THE BOY FROM THE COUNTY HELL
....or how shane almost stopped the apocalypse
by
C.SeanMcGee
The Boy from the County Hell
“or how shane almost stopped the apocalypse”
Copyright© 2013 Cian Sean McGee
CSM Publishing
‘The Free Art Collection’
Santo André, Sao Paulo, Brazil
First Edition
All rights reserved. This ebook may be copied, distributed, reposted, reprinted and shared, provided it appears in its entirety without alteration, the reader is not charged to access it and the downloader or sharer does not attempt to assume any part of the work as their own.
Cover Design: C. Sean McGee
Interior layout: C. Sean McGee
Author Photo: Carla Raiter
This story makes up Volume I in the Rock Book series.
This is a story comprised and inspired by working literary covers of the following songs by The Pogues, The Clash, Johnny Cash and Nick Cave:
The Boys from the County Hell
The Guns of Brixton
USA
Fairytale of New York
Red Right Hand
Boat Train
London Calling
When the Man Comes Around
Summer in Siam
Parts of lyrics of said songs were used in the writing of this book, in describing scenes and in character’s speech, hence it being a literary cover.
Disclaimer:
All descriptions of characters are complete fictional representations of the fictional identities presented in media worldwide and no way reflect the attitudes or beliefs of the people who attain these names or identities in real life. It’s a fucking story. So don’t sue me. I was possessed by the devil when writing this novel so I can’t be held responsible for your ill feelings and your hurt pride.
CHAPTER ZERO
“Shane” Mrs. MacGowan yelled, between every pounding strike of her fist against his bedroom door. “Get up would ya.”
Shane pulled the covers back over his head and squashed a handful of warm blanket against his tingling face, moaning away as he rolled back and forth, fighting the truth in his mind about his aching belly and explosive head; leaving the black stupor of sleep and waking to a despotic hangover; one of aching sobriety.
He mumbled something that I don’t think even he understood before he eventually lifted himself with stinging eyes to the light bursting through his window, cursing about the rain that was pelting down outside; lashing against his window and yelling at him to stay inside.
Every time he took a breath, he could feel a pressure in his head swelling and receding as if someone had performed some cruel experiment on him, swapping his brain for his lungs.
“What’s da time mammy?” he shouted.
“It’s early and I’m feckin late and you will be too if you don’t get yer arse up and dressed. Yer man called by da way said he’ll meet you down the pub after one. What time you finish taday?” asked Mrs. MacGowan, leaning her ear against the door.
Shane pushed the balls of his hands against his forehead, pressing hard and squashing his eyes in little circles as he quelled the siren in his head, trying to differ its highly wail from the sound of his mother’s nagging.
“Ah, around one I tink,” he said.
“Convenient. I suppose you’ll be in da pub till late den?” she asked.
Shane slid his hands back over his face and peeped his eyes through his spreading fingers, looking towards the door and the picture of a frowning Jesus looking despondingly at him.
“I might pop in for a wee chin wag. Just ta see da lads” he said.
“Right o. Stay away from yer man, I don’t trust him. You’re doin so grand lately. I’m proud o ya love. Just stay away from da grog and da junk.” she yelled.
“Yeah mam,” said Shane, wiping the frustration from his pores.
“I’m serious. Tink of Teresa and don’t drink anyting” she yelled.
“I’ll do all dat, yep,” he said.
“Just make sure. Can you do dat?”
“I will ya,” he said.
“I left a few pence. Ya can buy yourself some crisps on da way to work. I love ya son.”
“Tanks mam. Mammy” he shouted. “You couldn’t lend us a tenner mam, could ya?”
The house was silent, only the sound of Shane holding his breath and the light scratching of his girlfriend’s heels against the dining table in the back of his sobering mind.
“Mam?” he asked all innocent like.
The house was silent.
“Mammy,” he said.
An engine turned, rattled, spluttered and started.
“Ah, bollocks,” he said, lifting himself off the bed.
