‘I’m sorry.’
He was.
John Paul walked over to his bed.
‘John Paul …’
‘Fuck off, you little faggot.’
The word was an iron to Damien’s face.
‘What …’
‘You heard me: I said, fuck off, you little faggot.’
John Paul got into bed, though it hadn’t even gone nine. Damien didn’t dare move. Even the thought of running into the bathroom and curling up in the bathtub for ever was impossible; to breathe was to do something wrong. He stayed still so, while John Paul pretended to sleep and Granny Doyle clattered about downstairs and Rosie came home. Rosie saw her room and rushed into his and looked at Damien in the dark; then, she knew. Rosie wouldn’t look at him again, not really, not in the same way; this, he understood.
Damien sat on his bed, alone. None of the triplets would get any sleep that night, but there was no elastic band pulling them onto the one bed. Damien searched for God’s channel, but all he heard was static, as if God were a pirate radio station and Damien had missed the latest secret frequency. Instead, Damien listened to the sound of Rosie through the walls, crying into her pillow, and the shift of John Paul’s sheets in the bed across the room, not even a snore to be sent in Damien’s direction now.
4
Soundings (1993)
Happily, God was waiting for Damien in the pages of Peg’s poetry book, rescued from a St Vincent de Paul bag by a scared boy in search of an older sister. He hadn’t found Peg in the pages, even though he squinted at all her markings and marginalia, but there was God, waiting in the poems of Gerard Manley Hopkins, not caring if Damien couldn’t understand most of the words, the feeling was what mattered, and God swooped off the pages of ‘The Windhover’ and fluttered towards Damien, whose heart in hiding/stirred.
‘The language is quite … excited … for a poem about God,’ Rory said, peering at the book.
Years until they’d be studying for their Leaving, but Damien offered Soundings as treasure to Rory, proof that school might get more interesting than ‘Colonel Fazackerley Butterworth-Toast’, the poem they were supposed to be studying (Peg too had started Soundings too early, a precedent that Damien was unsure about).
‘I guess the idea is that the bird represents God,’ Rory said.
‘Uh-huh,’ Damien said.
Rory’s mind continued to speed ahead, a bicycle zipping through cars and running red lights, while Damien’s chugged along behind, stuck in traffic.
‘But there’s something terrible about the bird,’ Rory said, peering at ‘The Windhover’ for hidden clues. ‘Brute beauty … pride and plume … but then God is even more terrible – and beautiful! – and he describes God like a fire, more dangerous but also lovelier.’
Absorbed in the book, Rory probably didn’t notice that his knee had got too close to Damien’s.
‘It’s weirdly like a romantic relationship, I guess.’
Damien felt a tilt of his heart.
‘Uh-huh,’ Damien managed.
5
The Symposium (1994)
The Symposium! Peg had written beside one of the poems in Soundings, followed by true love!? It was from a Yeats poem, ‘Among School Children’, where he went on about his long-lost love for Maud Gonne, remembering the pair of them as schoolchildren, two souls finding each other, into the yolk and white of the one shell.
Damien was curious enough to search through Peg’s old books in the shed for The Symposium. It was quite the surprise to find a story from thousands of years ago where, among the two-legged creatures in search of their other half to make them whole, were men in search of men and women in search of women, no way for their bodies or souls to slot in easily with anybody of the opposite sex.
Oh, the Greeks! Rory said, when Damien told him, the noun loaded with knowledge, though as far as Damien knew, Rory hadn’t been to Athlone, let alone Athens.
6
The Colour of My Love Compact Disc (1995)
Damien couldn’t contradict Rory’s assertion that Celine Dion was a poet. Rory’s tone might have been arch and his enthusiastic crooning ironic; even so, Damien felt a swoon of his soul as Rory O’Donoghue, with twinkling eyes and soprano voice, declaimed his full-hearted readiness to learn ‘The Power of Love’.
