Skippy Dies (24 page)

Lightning flashes outside his window. In his imagination Carl hears cheers and laughing. His (Morgan’s) phone says 19:49,
which means 7:49. He is late. Liarliar has been texting him all night.

and

The lightning goes again, now he imagines the Sports Hall on fire, everybody inside screaming and burning.

He was ready to go, at 19:20 he put on his coat and took the pills from behind the stereo. In the lonely church parking lot
he would make her beg for them. All her friends are gone, tears are rolling down her cheeks. Sorry, the price has gone up.
She has no choice. She turns over, her belt clinks open, she pulls down her jeans, he fucks her right there on the rainy steps,
while God peeps out through the stained-glass window at him.

But then at the door of his room he stopped, and he is still stopped. On the TV at the end of his bed a faggot sings a faggot
song to a table of faggots.

Downstairs through the rain Carl’s mom is on the phone.

‘I just don’t understand why a sixty-eight-thousand-euro car keeps breaking down! That’s what I don’t understand! I mean,
isn’t it odd that it’s breaking down all the time, this wonderful sixty-eight-thousand-euro car?’

She has been on the phone for half an hour, saying the same things over and over. Or sometimes she will just cry, or scream
something but cry at the same time so you can’t understand what she’s saying.

‘Well, you get the train back, so, you get the train back, and they, I imagine they will be able to deliver it back to Dublin
for you, I imagine that must be part of the service they prov– well, why wouldn’t they? It’s a perfectly reasonable – well,
what about the expense of staying there? What about the expense of staying in a hotel?’

‘Because it would be
nice
– because it would be! Because that is where your place is, in your home, with your wife and child! Look – no, don’t give
me the name of the – what am I supposed to do with the name of the ho– what’s the point if you never answer your – David!’

He listens to her voice turning into a kind of shrieky growl, sort of like the pig on that Muppet show.

‘No, well, why don’t you stay there, in that case! Why don’t you stay in your hotel, with your tennis coach, or your dental
hygienist, or your – no, you’re irrational! You’re irrational, not to understand what you have here, which is love! So why
don’t you – no – no, David, it’s too late for that – no, it’s too late, so don’t bother because – no it is
not
, because you forfeited that right when you put a, a dental hygienist before the happiness of your own – well, tell that to
my solicitor because – no, I’m locking the doors now –’

The sound of keys jingling and locks turning and the chain rattling and windows slamming then Mom running back to the phone
to shout, ‘Do you hear that?’ Then she stamps back into the living room and there is a loud scuffing dragging noise then a
thud and she starts bawling like a baby.

On the TV three men are whipping another man with nettles, his back is all fiery red like he’s been burned and he is screaming
and laughing in between the screams. Carl turns up the sound, then he turns up the stereo too so the music from the show and
the music from the stereo crash into each other and scramble together so there is no room for anything else in his brain.
He lies in his bed, a man is hit on the toes with a sledgehammer, everyone is laughing.

Fuck you bitch you will have to get your pills somewhere else tonight. Carl is so bored, he takes a thumbtack from the wall
and makes a line on his arm then pulls down his sleeve fast because the door has creaked open and Mom is standing there. Her
face is invisible in the shadows. He can hear her snuffling even with the TV and the stereo.

‘Carl, baby?’

He does not answer.

‘Carl, turn off your music for a second, angel.’

He snorts with anger then points the stereo remote at the stereo then the TV remote at the TV. He is so sick of having to
use two remotes! But he leaves the picture on and looks at it not Mom, the guys with the hammer laughing and the guy who is
rolling around with his eyes closed and his mouth open.

‘Oh, Carl…’ Mom stands at the window a minute with the curtain held between her finger and thumb. ‘Oh, honey…’ Then she tumbles
down sideways on the bed beside Carl’s knees with her hands over her nose and mouth, and little mewly sounds squirm out of
her. Her nails are long and gold and pointed like the claws of some gold animal and around her neck she is wearing a necklace
with big shining diamonds like she’s just come from having dinner in a fancy restaurant with someone important, instead of
a microwave WeightWatchers that she ate on her own in the kitchen. ‘Sometimes –’ she lifts herself up and wipes
snot from under her nose ‘– even though two people love each other very, very much, there comes a point in their lives…’

The phone chirps with a new message. It’s from Barry.

Carl’s blood goes cold.

‘For a while now your father and I haven’t been seeing eye to eye. It’s not, it’s not anybody’s fault, it’s just the way relationships
sometimes go…’

Barry giving her pills. Barry making jokes. Barry telling her clever things.

‘… and God knows we’ve sat down so many times, and tried to, to hash it out, but in the end…’

Barry’s hands sliding into her jeans. Barry fucking her in a toilet cubicle – her tits in Barry’s hands, Barry’s eyes all
twisted up as he shoots his load all over her face!

‘… out of options.’ Carl’s mom is looking at him with trembling shining eyes and her voice wobbles when she speaks: ‘But your
dad and I, we both want you to know that… that doesn’t mean we love you any less, okay? Okay, honey?’

Barry’s white cum rolling slowly down her cheek.

‘No!’ Carl shouts.

‘Oh, my poor baby!’ Carl’s mom explodes into sobs. ‘My poor baby,’ and she scoops her hand under his neck and more strongly
than you would expect tugs his head into her chest. ‘Oh baby, we’ll be okay, I promise, I love you so much, Carly, I always
will, more than anything in the world, more than anything…’ He is crushed up against her tit, he can hear the saline inside
it sloshing around, it’s like holding a seashell to your ear and hearing the sea, a fake sea… Above him she keeps talking
and crying, against the window the rain beats, Carl feels his eyes close. But then he sees bitchface on her knees sucking
Barry’s dick! He opens them again and checks the clock. 20:30. He struggles free of Mom and sits up.

