Ken Bruen - The Guards

I ordered that. She said,

“Gravy, love?”

“Please.”

Dessert was stewed apple and custard. Lashings of it. I took that too. What the hell. I wasn’t intending to eat anyway. Bill said,

“Grab a spot near the window. I’ll bring tea.” I did.

The people at the table were chowing down. Eating as if their lives depended on it. Maybe they did.

Bill sat, immediately dug into the food. Ate like a horse. Mid-chew, he looked up, asked,

“You’re not eating?”

“No.”

“They take notice... better play the game.”

Pieces of cabbage had lodged in his front teeth. I couldn’t tear my eyes from them. I moved my fork listlessly through my own heap. Bill said,

“Slide it down the table, let the monkeys help.”

I did. The contents were demolished in seconds flat, the empty plate slid back. Bill said,

“I’ll have your dessert, I’m a sucker for sweet things.”

Finally finished, he sat back, loosened the top button of his pants and belched. Pulled out a pack of cigarettes, asked,

“Smoke?”

“No... thanks.”

He fired up, blew a cloud of smoke, said,

“Stick around, you will.”

“Doubt it.”

Then I noticed everybody — and I mean everybody — was smoking. Even the biddy behind the food counter was having a puff. He caught my look, said,

“A man having a share of the market would be set for life.”

I wasn’t sure where to go with that so I said,

“It’s a thought.”

Even as I felt, it was a shitty thought. Bill asked,

“You’re alky?”

“Come again?”

“An alcoholic, that’s why you’re here... right?”

Decided it was as good a time as any other to wax American, said,

“I guess.”

“I knew it. Can always spot the boozers. We have our own antennae. So, you doing the Unit?”

“The what?”

“Alcoholic Unit — the one here is the best in the country. I’ve done it many times.”

“No offence, Bill, but if it’s so hot, how come you’re here... again?”

“I tell you, Jack, I love to drink. When I go on a tear, I give them a ring, tell them to hold a bed. Two, shit... three times a year, I’m in.”

“Christ!”

“Don’t knock it till you’ve tried it. You’re out there causing mayhem, it’s a comfort to know you have a haven.”

A shudder passed through me. He looked at me. I said,

“Withdrawal.”

“Get another blast of the Librium, fix you right up.”

A man was passing, lurched into me, straightened, then weaved from side to side to the door. Bill grinned, said,

“That’s the Ballinasloe special.”

“What is?”

“Yer man, watch... see him sway... as if he was pissed. It’s the Largactil shuffle. Swoon to your own drummer, in orbit all the day long. Jesus, I love this place.”

I was getting a little bit tired of Bill. All that midlands bonhomie is very wearing. He said,

“Any questions?”

“Um...”

“I’m yer man. There’s nothing happens I don’t know about... or a way around.”

And, to my absolute horror, he fucking winked. If I live to be a hundred, doubtful though that be, I’ll never forget it. Stands as one of those moments of pure unadulterated awfulness. Fighting to keep my face in neutral, I said,

“There is one thing.”

“Whatever, I live to serve.”

“Where’s the library?”

He appeared profoundly shocked, took a minute then said,

“You’re kidding me.”

“Listen, Bert...” “It’s Bill!”

“Whatever. I realise you’ve known me all of ten minutes, but ask yourself, in all seriousness... do I look like a kidder?”

“No.”

“So... the library?”

He was confused, wanted to hit back, said,

“You sure don’t look like a reader.”

My turn to laugh. If you don’t laugh at least once in the asylum, time to up the medicine. I asked,

“What does a reader look like?”

“Jesus, I don’t know, a serious bastard... a...”

“Bill... yo, Bill, take this on trust... I’m one serious guy.”

He wasn’t throwing in the towel yet. No wonder them midland crowd make good farmers. He rushed,

“But you’re a boozer, you admitted it. When do you get time to read?”

“Between bouts. When I’m laid up, I read.”

“I never heard the banging of that. Between skites I’m in bed... dying.”

“I’ve always been a reader; no matter what else I lost, I hung on to that.”

He lit another cigarette, grunted,

“They don’t like you reading.”

“Gee, that’s going to weigh on my conscience. So, Bill, where is it?”

“On the first floor. You won’t be able to go, it’s OT after dinner.”

“O what?”

“Occupational therapy, making baskets.”

It had finally come to pass. I stood on the precipice of being a basket case. The nurses began to wheel round the medication trolley. Got my jolt of Librium and said to Bill,

“Catch you later.”

“But it’s OT!”

A whinge had crept into his voice. I stood up, said,

“Books are my therapy.”

I heard Bill mutter,

“Divil a queerer sort of alky I ever met.”

There’s always been books. All my bedraggled life, they’ve been the only constant. Even Sutton, my closest friend, had exclaimed,

“What’s with the fucking reading, man? You used to be a guard, for christsakes.”

Which is Irish logic at its finest.

I’d said to him then and umpteen times since,

“Reading transports me.”

He said with his characteristic candour,

“Shite talk.”

As I’ve said, my father worked on the railways. He loved cowboy books. There was always a battered Zane Grey in his jacket. He began to pass them on to me. My mother would say,

“You’ll make a sissy out of him.”

When she wasn’t within earshot, he’d whisper,

“Don’t mind your mother. She means well But you keep reading.

“Why, Dad?”

Not that I was going to stop, I was already hooked.

“They’ll give you options.”

“What’s options?”

A faraway look would come into his eyes and then,

“Freedom, son.”

For my tenth birthday, he gave me a library card. My mother gave me a hurley. She was frequently to use the same stick to wallop the bejaysus outa me. I did play hurling. How else could I have qualified for the Garda Síochána? No one appreciates a good hurler more.

The library card was “ticket to ride”. In those days the library was located in the Court House. Books above, courts below. Each time I went, I gazed at the gardaí in awe. Then upstairs to gaze at the books in wonder. The two threads of my life had been interwoven.

One literally led to the other. I have been unable to shed the influence of both no matter what the circumstances of my life have been.

I began with Robert Louis Stevenson, Richmal Crompton, the Hardy Boys. No doubt I’d have continued in a haphazard fashion, eventually losing interest, if not for head librarian at the time, Tommy Kennedy A tall thin man with an air of other-worldliness. My first few visits, he’d glance at my selection, go “mmm...” and stamp them.

One particularly wet dark Tuesday, he’d approached me, said, “I think it’s time we organised your reading.”

“Why?”

“Do you want to get bored?”

“No.”

Started me out with Dickens. Gradually eased me into the classics without any fanfare. Always, he kept it at low key, let me believe it was my choice.

Later, when teenage tornadoes played havoc with everything, he introduced crime fiction. Kept me reading.

He also put books aside, then later I’d get a parcel containing