Roddy Doyle - The Guts

He was freezing.

— Are you in a hurry? said Imelda.

— No, he said. — No.

— Liar.

— I’m not, said Jimmy. — Seriously.

He’d walked in earlier, into the kitchen. He’d looked at Aoife. He’d smiled. Brave man, only one night left to chemo.

— How are you? she’d asked.

— Grand.

— How was the day?

— Grand, he said. — Not too bad. Shifted a few units.

— Good.

He’d gone upstairs. He’d sat on the bed. He’d thought about leaving, sliding out of the house. Driving to Howth Head. Stepping off it. Onto the rocks and into the sea.

It wasn’t real thought. He was messing.

He walked back into the kitchen. He looked down at the dog.

— Do we have a lead for this thing? he said.

— In under the sink, said Aoife. — But he’s a bit small for it, I’d say.

She was right. The lead was a thick length of rope, probably made for a harpoon. And, now that he thought of it, the dog didn’t have a collar yet.

— Do we have any string?

— No way, like.

It was Mahalia.

— Why not?

— You’ll strangle him.

— Only if I want to.

— Not funny, she said. — Hang on.

She was gone — he had to wait. But it was fine; he wasn’t panicking.

Mahalia was back.

— There.

She handed him what looked like the cord of a dressing gown.

— Grand, he said. — Hang on, this is mine.

— Tough shit, Sherlock.

He tied the cord around the dog’s neck, not too tight. He stood up and gave it a little tug. The dog yelped, and skidded. It was the shock, not the tightness.

Jimmy had to get out. He felt devastated, and fuckin’ great. He didn’t trust himself.

— I’m gone.

— We’ll eat when you get back.

If I get back .

Gobshite .

— Grand. Come on, Messi.

— Bring this.

Aoife handed him a SuperValu bag.

— Why?

— Poo.

— I’ll wait till I get home.

— You’re hilarious, she said.

He put the bag in his pocket.

— See yeh in a bit.

— Has he been wormed, by the way? he shouted back from the hall.

— Keep him off the grass!

That made about as much sense as anything did these days.

— Grand.

He slammed the front door. It was expected; everything was normal.

He gave the cord a bit of a tug. The dog didn’t budge. He actually did look a bit like Messi, the hair and the front legs. But not nearly as cheerful or enthusiastic.

— Come on, for fuck sake.

He took a few steps but the dog didn’t go with him. He didn’t realise it — the dog was so light — until he heard a knock on the window behind him, and he looked back and saw Messi on his side, claiming a fuckin’ penalty. He laughed, although he wanted to kick the dog down the road.

— Come on, stop messin’.

He picked him up and put him back down when he got past the car and the gate. The dog pissed, then stood in the piss and shivered.

Jimmy pulled the dog out of the puddle, but any more pulling would have been cruel. He picked him up again, held him out and shook some of the piss off him. He took the SuperValu bag from his pocket and shook it open with his free hand. Then he put Messi into it.

That was the dog’s first walk, up to his neck in a SuperValu bag. His feet never touched the ground but he went as far as the coast, through the last of the daylight, across the wooden bridge to Bull Island.

Jimmy hadn’t walked this far in ages. But, then, he hadn’t committed adultery before. The word meant nothing. The sex felt like an achievement. The day before his third session of chemotherapy, with memories of the second one still raw enough to make him cry, he’d managed it. Simple as that. There were all sorts of reasons why he shouldn’t have done it, and all sorts of reasons why he shouldn’t have been able to do it. But he’d put his hands on the skin of a woman he didn’t really know, didn’t know well, and he’d pushed all the worries and doubts away. He’d given Imelda the best five minutes she’d had all week.

There were people staring at him.

Fuck them.

They could see the guilt on him.

That was just stupid. And he didn’t feel guilty.

He’d come too far, but he wanted to go to the end of the Wall. They’d be starving if they were waiting for him at home. He’d see if he could get a taxi when he got back onto the main road.

He should have told Imelda about the cancer. She’d liked his head; she’d said so. She’d run her hands over the stubble. His hair hadn’t fallen out — not yet. He was just a man with a shaved head. The excuse hadn’t been there to tell her.

You’ve no eyebrows, Jimmy .

But that was shite.

He’d been afraid of tears and sympathy. He’d wanted her to sit on him because he was a man, not because he was dying.

He believed that.

— So, she’d said. — Are we going to do this again?

— Yeah.

He’d been dying to go, to get the fuck away. But he’d have stayed. She was still gorgeous. Still ? He’d fancied her — and he’d liked her — for more than a quarter of a century, and he’d have kissed her neck again, while her kids came skipping up the garden path. Were her kids still kids? Her garden path was a three-minute walk from his parents’ garden path.

He was heading into chemo in the morning and three hours ago Imelda Quirk had groaned when he’d entered her. A woman fancied him. Simple as that. An attractive — that was the word — an attractive woman looked at him and saw someone, a man, she wanted to ride.

It was great.

There was rain in the wind now. He’d turn back in a bit. There were car lights behind him. His shadow stretched way ahead of him.

What a fuckin’ mess.

There was a cop car down on the beach, to his left, just below the embankment. It was going at a fair clip, over the sand. It stopped and the front doors opened. They must have been looking for someone. He kept going — he wasn’t interested.

He’d be able to face Aoife when he got home. There was nothing telling him he wouldn’t be.

The hand came down on his shoulder just as he saw the two cops coming up off the embankment stones and running at him.

— Where’re you going?

He was surrounded by big men half his age.

— What’s wrong?

— Where’re you goin’ with the dog there?

— A walk, said Jimmy. — I’m goin’ for a walk.

Then he saw it — what they saw. A man with a pup in a plastic bag, walking to the end of the Wall, the pier, whatever it was, with the tide coming in.

— Oh, hang on, he said.

They were young lads, probably fuckers, but they were questioning a middle-aged man in good clothes. So they listened to him.

— He went for a piss and stood in it. He’s only a pup. And I didn’t want to get the — eh — urine on my jacket.

Thank fuck he hadn’t worn the cancer trousers.

— And I had the bag with me, for his poo.

He remembered the faces now, those people staring at him back there, when he’d been walking past the golf club.

— Did someone phone you?

— Someone did, yes.

— Look, said Jimmy. — The dog’s name is Messi. If I went home without him —.

They believed him — the pricks.

They started to back away.

— Right, said one of them, the spokesman. — Just be careful.

The fuckin’ clown.

They were nearly off the embankment now, heading back to the squad car.

— Lads, he shouted.

They stopped.

— You couldn’t give me a lift, could yeh?

The thing he really hated about this place was the fact that he was so near people with cancer. Women with wigs like crash helmets, men who should never have been bald. Pinheads. He only felt dangerously sick when he was here. (The nausea wasn’t sickness. It was catastrophic but it ended, even if he couldn’t believe that while it was destroying him.) Some of them — women and the men — arrived, wandered around like they were all set for a day at the beach. Bags full of stuff. Someone had left a cake on the counter beyond, and it had been rancid-looking chocolate-chip muffins the last time he’d been in. There was a guy a bit down from Jimmy, in cargo shorts and — Jimmy couldn’t believe it — a Choose Life T-shirt. He kept looking around for someone to smile at.