What’s happening? he asked.
This is some trip, I said at last.
I lay down in the flat on a sofa and faced the wall. The pains were coming more often. He brought me water. It turned to vomit in my throat. He sat on the edge of the sofa.
I’m responsible for this, he said.
Don’t talk, I said. It only makes it worse.
Then this fierce hallucination grabbed me. The wall flew open and closed. I saw my own image opposite me, as I often saw my own reflection in the mirror in the Breifne. But there was no mirror. Sebastian walked me to my room. I lay down but could not find a place to rest my head. The pillow was like a bag of cement. Old demons materialized by my side. Minutes went by. My guts grew taut as hawsers.
You’re having a bad trip, said Sebastian.
Is that what it is?
Yes. Don’t worry. It will end soon.
But why the pain? It’s real pain, I said.
I don’t know. Look, I’ll go and I’ll be back. I’ll go and find something for you.
After he left night fell on the street. The room smelt of carbide. The Italian women chatted as they hung out their washing on the balconies. The red haze of a London sky lifted. Sirens blew from the Thames. I lay in the one place as long as I could, trying to batten down the overpowering maelstrom of crazy thinking that was assaulting me.
John McCaffrey, the hairdresser from Belturbet, looked in.
How did it go? he asked.
Not so good, I said.
He went next door and put on Crosby, Stills, Nash and Young. The music, after all those times it had exhilarated me, seemed false. I wrote into a notebook and turned the other way. Shay McArdle came home. The Saturday night continued. The lads dressed and went to the pub. I stayed stock still in the room wondering for whom I was waiting. Sudden rushes of cheerfulness would reach me, and just as quickly were spirited away.
The bell rang. I looked out the window and saw Aunty Bridgie and Leo standing below on Denbigh Street. They were dressed for the club. I slunk back to bed. They rang a few more times then went away. Daco, the Spanish guy below us, put flamenco on the record player. Eerie presences collected in the darkness. Faces swam by. But the heat of bad acid would not allow me pity.
*
At twelve Sebastian arrived back with a friend. I opened my eyes and found them sitting in chairs by the bed.
Dermot?
Yes.
Some of it was poison.
What?
Some of the tabs had cyanide in them.
Is that what it was?
For some unknown reason I felt a little better. At least what was happening me had a concrete reason.
I had it checked, he said. I’m sorry.
That’s all right.
Did you sleep?
I don’t think so.
I got something for you.
He lifted out a small white box of the type you’d put a slice of wedding cake in for guests who couldn’t make the breakfast. It contained four tablets.
It’s Mandrax.
It will bring you down, said his friend. It’s good.
I took two of the Mandrax. Slowly the darkness began to shift. The pains ceased or at least went away to another place. I was exhausted. Sebastian took out his guitar and began to play. His friend rolled a joint. The others came home, looked in and went away. Shay brought me a beer. I babbled a little. The night went on. I struggled for sleep but just as I’d make it this big wave of nothingness would crash in. So I’d start rapping again. Try for sleep and fail.
Sebastian and his friend were still there, seated at a great distance from me it seemed, in the small room, with its window open onto the London night. They made tea and gave me the other two Mandrax. My eyelids fell, yet my mind would not let go of consciousness. It seemed as if I would be forever lodged in a rigid wakefulness. This scared me. Then somewhere near dawn I woke and saw the two men asleep on the floor beside me.
I walked to the window. I put my hands on the sill. I was amazed to see the world still out there. One of the wild cats that lived in a bomb site down the road headed up the middle of the street. It was huge. It sat, looked back and wondered.
Chapter 17
In the shaky balcony of the high crossbeamed Town Hall I joined all the sinning couples at the Sunday matinees as they looked down in ecstasy on Roy Rodgers.
Every so often Packie Cullen would send a beam of torchlight over faces from which childhood was fast fading, or had already gone. Being adult meant groping in the dark. The females were restless and soft as the men on the balcony held in their gasps, and let go, afterwards, with a sigh. From the back row came the moist slap of a kiss. As Orna Galligan loosened her hair and leaned back on Kit Finnegan’s arm her white knee dug into the back of my seat. Des Hickey threw his coat over Ursula Smith’s lap and turned round with a stern eye.
What are you looking at? he barked.
Nothing, I said.
You better not be.
He brushed back his quiff with his fingertips. I stared resolutely over his head at the screen. He settled his ear against Ursula’s ear and continued to watch me. They listened gravely to each other’s thoughts. He whispered something. Now she glanced back. Never mind him, she said. They turned away. The projector ticked on. Big unaccompanied lads blew sparks off the lit end of their fags and sucked in heavily. The old cowboy Walter Brennan sang. The air went dry and expectant.
Then a paper bag exploded.
Hit her again, said someone, she’s no relation.
A posse of big girls in white blouses tramped down the stairs to the toilet laughing. Gerry Brady stood before the screen below and clapped. The arm of a seat broke. A bra snapped in the dark. A button shot open. The milky smell of semen spread like cuckoo spit.
