John Brady - The going rate

“You’re going to pass out,” he heard Cully say from a long way away.

He did not want to look again at the strange wetness around the man’s head. It gave off a dull gleam that was different from the rain.

“I’ve got to go home,” he said.

Said it? Or thought it?

He was aware of moving, of awkward steps, and the sound of soles scuffing and scraping under him.

“Come back,” he heard Cully shout. “Don’t be stupid, get back here! I’ll drive you.”

No: he was jogging now, and it was effortless and smooth. He heard Cully shouting again, and the sound of tires and revving.

But how fast he could run, and how easily. He turned onto the quays. Traffic, sounds, and even a few people. He stopped and looked back for headlights coming around after him. Everything was still amplified, sharp, engrossing. A flurry of footsteps erupted nearby, and he pressed into a doorway. The racket was two girls half-running and half-staggering, their heels dragging and clattering on the roadway, their boyfriends pulling on their arms, coaxing them on.

The normality of it flooded him with relief.

He waited a few moments, and then made his way toward the lights and crowds of the city centre.

For a moment, Fanning didn’t know if he was still in the dream. It was he himself who had shouted.

“God almighty!”

That was Brid’s voice.

“What was that? Was it you, Dermot?”

He couldn’t straighten up. He was stiff everywhere. He heard Brid’s slippers sliding on the floor.

“Jesus,” she whispered. “That was you yelling?”

“Sorry.”

His arm was asleep. The chair back had dug into his shoulder and lodged there.

“What are you doing out here?”

“I must have fallen asleep. I got home late — don’t. No, no light. Please.”

She stood in front of him, waiting. He began to rub at his face.

“You’re in a fierce state. Did you go overboard on the drink?”

The reproach and suspicion in her voice didn’t bother him now.

“I’m just exhausted. I got home, sat down for a think, and…”

“Well there’s a can of something there by the side of your chair.”

He raised his back slowly from the chair.

“Beer,” he said. “Right. I didn’t even get to it then.”

“And your phone,” she said, stooping. She picked it up with two fingers and held it out. “It’s soaked.”

“It’ll be okay in the morning.”

He knew she was holding back questions. The pins and needles were like fire down his arm.

“There’s a smell of something. Petrol. Do you smell it?”

“Right, yes. Well, I helped a fella push his car off the road there. Broken down.”

Her tone changed again.

“You got soaked, I bet.”

He shook his head. He was pretty certain now that the knot in his shoulders would morph into a headache.

“Dermot. Dermot?”

“I’m here.”

“Are you okay?”

“I’m half asleep. That’s all.”

“But is everything okay? That’s what I mean.”

“Everything’s okay,” he said. “Yes.”

“Whyn’t you come to bed when you got home?”

“Ah, you know.”

“Do I? I thought I was getting the come-hither earlier on.”

“I know you need your sleep,” he tried. “I didn’t want to wake you. Was Aisling wandering around in the night?”

“No. Not yet. If she slept through that, she’ll stay asleep. Jesus, Dermot. I only heard you like that once, remember after the accident?”

“Sorry,” he said.

She took a step toward the chest of drawers and leaned against it. He could still feel her battle between annoyance and worry.

“Did anyone phone?” he asked.

“What, in the middle of the night, you mean?”

“After I left.”

“Who were you expecting?”

“No-one, actually.”

“Colm Breen, maybe?”

“Not funny, Brid. Not this hour of the night.”

“Or that Guard you were supposed to talk to?”

He started in the chair.

“What Guard?”

She folded her arms.

“Oh whatever his name is. How would I remember? You said you were going to get a meeting with him. The research thing. Oh, what’s his name! Molloy? No — Malone. You pointed out his name in the paper last month. Him.”

He sat back slowly.

“That never panned out,” he said. “No.”

He straightened his back, and then arched it as far as it would go, and sat forward in the chair.

“Jesus, Dermot! Your trousers! What happened?”

“I know.”

“They’re wrecked, so they are! And the dirt? My God.”

The light hurt his eyes.

“That’s not just muck and dirt, Dermot. Tell me what happened?”

His throat felt blocked. A sharp pain ran down the middle of his chest.

“Stupid stuff,” he managed to say. “I was out in some fields. Barbed wire. Dark of course, and didn’t see it. Stupid. Embarrassing.”

She knelt by his leg.

“Don’t mind embarrassing,” she said, her voice now thick with concern. “Think tetanus.”

“It’s not that bad.”

“Well what the hell were you doing out in some field in the middle of the night, and it pouring rain, do you mind me asking?”

“You don’t have to believe me,” he said. “It’s okay.”

“Oh don’t try that on me,” she said. “Let me see it, you have a cut there.”

He drew back in the chair.

“I’ll take care of it,” he said evenly. “It’s okay. Thanks.”

She looked up sharply.

“How could it be okay? It’s more than a scrape. What on earth were you at?”

“Nothing, Brid. Nothing.”

Her expression was all too familiar to him now, coming from a place between exasperation and fright.

“If I wasn’t so knackered coming home, I’d have changed, and you wouldn’t be giving me the third degree. I didn’t plan to fall asleep, did I?”

“Can’t you accept that I am worried? What’s so hard about that?”

He was almost glad that his anger had made him alert now.

“Brid. For the love of… Give over a minute, will you? We’re adults, okay?”

“What does that mean? Or should I ask?”

“It means you know the score. I know the score. When did you start to be my mother, or something?”

“Christ, that’s rich. Your mother?”

“Remember? Remember what we were?”

“You’re still drunk. Or something.”

He grasped her forearm, and began to massage it.

“Remember what we said, what we swore to one another? How we wouldn’t end up like, well, my parents? The whole married thing? We’ll live the way we want, not in some prison full of cliches and stupid habits and all that?”

“Dermot. Listen. This is basic.”

“That’s what I’m saying! We don’t give up who we are. We do our thing- you do yours, I do mine. We don’t, you know, do surveillance on one another.”

“This is beginning to sound like ‘open marriage’ stuff, and you know what I think about that. I’m half-expecting to hear ‘bourgeois’ next. Or ‘repressive’ or the like.”

“Really,” he said, and he felt his mood lurch abruptly. Something stung his eyes. He remembered the humiliations of childhood, the sharp resentments that so easily went to tears.

“It’s fine and well to talk about it,” Brid murmured.

“But come on — things change.”

“I know,” he hissed. “I know, love! If anyone knows, I do. Trust me, okay?”

She looked down to where he had stopped massaging. When she spoke again, her voice was barely more than a whisper.

“Jesus, Dermot, I mean…”

She was close to tears herself, he saw.

“Jesus Dermot what?”

“I can’t believe,” she began, pausing to catch a breath. “I can’t believe we’re sitting here this hour of the night — of the morning.”