He sat back. I said nothing.
Then, he went,
“That nailed me exactly and, in the modern usage of woke, prison woke me the fuck up.”
Then he said,
“I need a smoke.”
We went outside. He produced a pack of Lucky Strikes (where the hell he got them, fuck knows?), lit us with a battered Zippo, looked at the lighter, said,
“Craig McDonald gave me that, in Arizona, when we went to a reading by James Sallis.”
He wasn’t trying to impress me, just stating a fact.
I said what any lame bollix would say, I said,
“You were in Arizona?”
God almighty.
He laughed, said,
“I’ve always wanted once in my life to say the following, so here goes,
“Well, duh.”
I laughed. He had the keen Irish gift of undermining you with a simple jibe that sounded like warmth but was anything but.
He crushed the butt under his sneaker, said,
“Let’s get another round.”
We did, got on the bliss side of those, where the world seems cozy.
He said,
“Your turn, Hoss.”
I feigned ignorance, asked,
“How d’ya mean?”
He grinned, said,
“Stories, we trade. You as the wankers say share.”
Utter contempt spilled all over share.
Had to like the guy and I did, so I said,
“You’re in the area of crime. How would you describe a teenage girl/young woman/demon/psychopath?”
I laid out the whole saga of Sara, all of it.
He never interrupted, focused, took the odd sip of the Jay but otherwise was still. When I finished, he said,
“Pure evil, you’ll find her in People of the Lie by Scott Peck, or Primo Levi, who in Auschwitz asked a Gestapo guard, ‘Why are you doing this?’ meaning the killing, torture, annihilation of a race.”
He paused, as if he could see the very evil, and maybe he had, in South America. He continued,
“The guard gave the best answer to that I’ve ever heard and, believe me, I’ve searched for reasons my whole life. He said...”
Pause.
“There is no why.”
With that showstopper, he stood, said,
“I’ve to bounce, as they say in Breaking Bad.”
He looked at me, said,
“Bhi curamach mo cara (be careful my friend). I sense your narrative is ending and that would be truly an Irish pity.”
He was gone and I was left like Padraig Pearse wrote in his poem
To ponder.
The Final Epiphany
I slept for two days solid. Did I dream?
Yes, of my father, who was walking away from me. No matter how I tried, I could not catch up.
I finally got myself together, showered, shaved, clean clothes, headed into town. I went to the best travel agency, with Annette Hynes behind the counter.
She is one of those Galwegians who effortlessly make you feel better than you are.
“Jack.”
She smiled.
I told her I wanted to visit Camargue. Professional that she is, she didn’t ask,
“Why?”
She suggested I fly to Marseille, take a train to the seaside resort Saintes-Maries-de-la-Mer. I said that sounded great, booked it there and then.
Thanked Annette, headed for coffee, black, strong, and bitter, I hoped. Got that in the GBC. Frank the chef waved to me. The whole day was shaping up well.
After the horrors of the last months I was glad of any small kindness.
Until.
Two young guys, dressed like wiggers — these are white guys acting like black men, the baseball caps worn backward, pants hanging round their arse, huge trainers, ultra-white, gold chains jangling.
I thought that annoying phase had died and been replaced by young guys adopting either
Peaky Blinders gig.
Or alas
The McGregor bad dude persona.
These assholes hadn’t got either of the above memos.
Worse.
They were talking in what they thought to be the brothers’ rap, like this,
“Shit just got real.”
I figured I knew what it meant but it was so irritating to hear these fuckheads shoot it back and forth. What did I do?
Nothing.
Declan Coyle would be proud of me. His book The Green Platform proposed moving from “the red platform,” rage, to a mellow state.
New to me. Very.
I was approaching the Wolfe Tone Bridge, stopped to stare at the horizon, heard,
“Hey, Taylor.”
Turned to see Haut, father of the troll girl. He lunged at my neck. I felt a blade slice through the skin. I fell down and he continued to stab. I saw my hands awash in blood. I tried to count the stabs, managed,
“One,
Two?
No, there’s more?
Is that
Four?”
Then I saw my father.
He was saying,
“Shit just got real, Jack.”