Outside his window, the rain was coming down hard. It was such oppressive weather; as if god were just pleasing himself; pissing all over this poor shitty part of the city and nowhere else, just because he was god and he could be a prick like that.
He stood with his hands against the pane, cursing to himself about anything he could remember that didn’t involve drinking. Most of all he cursed his boss; the baldy miser and he cursed the rain cause nothing on earth had the kind of thirst that needed weather like this.
He pulled his yellow briefs from their nest in the crack of his bum and farted once or twice as he hobbled out of the bedroom and stumbled towards the kitchen, passing his lovely Teresa sprawled unconscious on the dining table; her knickers around her ankles, a needle dangling like a peacock’s feather from her sinking vein and a length of kettle cord, wrapped around her upper arm.
She was a sight indeed, given that she shouldn’t have been there.
“What are ya doin on da table? Teresa, can ya here me?”
Teresa didn’t respond.
“You’re not feckin real,” he said, turning away from her still body.
Scratching his bum, Shane held the door open on the fridge and rested his sore body on its old hinges, swinging back and forth and the cold chill dimpled his skinny body. The fridge was empty except for a mushy onion dripping something from it; on the top shelf, to the black banana below.
He wasn’t looking for an old, sweating onion or spotted, sick banana, though. He leaned down to the vegetable tray and pulled out a pair of pants that; for some reason last night seemed like a fitting place to leave them. At eight thirty in the morning and with lashing rain and howling wind; looking back, it probably wasn’t the best idea, or then again maybe it was, but he just wasn’t drunk enough yet to truly appreciate it yet.
Shane left the house carrying the black, spotted banana in his hand; barely shedding a doling look at the woman spread like a half-finished supper all over the dining table; stopping only briefly to collect the couple of coins his mother had left for him on the table.
On the way out, he saw one of his mother’s bags on the floor and rummaged through it, looking for more coins or; if god could pardon a moment from this parody, maybe a few pounds tucked in the nether of that leather abyss somewhere.
He shoved his hand around poking his fingers on some sharp things and some sticky things and he wiped whatever both of them had been on the legs of his trousers as he opened the front door. With wind spitting nagging torment on his face, he drudged up the street with his hands buried in his pockets and his eyes squinting as his head hanged low with his chest perched on his chest, trying to will away the rain with his buggering anger.
He passed an old man that was sitting on his rump all alone, just hissing and cursing, at nothing really; passersby maybe, a street post, himself, who knows? The old man was furious with a rage tip toing its way onto his tongue and barging forwards with a boxe
r’s dazzle.
As Shane walked past the cursing old man, he was humming a song; not really thinking about anything, in particular, just humming away the spitting rain from his freezing lips. And as he hummed, the old man dropped his defenses, lowered his guard, pardoned his fighting tongue and quieted the screaming child from the pith of his soul.
It all happened so fast and so odd that Shane stopped in the pouring rain and turned to the statute old man, not at all concerned about the rain pissing down all over him, the condition he was in or the condition he would be in. He just stopped dead in his tracks and stared strangely at the old man.
“Are ye grand?” he asked.
The old man, feeling; for the longest time he could remember, no tremor in his soul and no clenching of his hands, held them out, begging and pleading for a few pence, nothing more than what he needed to make good another day.
“Do ya ave a penny or two; fifty would be grand?” said the old man.
Shane shoved his hand into his pocket, humming away to himself as he pulled out the few coins his mother had left for him. He had exactly fifty pence; enough money to buy a bag of crisps and exactly enough money for this old man to make good another day.
“How much ave you got?” asked Shane.
“Nutin” responded the old man.
“And all ya need is fifty pence?” asked Shane.
“To make good today, fifty would be grand,” the old man said.
Shane thought for a moment. He had fifty pence to buy some crisps but no doubt he wouldn’t buy any; he needed a tenner for a couple of pints that probably his haunted sobriety would not let him drink.
Now the old man he had nothing but all he needed was exactly what Shane had in his hands; fifty pence.
“Here you go, twill serve yerself better,” said Shane.
“You sure?” asked the old man.