7
Legion of Mary Handbook (1996)
I’ve been writing a poem, Rory said, when the two of them were sharing a hotel room in Knock for a Legion of Mary trip. They’d drunk a bottle of wine between them, pledge and Mrs McGinty be damned: dangerous territory. Damien had thought they would top and tail in the one bed, but then Rory clambered in beside him in his tartan boxers.
You’ll approve; it’s about God.
Damien did not search for Rory’s eyes. Rule one of his alternative handbook: do not look into Rory’s eyes under the influence of alcohol, even in the dark. Especially in the dark.
Well, Jesus.
Rule two: stay silent. Do not provide any encouraging words or sounds.
And his disciples.
Rule three: ignore the movement of the body.
Did you ever think it was weird that they were just men?
Rule four: especially ignore the bristle of hairs as Rory’s ankle touched against his or the fact that his pyjamas were too short to stop skin meeting skin.
I thought it would be cool to imagine their relationship.
Rule five: regulate breath.
You know?
Rule six: ignore the slight movement of Rory’s leg.
Jesus, travelling with those young fishermen …
Rule seven: clench eyes; sleep will come faster.
But there it was, as vivid as ever across Damien’s retina: the glowing buttocks of Ruadhan Kennedy-Carthy, white globes squeezing into blue jeans.
Rule eight: tune into God. Tune into Mary’s frequency. Any of the saints, anything.
Damien, are you awake?
Rule nine: sleep, sleep, you are asleep!
Damien?
Rule ten: In the morning light, it is acceptable to look at the sleeping face of Rory O’Donoghue. If legs have draped over legs while sleeping, if a wrist has dozed across a chest, best not to disturb, best to admire, for doesn’t every beauty lead us to the beauty of Our Lord?
8
Purple Marker (1997)
The graffiti artists in the school bathroom seemed to favour prose over poetry: ‘Cocksuckers’ was followed by ‘Rory O’Donoghue’ and ‘Damien Doyle’, with telephone numbers helpfully supplied.
John Paul was furious, making it clear who was to blame with a good thump directed towards Rory O’Donoghue’s face. He couldn’t hit Damien, so he shoved the school desk in front of him instead.
‘You haven’t an ounce of fucking cop-on, do you?’ John Paul said, still mad, for it was his phone number too and Granny Doyle might answer some messer’s call and Damien hadn’t even thanked him.
Damien gripped his desk, shaking.
‘You …’
‘I told the fucker to leave my brother alone, that’s all. And if you know what’s good for you, you’ll stay left alone. Only trying to help you, I am, fuck knows why, not as if you ever say thanks.’
No ‘thanks’ forthcoming, John Paul swiped Damien’s English homework and started to copy it, while Damien shook, searching for words to make things right: I didn’t ask you to or how could you?
Words remained stuck inside him, however, even as Rory entered the classroom, the wrong walk about him, defiant instead of defeated. Rory was terrible at being invisible, that vital skill for getting through secondary school; Rory talked too much in class and dropped his crisp packet into the bin too daintily and seemed to prance rather than walk, all details that he might have reined in, if he had any consideration for Damien. Damien might tell him, one day. For the moment, he focused on Jason Donnelly’s arse as Jason leant forward to chat to somebody, the inviting stretch of grey flannel a treat for Damien’s eyes. Easier for Damien t
o stare at Jason Donnelly’s arse than to turn towards Rory, who was looking in his direction, an ugly bruise under his eye and a tender smile that was waiting for a reflection, Damien! and talk to me at the ready.
John Paul was looking at Damien too – it felt as if the whole room was – and Damien knew that he was passing a test, staring fixedly ahead even as Rory whispered his name. The teacher entered, mercifully, and Rory at least had the sense to say ‘nothing’ when quizzed about what had happened to his eye. This, Damien interpreted as a move towards the right attitude but then Rory had to ruin this progress by bringing a purple marker to school the next day, ‘So what?’ written in bold beside ‘Cocksuckers’.
