DEIRDRE
PURCELL
JESUS AND BILLY ARE OFF TO
BARCELONA
Deirdre Purcell was born and brought up in Dublin. Since 1990 she has published nine critically acclaimed novels. Love Like Hate Adore was shortlisted for the prestigious Orange prize, while the bestselling Falling for a Dancer was filmed for the BBC and RTÉ. Her latest novels are Marble Gardens and Last Summer in Arcadia, also published by New Island.
JESUS AND BILLY ARE OFF TO BARCELONA
First published by GemmaMedia in 2009.
GemmaMedia
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Copyright © 1999, 2009 Deirdre Purcell.
This edition of Jesus & Billy Are Off to Barcelona is published by arrangement with New Island Books Ltd
All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced in any manner whatsoever without written permission from the publisher, except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles or reviews.
Printed in the United States of America
Cover design by Artmark
12 11 10 09 08 1 2 3 4 5
ISBN: 978-1-934848-07-4
Library of Congress Preassigned Control Number (PCN) applied for
OPEN DOOR SERIES
Patricia Scanlan
Series Editor
CHAPTER ONE
The Cast
Our hero is Billy O’Connor from Finglas. A fair-haired schoolboy of sixteen years of age and of normal talent. He is a wee bit small for his age. And rather young-looking. He is very annoyed about this. He has long conversations with his pals about the women he has had. He fights a lot with his very irritating sister, Doreen.
Jesus Martinez, from Barcelona, is aged seventeen. He looks, dresses and acts a lot older. He is beautiful, with skin as velvety as a peach, curly brown hair and dark grey eyes with lashes that Liz Hurley would kill for. His parents have money, lots of money. Jesus, who has lovely manners, never talks about this.
Doreen O’Connor, who is eighteen, spends most of her life worrying about being fat. Her best friend, Betty Fagan, is always telling her she is not fat. Doreen thinks that Betty, who is as thin as a lollipop stick, is only saying that. Doreen is feeling grim at the moment because she feels life is passing her by in the matter of boyfriends. She’s never had one. Betty has had a boyfriend for a year now and this has put their relationship under strain. Doreen’s also fed up with her parents because they’re fixing it for Billy to go to Barcelona. A chance she never got.
Jimmy O’Connor, thirty-nine years of age, the father of Billy and Doreen, works in Premier Dairies. He is a cheerful sort, happy with small joys. Likes the odd pint. He is proud of his family, proud of his little house. Proud that, with his own hands, he can keep the old family banger on the road. The only fly in the ointment is that his wife, Janet, keeps nagging at him to do courses so he can get a better job. Jimmy is glad to have the job he has. No hassle, no stress.
Janet O’Connor, Jimmy’s wife, loves her children. She loves Jimmy too, but is at an age where suddenly none of that seems enough. She finds herself looking at holiday programmes on the telly. Janet’s main question now is: why can’t Jimmy O’Connor get up off his arse and get himself a better job? She has great plans for her children and has taken on extra ironing shifts down at ValuKleen, the local laundromat.
Granny Teresa, who is seventy, is Jimmy’s mother. She lives with the O’Connors in a little granny flat stuck on to the side of the house. She is a terrific granny, warm, wise, motherly.
No one can guess the age of Amanda O’Connor (no relation) because she keeps herself so well. The gym, tennis, the odd facial – well, you have to, don’t you? Amanda lives with Hugo, her husband, on the south side of the city in a keyhole cul-de-sac of lovely houses. All with different shapes. Amanda has high ambitions for her only son, William. She doesn’t want him to be a dull old accountant like Hugo, who works all the hours God sends. William has always been good with his hands so maybe he would be a surgeon.
There are other people in this story, such as Billy’s uncle Dick, who also lives with the Finglas O’Connors and who is sozzled most weekends.
But finally – the person without whom we wouldn’t not have a story at all.