“I’m no closer to a tenner with dis fifty pence den I am witout it, but you, you’re fifty pence away from bein happier dan me so I tink it’s only fair, the money stick wit you” said Shane, dropping the coins in the old man’s hands, humming once again.
“Fair play to ya lad. May god bless ya, or strike you down quick, whichever serves ya kinder” the old man said, tucking the coins close to his chest and blowing warm air past his prickly beard and over his freezing fingers.
“Ah here, it’s fine,” Shane said.
“Sure dat’s a nice tune lad. Aint heard nutin like it. What is it? One o yers?” asked the old man.
“Yeah, no, it’s nutin. Just a song I forgot. Ya grand dough yeah?” said Shane.
“Da fuckin rain is relentless. You’d tink dat yer man up dere was planning sumtin; clearin da table, washin away da shite from da floor. I feel like a fuckin scribble on a feckin etch and sketch, just waitin to be cleaned off da board ya know?” said the old man.
“Aye, just wish he’d quit balssin around,” said Shane.
“And what about you?” asked the old man.
“What you mean?” asked Shane.
“You gonna remember dat song or you gonna forget it, for good?” said the old man.
“It’s just a song man. I’ve forgotten more of dem den I wrote” said Shane.
“If I were you, I’d do one or da udder. Seems like da fence aint tall enough ta keep ya safe. Song like dat could end a war you know. You watch yerself lad” said the old man, returning to blowing warm air over his cusped hands and spitting blasted rain from the curling whiskers of his beard.
“Aye, I will,” said Shane with a curious yet estranged shrinking of his eye before running off; headstrong, into the lashing rain.
The rest of the leg was done with a skip and a jump, cursing away with every bound as he ran along the crooked sidewalk, jumping over potholes and diving from the splashes of passing cars until he eventually keeled over himself in the doorway of a dilapidated old building, one whose mortar might just have been stirred with the deploring and despondence of all those unfortunate enough to call this shit hole their home.
He still had the banana in his hand and though it looked as crooked as the sidewalk and as evil as Thatcher in an evening gown, he thought only it, could best fight the evil already lurking in his stomach. So he peeled it; like you would an old poster from a mangy alley, and threw the remains on the ground before taking what good he could find, yielding his eyes shut, clasping his nostrils and mashing it once or twice between his teeth, just so it wouldn’t bruise as he tried to swallow the thing whole.
And Christ the taste was horrible; nothing a bottle of gin couldn’t fix.
“Dere ya are ya tinker. Yer late. Ya got me money?” asked The Landlord.
Shane slid his hands into his pockets, but it was just for show. He shook his head a couple of times, keeping his eyes to the floor knowing the old prick would start his ranting and raving at any second, waving his stubby little fingers around and stamping his feet up and down in a huff while his face boiled redder than a baboon’s arse; and he did.
“You fuckin promised me. You begged like the little poor cunt that you are and what did I do? The fuckin gentleman I am. I lent you ten fuckin quid on the proviso that you pay me back first ting dis mornin. I shudda known. Jayzus Christ. Yer ya fader’s son ya know. A complete bollocks of a man he was; a right edjit. Ya wanna be successful; like me, ya gotta stop tinking like a feckin rat. Rootin around for dis and dat and den what a ya get ta show for any of it? Fuckin head ache and a black eye. Not a penny in yer fuckin pants. Ya get nutin for today’s work den; you can pay me back the pennies ya owe me. Ya got yer gloves? Might be clearing a couple a floors” said The Landlord, jingling the coins in his pockets.
Shane hated him. He was a miserable fat bastard with a penny earned for every missing hair on his head. And he wore the same clothes every day; probably never even took them off. He wouldn’t want to waste the comfort he had saved up all this time on a cheap, cold draft. And he sure as hell didn’t wash them or himself for that matter. He stank like an old urinal cake; a mix of cheap minty cologne and warm piss and larger. And it could have been because he was a lazy fat cunt, sleeping in the same shite day after day or maybe it was just the pong from the sweat of a miser.
