Ride On

by Stephen J. Martin

  Jimmy closed his eyes and imagined a solo gig. He could see the hollering crowd, hear the thundering echoes of his guitar, feel the heat of the lights. It would be brilliant of course. Being back in the middle of all that. But then he imagined himself turning around and seeing nothing but a black curtain behind him and suddenly he didn’t want it any more. He wanted his fucking band back. His mates. He stared at the butt in his fingers, twisting and squeezing it until it was dead and hard.

  But it was time to start thinking about the future. He sat and thought about that. His future.

  Finally, he took out his phone and called Dónal, telling him to book a gig in McGuigans for six weeks time. Dónal knew not to ask too many questions, and just said he’d sort it out. Jimmy hung up, an almost-forgotten buzz settling into his belly. Okay. He was committed now, but that was okay. This gig would be the best thing he’d ever done. He’d make sure of that. For all of them. Whatever it took to put it together, he had six weeks and Jimmy had always worked better when he had a goal. They wanted a gig? He’d give them a gig they’d never fucking forget.

  He dialled another number then. One he should have dialled a long time ago, and would have only for the fucked-up priorities he used to carry around with him. But not any more. Shiggy was right. Life was short.

  He heard her voice.

  ‘Susan?’

  Then he had to wait, one finger in his free ear, as a sudden roar shook the air around him and made him look up to the sky. But that was okay. A few more seconds? He’d already waited a lot longer than that to tell her that he needed her more than anything else in his life. That he loved her.

  He could wait now for the climbing plane overhead to disappear into the clouds, bringing whoever was in it to wherever they had to go.

  Epilogue

  Jimmy stood in front of the crowd, his guitar hanging down in front of him. It had been a couple of minutes since he’d walked onto the stage and they were still screaming and clapping. Talk in the music press had been about nothing but this gig ever since it had been announced. Jimmy Collins was going to perform for the first time since the accident nearly four months ago that had claimed the drumming, and very nearly the life, of Aesop. Leet had finished playing about half an hour ago. They were good lads. Interrupted their tour of the UK to fly back and open this gig for Jimmy. Now he just stood there, his ears rattling against the noise of the punters and smiled out at everyone as best he could. He couldn’t see much against the lights in his face, but he caught a few eyes and gave a few little waves. Jennifer and Marco, his folks, Dónal and Sparky, his ex-bird Sandra and Beano, her fiancé. He knew his old mate Johnnie Fingers was out there somewhere. He was home from Tokyo to do a bit of business and said he’d get up for a couple of songs. The punters would lose their minds when they saw him. A few of the lads from Kíla were there too. They’d be getting up later to help out with ‘Caillte’. Jimmy couldn’t wait till the Irish public got an earful of that. Dónal was already talking about re-releasing it.

  Eventually Jimmy held up a hand so that he could say something, but that only made the noise louder. He shook his head and grinned, leaning in to the mike.

  ‘Will yis shut bleedin’ up a minute?’

  They laughed then and soon there was only the sound of coughs and whispers.

  ‘Thanks.’

  He adjusted the strap of his guitar, looking for the right words.

  ‘Eh … well, I s’pose … I don’t want to say too much. But there’s a couple of things I have to say before I start. Eh …’

  He looked down at the floor.

  ‘Eh … first of all, just … thanks. We’ve had a bit of a hairy time of it since … the accident. We’ve, as you know, we’ve had our share of mishaps. I won’t go into the whole thing now, cos the papers just about have it all covered anyway. Aesop … all of us … were just blown away by the generosity of everyone over the last few months. It’s been amazing to know that you’re all behind us. So … thanks very much.’

  He stepped back from the mike and gave a little bow as he waited for the cheering to die down.

  ‘So, obviously, Aesop can’t play the drums at the moment. But I guarantee you that he’s working on it!’

  More shouts and cheering.

  ‘And of course Shiggy went back to Japan, so … eh … well, I s’pose you might say that The Grove has been on a bit of a hiatus. But before you went and forgot all about us, I just wanted to play here tonight and to tell you that we appreciate everything that all of you – and a lot of other people – have done for us over the last few months.’

  There was no cheering this time. Just clapping. Lots of it, with a few whistles.

  ‘So … well, the last thing I wanted to say for the moment is that Aesop is very sorry that he’s not out there with you. But if you know Aesop, you’ll understand that he’d go mad being down in the crowd instead of up here. He told me to pass on his apologies and he’ll see you all very soon.’

  Jimmy didn’t want to drag this out. It was hard enough. Aesop had barely been able to speak when he’d seen him earlier. He tried not to think about it. He waited for the noise to ease off and then he strummed down on his guitar to check the tuning. The lights on the stage collapsed, leaving him standing there on his own in a single shaft of white.