Sharon Byrne is twenty-two and has lovely hair. She also has lovely nails and lovely ankles and a heavy DART accent. Her Daddy always said that Sharon was good with people so she did a PR diploma at a private college. Unfortunately, PR didn’t work out for her, so when she saw a summer job advertised in Irlanda Exchange, she thought she’d give it a whirl.
Sharon has been with The Agency for all of six weeks when the trouble she has to face on that August Bank Holiday weekend makes her think yet again about her line of work . . .
CHAPTER TWO
Billy Prepares to Meet Jesus
The jury was still out on Billy O’Connor’s family. Billy sometimes thought they were not too bad. Like on certain Sundays when his Uncle Dick was too sick to come downstairs. His mother, who always saw this as a blessing, would behave like a real mother. Like the mothers you see on the telly. Jolly. The kind of mother who cracks jokes about the burnt corned beef and is so relaxed about it that everyone is allowed to laugh.
Sometimes, on the other hand, Billy thought he was going to die of shame because he was forced to live on the same planet as these people. Not to speak of in the same house on the same street.
At the moment, he was in between.
On the good side, it was very good of his parents to go to all the trouble and expense of arranging this student exchange with the bloke from Barcelona. Billy’s scholarship covered only half the cost, so to pay for the rest of it, his Da had done lots of overtime. He had also borrowed from the Credit Union. His Ma had taken on extra work down at ValuKleen.
On the bad side, they never let Billy forget their goodness. Billy only had to do one thing. One small tiny thing (like forgetting to put out the milk bottles on one single night) and they were all off. He was an ungrateful little pup who had no idea what the real world was like. He didn’t have to wear the same pair of laddered tights for a month. He didn’t have to suck up to that shagger Moreno down at the plant in order to scrounge a few bloody hours of extra work on a Saturday night.
When they first told him about the trip, about three months ago, he had been excited. But then, the next day, when he thought about it, he became a bit afraid too.
It was all very well watching Barcelona on Sky and slagging off Rivaldo and Figo. Or laughing about the poxy Spanish food they must eat in Spain. But then you remembered that soon you’d have to eat the same poxy food. Billy hadn’t had the courage to ask anyone to tell him stuff about Barcelona. Billy was in the habit of pretending to know things.
What was most on his mind was that he might make a fool of himself with the Spanish women.
Billy was worrying about women right now, as a matter of fact. Lying on his bed on top of his Liverpool F.C. sleeping-bag, he was worrying not only about Spanish women but about all women. If worrying about women was an Olympic sport, Billy O’Connor would have walked it.
He looked at his watch. Only three hours before they were due to go to the airport to meet his exchange partner who had this weird name.
Jesus.
Imagine calling your son Jesus, Billy thought. It certainly wouldn’t work here. A Finglas Jesus wouldn’t dare to show his face outside the door.
In another part of the house, he could hear Granny Teresa crackling at something someone said on a re-run of The Golden Girls. Listening to her, Billy smiled. G
ranny Teresa was alright, actually. She was the only one in the house who liked Kung Fu films. And although it wasn’t really cool to admit that you loved your grandmother, in his secret heart, Billy glowed when he was around her.
He envied her in a sort of a way too because she was seventy and, therefore, everyone had to respect her. She didn’t have to give a sugar about his Ma’s moods or her PMT. And any time his Da got stroppy she’d shut him up with a look and ask him who did he think he was. That she used to change his nappy.
His Uncle Dick – now there was another kettle of kippers. Dick was the Black Sheep of the entire family on both sides. He was separated. He’d had to go back to live with Granny Teresa only four years after he was married. Then the two of them came to live with Billy’s family when Uncle Dick drank them both out of house and home and they had nowhere else to go.
The problem with having Dick in the house was that no one could sleep with him because he snored like an elephant. So he had to have a bedroom all to himself. But there were only three bedrooms in the house proper. So Dick got one. There was one for his parents and one left for Doreen. So Billy had to sleep on a sofa bed in what his Da liked to call The Conservatory.