Whatever it was, he always looked the same, dressed in his brown slacks that rode just above his ankles so that you could see his pasty white legs and those thick bulbous feet prodding into his shiny black loafers. Shiny because the fucker spat on them all day long, wiping them with an old rag that he swore was blessed by the pope; Paul, the good one, not that gobshite bringing the whole blessed institution into disrepute. He would polish in a way that looked more like he was enjoying himself; a bit too much if you ask me.
And his pants always sat high on his belly so that the crotch pulled tight around the generous curves of his gigantic arse. And he would wear the same woolen jumper with the green, white and gold and a map of Ireland stamped on both sides, as if whatever mean thing he was about to do were his patriotic duty to Ireland, for the fucking republic. And he tucked his jumper into his pants so that Limerick was floating around somewhere between his hairy belly button and his tiny penis that he assumed was there, hidden somewhere under a fold of skin from his hanging belly.
And when The Landlord talked about money and especially how others owed it to him and were no good with it or without it, he would always sway to and fro on the balls of his feet like a rocking horse, shaped like a fat bastard, and he would jingle the collection of pennies in his pockets; the hundreds of them that he kept, so that everywhere he walked he could hear his own impression.
And Shane hated him, but he needed work and there was nothing going anywhere. The country was in a state of shite at the moment and choices were slim if you could even scrounge one together.
“Ya know the ting about da poor is dat dey got no will power, no desire ta change deir situation. I mean ya look at dis. Dey pay nutin to me to live here, I’m like Santa fuckin Claus and yet the bare fuckin minimum, dey’d rader spend on luxuries like heaters a
nd new jumpers. And I’m da fuckin bad guy cause I have to get all tough. I’m a fuckin pariah I am. No fuckin rewards for me. Just spit and piss and cursin and fuckin tears, dat’s it” The Landlord said, stamping his fat feet onto every step as they wound their way up the staircase, feeling along the wall for the twists and turns for their eyes would do them no good in the absolute dark they found themselves in.
“Would ya tink of putting in some new bulbs?” asked Shane.
“It’s a fuckin staircase. It goes in two directions; up and fucking down. It’s not tricky. Dey can get demselves a new fuckin whatever as long as dey pay. And not a fucking penny spent before dey pay what dey owe me. Ya let a dog sit on yer lap, it’s gonna bite ya off yer own couch” said The Landlord as they neared the third floor.
The hallway was long and the carpet on the floor was torn and pulled up on all sides and the parts that weren’t torn were either damp and sloshy or icky and sticky and it could have been glue or it could have been bubblegum or it could even have been sex that was sticking their shoes to the ground as they made their way to apartment 308.
Shane knocked on the door lightly, thinking more about the babies that might be sleeping in one of the rooms and not wanting to invite anyone into this consolidation that needn’t be involved. There was no response at the door and as he lifted his hand to tap again, The Landlord leaned in a beat hard against the splintered frame with his thick fist, yelling as he did.
“Wake da fuck up an open da fuckin door. I know yer in dere Seamus. I can here ya breedin away and yer baby fuckin moanin under yer woman’s hand. Now, open the fuckin door or ill ave the Garda down in here in a jiff and toss yer arses out on da street. Seamus!” he screamed, like a donkey being branded; his voice carrying through the hallway and up the staircase to the other floors and the sound of locks clicking and turning then echoed throughout the building.
The lock on the door went click and a host of small chains quickly undid and you could tell that Seamus; on the other side of the door, was nervous as all hell cause of the way it took him some time to undo each clanking chain with his knuckles scraping and banging against the door as he fought to undo each one.
The door opened slightly and The Landlord did the rest, barging his fat gut into the tiny gap and swinging his fat arse so the door swung and the cowering man fell back onto his own rump on the floor not far behind.
The fat bastard pushed right past Shane so that his face scratched against the splintered door frame; grazing his skin to a pinkish tan but hardly spilling a drop of blood.
The Landlord stood over Seamus, standing with his trunk like arms folded over his ginormous belly. Still on his rump, Seamus cowered backwards; like a retreating crab, away from the threat to counsel and shield his wife from the ranting of this maniac.
