Catherine O’Flynn - Mr Lynch’s Holiday

He was sitting on a bed in a dimly lit room. He was waiting for someone to return, he was pretty sure of that. He couldn’t remember who they were or where they’d gone but he thought it was OK.

It was nice in the room, dark and soft. Everything was good in there. Apart from the music. Something awful was piping through from somewhere. A terrible noise. A constipated saxophone, trying over and over again to void its bowels. He was in danger of sobering up. Unpleasant shards of memory were starting to jab at him.

He needed another drink. He hoped that’s what he was waiting for, that any minute now someone would enter the room with something tall, cool, refreshing and alcoholic. Not calimocho though, he felt quite strongly about that. There had been some indefinite period of time spent in a bathroom, cold tiles on his face, someone holding his head, comforting him as he vomited the filthy combination of red wine and coke. ‘Fizzy sick’ — he remembered thinking it important that he repeated those words over and over again, turning around, trying to speak between retches, as if the person gently holding his head needed to know, as if the words might help with some diagnosis.

Sparse, asynchronous glimpses of the evening now started to flash in his mind. Jean and Rosemary practising some dance steps. Someone trying to convince him of the benefits of Reiki. Lionel Richie’s voice. Roger’s hand on Becca’s leg. ‘Everyone you meet, they’re dancing in the street.’ Somebody sobbing. His father’s voice. Gill threatening to do a handstand. Endless Lionel. David dancing on his own. ‘All Night Long’. Shovelling gambas into his mouth. His father’s face in the crowd.

The saxophone had stopped. Now there were synthesized pan pipes playing the song, the inevitable song. He sang quietly: ‘I’d rather be a hammer than a nail.’ He lay and pondered. Would he? It was quite a conundrum. It was a song he had previously loathed, played on an instrument he detested, but now he reconsidered. The sound was soothing, the lyrics challenging, maybe even profound. Hammer or nail? Who could say? He’d wasted so much of his life sneering. Maybe this was the start of his re-education. Pan pipes. Synthesized pan pipes. What the hell was wrong with them? Why couldn’t things be easy and nice? ‘El Cóndor Pasa’. There was so much he could learn from the condor. What exactly were the virtues of difficulty and cynicism and just constantly …

The door opened and Cheryl walked in. He smiled.

‘How are you, sweetheart?’

‘I like your music.’

‘Oh. Thank you.’

‘Can I borrow it?’

‘Ask Roger, he has it wired up to come into all the rooms; I think it’s just random tracks from his computer.’

‘Amazing.’

‘You look better anyway. Here.’ She handed him a drink.

His worst suspicions were confirmed with the first sip. Iced water. He put it down on the side table. ‘Thanks.’

She looked at him. ‘Oh, Eamonn, what are we going to do with you?’

He had an image in his mind of Cheryl doing something with him while Roger watched in the background. ‘What do you mean?’

‘I just mean, how can we help you?’

‘Oh, right.’

She sat next to him on the bed. He could smell her perfume, something heavy and sweet. He looked at her legs stretched out beside him. Her feet looked soft and delicate, imprisoned in the cage of her high-heeled sandals.

‘Is Roger home now?’

‘No, he won’t be back tonight. He’ll crash out on their sofa. He normally does.’

Now he saw Roger and Ian taking turns with Becca. There was something wrong with his head. Everything was turning to pornography.

‘Eamonn, you need to come to terms with Laura’s departure.’

‘I don’t want to talk about it.’

‘OK, but you’re not handling it very well; look what happened tonight. Sobbing on Jean’s shoulder. Shouting about circumcision. Constantly playing Lionel bloody Ritchie.’

He put his head in his hands.

‘Look, I’m not trying to make you feel bad. Everyone gets drunk and makes a fool of themselves sometimes, and you’ve got more cause than most, but I just want you to know that if you ever feel you need to talk, you can talk to me. I’m actually a pretty good listener.’ She squeezed his leg.

He kept his head buried. He felt the weight of her hand on his thigh. Normally he would move his leg, find an excuse to gently brush her hand away. Always polite. It had been hard work, constantly policing the borders of their relationship with Roger and Cheryl; this pressure he felt from them, low level, almost imperceptible, but constant. He pondered now the nature of that pressure, the intent within. It wasn’t simply sexual, it was something wider, looser, impelling them to let go, a call for Eamonn and Laura to abandon themselves; to what, he wasn’t sure, as he had always fiercely resisted. He thought of the condor again. The wise bird. The old Eamonn was always resisting, always putting barriers between himself and simple, uncomplicated pleasure: pan pipes, trashy TV, wife-swapping.

‘Have you fallen asleep?’ she asked gently.

He lifted his head from his hands and looked at her. ‘You’re beautiful, Cheryl. I know you know that, but you are.’

She gave a half-smile. ‘I was once.’

‘You still are. You have an incredible glamour.’

‘Not glamorous, please. Only grannies are glamorous.’

‘Something powerful about you. Something different.’

She looked at him and he felt something change in the room.

‘Does he appreciate it?’

‘Who?’

‘Roger, does he know what to do with you?’

She gave him a strange look.

He reached down and slid her hand up to his crotch. ‘I do.’

‘Eamonn.’

‘It’s OK.’

‘I think I should get Roger.’

Eamonn was unsurprised. ‘He likes to watch, doesn’t he?’ He moved his face closer to hers. ‘The old Eamonn would have said no, but the new Eamonn …’ He shrugged. ‘It’s all about letting go.’

Cheryl stood up. ‘Eamonn. You’re very drunk.’

‘I know what I’m doing.’

‘I’m calling Roger.’

He smiled. ‘I’m going with the flow.’

She ignored him and started searching for her phone.

‘I know I’ve resisted in the past, sent out the wrong signals.’

At this Cheryl turned and looked at him. ‘Resisted what exactly?’

‘You and Roger. I know how you must see us. Repressed. Uptight. I don’t know why I’ve fought against it so hard. Not tonight though, I’m past all that, tonight you can have me.’

Cheryl laughed. ‘I can have you? Listen, sweetheart, there are only so many allowances I’ll make for alcohol and a broken heart.’

He stood up and held her hands. ‘I’m saying it all wrong, but you know what I mean. One night. Come on.’ He tried to push her back towards the bed, but she freed a hand and delivered a powerful punch to his nose.

He fell back, holding his nose, a terrible sobriety lapping at his shores.

‘Listen, Eamonn. You’re drunk. I’m trying to keep that in mind, but you’re making it difficult. I need you to hear what I’m saying. You have fantasies about me, fine, whatever, you’re not the first, you won’t be the last, but that’s just what they are, fantasies, and they don’t interest me at all. Maybe Roger and I like to flirt, we like to play our little games, but I thought we were all adults and we knew the rules. Jesus, it’s not the fucking 1970s, Eamonn. I do not and never have thought of you as …’ she trailed off, as if unable to even put the idea into words. ‘I just don’t think of you in that way. Now, you’re upset, but you’ve done your crying now and you need to stop being a boy and start being a man. Laura’s left you. Deal with it. Move on or get her back.’