For the next three weeks, Jesus was going to be in Dick’s room and Dick was going to be sleeping with Granny Teresa in the granny flat. The rules from the agency said that Jesus had to have a room of his own.
The Conservatory was a lean-to glasshouse. Billy’s Da had bought it cheaply from someone in Rush who was getting out of market gardening. His Da ‘borrowed’ a milk float from Premier Dairies and one Saturday morning, he, a mate of his, and Billy had gone to collect it. They had to hurry and get the float back to the plant before that shagger Moreno missed it.
Billy didn’t mind because, as a bedroom, it wasn’t too bad actually. Once he got used to the brightness, birds in the morning, that sort of thing, Billy got to quite like it.
He checked his watch again. Two hours and fifty minutes to go. He settled down with a dog-eared copy of Playboy magazine. His friend, Anthony, had got it from a bloke he worked with on the building site. Now that Billy was sixteen years old, his Ma and Da didn’t bother taking stuff like Playboy away from him any more. He hoped this Jesus was as into women as he was.
CHAPTER THREE
Sharon Gets a Puncture
‘Bloody hell!’ Sharon Bryne swore as the steering wheel of the Polo shuddered and then became heavy between her hands. (She had wanted a Golf but her Daddy wouldn’t rise to it. The old meanie.)
She had a puncture.
Of all the days!
Sharon had been driving down Monkstown Avenue in a thick stream of traffic. She heaved at the steering wheel to get the car neatly into the kerb. She glared at the furious face of the Beemer driver who passed her making rude finger signs. All right, so she hadn’t indicated. Big deal. She stuck out her tongue at him as she put on her flashers.
One by one, the honking cars swerved out and drove past her. Calm down, Sharon, she said to herself. Just ring the AA first. Then ring Jackie and tell her you’ll be there as quickly as you can.
Thank God for mobiles, she thought.
Making sure she did not break her fingernail, she carefully tapped in the AA breakdown number. She always kept it safely taped to the dashboard of the Polo. She was kept waiting, of course. She had to listen to bloody Enya. What was it about Enya? She was everywhere. Poodle music, Sharon called it. Sharon herself was into heavier music, like Blur.
After what seemed like a week, the AA woman came on. Took the details. Then – disaster! The wait would be an hour or probably more.
‘An hour?’ Sharon couldn’t believe it. This was an emergency. She tried to explain to the woman how much of an emergency this was. But the woman explained back to her that because this was a Bank Holiday Friday, there was murder on the roads. She’d do her best, the woman said, but she couldn’t promise help sooner than an hour. Click. The woman was gone.
Sharon thought for a moment. Then tapped again on her mobile.
Damn! Daddy’s mobile was off.
It wasn’t fair. She just felt like getting out of the Polo altogether and walking away. She felt like crying. She nearly did, actually, but then she pulled herself together. Stop this, Sharon, she said sternly to herself. Don’t be such a baby. You’re in a grown-up job. Behave like a grown-up.
She frowned. Sharon Bryne was not going to be beaten by this. She tapped in Jackie’s number
‘Oh my God – !’ Jackie’s voice could barely be heard above the noise all around her. She was in the arrivals hall at the airport. ‘Sharon, you can’t do this to me. You just can’t. You have to come immediately. Get a taxi, all right? The company will pay. Just come now. You should be here already – ’ The connection was broken and Sharon was left holding the stupid dead mobile in her hand.
This was dreadful. The silly woman was demanding that she should abandon the Polo? Just leave it here for robbers and lowlifes?
She took three deep breaths to calm herself down. Brigitte, who gave Sharon and her mother Ki-Massage, had taught the two of them how to slow the body down. It always worked. After the third breath, Sharon was no longer upset.
She tapped in Daddy’s mobile number again. Still off.