*
One Sunday we were there as usual. On came the Three Stooges. Next the ads for McCarren’s, for Provider’s, for Fegan’s. Then began a black-and-white documentary set in Africa. When we saw it wasn’t a film a derisory cheer went up. We thought it might be something to do with the missions. The documentary was narrated by a faraway BBC voice. We tramped through jungles and heard exotic birds scream.
Then onto the screen came a village filled with black people in their skin. There was a great deal of guttural sounds, laughter and shy asides. Campfires were burning. In the background, a tom-tom. The camera homed in on breasts, groins and huge swinging penises. The Town Hall went silent.
No one touched a sweet bag. Couples left each other alone.
We were shown a child being delivered. We were shown suckling. Then we watched fascinated as an erection occurred. The voice told us something we couldn’t hear. A woman, richly bearded between the thighs, approached the excited male in a wild headdress. Painted arrows pointed to her nipples. She touched the young man fondly on the cheek and made soft sounds in her throat. The other villagers began an eerie chant and lobbed their mickeys and breasts to and fro. He stood with his hands flat down by his side and his dark member aloft. There wasn’t a sound.
What’s going on? we heard Packie Cullen shouting.
I don’t know, said Mr McKiernan.
This, said the voice, is an ancient ritual of fertility.
Good God, said Packie.
We held our breath as she ran flowers down the man’s chest. As she did so she never took her eyes off his. The walls of the Town Hall seemed to strain imperceptibly. She brushed his stomach with the petals. We heard Packie running upstairs towards the projection room. Bang! Bang! Bang! She slapped the young man’s buttocks.
Take that off, said Packie.
What?!
I said take it off!
The film stopped, the screen went white and there was silence. No one battered the floor. The lights came up.
There’s been a mistake, said the ticket seller.
No one moved.
Your entrance fee will be returned at the door, shouted Packie.
The tired, dark-eyed projectio
n man stood in the door of the balcony scratching his scalp. We filed past him and formed a bewildered queue. As we collected our money, Packie, scandalized by what had happened, never rose his head from the wooden box. We walked up Town Hall Street like a crowd returning from an apparition.
Did you see what I saw? asked Tony Gilhooley.
I did, I said.
By Monday the story had gone round the town. Those who had been there told all that happened to those who had not. And we exaggerated all we’d seen. As I am doing here, and not for the first time.
*
We broke into the golf links and stole beer. Climbed over into Colm Smith’s stores and stole cider.
It annoys me to remember those days. I would rather attribute them to some fictional character who would later be given some understated moral retribution. But those acts, follies, thieving, are me.
But what awfulness do we leave out as memory defends its terrain? What images are locked away that only imagination can release? Beyond those wild sexual arousals are other plainer moments, disguised as clichés, hiding from the language of elation. They are the mundane everyday that memory does not espouse.
*
There was something wrong with the stew in the Breifne. It was served on Tuesdays. I remember well the heartburn from the Irish stew. Nights I’d lie in bed with a thread of bile from my mouth reaching down to a basin by the bed. Wet dreams, instead of sending spasms of delight through my groin, shot pellets of pain instead. In those dreams I was trying to ward off my wrongdoings while in my waking hours I was given over totally to licentiousness. The guilt was rearing its head in my subconsciousness. I’d put a hand up a dress in my sleep and find there a male organ much like my own. I sought in vain for the womanly fold, the honeyed lips, the promised soft place.
Instead I had to take this penis into my hand. There would be revulsion and terror and excitement. I’d spring awake, wet and in pain. The woman I’d been abusing was myself.
*
The boys were pulling their wire guiltily on the Fair Green, and comparing sizes in the haunted house by the nun’s lake. In the slatted attic we stood with our penises out while Derek Flynn showed us how it was done. Even the scholarship boys in the Brothers merrily masturbated twice daily in their desks in full view of the class while Brother Cyril went through Irish grammar.
Hormones raced through the town.
Sixth class at the Brothers smelt of chalk and sperm. Trousers were covered in come. Derek Flynn who had a long cock bent over and took the head of his mickey out through a hole in the back of his trousers. Bill Crosby threw a coat over Eamon McCabe’s knees at the pictures. We could see the coat jigging. A loud gasp of breath sounded behind a toilet door. You wanker, someone shouted. Fuck off, came the reply. Then Brian Leddy found a copy of Lady Chatterley’s Lover in his mother’s bedroom. We went out to Loreto woods with it. In the front desk Dennis Farrely’s head went down with a sigh. When you stepped into Brother Felim’s class with the roll-call book he brought you in behind his desk and felt your mickey as you called out the names.
Felim Coffey, you said.
Anseo, said Felim. Here.
Bimbo Flynn, you said.
Anseo, said Bimbo.
He undid a button, then another and curled a finger round your member. The Brother slipped your damp foreskin to and fro. That is if you had one. Once the lad from the Bridge peed onto his hand. He pulled you in close to him so that you stood between his legs. He smelt of porridge and cold tea. His blue stubble powdered. You could feel through his dress the hump of his erection against your thigh.
Patsy Lee.
