Wednesday's Child (25 page)

He had, apparently, not spent much time browsing the shelves, because when I went in he was already at the counter, a bottle of bargain-bin vodka being put into a brown paper bag for him. I waited for him to turn and see me. His eyes met mine, but he did not say hello, and pushed past me on to the street. I followed him and grabbed his shoulder.

‘Jesus Christ, Max, will you talk to me?’

He shook loose of my grip and shoved me in the chest with all his strength. I was not expecting the blow, and staggered back a few steps. He didn’t stop there, and came after me, angry now, and swinging at me with his left. I hunched up and took the punch on my shoulder, then stepped aside as his momentum carried him off balance. He fell against the wall.

‘You finished?’ I asked him.

He was breathing heavily, the exertion having been too much for him.

‘Leave me alone, you bastard.’

‘No.’

‘Leave me alone!’ he shouted and launched himself at me again, ramming into my body with his head. I was ready this time and caught him by his shoulders and pushed him back. He sat down hard on the pavement.

‘Now you listen to me, you arsehole. We are going to talk. I’ve waited all fucking day for you to surface, and I’m not leaving until you hear what I’ve got to say.’

‘Say it then, you cunt, and let me go home.’

I held out my hand and he took it and I pulled him to his feet. Now that I could see him close up, he looked even worse. The whites of his eyes were yellowed. He had aged, his face was leathery and lined, and he had lost a good deal of weight. It made me afraid for him. He was sick and getting sicker.

‘The de-tox centre will take you again. I’ve got their number here. They want you to ring them to set up a date for going in. You can call them from my phone.’

‘Is that all?’

‘Yeah.’

‘Okay. I’ll be seeing you.’

He shuffled past me and began to walk down the street back towards his house. I ran after him.

‘Max, what the fuck is wrong with you? This will help you to kick the booze! Don’t you want to get the kids back? Isn’t this what you’ve been waiting for?’

He stopped and looked at me, and I saw that he was crying.

‘You stupid, pretentious do-gooder
prick
. Don’t you see? I’ve been here before. I’ve done it. Didn’t work. I came out and the need for a drink was like a fire in my gut. I went straight to the pub as soon as I got off the bus. I managed to keep it hidden for a while, but it soon got out of control, just like it always does. Now you tell me, you fucker, why I should waste my time going in there again? What difference will it make?’

‘You want to make it work. You told me you did …’

‘I said that before, too. But you see, I say these things, and I even mean them for a while. And then
this
starts calling to me. And I can’t refuse it. It owns me.’

He brandished the bottle at me, and screwed the lid off and took a long, sucking gulp. I grimaced as I imagined the foul stuff burning its way down his throat.

‘So you see, it’s over. You can take your de-tox bullshit and shove it right up your arse as far as you can get it.’

‘What do you want me to tell Cordelia and Victor and Ibar?’

The fight went out of him then, and he took another throatful of vodka, tears streaming down his face.

‘Tell them I just couldn’t do it any more. Tell them I’m sorry.’

‘Max …’

‘No. No more. I can’t. It hurts too much.’

I reached out to him, imploring him to stay and talk to me, but he shook his head and lurched away. He staggered off up the road, clutching the only thing in his life that mattered, wrapped in a brown paper bag. I stood there watching him go, suddenly realising that I was crying too.

Pictures of Spiderweb

For you took what’s before me

And what’s behind me

Took right and left and all around me

You took my name

And you took my station

And God as well, if I’m not mistaken

Dònal Òg, Anonymous

(8th century bardic poem)

I was in the Indian restaurant with Andi and Muriel, celebrating. The next day I was going to court with Josephine and Sinéad to seek the Supervision Order for Connie. While things were otherwise at a standstill with her, I felt that this was a significantly positive development. Josephine was confident that the Order would be granted. Although her attitude towards me since the review had been a little frosty, Sinéad had agreed to take a more active part in the case and had helped me to do some work with Mr and Mrs Kelly to prepare them for our more constant presence. I felt that maybe, once we began working in the home, we would see some concrete progress. I knew that Sinéad was angry about my report, which, as Josephine had pointed out, suggested the Kellys had been left to rot by previous workers. I was upset that she should feel that way, but it was a small enough sacrifice to make if it meant that we could do something real for the Kellys.

I raised my bottle of Tiger beer.

‘To the Irish legal system. May it, for once, not perform like an ass.’

Andi and Muriel cheered and clinked bottle necks.
Muriel was a slim, dark-haired girl with glasses and a similar dress-sense to her girlfriend.

‘It truly depends on the judge you get, of course,’ she said, picking at her lamb rogan josh.

‘Really? I thought this was just an open-and-shut kind of thing. A formality.’

‘It should be, but we’ve both seen cases that should have been a doddle turn into shit-storms, haven’t we?’ Andi said to Muriel.

I had chicken sagwaala. The food in the restaurant was actually pretty good, despite Andi’s initial joking about it. We had taken to coming here on special occasions. The staff were polite, the seating was comfortable and it was never difficult to get a table.