From this point, it became impossible to acknowledge Rory O’Donoghue; surely he understood that? Damien avoided Rory’s gaze but he followed the battles that took place across toilet doors. Rory hadn’t a clue how to respond. Instead of ignoring the cartoon-cock beside his name, Rory added ‘Bit bigger next time please’ in purple marker. ‘Faggot’ was crossed out, replaced in purple with ‘Fabulous’. ‘Like I’d touch any of you mingers’ was added beside his phone number; no wonder he earned himself a proper beating, purple pen flushed down the toilet, the bruises on his face traitorously turning an unflattering shade of turmeric.
Incredibly, Rory refused to learn this lesson, unveiling part of some Walt Whitman poem in purple the next week, for he’d moved beyond the confines of Soundings, didn’t attempt to catch Damien’s gaze any more, fuck-it-all fearlessness powering him through the yard, ‘All this I swallow’ and ‘It tastes good’ and ‘I like it well’ proud and loud on the toilet door.
Damien was left sitting on the bog and puzzling at the strange words, which, even behind a swarm of cartoon penises and scrawls of ‘faggot’, seemed somehow to shine.
9
Soundings (1998)
Damien stared at Peg’s old book. The poems made more sense, now that he was studying them, the teacher plodding the class through each metaphor and reference. Yet, Damien had lost the joy of them; back when he was thirteen and thrilled at Gerard Manley Hopkins, God had skittered off the page like a bird, O my chevalier! Now, Damien read the same words – even understood that chevalier was a reference to Christ – but his heart felt no ping of solidarity. Instead, he was stuck with Comforter, where, where is your comforting? and Mary, mother of us, where is your relief?, from the later poems of Gerard Manley Hopkins, when he had lost the certainty of his faith, his voice reaching across centuries to sound Damien’s despair with precision.
(There was no consolation in poetry, generally; when Damien flipped to the Yeats poem which had led him towards The Symposium, he saw that Peg had written satirical? in the margins, underneath true love!?, coming back later with a different pen to underline the question, twice.)
‘I think he’s making himself sick,’ Rory said, talking about some Gerard Manley Hopkins poem that Damien didn’t want to think about.
Rory still hadn’t learnt not to talk too much in class, though now that they had reached sixth year nobody seemed to mind as much; Jason Donnelly even took notes, sometimes. Rory went out in town now, so Damien heard, with a gang of friends from Loreto,‘bitch’ and ‘babe’ the salt and pepper of his sentences. John Paul wasn’t there to beat him up; he’d been expelled after the controversy about the tablets, which, perhaps, was Damien’s fault. Damien wasn’t sure if he should feel guilty about what had happened to John Paul; he would normally have asked God or Rory, but neither was talking to him.
Instead, Rory was talking to the class, as if he’d already made it into Trinity’s English department.
‘He’s trying to experience God through Communion, I guess, but he only tastes himself – my taste was me – but he can’t reach God, just some sour selfyeast.’
Damien stared at the book that Peg had never got to use for her Leaving; she’d worked out the Communion imagery too, markings that Damien had glossed over all those years ago. Rory sat straight in his chair, on the precipice of a new thought.
‘I think he’s figured something out, sir. It’s as if he’s realized that God is just a projection; he’s trying to reach God again, but he’s stuck with himself, because that’s all God ever was, a voice in his mind.’
Damien could never be sure if Rory’s head turned slightly or not.
‘I feel sorry for him, sir.’
10
Nail Polish (2007)
Damien stepped inside. The holy water font was inside the door, mocking him. There wasn’t even the sound of the television. Granny Doyle was asleep upstairs. He should leave, Damien felt that immediately, though some instinct led him to the kettle in the kitchen. He’d leave her a note, he decided, no shock that the spare biros were still in the same drawer. The only thing that had changed was the dirt; Granny Doyle wouldn’t have stood for grime on her tiles, back in the day. Damien resisted the urge to pick up the forlorn J-cloth from the sink; the stains would need more than water and he was sure that the cleaning products would not be environmentally friendly. He’d focus on the tea. A quick cup, and he’d be off. The mugs were brown on the inside, more stain than mug, but he left them be. Once you started, the day would be gone: there were mouse droppings in the drawer with the biros and the oven was crying out for a scrub and somebody should cut the grass before they got too deep into the summer. Somebody. Damien Doyle had an election to win. Besides, with what he had to say, chances were he wouldn’t be back.
