Joseph O'Neill - The Breezes

‘Get me the phone, my hero,’ she said to Steve, who complied. Still chortling, Rosie ordered a pizza supreme and six beers for delivery. ‘My warrior,’ she said, handing him back the telephone. ‘We’re going to celebrate the fame which you have brought to this house. Now get me the duvet,’ she ordered, ‘and bring me the TV guide.’ Steve obeyed, and the two of them settled down on the sofa face to face, their legs interlocked beneath the quilt.

The room, already oppressive in its disarray, shrank with their happiness. I put on my jacket. ‘I’m going to Pa’s,’ I said. ‘I’ll leave you two lovebirds to get on with it.’

‘I’ll call him tomorrow,’ Rosie said. ‘I promise. I’m just not up to it now. I’ll call him first thing.’

I arrived at the house to find that my father had finally got out of bed. He was sitting downstairs in the living-room in a vest and pyjama bottoms, a can of Heineken in his hand. The curtains were drawn and the room’s darkness was relieved only by the luminosity of the television, a fifteen-year-old black-and-white portable which he had brought down from the spare room. He was watching football. I recognized the team in dark-and-light: Rockport United. It was a programme about last Sunday’s game.

I fetched a beer, too, and took over an armchair on the other side of the room.

They were showing Ballybrew’s fateful last-minute free kick. The picture froze just as the kick was about to be taken. The analyst, a distinguished former international, drew a white arrow from the ball to the corner of the goal. ‘This is where Burke is aiming — to the goalkeeper’s, Taylor’s, left. That’s at least thirty-five yards away. Now, unless you’re Koeman or Cantona or one of the other great strikers of the ball, your chance of scoring from there is very remote indeed. I question the need for having a wall there at all.’ The analyst paused for emphasis. ‘Now take a look at what happens next.’ Burke hoofed the ball in slow motion. ‘The ball hits the wall, deviates to the keeper’s right and ends up in the back of the net. There.’ He circled the ball. ‘So if Burke’s kick had gone as intended, there would not have been a goal, because the keeper had his left corner covered and would have saved it. And if United had not been extra cautious and had not put a wall in front of the kicker, there wouldn’t have been a goal either.’ We were returned to the studio, where the three members of the panel were grinning ruefully. ‘Sometimes you just can’t win,’ the analyst said, laughing.

‘Rubbish,’ Pa said forcibly. ‘They’re just rubbish. I’ll never waste my time on that team again.’ He looked at me. Threadbare silver stubble sprouted from his soft face like grass in poor soil. ‘You want another beer?’ I shook my head. Barefooted, he went to the kitchen to help himself. His toenails, hard, shining curves in the half-light, needed cutting.

The curtains were billowing. I went over to investigate.

‘Pa, the windows are completely broken. Anybody could walk in.’

‘What do you want me to do, call that clown Whelan? Anyway, what does it matter? If somebody wants to come in here, that’s fine by me.’ Pa fell into his chair with a fresh can. ‘As far as I’m concerned, they can all come in and help themselves. I mean it.’ He made a sweeping gesture. ‘The TV, the chairs, the lot. It’s all theirs.’

I didn’t react.

Fresh figures appeared on the television: athletes, lining up on their blocks for a sprint. Down they went, into a crouch, waiting. The starting pistol cracked, then cracked once more. A false start.

Perhaps it was just the light of the television and the shadows it pooled in the sockets of his eyes, but my father’s pale face looked ghostlier than ever.

‘Have you eaten, Pa?’

‘I’m not hungry.’

‘I’ll make you some soup, if you like. I think I’ve seen some onion soup somewhere.’

‘Son, I’m not hungry .’

The sprinters crouched once more. Crack. This time it was for real. They ran as fast as they could for a hundred metres.

It was all too dismal. ‘What about Steve, eh?’ I said, pointing at the discarded copy of the Crier on the floor. ‘Who would have thought it?’

Pa took a sip from his can and shrugged. ‘It’s all phoney, all that Man of the Month stuff. It’s all done to sell newspapers.’

‘I know,’ I said, ‘but still …’ Jesus, I had never known him to be so negative. ‘I just think that it’s great for Steve, that’s all. I don’t know, maybe this is the break he’s been looking for.’

‘Getting your picture in the papers doesn’t mean a damn thing. Look at me, I’ve got my photograph all over Rockport.’

I said, with an actual flicker of conviction, ‘Maybe this will be the turning-point for him; maybe this will give him the push he needs.’

Pa gave a dry laugh. ‘John, let’s not kid ourselves any longer about Steve: the boy’s a complete washout.’

Hold on, I felt like saying, I’ve never deluded myself about Steve; you’re the one who keeps saying what a great guy he is underneath it all.

‘I think you’re being harsh,’ I said. ‘It’s not a small thing, what he did.’

‘The fellow’s a halfwit,’ Pa said. ‘Otherwise what would he be doing with Rosie?’

I could not believe what I had heard.

‘Don’t look so shocked, Johnny,’ he said, pronouncing my name with a touch of mockery. ‘Would you want her as your girlfriend? All that screaming and shouting and selfishness?’ He tilted the last drops of Heineken down his throat. ‘I’ve been doing some thinking,’ he said. ‘I’ve been sorting things out in my mind and seeing things as they are. See things as they really are,’ he said. ‘And I’m telling you, Rosie’s no good.’ He began to extend the fingers of his left hand one by one, numbering. ‘She’s selfish. She’s mean-minded. She’s unloving. She doesn’t give a moment’s thought either to me, or to you, or to Steve, or to anybody else.’ He flicked his hand dismissively. ‘Those are the facts.’

‘She’s your daughter.’

‘So? She’s nearly thirty. She can’t ask us to suspend our judgements for ever. She takes and she takes and she takes. She never gives. Do remember what she said when I asked her to come and visit Merv? Do you remember?’ Pa made a noise of disgust. ‘She exploits everybody around her. She manipulates us all with her unhappiness.’

‘She doesn’t mean to be unkind,’ I said. ‘You think that she wouldn’t change if she could?’

He stared at the television. ‘I don’t know,’ he eventually said tiredly. ‘I don’t know anything any more.’ He kept staring. A long-distance race was now in progress, the athletes bobbing along on the inside track.

I noticed a card on the floor. It was an invitation to the cremation of Mr Mervyn Rasmussen, taking place the next day.

‘Are you going to this?’ I said. There was a silence. ‘I’ll come with you, if you like,’ I said.

Pa asserted suddenly, ‘You spend years, your whole life, making a family, a home, working, and then …’ He clicked his fingers, making a small sound. ‘What’s the use.’

He was beginning to sound like me.

I said, ‘You’re bound to feel low. You’ve gone through a terrible patch which nobody deserves. The job, Merv Rasmussen, Jesus, even Trusty …’

‘I don’t care about the dog. I could get another dog tomorrow. They’re all the same. They’re just dogs.’ He rubbed his eyes. ‘Anyway, I’m better off without her. All she’s ever been good for is …’ He motioned tiredly at the carpet.

Around the track the runners went and then around once more. A small group broke free at the front.