Growl about it all the weeks I’m here, she does. I can tell. It’s to push me off your side. But. Still. I don’t know. We are not the same. We are something else now. Shift. Allied in other places than we were. Games and stuff and fun that. I see it first then soon so much. And she is saying more than she was behind your back. There’s a flea now, for your ear. My ear. I think about it. Bed at night. I’d justify. I throw. Mercy mercy God on me. There’s so much. Dredge up so much muck. I’d drown in that much shit. I couldn’t put a face on that. So listen, I say to myself. Listen careful to what she says. Listen. Hear it. What the words are. What’s going on under them. Don’t fight her. Hear that. God I know. Go on. This is it. She wants. I will do. She want that I’ll rifle through your flesh. So now go. Ask her. Mammy? Say it right out. Is something wrong while I’m not around? What’s the matter? Oh. I hear.
He’s got this job and he won’t drive but won’t get a lift with yer one and he won’t give me his pay now and won’t move to his own and he won’t help around the house and he won’t fill the buckets clean the fire and his bin is full of sweets and he’s getting tub now and he won’t go out and he has no friends in and computer games morning noon and night and he won’t make the dinner even if I’m at work til all hours and he won’t even throw his laundry out and he won’t make his bed and he gets raging if I say and he kicked my washing line pole in two and he won’t clean the drains and he won’t put up those shelves and he won’t take the hoover out and he is eating curry noodles late at night and makes me wash his dishes up there’s something wrong he’s so unfair and I always did my best for you and worst off he won’t come for prayers or on Sunday go to mass says Jesus shove it up his rear I never reared ye to speak like that and what shall I do with him what can I do he’s a grown man he’s twenty-one and sometimes I wish your father hadn’t died that he’d had enough gumption to be a man it never would have been like this I know we’ve had our difficulties but you’re such a good girl that I know I know I must have done something somewhere right what did I do to deserve this treatment?
I did try. I did try first. She won’t hear. She will not. You know Mammy something’s wrong. You know there is. And has been. She turn her eyes from me. I am not supposed to say. We aren’t. None of us. A secret that we. Must not remember. I can’t do. Say that. And I do know. She won’t bear. It. Somehow she think that’s not the truth. Better so lazy than. What? That’s a trap. Leave it undone. Unsaid. It is true. But then? And so I say. Not. Nothing on this. Yes maybe nothing’s really wrong. That’s an excuse. Yes. More. I like that. It’s, has been a lie I carry. Yes. I made it all up in my head. It is not it is. Yes it could be. Very well. How do I know? It was a long time. Broke a statue so what? She could have said anything then. Do I remember? Do I? Ha. So. Maybe not. Maybe not very well. Now. Some inside revolution I made. Turn the world about. So. On this day. I begin again. Again. It’s easier and I breathe it in. Yes I will not know you very well or what inside’s working right or wrong.
Cluck my feathers. Puff them up. Think. Right so. You’re a fucking bastard. Actually. Fucking useless now I think. Carry on. Your rubbish. As though she hadn’t had enough. You selfish fucking bastard shit. Just make her life misery and your own and my. Think I’ll brave you. Tell you where you’re wrong. Shall on her right side knight against you.
I am in your room. Saying. So tell me. What’s all this about? All this shit of you not doing this and that. This room’s a pigsty. It’s a hole. The smell of it in here. The stink. Your feet and you. Dried up food. Jes. Us. Open the window God. You turning. Say what’s up? What? I. Look at this and all your clothes you know. She’s not getting any younger. You’re the only one at home. You’re not a baby. I know. Then what are you going to do about this carry on? She can’t be running after you all your life. You so bone idle. Does it all revolve around you? Sitting playing computer games. There’s a whole world out there you know. You show no interest in anybody else. Not a civil word or help around the house. You know. Bring in the coal for her. Do the dishes. At least your own room should be clean. Is it you blame her? You were too lazy at school, is that it? Is it? You’re not such a hard man now. No one to blame but yourself. Self-pity. Self-indulgence. Get up off your arse and do something with your life. Read a paper now and then. Or. Are you stupid? Have you no friends, little wonder. Who’d hang round with you? The state of this. Get yourself a girlfriend once or will you spend your whole life stacking shelves?
I like it you said. Running out your eye. I just like it it’s fun to watch them doing kicks. I think I’d like to kick like that. I practise it when there’s no one in. I hiyah’d the clothes line and it broke. But. By accident. Not. On purpose. I didn’t know how to fix it but I tried. I propped it up. It was all rotten inside. I’m sorry. Sorry. I’ll do better. I will. I. Do it then tomorrow. I. Don’t be angry with me. Eyes in tears sniffing. You are so dissolved. Sop of them sitting hiccing in your mouth. Now’s not supposed to work this way. Just thought you liked it kicking too you say. You and me isn’t it just? Like when we were little playing all that stuff. Before. Clap. You know when you were thirteen but I remember we did have great games. Oh God. What have I said? Wilt guilty my own badness swilling up to my head. Bleeding through. Don’t move. I can’t. Anyway. Just get off your arse and pull your weight. That’s it. Jesus. What have I done?
That night sitting sitting room. Her knits. Floor balls of wool. You come in. Quiet as any. With The Irish Times. Sitting back against the sofa. Doubled over and knees bent. Flick. Flick through it. Your eyes. Turned about. Think. Talk. And look at me and say. What do you think of that? And see this picture? See yer one? All the things out in the world. And fill your eyes up. Fill your nose. Then looking back and flick again. I saying Yeah or no or so? And pressing on. You. Here what you think? Your opinion of the thing? Aye yes and maybe no not me. Not so interested. Think nice to be left alone. You’re trying too hard. Rubbing me the wrong way. Ho. Sniff. She says and what is that? Read the paper. Since when do you? Who got you up to that? And quiet cross the room you said she did. Point at me. Had a word. Put that flea in my ear. Did she now and what gave her the right? Turn. Now miss. What are you playing at? What? Come back here splashing orders saying who’s doing what. Oh thinking you’re so grand. Off up there at some college. You needn’t come back here to be upsetting him. Your brother is your elder and you should respect that. Are you listening? I am. Almost to the floor. Gobsmacked. Right down there. Excuse me? All these weeks you’ve been giving out saying what a so and so he is. He’s not doing that for me or this or this. So I had a little word with him. Told him what to do. Oh you did did you? Well aren’t you great. And who asked you to or told you or wanted you to? You self-righteous Madam. Looking down your nose at me and your brother. I can tell. We get on. Just fine without you here. Fine without you. And I’ll thank you not to interfere. The cheek. The cheek of it. Snapping snapping. So I got up. Went. Packed my bags. Left next morning by myself. I’ve had a fucking nough of this. Goodbye and then goodbye to you.
I went off back to there and my best friend. Come on. She me go gallivanting. We’ll run riot. Run the best. Ourselves and everyone else into the ground. Going on with. A project we like. That likes us. Bite and chew.