Heaps of Trouble (21 page)

‘A few of us were just talking about farmers and especially about farmers not having to pay taxes. We believe that's not right and they should be taxed like the rest of the working population, Auntie Ruby, what do you think?'

‘
What
?
What
?
What
did you say?' As her eyes instantly became bloodshot with the explosion of some vessel at the rapid rise in blood pressure.

‘I said, I thought that all farmers should pay taxes.'

‘That's what I thought you said you basstaard. You hear me, you're nothing but a bassstared. All before you were bassstarrreds, you rotten basstarred.'

With that she jumped up. (At times, owing to her height, it was hard to tell if she was standing or not.) Gripping the table with both hands she upended it, screaming, ‘Your father was a basstarred before you, you're nothing but a rotten basstarrded, you bastard.' At that point whoever had pulled the short straw slunk away, leaving her to her rant until one of her children rushed over to settle her down, wildly searching around the room for the culprit who had started her off.

After we had performed the obligatory greetings to all of our aunts and uncles, we slipped away into our own area and surrounded the punch-bowl, which I had fortified with the contents of the Kipper's car boot. It tasted foul, but after a few glasses it numbed the mouth into acceptance. While I was wondering what would happen if I spilt some on the concrete floor (figuring that it might just eat through the concrete), Gina arrived with her sister Marigold. I didn't have to see or be told of her arrival, I felt it in the form of a shock wave that hit me like a sledgehammer. And, sure enough, when I turned around I saw her smiling and nodding at friends as she entered the lower kitchen (they must have opted to come in via the front door).

Since the Kipper had set himself up as acting DJ for the evening, he decided that he was going to run a ‘Top Ten' as one of the evening's highlights and announced to the room in general that the dancing was about to commence. Well, I can't say that this was what he actually said, because it was so noisy that he could have been telling everybody the place was on fire. But since the music came on and everybody got up to dance, I can only assume that he must have said something along those lines.

Gina looked radiant, dressed in white jeans and an off-white, fluffy woollen jumper. Casting all thoughts of introduction aside, I simply walked up to her and asked her if she wanted to dance. And that was that, we danced the night away to the sounds of the Kipper's Top Ten, with constant replays, especially of the current number one, ‘Whiskey in the Jar.' Around midnight I asked Gina if she would like to take a walk with me and she nodded her agreement. We slipped out the back door leaving the multitude pounding the floor to another chorus of ‘with me ring, for a do, for a da; [stamp, stamp, stamp, stamp] rock for me da-di-oh, there's whiskey in the jar.' We headed down the tree-lined driveway with no specific destination in mind. Mesmerised by her presence at my side, it seemed to me that our feet were our navigators as we gazed up at the night's glory.

A full moon had risen in a cloudless sky, bathing the road in front of us with a soft, golden splendour of dancing shadows. Before long we arrived at a lovely stone bridge that spanned a brook, and the sound of water hurrying over the stones, as if on a mission, echoed up to us through its arches. Peering over the wall, we gazed in wonder, for the moonlight had transformed the dark waters of the brook into a riot of sparkling silver droplets as its waters filtered and bounced over large pebbles. We turned together, as if on cue, and our heads touched: from there it was the most natural thing in the world to slowly lean down and search out her lips with mine. That first kiss dissolved all the uncertainties I had felt until that moment. I finally understood the feeling that I had carried around inside me those past two years, from the very first moment I had set eyes on her. I knew with an adult's certainty that I was totally in love with this creature who had transformed me from a competent being into a babbling moron. Eventually, arm in arm, as if we had known each other for decades, we made our way slowly back to the party, planning our next meeting. Confident that, in spite of our youth, we were the only people in the world for each other.

On our return we found the place in turmoil, as if a murder had been committed in our absence – or, worse still, as if somebody had upset Auntie Ruby again. However, as soon as Matty set eyes on me, I quickly realised that I had generated the hullabaloo. Gina and I had been missed and apparently, although we had taken no notice of the time, we had been away for hours. Gina was whisked home and I was told that I would be sent packing the next morning on the first available bus to Dublin. Thankfully Matty relented the following day and, as we had really done nothing wrong, he was unable to chastise me over the incident. Throughout the remainder of my stay there (which was cut short, because my parents came down to collect me) Gina and I stole as much time together as we possibly could.

We came alive in each other's company. We laughed and joked about the silliest things and we bantered that ‘anything she could do, I could do better'. (This last was to become the constant postscript in our letters to each other.) We held hands and dreamt about a future that we would make together, we built rockets in our hearts and flew them to the stars. We passed the summer weeks like caterpillars that had metamorphosed into wonderfully colourful butterflies, knowing that they had only a short time to live and wanting to experience every moment fully. I returned to Dublin with promises that we would write to each other. Sitting in the back of the car listening to my parents squabbling, I felt that my heart was going to break, because every revolution of the car's wheels was taking me further and further away from her. Nothing could raise my spirits.

When we arrived back in Dublin, the mother informed me that she was going to go back nursing in St James' Hospital. The shop was to be put up for sale and the father was going to check himself into St John of Gods – and this time he was determined to dry out.

I was totally in love with the most beautiful creature that I had ever set eyes on. She was in County Cork; and I was in Dublin with a totally uncertain future. I searched for the strength to continue living in an environment that was plagued day and night with rows and accusations. With the feeling that I had left a greater part of me behind with Gina, a depression set in that threatened to overpower me. The parents were now threatening to sell the only structure that gave me a sense of security. I thought seriously about leaving home and taking to the streets. And then I contemplated contacting Matty, enlisting Pat's help, and requesting that I work on his farm.

