“I had hoped I might.”
He pondered that, staring at the remains of the vodka in his glass, said,
“Quel dommage.”
That I knew.
French for what a pity.
I asked,
“Like a brew to go with the Goose?”
He nodded, and still cradling the Mossberg, I grabbed two ice-cold Buds from the fridge. Screw-off tops which are, in my view, damn smart. Handed one to him, and said,
“To all the girls we loved before.”
He was a major Willie Nelson fan and the duet with Julio Iglesias was a staple on his sound track, inner and outer.
He smiled, said,
“And to those who might yet find us old guys… colorful.”
Unless beige came back into vogue, I was shit out of luck.
He took a large gulp of the brew, waited, then,
“Jack, you were a policeman but you didn’t carry a gun. Now you are not a policeman, you do. Is that how you define irony?”
I said,
“More like insurance.”
His mobile shrilled, he took it from his coat, answered, said, “Abla.”
Listened, his face expressing nothing until he spat out a staccato of some East European language. Then he snapped his phone shut, said,
“A rumor, without a leg to stand on…will find… another way to move around.”
I left it as cryptic as it was.
He stood, took me in a bear hug again, said,
“We have much in common, hermano.”
Thanked me for the book, the hospitality, and was gone. I drank the Bud slowly, took one of the painkillers the doctor had provided. I wasn’t hurting but felt it coming on. Then I lifted Laura’s letter, moved over to the sink, and, using my Zippo, set it alight. If I opened it, her words would be branded forever on a soul already too heavy. It burnt quickly, like my aspirations, as I held it over the sink. The slightly smoldering remains floated towards the drain like the dying dance of a disintegrating dream. Turned the tap on full, the jet of water sucking the embers of what might have been. I’d laid the gun on the countertop and avoided looking at it lest I put the barrel in my mouth.
I thought of A Moveable Feast, of all the wood that had surrounded us then and how I never touched one single piece of it for luck. Blinded by love and joy, I believed I’d little need of luck and that Paris would simply continue in Galway and that Laura would hold my hand forever. One glorious moment, as we were standing by the Eiffel Tower, I’d been looking up at the steel girders when Laura kissed the nape of my neck; a fleeting kiss, almost imperceptible, and my whole body was alight with awe that such a single gesture could have me believe I was bulletproof and that the future would be writ as it was then. A light rain had begun to fall and Laura turned her face up to it, said,
“Thank you, Lord.”
I said,
“Wait till you see the rain in Galway. It’s incessant but soft, like your eyes.”
She’d never feel the Galway rain and I’d never feel her gentle eyes light on my face.
Och ocon…Oh misery is me.
I moved back to the sofa, the gun resting in my arm again, turned on Marc Roberts’s new album, the track “Dust” killing me slowly. My mobile rang, thank Christ.
A Dhia, ta bron orm.
(God, I am so sad.)
– Old Irish prayer
Stewart.
He launched,
“Father Malachy has regained consciousness.”
Father!
I never… never heard him call him thus.
I said,
“Good, how is he?”
Stewart seemed momentarily lost for words; Malachy had that effect, then,
“I think the nurses might be about to blacken his eyes, too.”
I might actually help them. I asked,
“When can I go see the oul bastard?”
“Ridge has the day off on Thursday and asks if she can pick you up then, go with you?”
I laughed, not out of humor, but Ridge? Said,
“Safety in numbers. You think we need that for him?”
Without hesitation, he said,
“Actually we were both thinking of protecting him from you.”
Nice.
I needled,
“You think I’d assault a priest?”
“Why not? You’ve assaulted everyone else.”
The little sanctimonious prick. I hissed,
“Thanks Stewart, your Zen spirit has made a contented man very old.”
Silence, then,
“Jack, you OK? You sound a little… off.”
I thought of Kosta, said,
“I’m all right, as right as a rumor.”
Clicked off.
I crashed early, meaning I managed to get to my bed, took the Mossberg with me, and, as long as I didn’t shoot meself during the night, I was doing OK.
Next morning, thank Christ, I couldn’t remember my dreams but they’d been rough. When you wake with your hair drenched in sweat and panic riding roughshod all over your torso, you weren’t dreaming you won the freaking lotto.
Got a scalding shower done, a lethal strong coffee in me and the Xanax. Spent an hour practicing the moves with the gun. I was clumsy, couldn’t get into a rhythm but stayed with it; it would come. By fuck, I’d make it. Got my all-weather coat. The right inside pocket was a shoplifter’s dream, large and unobtrusive. The Mossberg slid in like sin. I got a yellow pad, wrote down all I knew about Headstone. Took me a time, writing with your left hand for the first time is a bitch.
Done, I sat back, drained the coffee, and stared at the pad, willing it to speak to me. There was a pattern, a design; I just hadn’t got it yet. I brushed my teeth, the smell of burnt paper still lingering in the air, hovering above the sink, like some specter of paradise lost, a lost plea of transcendence.
Shrugged on my coat, the gun in place, and headed out to face the day. Whatever it brought, I was at least locked and loaded. As I opened the door, I glanced one last time at the sink and my dead dream, muttered,
“Smoke, that’s all.”
I came out of my apartment building, made a sign of the cross at the cathedral, moved across the Salmon Weir Bridge, and didn’t look to see if the salmon were jumping. The water had been poisoned two years now and the only things jumping were me nerves.
Of course, I ran into a wise guy, some fuck I vaguely knew, who immediately stared at my fingers, said,
“Not paying your debts, eh?”
It did flit across my mind to have him jump where the salmon didn’t. I said,
“Yeah, how’d you know?”
Smirk in place, he said,
“Common as muck these days, everybody’s in debt and having to give up parts of their life they never expected.”
I said,
“I gave them your name, said you’d cover my tab.”
Whatever he shouted after me, it contained not only invective but a sense of alarm.
Good.
Books.
I needed to ground myself and nothing, not even the Jay, quite does it like books. I don’t always have the focus to read them but I sure do need them around. Especially as a woman was not in the cards, not no more. I headed for my second home.
Charlie Byrne’s Bookshop has grown and become almost as important as the swans of Galway in the very pulse of the city. I hadn’t been since my most recent accident and felt almost content to be heading there. I passed the newest head shop, doing, it seemed, a brisk trade. Not a high away was the Oxfam shop, emanating a mellow vibe. And then Charlie’s. Sylvia Beach would have been proud of those guys.
Vinny was behind the counter, chatting animatedly to a customer. He had that Clinton touch of making each person feel like the most important one. His trademark long black hair was trimmed. He no longer resembled John Travolta in Pulp Fiction, whose character was named.. . Vincent.
Go figure.
He handed a stack of books to the customer, said,
“Sure, pay the rest when you can.”
Why the town loves the shop.
He saw me, asked,
“Jack, it’s my smoke break, time to join me?”
Oh, yeah.
He has the laid-back gig down to a fine art, without working, and yet, if the situation requires it, he can focus like a hunting Galway heron. He lit up his Marlboro Light, offered the pack, and I said,