“I’m at da end o me tether Seamus. Week after week after week after feckin week, I hear da same ol bollocks. Pullin on me heart strings ta cut yerself a fuckin break. Well, I’m tired of yer fuckin melody. All o ya, every poor cunt in dis buildin. I’m sick to fuckin deat of it all. Where’s my rent, Seamus? Where da fuck is my money?” The Landlord screamed, knocking over a few dirty glasses that were sitting on an upturned crate, covered by a flowered shower curtain.
Seamus had panic in his eyes, but he held his family firm.
“I tried,” Seamus said. “Honestly I did. It’s tuff out dere. Dere’s no work at all. All dese immigrants are comin now and dey all got tickets for dis and dat and diplomas and shite I’ve never heard of. And dey work for fuckin nutin” he wept, sweeping his arms in a considerate protective net, behind his back and around his wife and wheezing daughter.
“Aye tis true. Dey come in deir fuckin droves. Pilin in on feckin row boats and canoes. Got a few here, in da buildin. Don’t trust em for da life o me. All dat bowin and odd prayin and deir fuckin garb; Christ, it’s some strange get up. But you know what? Dese stinky fuckers might work for peanuts it’s true, takin Irish jobs, but each and every one of em, dey all pay deir fuckin rent” said The Landlord standing like a crooked cop.
Behind Seamus, a small girl was shaking, whimpering and wheezing. She was clinging to her father’s broad arm with one hand and catching phlegm with the other. Beside her, Seamus’ wife did much the same. Clinging to her husband’s cradle with one hand whilst gently rubbing the middle of her daughter’s back with the other, trying to calm her down and help clear her diseased lungs.
“Tings are not good. Siobhan, sure she’s getting worse. I had to beg da udder week just ta get enough money for da bus; ta get her to da hospital” said Seamus.
“What’s wrong wit her?” asked Shane concerned.
“We tink maybe she got da pneumonia. It’s de apartment. Da draft and da damp air, dey’re fuckin right serious. Made her sick in her lungs. She’s been like dis for monts now” said Seamus.
“Well, den fuckin leave” said The Landlord leaning down to his face in mocking glory then kicking the upturned crate; the only furniture on the apartment, so that it flipped along the floor and smacked against the feet of the little girl, who screamed in a way that sounded like air being squashed out of a rubber ball.
The Landlord walked over to the only window in the apartment and though it was stubborn and seemingly inoperable, he dug his elbows in, huffed and heaved, and pushed it up so that the freezing rain blew inwards past his face and onto the shivering family cowering on the floor behind him.
“Dis’ll do ta get rid o yer stink. Ungrateful cunts. Ya bitch and fuckin moan about da state of a horse’s teeth and ya won’t even trow a penny’s wort a hay ta feed his fuckin belly. Yer out, now” The Landlord said, taking the heap of clothes and possessions from the floor and throwing them out of the window with photos of the girl; on the day she was born, being taken up by the wind and scattered about and then trampled upon somewhere far and very unfortunate.
“For fuck’s sake man, it’s dey’re fuckin clodes. Have ya not an inch of decency in ya?” said Shane in disbelief, rushing over to The Landlord and trying to pull the last jumper from his hands before the fat bastard threw it out the window with the rest of their things.
“Yer fuckin mad, man. Da wee one’s sick as all hell an yer trowin em out in da rain. In dis, fuckin rain” pleaded Shane.
“Leave it, lad. It’ll only make it worse” said Seamus.
“Ya wanna know how ta make money Shane? Ya ave ta be fuckin tuff like I said. Dis is a blessin for em. Deir girl won’t be getting sick no more from dis shitty apartment, dat right?” That Landlord said looking over to a bemused and defeated Seamus; thankful in his silent musings for Shane being here in his eviction, to avoid what could have been like all of the others; a violent persecution.
“What’s tuff about trowin a wee girl on da streets?” said Shane.
