rabbit ears. He’s obviously working up to telling me something. ‘You know,’ he goes, loving the sound of his own voice, ‘when you broke Sorcha’s heart, I made it my life’s ambition to destroy you.’ ‘You’ve told me that before – loads of times.’ He just nods. ‘Sorcha asked me to put the brake on the divorce proceedings for a little while – you know that as well, I expect. Not to give you false hope, of course – she’s got you well out of her system …’ I wouldn’t be so sure about that but I let him continue. ‘I tried to talk her out of it, of course. Let’s crush the little bastard into the dirt, I said. But her mother said no, give the girl time to reflect on what she’s doing, if that’s what she wants. But me, I can’t wait to get back to it.’ ‘I bet you can’t.’ ‘You see, I’m very, very good at what I do. And obviously I’ve a passion for this particular case. I could cripple you, Ross – financially speaking of course.’ ‘I’m not sure Sorcha would want that.’ ‘Of course she wouldn’t. But I still could. I want you to appreciate the power I have over you.’ I’m there, ‘What exactly are you saying?’ He laughs, I suppose, cruelly. ‘I don’t care whether Sorcha’s shop remains open or closed for business,’ he goes. ‘What I’m telling you is this. I’m going to walk down Grafton Street tomorrow morning, and if I see my daughter there, demeaning herself again, I’m going to obliterate you in the divorce courts, regardless of what she and her mother say. If she’s back on that street with that loud-hailer in her hand, I’ll make sure it’s you who ends up paying whatever debts she has … for ever!’ Then off he goes. It’s often occurred to me that there’s nothing like the threat of poverty to suddenly concentrate the mind. I sit down at the table, mulling over my dilemma, until a plan eventually comes into my mind. I tip back into Abhlach, who’s watching Murder, She Wrote, outstaying her welcome by a good fourteen hours at this stage. I grab the remote and just mute it. ‘Okay,’ I go, ‘I think we’d all agree that that was a pretty shitty stunt you pulled on me last night, with your period, blah blah blah,’ and she looks at me, roysh, still trying to play the innocent. ‘But you can make it up to me by doing me a favour.’ I pick up my chinos from where I dropped them last night, then I grab a whack of notes out of the pocket. She’s going, ‘What are you talking about?’ ‘Don’t worry, you’re probably going to enjoy it. Do you know a shop called Sorcha & Circa in the Powerscourt Townhouse Centre?’ She shakes her head. ‘Well,’ I go, peeling off five hundred snots, ‘it exists. Only focking barely – but it does. I want you to go and spend this in there …’ She’s obviously surprised. ‘Why?’ ‘That’s for me to know. You’ve just got to promise me you’ll spend every focking cent of it in there. As in, don’t be nipping around the corner to Rococo.’ ‘You’re giving me five hundred euros? To spend on, like, clothes?’ I laugh. ‘And no sex,’ I go. ‘Yeah, we might as well be focking married, huh?’ I pull back the sheets and gesture for her to get out of the bed. Then I grab my phone and stort scrolling down through my contacts, looking for exes who are still on talking terms with me. ‘Remember that – oh my God – really flirty Saloni Alexia dress that I actually wanted for myself?’ Sorcha goes. ‘Well, I actually sold it this morning? With a pair of strappy Chanel ankle boots.’ I’m there, ‘That’s cool.’ ‘I’m sure I know her, by the way.’ ‘Who?’ ‘The girl who bought them. Maybe from Annabel’s …’ Shit. I quickly get her off the subject. ‘Business-wise,’ I go, ‘you really seem to have turned a corner. Fair focks would have to be my basic attitude.’ She smiles – happy that I’m happy for her – and says she sold three Milly of London dresses yesterday alone and that pair of neutral-seam-detail jodhpurs that she’s had, like, for ever? ‘I just knew we’d ride this recession out,’ she goes. ‘See, the key to it, as we learned in college, is to keep money in circulation …’ I’m certainly doing that – down five focking Ks in just over a week. As we’re talking, Sorcha’s putting Honor’s little coat on her and I ask her where they’re headed anyway at, like, four o’clock on a Sunday afternoon. At first, roysh, she’s not going to tell me, but eventually I get it out of her that Claire has found – oh my God – the most amazing previously loved wedding dress online. See, when I hear that, I end up needing a moment – that’s how hord I laugh. ‘You mean second-hand?’ I go, then of course Sorcha’s on the immediate defensive. ‘No, I mean previously loved, Ross.’ This wedding just gets funnier and funnier. ‘I’ve already told you – they don’t have much money.’ ‘As if that’s an excuse! Who even sells their wedding dress?’ The reason I ask is that, look, our marriage wasn’t one of those happy ever after jobbies, yet Sorcha still pulls on the old Vera Wang when she’s having one of her blue days, even if it is just to eat her own body weight in Dairy Milk and watch movies with Patrick Dempsey and Anne Hathaway in them. ‘Okay, don’t laugh,’ she goes, ‘but it’s this, like, website she found? It’s for people who had wedding plans but, for one reason or another, they didn’t go ahead.’ I actually do laugh. ‘Are we talking people who were, like, jilted at the altar? Because I thought that shit only happened in EastEnders.’ She shakes her head, like I’m the only one who watches too much TV? ‘We’re talking about people who had second thoughts,’ she goes. ‘Anyway, Claire’s going to be here any minute, Ross, so if you wouldn’t mind …’ She sort of, like, indicates the front door, telling me to hit the bricks. I’m there, ‘Er, not a chance,’ and then I scoop Honor up in my orms. ‘I wouldn’t miss this for the world.’ ‘Ross,’ she goes, ‘it’s in a place called Kilcroney,’ which I know is supposed to scare me off. But nothing could. I get the feeling that this is one experience not to be missed? I look at Honor and I go, ‘Would you like your daddy to come along with you?’ and Honor sort of, like, squeals, then claps her hands and goes, ‘Daddy,’ and I’m like, ‘Yeah, that’s right, kiddo – road trip!’ There’s a sudden ring at the door and it’s Claire. ‘Ross wants to come,’ Sorcha tells her. She ends up being weirdly cool with it, though. She’s like, ‘Let him if he wants to,’ even though she knows I’m there just to rip the actual. So we pile into Claire’s Renault Clio, then we’re off. Kilcroney ends up being in Wicklow, which I should have guessed. Poor Honor’s little face as she watches the worst of it zip by – she’ll never stray further than the Loughlinstown roundabout again. Which is no bad thing. Teach them young. Of course straight away I stort getting the subtle digs in. ‘Has he got his suit yet?’ I go. ‘If you want, I could go through the death notices in the paper – find someone who won’t be needing theirs any more.’ Sorcha’s like, ‘Ignore him, Claire,’ and Claire says she learned that lesson a long time ago. He rings when we’re halfway down there. She answers by going, ‘Garret, I’ve got you on speakerphone,’ just in case he’s about to say somethin
g weird. I’ve got the handcuffs and the rubber nappy on – come straight home. That kind of shit. He asks her if she’s tried the dress on yet and she says no, we’re only, like, driving down there now. Then she goes, ‘I probably should tell you – Ross is here as well.’ He’s like, ‘Ross?’ and then there’s all of a sudden silence on the other end of the phone. It’s obvious he’s bulling at the idea that I’m going to see the dress before he does? So I go, ‘Hey, Garret,’ all happy, like a man with a tit in either pocket. ‘I’ve had an amazing idea about your suit. Can you get an Evening Herald if you’re out?’ He doesn’t rise to the bait. He just goes, ‘Claire, we’ll talk about this later,’ and she’s like, ‘Gar, he only came for the drive,’ but he’s there, ‘I said later,’ and he just hangs up. ‘It might just be pre-wedding nerves,’ Sorcha tries to go, ready to defend him, but Claire’s like, ‘No, he just gets – oh my God – so possessive.’ I suddenly cop why she was so happy to have me along for the ride. She’s using me to fock with his head. Women. You could stay awake all night and you still wouldn’t be up early enough for them. It takes forever to find the gaff. The satnav stops talking to us somewhere around Kilmacanogue, presumably writing us off for dead. But we eventually find the place – a surprisingly all right gaff, it has to be said. Julie is the bird’s name. It’s all, ‘So you’re the bride – congratulations!’ and blahdy blahdy blah. She brings us into the kitchen and we all make horseshit conversation about the drive down and the recapitalization of the banks and how bad things are out there at the moment. She’s not actually that bad. She’s maybe twenty-four, twenty-five. She could look like Emily Browning if she did something with herself. All I want to know, of course, is why she’s flogging the Eton Mess. ‘I only bought it three months ago,’ she goes. Sorcha’s like, ‘We saw the photos online. Oh my God, it’s so beautiful. It is a Rosetta Nicolini, is it?’ ‘It is, yeah.’ Sorcha and Claire smile at each other. ‘Daddy, what’s that smell?’ Honor goes. ‘Ssshhh!’ I go. ‘It’s Wicklow, Honor. It’ll be over soon.’ ‘It’s next Saturday we were supposed to get married,’ Julie goes. This is, like, totally out of the blue. Claire puts on this, like, sympathetic face – totally fake. ‘I’m so sorry,’ she goes, then she sort of, like, grips Julie’s upper orm. You can tell what she’s thinking is, hurry up and get the focking thing. She disappears into the bedroom to get it. I’m there, ‘I wonder what happened,’ and Sorcha tells me to behave myself, knowing my previous. Sixty seconds later, she’s back. Claire and Sorcha practically buckle at the knees when they see it. There’s a lot of hands over mouths and a lot of oh my Gods, then Claire says she has to try it on – oh my God, right now! She doesn’t disappear into another room to do it either. She strips down to her Biggie Smalls right there in front of me, then even goes, ‘Oh my God, Ross, don’t ever tell Garret you saw me in just my bra and knickers.’ It’s like, er, yeah – like she’s not going to let it slip? ‘Do you mind me asking,’ Julie goes, ‘what colour are your bridesmaids’ dresses?’ Claire turns to Sorcha, the last word in fashion. ‘Would you say egg yolk?’ Sorcha nods. ‘Egg yolk!’ Julie goes, a little big shocked – she tries her best to hide it but you can hear it in her voice, like when someone tells you they’ve named their kid Blaine or some shit. Claire’s there, ‘Yeah, egg yolk, with, like, white pagodas on them?’ ‘Pagodas?’ I get in then. ‘Did you ever eat in the restaurant that used to be above Kielys?’ Sorcha interrupts before she has a chance to answer and tries explain that the actual theme of the wedding is Thai. From the way Julie looks at her, she might as well have said it was fancy focking dress. Claire puts the thing on over her head, then Sorcha storts pulling it this way and that, basically adjusting it. ‘Do you mind me asking,’ I suddenly go, ‘because it’s focking killing me at this stage – why was the wedding called off?’ ‘Ross!’ Sorcha goes, like she’s giving out to an actual child. But the thing is, roysh, Julie seems happy enough to talk about it. She’s there, ‘Breffni was cheating on me,’ she goes. ‘With my best friend. I’m just happy I found out before I made the biggest mistake of my life.’ Then she opens this sort of, like, long cupboard with the ironing board in it and there’s, like, a full-length mirror on the inside of the door. Claire checks herself out in it, striking various poses, and she seems to like whatever the fock it is she sees. ‘Oh, yes!’ she’s going. ‘Oh, yes! Wait till Erika sees me in this!’ ‘So what shoes are you going to wear with it?’ Julie goes. ‘I had these beautiful white Louboutins that my sister bought me in New York …’ Claire’s there, ‘Okay, this is going to sound bad? But I fell – oh my God – in love with this one pair? They just happen to be from Barratts but they are really nice …’ Julie’s there, ‘Oh …’ ‘They are amazing shoes,’ Sorcha goes, trying to back her up. This is the same Sorcha, remember, who’d sooner cut her own toes off with a blunt scissors and wear focking horse shoes than put anything from Barratts on her actual foot. I turn around to Julie and I’m like, ‘So what’s the Jack – how did you find out, about him and your so-called bezzy mate?’ ‘I saw them out together – in Bray one night.’ ‘Bray!’ I instantly go. ‘That’s where Claire’s from! Lovely port of the world, I’m told.’ I’m too busy ripping the piss to notice how upset Julie is suddenly becoming. ‘It was all planned …’ she goes, her eyes filling up. Sorcha tells me to stop, I’m making her sad. I tell her I disagree – she seems to want to get it off her chest? ‘I sometimes think, if I could only talk to him. It might have been just pre-wedding jitters …’ You can see Claire suddenly thinking, fock, is she going to change her mind about selling this thing? ‘Er, after the way he obviously humiliated you,’ she goes, ‘you’d be mad, Julie, to even want him back.’ Julie dabs at her tears with the back of her hand and tries to change the subject. She’s there, ‘So who’s doing your make-up? Are you going to Brown Sugar or one of those?’ Claire looks at Sorcha – guiltily, if that’s a word? She’s like, ‘No, it’s not one of the well-known ones? Well, what I’m actually doing is – there’s this new, like, beauty college that’s just opened up on the Main Street in Greystones. They’re always looking for models …’ ‘What?’ Julie goes, genuinely disgusted. From my long and often sorry experience of birds, I’d say she’s less than ten seconds away from flipping the tits here. ‘When you think about it,’ Claire tries to go, ‘these are the make-up artists of the future. They’re the ones who are going to be working in all the well-known places once they qualify.’ ‘Oh my God, take the dress off,’ Julie suddenly goes. She’s not focking about either, just from the way she says it. Claire’s there, ‘What?’ ‘I said take it off!’ ‘No, I’ve decided I want it.’ ‘What, so you can go mud-wrestling in it? Take it off!’ I tell Claire not to orgue. I’ve heard what they do to GAA referees in these ports. Except that’s exactly what she does do? ‘I will not take it off. I’m paying you what you wanted for it – four hundred euros – and that’s it …’ The next thing any of us knows, roysh, Julie has made a sudden lunge for Claire. She grabs two massive fistfuls of the dress and she’s twisting it in her hands, at the same time going, ‘Take it off! Take it fucking off!’ I’m standing there thinking, see, this is what ends up happening when you try to do shit on the cheap. ‘It was for my big day!’ Julie’s going. ‘My big day!’ ‘Ross!’ Sorcha goes. ‘Get her off her!’ which I decide I probably should do, especially when Honor storts getting distressed about what she’s seeing – two natives basically going at it. I hand the kid to Sorcha, then I grab Julie’s fingers and try to unlock them from the – it’s a gay word – but fabric? The problem is, she’s unbelievably strong, roysh, and the angrier she gets, the tighter her grip becomes. At the same time, Claire and Sorcha are both screaming at me to do something. They’re going, ‘Do something, Ross! Do something!’ So I end up grabbing Julie from behind, by the two shoulders, putting one foot on Claire’s chest, then sort of, like, pulling Julie backwards with every b
it of strength in my body. The next thing any of us hears is this humungous rip. Claire goes flying in one direction and hits the focking wall. I go the other way and land sprawled on the kitchen floor, with Julie on top of me, still holding two pieces of the focking dress. Sorcha helps Claire up. I hear her go, ‘My mum will fix it – she’s an amazing seamstress,’ then the two of them – get this – just leg it out of the house, leaving me there, still wrestling on the floor with Julie. She’s strong, it has to be said, with a bite like a focking donkey, though I manage eventually to get the better of her, thanks to my superior fitness, then stumble, battered and bloodied, out into the gorden. Claire, still in the dress, has the engine of the Clio idling and the front-passenger door open. I dive in, head first, then manage somehow to get the door closed and Claire doesn’t drop below a hundred Ks an hour until we return to civilization. ‘Why me?’ Malindi goes. God, she’s thick as pig shit. Which is saying something coming from me. How she made it in PR is a focking mystery. ‘Because it’s got to be birds that Sorcha doesn’t know,’ I go. ‘Otherwise she’ll get suspicious.’ This is us in the Brown Thomas café, by the way. She takes the money off the table like she’s just woken up out of a twenty-year coma and has just clapped eyes on the euro for the first time. ‘I haven’t seen you for, like, two years …’ ‘Like I said, I wasn’t ready to go down that whole relationship road.’ ‘Presumably because you were married – which you failed to mention by the way in the three months we were seeing each other.’ ‘Look, I get why you’re pissed off?’ ‘Then you ring me, totally out of the blue, ask me to meet you for coffee and you offer me five hundred euros to spend in your wife’s shop …’ I’m on the point of actually giving in. I go to take the money out of her hand but she whips it away quickly. ‘I’m not saying I won’t do it,’ she goes. ‘In fact, yeah, I’ll accept this as compensation for the way you treated me.’ I laugh and I tell her fair enough. She drains the rest of her cappuccino, then focks off without saying another word. I’m left just sitting there. I’m actually just texting Fionn – he’s totally ashamed of his antics in Edinburgh, by the way – when all of a sudden I hear this sort of, like, squeaking noise, like a wheel that needs oiling, then I look up to see Blathin approaching, her old dear pushing her in the chair. I’m there, ‘Hey, how the hell are you?’ trying to, I suppose, gloss over what happened the last time we saw each other. ‘Do you want to join me for a coffee?’ Blathin’s old dear pushes her right up to me – you could say she pushes her into position – then, without any warning, Bla hits me the most unbelievable slap across the face. Even the sound of it is, you’d have to say, perfect, and you can see people looking up from their bruschettas and their organic fish cakes, in admiration as much as curiosity. It’s pretty clear there’s been a development between her and Ro. She goes, ‘I know where he gets it from,’ which is almost certainly unfair on him. I look up at Amanda, as if to say, hey, this shit happens every day – they’re only kids, for fock’s sake. That’s when the second slap – her, this time – reddens the other side of my face. ‘And I’ve been waiting to give you that,’ she goes, ‘since the day of the party.’ Amanda’s sort of, like, reversing Blathin out of there when my phone comes alive on the table. I immediately recognize the ring as Ro’s – Omar Little whistling ‘The Farmer in the Dell’ – and Bla must recognize it too, roysh, because she just goes, ‘Tell him to have a nice focking life!’ at the top of her voice, as her old dear pushes her back though Gifts and Household, towards the elevator. I answer. Of course everyone in the place is glued to the focking drama now. ‘Rosser?’ he goes, in a sort of, like, hushed tone? I’m there, ‘Hey, Ro.’ ‘She’s arthur findin out, Rosser.’ ‘Okay.’ ‘Yeah, you were reet. Kandra opened her mouth.’ ‘I thought she would.’ ‘She’s goin bleaten mental, Rosser. Ine stayin out of her way.’ ‘You’re learning, Ro. You’re definitely learning.’ Woof! Woof, woof! Woof, woof, woof! For fock’s sake! Woof! Woof, woof! Christy Moore, I’ve gotten strangely used to. Damien Demspey – I can learn to live with him. Even Christy Dignam, singing ‘Wish You Were Here’ on permanent repeat from one end of the night to the other – in a funny way, I think I’d miss it if it ever stopped. But that focking borking coming from next door’s balcony. It’s, like, they shouldn’t even have a dog in there? It’s eleven o’clock in the morning and I’m wide awake and I end up jumping out of the bed – I admit it – in a bit of a rage. Before I even know what I’m doing, I’m suddenly out in the hallway, hammering on Terry and Larry’s door, thinking it’s about time I told them a thing or two. It’s Terry who answers – he’s, like, the older of the two? ‘Ah, howiya,’ is his opening line, then he sort, of, like, totally wrongfoots me, roysh, by inviting me in. Their gaff, I straight away notice, is a lot nicer than mine – Eddie focking Torsney – and every room is like one of those ready-made demonstration rooms you see in Ikea. ‘So,’ Terry goes, leaning against the exact same Lagan worktop that Sorcha has, ‘how’s effery little ting?’ I’m there, ‘Not great. There’s something I wanted to …’ ‘Keepin the head abuff wather, says you.’ ‘What?’ ‘Keepin the head abuff wather …’ ‘Er, yeah …’ ‘Like the rest of us, wha?’ ‘Yeah, I suppose.’ ‘So this is, wha, a soshiddle call?’ I’m like, ‘Er, no, as I was about to say, there’s a couple of things I wanted to talk to you about. Look, I know we didn’t get off to the best of storts …’ ‘Wha, you threatenin to call the loar on us?’ ‘Yeah, I admit it – a lot of that was down to me, jumping to certain conclusions, because of the way you dress, the way you talk, blah blah blah. The other thing was, I actually got conned out of my previous place, which is how I ended up getting dumped next to … well, next to you.’ It’s hord to tell from his expression exactly what he’s thinking. He’s just like, ‘Continue …’ This guy must be, like, five or six years younger than me. And here I am having to explain myself to him. I’m there, ‘I think we’d all agree that it’s not an ideal situation …’ ‘How do you mee-in?’ ‘In that we’re, like, very different people.’ ‘Diffordent?’ ‘Er – obviously? But, for better or worse, we have ended up living beside each other, and if we’re going to get along we’re both going to have to put in the effort.’ He gets suddenly serious. He turns the handle on the Alsvik single-lever mixer-tap, which was, like, dripping? ‘Is there somethin in pertickiller?’ he goes. ‘Somethin dats bodderin ya?’ ‘Well, okay, being honest, it’s the dog.’ ‘Rooney?’ ‘If that’s what he’s called, yeah. You must be able to hear the borking yourselves ….’ ‘Laddy!’ he suddenly shouts, without taking his eyes off me – he’s obviously calling Larry. ‘Come in hee-er a minute, will ya?’ His facial expression hasn’t changed, roysh, but there’s, like, a definite shift in the mood all of a sudden. Larry walks into the kitchen. He immediately storts looking me up and down, sizing me up. Terry keeps just staring at me. He’s there, ‘Tell Laddy what you’re joost arthur sayin to me.’ I laugh, roysh, to try to, like, defuse the situation? ‘Look, it’s not a biggie,’ I go. ‘It’s just your dog …’ ‘Rooney?’ Larry goes. ‘Yeah, if that’s his name. It’s just his borking’s driving me a little bit mental.’ The two of them look at each other and it’s like they’ve got this secret means of, I don’t know, communication. ‘He’d be veddy hoort to hear dat,’ Terry goes, ‘wootent he, Laddy?’ Larry nods. ‘Veddy hoort – fact, Tetty, I tink we should let dis fella hee-er tell him to he’s bleaten face.’ I’m there, ‘Goys, like I said, this only needs to be as big a deal as we make it.’ Larry’s not listening, though. He wanders over to the sliding door leading out on to the balcony, then pulls back the net curtain. I end up having to do a focking double-take. Out there, beyond that sheet of glass, is the most terrifying animal I’ve ever seen. It’s a Rottweiler, roysh, except it happens to be built like a focking tiger and it’s, like, pacing back and forth, we’re talking, I don’t know, half a tonne of rippling muscles and pu
re pent-up focking anger. As soon as he spots me through the window, he suddenly stops pacing. His eyes go wide and you can see him sort of, like, adjusting his back legs, presumably getting ready to make a lunge. Even through the double glazing, I can hear him breathing – he growls in the same way that other dogs exhale. I tell them I’d better be getting back – meant no offence, blah blah blah – when all of a sudden, without any warning, Larry just flicks the catch and slides the door open. All I hear is, like, a roar, then I’m suddenly like that dude in Jurassic Pork, who was sitting on the shitter when the Tyrannosaurus Rex came through the door. Larry dives one way, Terry dives the other and this – literally – monster comes tearing towards me. It’s honestly like being hit by a focking Subaru Forester. All the air disappears from my lungs and I go down like a dynamited building, with this savage beast tearing at me, while I’m kicking and thrashing, going, ‘Not the face! Not the face!’ Gggrrr! Gggrrr! Gggrrr! I make two or three attempts to get back on my feet, but he’s too strong for me, pinning me down with his big muscly legs, and in the end I just curl up into a ball, resigned to being basically eaten. Gggrrr! Gggrrr! Gggrrr! It’s then, roysh, that I hear the laughter – Larry and Terry, breaking their actual holes. I do, like, a quick inventory, if that’s the word, to see what bits I’m missing. The answer, I realize, is nothing. It’s suddenly obvious that I haven’t been bitten and that the only thing I can actually feel is Rooney’s dead weight on top of me and his warm, sickly sweet breath on my neck. I manage to just about move my neck to have a look and that’s when I realize that he’s not savaging me at all. He’s focking humping me. Gggrrr! Gggrrr! Gggrrr! Gggrrr! Gggrrr! Gggrrr! Terry and Larry are pretty much on the floor laughing. I’m going, ‘Get him off me! Get him off me!’ looking at the animal hanging on to my focking leg for dear life, with his eyes rolled back and his tongue flapping around like a focked roller blind in a Force 10 gale. Gggrrr! Gggrrr! Gggrrr! The two boys take their time before they help me as well. It eventually takes all their combined strength to drag him off me, then they pull him – still panting like a focking phone pest – back out on to the balcony, where he regathers his breath and, for all I know, lights up a cigarette. Terry helps me to my feet, while Larry goes, ‘I tink Rooney has a ting for you,’ which seems to be the funniest line either of them has ever heard. This shiver goes up my spine. I head for the door, too scared to even check whether he’s left a deposit on my chinos. ‘Hee-er,’ Terry goes, ‘I’ll make shewer he’s a gentleman and rings ya.’ 5. A Closed Shop