  He opened with ‘Wish You Were Here’. He’d played it the last time himself and Aesop had been on a stage together down at the Open Mike night in Cork. The punters swayed and hummed along, lost in it. He hadn’t planned on trying to turn on any waterworks. Certainly not this early. But it was happening now, a few girls right in front of him gazing up with shining, wet eyes. Well fuck it. This gig would have a vibe of its own and he wasn’t here to put clamps around it. Everyone joined in on the chorus, the sound of it thudding against the walls and the ceiling and making Jimmy’s mike resonate against his lips. Everyone in McGuigans tonight was on the same page. Good. He needed them that way.

  He went through the set for another hour without stopping or talking. It wasn’t all deep and emotional stuff. He played acoustic versions of ‘Landlady Lover’ and ‘Alibi’, two old Grove favourites. Then he took out a slide and did a Rory Gallagher number, fast and thumping. Jimmy wanted to show off some new stuff, so he played a couple of songs that no one knew. They were tasters from the new album, but he didn’t introduce them. He wanted them to speak for themselves. They were based on two Carolan airs. He just closed his eyes and played and did his best to let the songs fill the room without any help from his hips or his grin or that part of him that needed punters to like them more than anything he’d ever written. Then he finished out with ‘Caillte’ and ‘More Than Me’. The song that broke the Grove and the song that made them the biggest-selling artists in Europe.

  Once he’d taken his bow and looked back out at them, he felt the nerves building in him again. He’d told Dónal he might take a break at this stage of the gig, but he knew he couldn’t do that now. He had to keep going. His belly was writhing, sweat on his hands, as he took the mike in his hand again.

  ‘Thanks very much.’

  He waited.

  ‘Eh, I spoke to Aesop … oh, a good few weeks ago now … and I told him I’d be doing this gig. Y’know what I mean … I didn’t know if he’d be all pissed-off that he couldn’t play and I wanted to make sure he’d be okay with it. Of course, he was grand. He actually threatened to slap me if I didn’t do it!’

  Laughter.

  ‘Anyway, our manager Dónal had already suggested that maybe getting a couple of new people in to take over on the drums and the bass might be an idea. Just temporary, like. It’d be good for the band to be out there, doing concerts for everyone … all that.’

  ‘So, once I agreed to do this gig, I started thinking about that again. I mean … thinking about getting a new drummer and a new bass player and touring with The Grove again. So anyway, I talked to Aesop about it, and he said I should do it too. He wanted to see The Grove out there.’

  Now
there wasn’t even any coughing or whispering. Even the staff were staring up at him, not really sure about where this was going.

  ‘So then I called Shiggy in Japan. Just to see. But he said the same thing. He told me that The Grove shouldn’t stop just because of what had happened. So, anyway, to be honest with you … I guess tonight was never really a Jimmy Collins gig. Jimmy Collins is part of a band. And now I think it’s time for you to meet the rest of that band … ’

  Jimmy stood back from the mike and looked stage left with one hand out.

  Shiggy walked out first, but the crowd didn’t even get a chance to roar.

  Aesop appeared, grinning, and limped over to the middle of the stage. The three of them hugged and waved out at the erupting scene in front of them.

  Jimmy stepped up to the mike again and grinned.

  ‘Weren’t expecting that, were you? Yeah. Well you wouldn’t believe how nervous we all are, I’m telling you.’

  He pointed to Shiggy next to him.

  ‘He never fuckin’ told us he played the drums!’

  Shiggy pumped the air with two sticks and leaned into the mike.

  ‘Never fuckin’ ask, Jimmy.’

  Jimmy turned around and helped Aesop strap on the bass as Shiggy got in behind the drum kit. Back at the mike he put on a pair of dark shades and pointed over to his left.

  ‘Hit it Aesop.’

  Aesop started the bass line to ‘Strut’ and then Shiggy came in on the high-hat.

  Jimmy leapt up into the air and the roar of his guitar as he came down was the only thing that could have drowned out the noise of the crowd as nearly three hundred people screamed and rushed the stage.

  He looked around at the lads and grinned. He was home, at long fucking last. Then he shuffled over to the edge of the stage and got down on his knees, his guitar still wailing and screeching. He leaned down without missing a note and planted a big one on the beautiful girl that was dancing there. She kissed him back and said something, but he couldn’t hear what it was. Didn’t matter.

  He’d ask her later when they got home.

  *

  Down in the audience, they were feeling nothing but love. A mother wiped away her tears as she looked up at the stage. She only had one son, but they were all her boys up there. She’d never felt so proud, even as she grimaced against the noise. A policewoman held her girlfriend’s hand and tried not to allow herself get too caught up in the gig. She’d promised Dónal that she’d keep an eye out, just in case. An old sound engineer frowned down at his desk and made sure that every nuance that Jimmy had planned would come out of the speakers for him. Occasionally, he’d yell abuse at the young guy doing the lights next to him, but on the whole he was pretty happy. He pulled out a banana and peeled it. An English girl gazed up at her man. She’d never seen this before, never imagined it would be like this, and would have pinched herself if her hands weren’t punching the air.