“Ya tink it’s easy? Go on den, do it. Ya want yer mammy’s debt cleared yeah? Trow out dese cunts, now” he screamed, taking Shane by the collar and shaking him like an old Polaroid.
Shane thought for a second about his poor mother and how hard she worked just so she could do all of the things she had to do, right; only to end up enslaved to this greedy fat miser and of course, Shane’s own occasional mistakes which were the hangover she wore because of her son’s love affair with oblivion and the taxes he paid to get himself there.
“You’re a horrible cunt and pretty soon yer gonna get what ya deserve,” said Shane, passing The Landlord and looking him dead in the eye.
The Landlord just smiled, rubbing his fat belly with one open palm whilst the other picked and scratched at the creepy crawlies, creeping about in his underpants.
“I’m Sorry,” said Shane, his words as honest as the tears from the father’s eyes, knowing he couldn’t defend his family.
Shane helped Seamus onto his feet and helped him to collect his wife and his sick child, whose wheezing only worsened when she got to her feet. There was nothing left in the apartment, nothing of theirs to take with them. Everything was saturated, sodden and scattered o
n the street below.
Shane walked with them, holding the sick girl in his arms as Seamus; walking just behind, fought to console his delirious wife.
“What are we supposed to do?” asked Seamus.
“I wish I could tell ya. I’m real sorry, I am” said Shane.
“It’s not yer fault lad. It’s him, it’s Ireland, it’s da world, it’s all of it. The roof is comin off a da whole ting. I can feel it in me bones. What god would put a tug like him charge o anyting unless dat god is a complete prick himself?” said Seamus.
The rain was pelting down and aside from the cold and the wet, the weather brought with it a howling wind that screamed in their ears and blew them off of their concentration.
Seamus was shouting something, but Shane couldn’t hear a word on account of the wind, licking the inside of his ear. Instead, he hunched his shoulders up to his ears, buried his hands in his pockets and made a host of funny faces, trying to cheer up the sick girl who was clinging with fright to her mother’s hand.
Shane took off his jacket and wrapped it around the girl’s shoulders then walked off by himself as the rain pelted down on his head, looking for nothing but a roof and a pint; though neither would shelter him from the horror of his sobriety.
“Like yer fader” yelled The Landlord. “Not a lick o meat on yer balls.”
Shane ignored the fat bastard’s rant, thinking he should have done this sooner, walking away from things that didn’t at all matter. The wind was deadly, digging right into his bones, but he kept his chin tucked to his chest, using his brow as a kind of shield to keep the rain from stinging his eyes as it shot down from the heavens like a trillion tiny darts from the drunken, conspicuous hand of god.
When he reached the pub, he had an almighty thirst and he burst through the doors as if he were about to strip it of its license and maybe that was his intention; to make lunch of its debris and drink of its sorrow and cleanse this pub of every last mil of larger; as Jesus took the blame and guilt, he too would take the cruel stomach and sore head of mankind.
“Shane,” said the barman, tipping his hat as Shane walked into the still smoky room.
It was early morning, but the pub was filled with young and old, sitting around tables by themselves, arguing with their reflections in their half empty glasses, cursing about this and that; filling their stomachs and building their poetic reserves.
“Lads,” said Shane to the room.
Glasses rose slightly; as much as their hands would let.
“Tis some rain,” said an old man, obviously.
All the other men nodded in silent chorus.
Shane looked at his shirt and pants. His hair was flat against his face, running a waterfall from the top of his head down to his soaking shoes where inside, his stinking feet splished and splashed and squished and squashed their way through a hole in his saturated socks.
“I’ll ave a pint,” said Shane to The Barman.
“Have you any money?” said the barman.
“Oh come on, one drink, I’ve had a right fuck of a day. C’mon, just one pint” said Shane.
“If you had a penny for every time you asked me that, I’d probably serve you by the end of that day,” said The Barman.
“You won’t give me one free pint?” said Shane.
“Like fuck I will,” said The Barman.
“Well then can you lend me ten pounds?” asked Shane.
“What? You fuckin mad?” said The Barman.