I dismissed that idea as soon as I had thought it. It might bring me temporarily closer to Gina but, in the long run, I would end up as a farm hand. I realised that one day, if I made that choice, I would have to watch as Gina set up home with somebody else – somebody who could offer her a lot more than a dreary farm helper's cottage in the wilderness – and I knew that would wrench my heart out. Even worse, she might fall in love with one of my cousins and end up living in Boulta. My mind was ran wild with crazy thoughts, and that did not improve my mental stability one little bit. I was determined that no matter how long it took, wherever I ended up having to travel, whatever hardships I went through, some day the two of us would eventually be together.

For the remainder of that week I begged, pleaded and cajoled the mother into changing her mind. I suggested that I could now leave school and run the shop full-time, which was flatly refused. Both parents were adamant; for better or worse, I was to continue with my schooling. With four weeks left before I returned to start my fifth year, we reached a compromise. We would keep my home (at least for the present), and I could reopen the shop, restock and re-establish the business while the father dried out for the ‘last time'. The mother would return to nursing when the father came out. We would also hire a competent person to run the shop after I went back to school. The next day I set out with tremendous energy to clean up the shop, burning all the rubbish, sweeping and cleaning the windows. There was quite a bit of stock still gathering dust on the shelves, so the next item on my agenda was take stock and work out my next orders.

The father had taken the car into St John of God's with him, because the mother couldn't drive. I spent a whole week visiting wholesalers and lugging the stuff back home on the 21A bus, which caused me a great deal of trouble. The really heavy items, such as the dartboards from Millard Brothers, I strapped on the back of my bike. But, after the first attempt, the weight of the load blew out the back tyre, so I resorted to taking them, one at a time, on the bus. I was open for business within a week and David called in every day to give me a hand.

More importantly, Gina's first letter arrived. On opening it, I immediately jumped to the last line – when I read the words ‘all of my love' at the bottom, I was able to return to the beginning and read the whole without mounting apprehension. That same evening I sat down and attempted to respond, scribbling words in block letters, which were spelt so badly that I worried I would never again hear from her. But all through the remainder of that summer, her letters kept coming with the now familiar ‘all of my love' signature.

Very quickly I was back in school, the shop was kept open with a new assistant, the father was back home from ‘drying out', and the mother had returned to nursing.

During Christmas week our shop assistant quit because she wanted to join her brother in England. At least that was what she told us, but a few days later I spotted her walking down O'Connell Street, so perhaps she quit for another reason. The mother had opted to work Christmas Eve and Day at the hospital, with the plan being that the father and I joined her in the hospital canteen for Christmas lunch. This left David and I working on our own in the shop on Christmas Eve. Gone were the days when the shop was black with people and we had to have a multitude of serving staff.

That Christmas Eve the shop barely ticked over to the sound of the occasional customer entering to look for a last-minute present; times had changed, and most people now bought their presents well in advance of the so-called Christmas rush. No more would ‘Everybody's' on Emmett Road reverberate to Boy-o-Boy's voice as he passed out drink to eager hands who were selling toys to punters caught up in the fever pitch of buying their Christmas presents. The father spent the day commuting back and forth from the shop to the Workman's Club, and David went home around eight, disappointed that the rush of shoppers he recalled from Christmases past had never materialised. I stood behind the counter until the last person had left the street, hoping, forever hoping, that the bright lights of the shop windows exploding out onto the pavement of the otherwise darkened street would draw a last minute press.

Around midnight I finally gave up and closed the shop doors. I didn't know it, but I was doing it for the last time. I had taken in exactly £140 that day. When the father returned from the pub, completely paralytic, he refused to believe my tally and accused me of having pocketed the large outstanding balance that he was expecting. This resulted in us having a stand-up row and, when I finally retreated to my room, I wished that I were back down on Matty's farm, where I was sure they were preparing for a Christmas Day without the arguments. I also thought of Gina, no doubt riding in the St Steven's Day hunt; at that point in time I absolutely regretted ever having been introduced into Matty's family.

I felt as if I was playing a role in
Alice Through the Looking Glass
. Mine was an upside-down, chaotic world: but I had been given a brief vision of what family life could be, a life that I would never have, or be part of. I paced my room, which because of its size was always cold, not looking forward to lunch in the hospital, but realising that at least it had its plus side. The mother couldn't drink while on duty, so that was a promise of one argument less. My mind drifted back to Gina. I read all of her letters once more and decided that, come the New Year, I would have to rethink my strategy for breaking out of this environment I was living in. And, most importantly, when was I going to see her again?

I was sixteen years old and had decided that I needed three items in my life. Money was the first, which would lead to the second, a motor bike, which would then put me in contact with the third, Gina. How I was missing her, but her letters still arrived, giving me a wonderful insight into what was happening down in County Cork; and they were still signed with ‘all of my love'. At times her stories of recent events included the names of people I wasn't familiar with and sparked chords of jealousy within me, because these faceless people were spending time with her, while I was so far away. Why did I think that life was unfair?

Having come up with a plan, which was relatively simple, all I had to do was acquire the first item on my list and the rest would fall into place. To get some money, I had to get a job in the evenings. Moreover, a job that the mother would not find out about, which might be a bit tricky, since she had issued a mandate stating that I was to study at home during the school terms for the next two years to ensure that I passed my Leaving Cert.

However I had other ideas, which didn't involve me being incarcerated in my room for five hours every evening. Anyway, now that we were fifth formers, the school was treating us a bit more like adults, with the result that we had plenty of study time during the day. It was on the way home from school one evening that I got my first idea for raising the cash needed to get the bike of my dreams. South Circular Road was described as ‘flat land'. Lying close to St James' Hospital, most of the houses had been converted into bedsits and were occupied by country folk, whose only communication with their loved ones back home was by letter or telephone.