Roddy Doyle - The Van

They looked at the van.

— Where’s the window? said Jimmy Sr.

— You’re beginnin’ to annoy me, said Bertie, — d’yeh know tha’?

— No, I didn’t mean it like—

— Who wants the van annyway? You or Bimbo? It’s nothin’ got to do with you, chum.

— I only fuckin’ asked! said Jimmy Sr. — For fuck sake.

— Maybe, said Bertie.

— I only asked, said Jimmy Sr. — I did. I was only fuckin’ curious. Where’s the fuckin’ window, that’s all. It has to have one.

Bertie thought about this.

He went over to the van. He tapped it, at about chin level.

— No, he said.

He moved down a bit and tapped again.

— No, he said again.

He moved further down.

— It must be here somewhere, he said.

He tapped again.

— No.

He looked at his knuckles.

— Jesus, it’s fuckin’ dirty alrigh’, he said.

He stepped back and looked carefully at the side of the van from left to right.

— It must be round the other side, he told Jimmy Sr. — Does it have to have a window?

—’Course it does, said Jimmy Sr.

This was great; no fuckin’ window.

— Why? said Bertie.

— How else can yeh serve the fuckin’ customers? said Jimmy Sr. — Get up on the fuckin’ roof?

— Oh, said Bertie. — You mean the hatch, compadre. It’s round the back. A fine big hatch. Yeh could serve a small elephant through it.

— Ventilation, said Jimmy Sr.

— Que?

— Yeh’d want a window for ventilation, said Jimmy Sr.

— Me bollix yeh would, said Bertie. — Why would yeh? You’ve the hatch, for fuck sake. It’s as big as a garage door.

— Doesn’t matter a shite wha’ size it is if there isn’t a through draught.

— There’s the door for gettin’ in an’ ou’ as well, said Bertie. — That’ll give yeh your through draught.

Jimmy Sr studied the van.

— I don’t know, he said.

— Look it, said Bertie. — Let me at this point remind you of one small thing; uno small thing, righ’. It’s a van for selling chips out of, not a caravan for goin’ on your holidays in; comprende? It doesn’t matter a wank if there’s a window or not. Unless you’re plannin’ on—

— Oh God.

It was Maggie.

— Ah, said Bertie. — There yis are. Use your imagination, signora, he told Maggie as he stepped aside to let her have a good look at the van.

Maggie stayed where she was, as if she was afraid to go closer to it. She brought her cardigan in closer around her shoulders. Bimbo was beside her, looking at her carefully, hoping, hoping.

Like a kid, the fuckin’ eejit; buy me tha’, Mammy, he’d say in a minute, the fuckin’ head on him. If she did let him buy it Jimmy Sr’d — he didn’t know what he’d do. Fuck them, it was their money.

Bertie’s outstretched hand showed Maggie the van from top to bottom and back up again.

— A few minutes with a hose an’ maybe, just maybe, a few hours with a paint scraper an’ it’ll be perfect. The Rolls-Royce o’ chipper vans.

Jimmy Sr didn’t know why he didn’t want Bimbo to buy it. It just sort of messed things up, that was it. It was a shocking waste of money as well though.

— Have yeh looked inside it? Maggie asked Bimbo.

— Oh I have, yeah, said Bimbo. — No, it’s grand. It’s all there, all the equipment. It’s a bit, eh—

— What abou’ the engine? said Maggie.

Bertie got there before Bimbo.

— Wha’ engine would tha’ be, signora?

There was a window. They found it when they got it back to Bimbo’s. Two days after he bought it.

It was like a procession, pushing and dragging the van through Barrytown, Bimbo and Jimmy Sr and some of their kids although the twins were no help at all, just worried about getting their clothes dirty. Mind you, you didn’t even have to touch the van to get dirty from it, you only had to stand near it. It took them ages to get the wheels on it and then getting it around to the front without knocking a lump off the house took ages as well and it was nearly dark by the time they were on the road to Bimbo’s. The weather was great, of course, and everyone on the left side of the street was out on their front steps getting the last of the sun and by the time they’d got to the corner of Barrytown Road there was a huge fuckin’ crowd out watching them. Jimmy Sr kept his head down all the way, except when they were going down the hill just at the turn into Chestnut Avenue and he had to run up to the front to help Bimbo stop the van from taking off on its own, past the corner. They’d had to dig their heels in or else it would’ve gone over Bimbo and his young one, Jessica. He should have let it; that would have taught Bimbo a lesson about how to spend his money. Anyway, they got the useless piece of rusty shite to stop just after the corner and there was a really huge crowd by now and they cheered when they missed the corner, the cunts. They backed it back and Wayne, one of Bimbo’s young fellas, got the steering wheel around; the sweat was running off the poor little fucker, and they got it onto Chestnut Avenue and the cunts at the corner cheered again. No fear of the lazy shites giving them a hand, of course.

There really was a huge crowd out. It was a bit like Gandhi’s funeral in the film, except noisier. It was more like the Tour de France, the neighbours at the side of the road clapping and whooping, the cynical bastards.

— Hey Jimmy, are yeh pushin’ it or ridin’ it!?

And they all laughed, the eejits, like sheep.

— Yeow, Jimmy!

— Hey, look it! Mister Rabbitte’s wearin’ stripy kaks!

God, he wanted to kill someone when he heard that. Veronica was right; he should never have tucked his shirt inside his underpants; she’d been saying it for years. He tried to stand up straighter when he was pushing to make the underpants go back down in behind his trousers but he was probably too late, and he couldn’t put a hand behind and shove them back down; that would only have been giving in to them.

— Here, lads, look at the skidmarks!

Some people would laugh at anything. A kid had his ghetto blaster on full blast; it was like a jaysis circus. Only a couple of gates left and they’d be at Bimbo’s gate and it would be over. The worst part but, was earlier, going past the Hikers, not only because he’d have loved a pint but because loads of the lads came out with their pints and sat on the wall laughing and slagging them. Larry O‘Rourke was offering 3/1 that Jimmy Sr would die before they got to Bimbo’s. Ha fuckin’ ha. By Jaysis, the next bank holiday that fucker got up with the band and started doing his Elvis impressions Jimmy Sr would let him know who he really sounded like; Christy fuckin’ Brown.

— Come on, three to one Jimmy snuffs it. Anny takers?

— That’s a fuckin’ big pram he’s pushin’, isn’t it?

Jimmy Sr looked up to see who’d said that and it was Bertie.

He couldn’t believe it. He’d only enough breath in him to say one thing back at them.

— Fuck yis.

He got a bit more air in.

— Yis cunts.

They were there. Just one last big push up onto the path and into Bimbo’s drive and it was over.

Jimmy Sr couldn’t stand up straight for a while, his back was killing him. The sweat was worse though. He was wringing. His shoes squelched, his shirt was stuck to him, his arse was wet. He sat down on the grass. The twins wanted money for helping.

— Get lost, he managed to say.

— Ah, that’s not fair—

— Fuck off!

Jimmy Sr got the sweat out of his eyes and looked at Bimbo and Maggie looking at the van. Not a bother on Bimbo, of course; he didn’t even look dirty. He had his arm around Maggie’s shoulders and the two of them were gawking at the van like it was their first fuckin’ grandchild. Bimbo was anyway; Maggie didn’t look as delighted. You couldn’t blame her. If her first grandchild was in the same state as the van she’d want to smother it, and nobody would object. Then they looked at each other and started laughing and then they looked at the van and stopped laughing, and then they started again. It was nice really, seeing them like that.