‘I have to go. I’m going to be late for the Hop.’

‘Of course, darling. I don’t want you to let this affect your life.’ Mom wipes her cheek with the back of her hand and gives
him a fake smile. ‘We’re going to stay strong for each other, aren’t we?’

‘I’m really late,’ Carl says again. He stands up, zips his coat, not looking at her though he can feel her looking at him.

‘You’re going to be the cutest thing there,’ she says. She starts to cry again.

Carl rushes out of the room and down the stairs. Two chairs are stacked up against the front door and the couch is poking
halfway out the living-room door. He carries the chairs back into the kitchen.

He pushes the couch back into its place, then goes to open the front door. But the front door is locked. He unhooks the chain
and slides back the bolt and turns the key in the latch. But it is still locked. Fuck it! Blood thumps in his head. Lori takes
down her knickers, Barry sticks his fingers into her. ‘Mom!’ Carl roars. She doesn’t reply. ‘MOM!’ even louder, charging back
up the stairs.

‘In here, darling,’ her voice calls weakly from her own bedroom. He pushes through the door. Everything in here is gold and
red. Mom is sitting at the end of her bed, watching TV. She has a glass in her hand and between her fingers is a white plastic
tube, a fake cigarette you smoke to help you stop real cigarettes.

‘The fucking door is locked,’ Carl says.

‘Oh sweetheart, I’m so sorry, I forgot…’ She reaches for her bag and starts fishing in it for her keys. She flicks through
them till she finds the right one then hands the bunch to Carl. ‘You can hang onto them for tonight, petal. Leave them on
the breakfast bar when you come in. I’ve taken a sleeping pill so I won’t be going anywhere.’ Carl grabs the keys with a grunt
of disgust. ‘Have a good time, honey,’ she calls after him. Tears are creeping back into her voice. ‘Don’t worry about me.’

Carl unlocks the front door and steps out into the cold rainy
porch – and that’s when the idea comes. At first he doesn’t know it’s an idea. It’s just the words reappearing in his brain,
KEY
and
PILL
. He doesn’t know why they are there. He stops on the step, frowning to himself, one hand on the doorknob about to pull it
closed.
KEY PILL KEY PILL
, the words stare at him like the eyes of a painting. Carl’s brain is not used to
KEY PILL
ideas, and in the
KEY
beginning it refuses to
PILL
fit them together – then all at once, all by themselves, they fall into place and the idea is there, where a second ago there
was nothing. This must be what happens to Barry all the time! With the idea fizzing up his arms, Carl slips back into the
house! Inside, he slams the door. He waits a moment to make sure his mom is still in bed. Then he creeps up the stairs and
into her bathroom.

In the mirror over the sink he sees himself. The idea is written like a smirk across his face. Carefully, he lifts the keys
to the light and prods through them. He picks out a tiny silver wand and puts it into the tiny silver lock in the mirror.
The key turns silently. He screws up his eyes and pulls the handle. The door swings open without a sound.

Every inch of the cabinet has been filled. Tubes, jars, boxes, pills of every colour and size and shape, all with white labels
with Carl’s mom’s name written on them. If Barry was here he could probably tell you which ones do what. But Carl is only
looking for one thing.

They call it the date-rape drug, Barry said. It’s this pill that they invented that if you put it in a girl’s drink it makes
her really horny and she’ll do whatever you want. But then the next day she won’t remember anything.

They invented a pill to make girls do that? Carl was surprised.

No, they invented it to be a sleeping pill but then someone else found out it did all this other stuff too when you mixed
it with alcohol.

Sleeping pill.

Then she would do whatever you wanted.

That is Carl’s idea for Lori.

But there is a problem. The labels on the little bottles and boxes do not tell you which one is the sleeping pill. Instead
they have names, long strange names that slide out of shape while you are reading them. They sound like kings from history
or alien planets. There are hundreds of them. He thinks of ringing Barry to ask him which pill he was talking about. But then
he would have to tell Barry his idea, which he doesn’t want to do while Barry is alone with the girl, in case it gives Barry
an idea as well. Then he has another idea – put
all
the bottles and boxes in his bag and bring them to the Hop so that Barry can pick out the right ones! He is just lifting
his hand to grab the bottles on the bottom shelf when he hears his mom in the next room. He freezes then runs over to the
shower door to hide, but nothing happens. Maybe it was just the TV. From here behind the shower door though he notices something
he didn’t see before, a white box on the window sill, beside her Ladyshave, with a pack of pills sticking out like a silver
tongue.

The label tells him nothing, just another weird alien name. But inside the box he finds instructions, folded up like a map:

Here you are Lori, I got you a drink. Oh thank you. Smiling at her the way Barry would smile, in his imagination he is wearing
a James Bond tuxedo. Why don’t you drink it? he says.

In a little while, she says.

He smiles. He is not sure what is happening. Why don’t you drink it now? he says.

I’m not thirsty now, she says. Her eyes are like two pills.

Drink it, he says. She backs away. What is going on? He grabs her wrist. Drink it! She won’t, she fights him. He gets angrier
and angrier. Her eyes fill with tears as he forces her wrist up to her mouth – and now she drops the cup, and it spills away
into the grey fog of his imagination. I will never fuck you! she shouts. Carl begins to roar, not words, just a raggedy animal
roar, and he folds his hands into clubs, and raises them against the shrinking girl –