“C'mon, I’ll buy ya a drink,” said Shane smartly.
“Feck off ya edjit,” said The Barman.
“Bollocks,” said Shane, sitting down by himself on a rickety stool and flipping a coaster between his fingers; trying to spin it on its end and managing to lose himself in its every turn, biding his time before the inevitable passing of hands over numbers and the shaking of hands over tables.
“Some fellas were looking for you earlier Shane. Weren’t Garda. Looked pretty official, though. They had badges and all that, fancy coats and odd looking hats. One fella had some terrific looking shades on” said The Barman.
“What did dey want?” asked Shane.
“They were asking about some song. They were acting all secret like. They wanted to know if I heard it” said The Barman.
‘What did ya tell em?” asked Shane.
“The truth. They all sound the feckin same, lots of shoutin and cursin and the like. Hardly the lord’s music” said The Barman.
“And what is da lord’s music den?” asked Shane.
“Bono. He has the world on his shoulders” said The Barman.
“Yeah, by sticking his head up its fucking arse. Jaysus. Sure I hope dat twat lives for a fuckin hundred centuries. I hope he never dies. God help us when he does and you all make a fuckin saint out of him. Ya do realize dat he is to music what Father Brendan Smyth was to da fuckin church” said Shane.
“Watch your mouth boy. Bono is a good man. You look at the good he does in Africa. The place is shining and they’re celebrating Easter now because of him. And what have you done? Inspired a nation of youth to drink till they’re green, piss in their pants and wake up stoned somewhere that they can’t remember for the life of them how the hell they even got there.”
“I’m savin da fuckin world.”
“By doing what? Shouting, cursing, shaming your mother?”
“Now ya see dat dere,” said Shane pointing to the television. “Dat’s music. Nick fuckin Cave. Kinda music ya could rob a bank or make a baby to.”
“Sounds like the devils music.”
“Would you give us one pint of the black stuff?” asked Shane.
“No,” said The Barman.
“Well, you got all dat residue and spill in the tray down da bottom. Can I drink dat? I got a mean fuckin tirst” said Shane.
“Jaysus. Have you got no feckin shame?” said The Barman.
“Gave it all to mammy apparently,” said Shane.
“I can’t serve you, Shane. I’d be crossing your own words. It’s for the best. Look at you. You’re working now.”
“Yeah for a complete cunt.”
“That’s life, Shane. You can’t just mix all your dreams with whiskey and gin. Look what happens. Look what happened. You’re doing great now Shane. We’re all proud of ya.”
“Just one pint man. What bad could happen?”
“You’re sure? It’s a feckin shame it is.”
“It’s just one pint.”
“Here you are,” said The Barman, handing Shane a glass over the counter knowing too well, whatever curse was in his mind would not let him touch a drop.
He held the glass to his eyes and watched the colour slowly turn darker and darker, losing himself in the spill of white that rolled down the length of the rim and onto his index finger. He watched the Guinness change its colour like a father would watch his first child learning to crawl and though the average man might want to hurry the process and tuck the child’s knees under its belly and speed it along, Shane enjoyed nothing more than wetting his appetite on watching nature, making perfect, a wonderful thing that man had started.
“Dese fellas,” said Shane, licking his upper lip. “Dey say anyting else?”
“Not to me. But yer man, they gave him a speaking to.”
“Who?”
“Yer man.”
“Damian?”
“No, yer man.”
“Not that gobshite Sean? Writer my feckin arse. Bad grammar, horrible fuckin punctuation. Ya know he’s a writer and he’s never even read a fuckin book in his life? Never been to university eider? Did pretty shite at school as well from what I heard.”
“Look who’s talking and no, not him, yer man, the insect. What do you call him? Caterpillar, mosquito?”
“Spider?”
“That’s the one. They had him down at the table there for a wee bit.”
“Yer sure about dat?” said Shane.
“Have you ever known me to fib?” said The Barman.
“Roight,” said Shane, burying his face into his Guinness and stopping just before the lovely aroma could wisp against the fine hairs of his nose.