‘Do you remember the Connors case?’ Muriel said.

‘Tell him about it, Muriel. You’ll love this, Shane.’

Muriel smiled and put down her fork. She tore off a piece of naan bread and picked crumbs off it as she spoke.

‘I had a family at the refuge. Mum and two kids. The father kept on coming around, hanging about outside trying to intimidate them. We’d call the police, but there was little they could do. He was standing a small distance away, not acting threateningly, in a public car park. They sympathised, but that was about it. So, we decided to apply for a barring order. The details were fairly straightforward. He was an alcoholic and a drug abuser. He also pushed. There was every class of low-life coming in and out of the family home at all hours of the day and night. When the
woman asked him to take his business elsewhere, he beat the shit out of her and threw her and the children out of the house. Now, you’d imagine that this would be a classic example of going in, presenting the evidence, getting your order, thank you very much judge, let’s all go home for tea.’

‘But I assume it wasn’t?’

‘The judge was new, one of those visiting ones that come when the usual guy is off playing golf or something. We also had a young lawyer. Our usual, Trudy, was on leave. I started to realise that we were in trouble when he wanted to know if this was your man’s first offence. Now, gobshite had a rap-sheet as long as your arm, but it was all drug-related. He had never been up for domestic violence before. So the judge decides that he will not, in this instance, grant the order. He recommends that they go to
marriage guidance counselling
, and asks to see them in a month to review the situation.’

‘And I suppose that this was not helpful under the circumstances?’

‘He beat this girl to within an inch of her life,’ Andi said, shaking her head at the recollection. ‘She needed reconstructive surgery, for fuck’s sake. She was afraid to be on the same street as him. No, marriage guidance counselling was not an option. Of course baby lawyer just stands there with his fucking gob hanging open and decides not to point any of this out to our wise and learned judge.’

‘So what did you do?’

‘Well, we couldn’t use the law to achieve our end,’ Muriel said. ‘So we decided to step outside of it. Here we had a drug dealer from out of town, hanging around and making himself visible. I began to wonder what the other dealers would think about that.’

‘You didn’t!’

‘I did. I made a couple of phone calls, and spoke to some people I know, and just put it out there on the grapevine that this guy was looking to expand his turf. Which he may have been doing, for all I know.’

‘What happened?’

‘Let’s just say he stopped hanging around outside the refuge fairly quickly.’

‘So you’re basically telling me that it ain’t over until the fat man in the black robes sings.’

‘Precisely.’

‘I’ll keep it in mind, but I don’t see how this can go wrong tomorrow. I’ve got a good feeling in my gut.’

I thought I was going to die.

My insides seemed hell-bent on making their way up my throat and into the toilet bowl. My bowels were one minute shrivelling up to the size of walnuts and then expanding and inflating at an alarming rate. My large and small intestines felt like they were wrestling with one another, and I wasn’t sure which one was winning. I was bathed in sweat and freezing all at the same time. I was also supposed to be in court and I couldn’t get to my phone for fear of spraying
substances from orifices as yet undetermined all over my living room. I eventually dragged myself on all fours over to the coffee table upon which I had dumped my phone the previous night. Andi’s number was the first one in my phone, and I couldn’t focus on trying to make my way to J to find Josephine’s.

‘Hey Shane. What’s the crack?’

‘Andi, I’m supposed to be in court.’

‘I know.’

‘I think I have food poisoning.’

‘Couldn’t have. Me and Muriel are grand.’

‘I’m really sick. Can you get hold of Jo and explain for me?’

‘Ring her yourself.’

‘Andi, I can’t. I have to go. I’m gonna be sick.’

‘Enjoy.’

I made it back to the toilet – barely.

Owing to my absence, the case was adjourned for a month. To say that Josephine was angry with me would be an understatement. I knew that I deserved her ire – she had had her phone switched off, since she was in court, and had not received Andi’s call until midday; to all intents and purposes, I had simply not turned up to a court hearing – so I stood in her office and absorbed the flow of invective with my head bowed. After five minutes or so, she ran out of steam.

‘Are you feeling better?’

‘Haven’t got much of an appetite, but I can drink water and hold it down.’

‘Shane, that was
almost
a rhetorical question. You’re standing in my fucking office, so the appropriate answer is: “Yes, I’m fine.” I’m still too annoyed at you to be interested in a blow by blow account of how your goddam digestive tract is doing. Now get out and go and do whatever you have to do. If you
ever
let me down like that again, I will not be responsible for my actions.’

‘Okay. I can only apologise again —’

‘Get – out!’

One month later, Josephine, Sinéad and I were seated in court, waiting to be seen by the judge. In the Family Court, cases are heard
in camera
, meaning that each case is seen in private. Our lawyer, Gloria, was dealing with several cases that morning, so we took a seat among the other groups seeking justice and waited. After two hours we were ushered into the judge’s chambers and Gloria spoke for a few moments in legalese.