All right. She was on her own here. She would leave the Polo and get a taxi. But first she would ring AA and tell them they’d have to tow it for her to a garage. They’d do that. They’d have to. Sharon’s family paid squillions to them every year for the very top cover.
Twenty minutes later, Sharon was driven in her taxi past the Frascati Shopping Centre. She was quite pleased with how she had handled matters. She saw she was clutching her clipboard as though it was a life-belt. Tension. Brigitte certainly would not have approved of that! So Sharon took three more deep breaths and settled back in her seat for the ride to the airport. She wouldn’t think any negative thoughts. The Polo would be fine. She had put the light around it as Brigitte had taught her.
She didn’t remember that she had left a file on the Polo’s back seat.
CHAPTER FOUR
Jesus Flies In
Jesus leaned forward in his seat and stared through the oval window as the jet at last broke through the cloud cover. The fields around Dublin airport spread out beneath it like a bright green-and-white tablecloth. All around him was the excited buzz of chatter and loud talk. Jesus had no wish to be part of it. He had no friends on this trip and he was contented about that. Three weeks in Ireland with a family he did not know was fine with him.
To prepare for the visit, he had read a lot about Ireland. About Riverdance and Gerry Adams and Bono and computers. And most of all, about the craic and the Guinness and the little fairy-sized churches and the green, green grass.
And now here it was, all starting. Jesus, who never showed any excitement because to do so would be vulgar, felt a little flutter somewhere around his middle. He sat back. The flight attendant, who was passing along to check seat belts, shot him a big toothy smile. Jesus smiled back. It was good to be coming to Ireland, to escape the summer heat of Barcelona. All that endless, tiring, boring sunshine. It rained a lot in Ireland. Jesus liked rain, the way it rushed from the sky to cool the streets and freshen the flowers.
His Mama had not wanted him to come. Lately, Jesus had been finding that he and his Mama were not seeing eye-to-eye the way they used to. His brother, Jose Manuel, who was married and six years older than Jesus, had helped to persuade their Mama. Jose Manuel had said that a little holiday away from one another would be no bad thing for either of them.
His Papa did not care one way or the other. Between the polo, the bank and the club, his Papa cared little about anything to do with the family. So long as they were clothed and fed and didn’t cause scandal or crash any of the cars. His Papa had no idea that Jesus knew all about the mistress he kept in an airy house near the summit of Tibidabo – the cool, wooded mountains which watched over the city.
Jesus was past caring what his
Papa did.
He preferred not to remember the yelling and the screaming he had overheard from the safety of his first-floor apartment on the evening the mistress had come to the house to confront his Mama. The mistress was demanding her rightful share of his Papa’s wealth.
Jesus shuddered a little now as the memory came to the surface. To push it back down again, he concentrated hard on looking at this watery land which was rushing up to meet the wheels of the jet. He could see puddles now, tiny cows, a ribbon of road, a fence and then the runway. He closed his eyes, waited for the thump and squeal . . .
His fellow students clapped and cheered.
Jesus had arrived in Ireland.
CHAPTER FIVE
Amanda and William Get Lost
on the Way to the Airport
‘I just don’t believe this.’ Amanda stared at the wasteland of shops. Many of them had strong steel bars across their windows.
‘How could this have happened?’ she moaned. ‘I’ve been to the airport to collect your father a hundred times. I couldn’t have taken a wrong turn!’
She leaned across, took a map of the city out of the glove compartment and rustled it open.
William, hot and fat in the leather seat beside her, slumped deeper and closed his eyes. His Walkman already blared into his ears but he turned it up further. He hated this. He didn’t want an exchange student. He didn’t want to go to Barcelona. All he wanted was to be left alone in peace in his own nice quiet room with his Playstation and his catalogues.
William collected catalogues. It didn’t matter what they sold. Toys. Time-Past Celtic candles. Fishing tackle. They were all great. He filed his catalogues in big box files.
He became hooked on the hobby when his desk partner at school brought in a gun catalogue he had found in the boot of his father’s car.
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