Anseo.
Misey Crow.
Anseo.
You looked down at the book and out at the faces while his hand hurried and his breath grew flustered.
Dickey Smith.
Anseo.
He suddenly let you go like a bad thing. Did your buttons up. He signed the roll-book then crossed over to the window and looked out at the town with his hands stuck in his skirt. Down there too sex was raging.
Is it standing? asked the local house painter.
If it’s standing let’s go into the side room of the Town Hall and I’ll do something for you.
*
Charlie McGriskin banged the organ at Benediction, the sacrament was exposed, the choir sang Salutaris in the organ loft. Incense streamed skyward. We came down from the organ loft like we’d come down from the gallery in the Town Hall and glided out into the frosty night. The aura of the light behind us spilled onto the grass. The sacristan stepped out of the shadows on the avenue below the cathedral.
I’ll give you sixpence if you put your hand in here, he’d say.
Us choir boys would gather round. He’d strain the erection in his trousers in our direction.
Take a hold of that, he’d say.
We’d pretend not to be interested, but still and all we were fascinated. The bulge in his trousers was huge. He undid a button. The white head of his penis popped out. He slipped back the wet foreskin.
Have any of you lads got one like that?
He flicked the slippery skin to and fro. His touch for a rough man was somehow graceful.
Put your hand on it, he said.
Some adult appeared on the steps of the church. The sacristan disappeared off into the grounds. The lights in the cathedral went off. March snow was flying across the streets.
*
The cathedral on confession morning smelt of urine, moist knickers and damp trousers. The air was filled with misgivings. The marble walls ran with condensation. Candles rustled like moths. You waited your turn among pungent farts and beating hearts. We moved along the pew fearfully. Then my turn came.
I told my sins and waited.
He leaned towards me so I could see his face and purple scarf and knitted waistcoat. His breath smelt of meringue and maybe cloves.
Dermot, he said.
Yes, Father.
So who was this girl you touched? he asked smiling.
What? I said, astonished.
Who was this girl? he repeated.
I told you, Father.
But I’d like to know her name.
I can’t tell you that, Father.
Why not?
It’s not right.
Come on, young Healy.
But you won’t tell anyone?
No.
Mary, I said eventually.
Mary who?
Mary Smith.
Mary Smith of Farnham?
Yes.
Isn’t she a bit old for you?
Yes, Father.
And did she touch you?
No.
She didn’t? His eyes widened.
A little.
A little. What does that mean?
She might have brushed up against me.
I see. She brushed up against you.
Yes, Father.
And she didn’t touch you?
No.
Not even once?
No, Father.
So you touched yourself.
Yes, Father.
Of course you did. There and then?
No, Father. Afterwards.
How many times?
Twice.
I see. Mary Smith, he said.
Yes.
And are you going to see her again?
No, Father.
No?
No, Father. I don’t think so.
And is there anyone else?
No.
Not yet, you mean.
No, Father.
And that’s it?
Yes, Father.
Say an Our Father and three Hail Marys. And Dermot?
Yes.
You wouldn’t be telling me lies?
No, Father.
About Mary Smith?
No, Father.
So if I mention it to her she’ll know what I’m talking about?
I don’t think you should do that, Father, I said, frightened.
>
Why?
She might not like to think I told you.
That she brushed up against you.
Yes, Father.
All right then. Are you sorry?
Yes, Father.
Will you do it again?
No, Father.
Ha-ha, he said, disbelieving me.
He blessed me nevertheless and when I stepped outside the confessional everyone looked at me because I’d been in for so long. I buried my face in my hands, knelt once and scattered holy water on my forehead. Then with a giddy heart I stood on the steps of the cathedral ready to start all over from scratch again.
Chapter 18
The steps to Cavan Cathedral rise to a great height. My father, with his asthma turning to emphysema, found it a difficult climb. On Mass days we left home before anyone else. My job was to proffer a shoulder for him to lean on. Every few steps we stopped so that he could catch his breath.
We stopped at the Farnham Hotel. We stopped at the top of Ashe Street. We stopped outside the Protestant hall where in autumn chestnuts rain down. We stopped at the foot of the cathedral outside the old presbytery, beneath which closed-up underground tunnels converged. He’d look ahead towards the final climb. We’d take a few steps at a time, halt, take cognizance, then go on. His breath whistled overhead. When at last we stood amongst the pillars he’d lean a minute on me and survey the town.
The glands in the left side of his neck had swollen. One was the size of a billiard ball, and sometimes it burst and a trickle of blood would run down his neck onto his crisp shirt. Today it ran. He dabbed the sore throughout Mass, and stared unblinking at the altar. Wind blew up the central aisle. It announced a latecomer. The huge doors bounced closed. Mrs Reilly, who lived nearest the cathedral, was always the last to arrive. Everyone watched her head up the left aisle, slowly, oblivious to the eyes on her; a bag propped on her right arm, a huge missal with a red tag in her left hand, she advanced in a green woollen beret festooned with an array of colourful hatpins.
Bend for Home, The Page 10
