It’s dark out, I’m still dying from becoming eighteen again with the Canadians. They’re just the same as back then, I’m not, the hard nights depress me now. It’s not the night so much, as the day after. Or seeing the sun come up and knowing you won’t feel it on your skin today, because of what you’ve done to yourself yesterday.
Skin feels like it’s crawling and the wind’s found a hole between my scarf and hood. I call Dinga, she’s in town not Dun Laoghaire, poxy. I’m not going into town, I’m too hungover, too weak and too full of self pity. And I can’t go back to house, partly because I want chips and partly because I said goodbye to everyone not ten minutes ago. It’ll be embarrassing, my excuses had been exquisite.
My auntie’s in the gaff with her knew fella, she smiles with more of herself than usual. He moves like a thinking man, without using his body, she’ll like that. She likes thinking. My other aunties there with her still mischievous Limerick man. The conversation swung, at times dangerously, close to a scenario where my Da, uncle an self were left messing and farting at one end of the room while the women and new man talked of loftier things. Poor guy, picked the wrong corner. We, on the other hand, got to fill silences by sending a scout down to check how Munster were doing. They eventually won, so we had to switch over to the hurling and a texted joke about Limerick being hammered in the semi’s.
Croker had been dug up for U2 a few days before the match. The replacement sod came from England. An IRA statement read: “The Irish Republican Army would like to extend their thanks to the Limerick Senior Hurling Team. Their refusal to play on foreign soil is a fine example to us all.”
But I’m out in the cold now, shivering shaking and really just wanting to get back into bed. Bollox, I knew I should’ve called earlier. Feck it, I need chips, my stomach needs lining. So on down to the chipper I stroll. Along the way I text AAF and Diamond, both otherwise engaged. Probably for the best, I’d only be moaning anyway.
The pair of them go silent as I enter. A private dispute behind the counter is put on hold for the customer, ‘ just a bag of chips please’. My accent says I’m local, and my face is matched to their internal mental database of regulars, the dispute continues. The little ones calling the big one fat, the big ones calling the little one lazy. “Clean up will ye, I always clean up, why don’t you ever clean up” “Because when I clean up it stays clean so I only have to do it once”. He grabs a rag anyway and gives the fry a wipe, before scrunching it up and firing a perfect volley to the big fella’s face.
That didn’t go down too well. Black Betty comes on, the little one starts singing ‘Fat Belly’ and asking the big lad if he knows the band. It’s pretty funny. Salt, vinegar and a cadet cream soda later I’m outside. What to do? Down to the sea of course. Not the pier though, that’s for rentboys. Salthill and the end of the world, my favorite seat.
Not so cold now, I’m actually sweating. With the heat of the chips and a brisk pace the poison from last night is draining out. I sit down on the wall and look out to sea, a pair of German girls chortle past, shopping in toe. I overtook them on my way out of Dun Laoghaire. They were laughing then too, must get on.
A fat old man, maybe not so old, fifty maybe, but certainly fat, wheezes past. His pace is glacial. I’m petrified he’ll start talking to me. He doesn’t, but it was a scary five minutes.
Three gays come next, “give me a call tomorrow if you’re doing anything” lurches one as he goes up the steps of the rail bridge. In response, an enthusiastic “oh, we will”. Followed by a bitchy “not” as they pass behind me. A laugh snorts out of me, I think they heard that I heard. One looks at me with his peripheral, my eyes follow them for a while, until I get bored.
I turn back to the city’s lights, they breathe with me. Glowing warm, I imagine how I’d explain my love for this spot to a woman. Because I prefer professing my love for the sea to women than men. Men just fart and call you gay, women put up with it for a full fifteen minutes before telling you to fuck off.
From this spot you can see Dublins literary history. The Mortello Tower at Seapoint is Joyce, the chimney stacks across the bay are the twin towers Flann and Behan, the dirty warmth of the street lights is Doyle and somewhere out to sea; where the light cannot penetrate, tousled and turned in the darkest recesses of that infinite black-lies Beckett. But that isn’t why I’m here. I’m here for the wind, she whispers and howls, rasps and growls. She wraps herself around you in a blanket of cold air, before shooting up and screaming blank black murder in the bare black sky. Not even the stars shine from here.
I start seeing hoodies crouched in the grass behind me. They’re not really there mind, it’s just a trick of the light. But it’s time for me to go anyway. I take on last look at the sky, the city and the sea. It’s an orchestra of light and dark, with the wind dancing in the aisles.
I’m home in time to catch the aul ones. Still going strong, it’s another hour of wisecracks and knowing looks before they hit the road. And I finally make it to bed.