And as he wished he could just drink that flaming first pint, the comfortable dark in the pub was broken as the doors burst open and a small, stubby frame stood like a miniature statue in the morning light with his face invisible but his grunting and unsavoury odour, unmistakable.
“Pint o larger and a packet o crisps,” said The Landlord, slapping his legs to brush off the rain that collected on him like flies to an open sore.
He sat himself on a stool at the bar, tapping his thick fingers away on the wooden ends, completely out of time and devoid of any rhythm whatsoever; his beat sounding like a room full of defibrillating hearts.
“Jaysus it’s some rain out dere. Any craic?” he said.
The Barman looked at him. His hands said I’m busy and his eyes said fuck off. He stopped wiping the counter and poured the man a larger and handed him a packet of crisps; taking his greasy folded note and throwing a pile of coins down on the table before him.
“Ya fucked up here man. Larger and crisps, dat’s tree pounds twenty two. I gave ya four pounds. Dere’s only seventy five pence here. Tree pence short. Where’s me tree pence?’ shouted The Landlord.
The Barman sifted through the coins, counting them out in his mind while his eyes still had a ‘fuck off’ kind of allure about them.
“Don’t give me dat fuckin look. Tree pence is tree pence. It’s tree pence next to the tree pence beside it and to da tree pence beside dat. It fuckin adds up. Before ya know it ya got a hundred, a thousand and a fuckin million. To you, tree pence is nutin. You round it back to nutin. To me, tree pence is everytin. So where da fuck is my million fuckin pounds ya greedy cunt?” he shouted, spitting crisps at The Barman as he did.
Unfazed, bemused and unbothered, The Barman reached into his till and pulled out three coins and swung them in the direction of the angry Landlord; huffing and puffing whilst munching down on his crisps, giving the wanted impressions that just maybe, he was breaking bones up in his teeth and he would do just that, were it that anyone should test him.
“What happened to you?” asked The Barman, noticing some scratches and an open cut on the back of The Landlord’s hand.
“Fuckin kid bit me. Ungrateful little fuckers. Gave er, a good punch dough. And da mudder. Dey’re not teachin any fuckin respect dese days. Da kids are fuckin wild and da parents, lazy and no good” said The Landlord.
The Barman turned away, gave Shane an appreciating look and then went through a door behind the bar, somewhere out the back to look for something of which, what that was, he could not remember and might need some time to do so.
The old and young men sitting by themselves at tables scattered around the dark room all cradled their fingers around their glasses and imagined things in their minds. Some thought about football, other thought about Jesus and others imagined Mary, the girl at the supermarket with the massive knockers; jogging on the spot.
Shane stepped up from the table and took a long breath before exhaling calmly, lifting his glass to his lips then imagining a stream of Guinness rolling over his tongue and down his throat as if it were an embrace from his own mother and he pushed his chair in neatly and quietly and walked over to where The Landlord sat; licking the salt off of his fingers.
And before the fat bastard could turn, Shane clenched his pint in his hand and smashed it against The Landlord’s face, cutting open his right eye and the ripping open his cheek like a fresh tomato, blood and Guinness spilling over his clothes and onto the floor.
The Landlord fell back off his stool and onto the floor and Shane jumped on top of him with the broken glass in his hand and he stabbed and he struck and he slashed and he cut; digging the glass into The Landlord’s face, ripping his lips in half and tearing open his nose and stabbing at his eyes until part of one of them went flying over his shoulder and rested against an old man’s foot as in his mind, the old man imagined Mary; with the massive knockers, doing star jumps on the spot.
Though it looked like he was screaming, not a sound escaped his mouth. Shane tore at his face and neck and ears and arms and chest with the broken glass until there was no glass left in his hands and then he started to punch and bite and he stood up and clung to the counter with one hand whilst stomping down on the Landlord’s bloody face with his right boot that he pulled high into the air and threw down with the force of every child he had very thrown out on the street and he kicked and he stamped and he beat with his boot until the fat bastard on the floor stopped moving.
“Ya’d best be off now lad,” said an old man.