  Further back, a big guy from Cork stood against the wall with his girl, grinning and tapping his foot. He’d seen it loads of times, but hadn’t expected ever to see it again. The young nurse stood in front of him so that he could fold his hands across her belly. He leaned down and kissed her neck and remembered when she’d called him back that day as his hand was swinging his bag into the back of a taxi. How she’d told him and then how every bad thing that had ever happened to him, in that instant, didn’t matter any more and never would again.

  Right at the back wall, a father held his son on his shoulders. They were coming out of a rough time too, although they’d never be completely free of it. They’d lost a daughter, a sister. Little Philomena was gone, but things were slowly getting better again. Liam roared laughing and sang as he held on around his Dad’s chin. His skinny frame was lost in the folds of the huge black Cradle of Filth t-shirt that he’d suddenly produced and started to wear a few months ago, when things had been really bad. But he’d been seeing someone since then, getting some proper help. Now he didn’t keep spending all his money on flowers for her grave. He didn’t sit reading her diary any more for hours on end, drawing little lovehearts in it to match the hundreds she’d drawn on it for herself and her favourite rockstar. He’d stopped running away at night too.

  And he hadn’t wet the bed in a long time now …

  CRÍOCH

  Ta very much …

  Despite what you may have heard, writing a novel isn’t all about sitting around in your underpants and shutting out the world as you dig repeatedly down into yourself to nose out fragrant truffles of literary brilliance. That was the drink talking. And I’m sorry for what I said about your bird too – it was probably just the way she was standing.

  Anyway, I owe the following people a big bowl of jelly and ice cream for helping me out with Ride On … Jonie Hell, Mick O’Gorman, Shane Harmon (legend), Rebecca Prince, Andy Plester, Miles Essex, Villads Spangsberg, Alan Baxter, Kevin English, Rob Wrixon, Joe Burke, Damien Murphy, Neil Clarke and Declan Burke. Also, Johnny O’Reilly, John Tierney and Will Murray for reminding me what it’s like to be young and mad – cheers lads … always a pleasure.

  It’s about time that Dave ‘Kitty’ Barry got a special mention all for himself. He knows why … I’ll say no more.

  Colm Ó’Snodaigh from the band Kíla was an enormous help and I’d like to thank him and the rest of the band for allowing me to have a laugh with their fictional doppelgängers in the book. Míle buíochas!

  Every book needs a shower, a shave and the rub of a cotton bud or two before being let out into polite society. Joe Burke, Brian Dolan, Ruth Kelly, Fiona Lodge and Stewart Ward were on hand – again – to help me perform the necessary ablutions. And it wasn’t like they didn’t have enough to be doing!

  It takes a unique blend of talents to edit a book so that everyone wins, and my editor, Isobel Creed, has them all in abundance. Many thanks to Isobel and Mercier Press for helping Ride On out of my head and into your hands.

  And, always, thanks and love to Ruth, without whom there’d be no Jimmy, no Aesop, no Grove, no Sparky, no Shiggy, no Norman, no Peggy, no gigs, no Caillte, no laughs … no nuthin’ …

  SJM

  Hong Kong, 2007.

  [www.pointedshoe.com]

  About the Publisher

  We hope you enjoyed this book.

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  Mercier Press, Unit 3b, Oak House, Bessboro Rd, Blackrock, Cork, Ireland

  About the Author

  Stephen J. Martin was born and raised in Dublin, spent most of the last ten years in Tokyo and now lives in Sydney. Steve has acted and directed for the stage, been the lead singer in a successful rock band in Tokyo and also designs computer systems for investment banks. His first novel was the hugely successful Superchick.

  Other titles from this Author

  9781856354646

  ‘All women are bastards …’ Jimmy Collins, competent middle manager by day, suburban rockstar by night, has just been dumped and he’s not taking it very well. Even a visit to his stylist can’t cheer him up.

  He decides to take control of the situation, convincing his friends to help him find the perfect girl – beautiful (but loyal), smart (but not too sma
rt), confident (without being a feminist), an expert bun-maker; who’s indifferent about shopping, enthusiastic about Star Trek and scornful of self-help books.

  9781856355940

  ‘What is a chance at your dream worth?’ Being a rock star was all Jimmy ever wanted, but it was supposed to happen when he was seventeen, not in his thirties. Jimmy had spent the best part of twenty years building a career. He studied, he got a great job and he had worked hard at it. He was being groomed for stardom all right, but his stage was to be in a boardroom, not a beer-soaked and panty-strewn concert hall.

  Now it’s coming to the crunch. While the band are wondering why his phone keeps ringing at rehearsals, his boss in work is wondering why he keeps coming into the office with bags under his eyes.

  Jimmy is starting to crack under the pressure. He’s even started to call round to his Mam for chats in the evenings. The doctor is telling him to take a holiday – Greece, maybe? – but his boss and his manager have other ideas. Jimmy’s going away all right, but he’s going a lot further than Greece …

  www.mercierpress.ie/stephenjmartin