One cuppa; he owed her that. Damien got out a saucer for biscuits, sighing as he opened the tin to find a packet of Bourbon Creams. Next time – if there was a next time – he’d stop by Marks & Spencer in town and get some expensive biscuits, chocolate and orange ginger nuts or some things with designs latticed across in white chocolate. Mark was right: he could do better. Perhaps they could visit together. Mark had the knack of chat, he was a brilliant canvasser, talking the ear off anybody, always finding a way to get them to agree that yes, the country needed a change, they’d give the Greens a think after all. Damien smiled at the thought of Mark knocking his way down Dunluce Crescent, agreeing with Mrs Fay that her flowers were lovely and shooting the shit with Mr Geoghan and charming Granny Doyle – Mark could manage that, surely. Damien poured the tea, losing himself in a fantasy where Mark cut the grass while Damien found a delightful apron and baked scones and Granny Doyle glowed with gratitude—
‘What are you at?’
Damien nearly spilled the milk with the fright.
‘Why are you the one leaping up? Aren’t you the one who’s let yourself into my kitchen?’
The real Granny Doyle was far from glowing. More wrinkles than he remembered. Red eyes, from tears or tiredness, he couldn’t tell.
‘Sorry, I rang the bell …’
‘That thing’s buzzing all day, as if I didn’t have anything better to be doing than talking about the election.’
Damien bit his lip quite hard.
‘Sorry, I should have called.’
‘Well, I might have had something in the oven for you then.’
‘It’s grand, I ate before I came.’
‘Oh!’
‘I didn’t want to trouble you.’
But Granny Doyle was determined to find trouble.
‘I’d never turn my nose up at a meal – that was how I was reared, but oh, well, isn’t everything takeway nowadays? And is that tea you’re attempting to make there? Lord preserve us, I’ve seen less milk come out of a cow’s udder! Would you ever throw that sickly concoction away and make a proper pot?’
She was tired after her nap, Damien reasoned, pressing the teabag against the mug quite vigorously.
‘Winning Streak will be on in a minute.’
How could he forget?
‘Right. I’ll bring in a pot.’
‘Grand, so.’
And with that she was shuffling off into the sitting room. Damien clicked on the kettle and found some steel teapot that had generations of tea clinging to its spout. The jingle o
f ads sounded from the next room. Nothing that she couldn’t have skipped, if she’d wanted to spend a couple of minutes chatting with him. She had not noticed the peach nail polish. He shouldn’t have come; Mark was mad.
‘There’s biscuits in the tin if you want,’ Granny Doyle called from the sitting room.
‘Thanks,’ Damien called in.
He’d deposit the tea and the biscuits and leg it out the door before Winning Streak started. Or, he’d get it over and done with. Like ripping a plaster.
The thing is, Gran, I’m gay!
No, he needed some smooth conversational transition, difficult when the chat was as dry as Bourbon Creams. Maybe Coronation Street would be on afterwards?
The thing is, Gran, I’m like Sarah-Louise’s boyfriend. The one who went out with a nurse. Yes, the male nurse.
That might do the trick, at a pinch.
The thing is, Gran, I used to watch Coronation Street!
Not to mention that he borrowed Rosie’s Smash Hits to keep the Take That covers or used to plait the hair of Peg’s Barbies; when he assembled the evidence, it seemed to Damien that he should never have needed to come out to anybody, least of all himself.
‘You’re missing the start!’ Granny Doyle called.
That was how visits went: Granny Doyle refused to budge from her routine and imagined that nobody else would dream of missing a minute of her scheduled thrills.
‘Coming!’ Damien called.
He found a tray for the pot and the biscuits. Some steel jug so the battleaxe could pour her own milk. He hesitated at the door, wondering if there were any hope of whiskey in the house.
‘Are you coming in or out?’
She had bat ears as well as X-ray vision: it was the only explanation.
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