Lisa McInerney - The Glorious Heresies

The ‘hall’ was a poky thing. There was a keyboard by the back wall, and a few books of sheet music, and enough faux-leather-bound Bibles to make a fort. Once she’d set up the circle of plastic chairs and the trestle tables, and pulled out the lectern from the corner, there seemed a dangerous shortage of the room necessary to keep breathing an assembly of Christians all equally afire with the faith. Still, the first part of her job was done. She locked the door behind her and walked to the Centra on the next street over. She had sliced pan to buy, and a plan to put in motion.

‘I’m sorry to ask,’ she said, as the girl behind the counter scanned the provisions, ‘but is there a phone I could use?’

There was no provision given for call credit at the centre. Mobile phones were a distraction, William said, a link to the outside world that had chewed them up and puked them out. That had made perfect sense at the time, because Georgie had been sure that nobody needed or wanted a call from her while she was getting sober or realigning her principles or whatever you fancied calling it. She hadn’t taken her phone out of the bedside table drawer in weeks.

She remembered his number, all the same. It was one of those numbers you never forgot. 999, your parents’ house, your dealer.

‘ What is going on with you?’ he asked, in charmed incredulity, when she opened the door.

‘What, the rig out?’ She twirled. ‘Better than freezing your arse off in a greyhound skirt, isn’t it?’

‘It’s a bit wholesome, like.’

‘It’s a long-sleeved maxi dress, not a burqa! Modesty is the whore’s kryptonite. Besides, it’s kind of a condition of this whole thing.’ She gestured at the hall, and he stepped in and looked around and said, ‘Jesus Christ, Georgie. You’re hardly trying to convert me.’

‘Could you be converted, Ryan?’

‘Not without a skinful of acid.’

‘Well phew for the pair of us, coz they haven’t gotten me yet either.’

‘Clearly not if you’re calling me down. Where’ve you been anyway, girl?’

‘Getting saved,’ she said, and he smiled at her, and she was pleased to note that his smile lacked the mercantile cunning she had worried the missing months would give him. ‘Down in West Cork. They have this commune.’

‘A cult, like?’

‘No! Unless you mean it in the Christian sense. But I bet you’re a good Catholic boy so you can’t really talk.’

She handed over the money she’d put together with David, and Ryan produced a couple of wraps, one of which she tucked into her bra.

‘Don’t get them wet,’ he said.

‘I’m not lactating, for God’s sake.’

He looked put out. ‘If they get damp they’re fucked altogether.’

‘I’ll mind them. Anyway, they’re not yours anymore, so relax.’

She sat in the circle of chairs and opened the second wrap.

‘Have you got anything to chop this with?’

He was wearing combat-style jeans; folds and compartments enough for the one-man band. He reached into a pocket and produced a small knife.

‘Aren’t you ever worried you’ll be stopped and searched? Drugs and weapons on you; it’s like something out of The Wire .’

‘That’s not a weapon,’ he said.

‘Yeah, I’m sure the guards would see it that way. Here, pass me one of them Bibles.’

The faux leather wasn’t the ideal chopping platform; she’d have to wash the cover after. She opened the wrap.

‘Sit down,’ she said, and he did, across from her.

‘Your congregation aren’t on the way back for you so?’

‘They’ll be a couple of hours yet,’ she said. ‘I told them I was going to visit my mam and dad.’

‘But you’re from Millstreet.’

‘Exactly.’

She was glad to see him. It wasn’t wise to get too fond of your dealer, and the likelihood of one of that breed gaining her approval had never come up before. It’s just that Ryan was… well, young. And though his existence was proof that they were learning the dark arts prematurely these days, she still felt safer in his company than she had done with any other dealer.

‘Is it good?’ she asked as she chopped, and he said, ‘It’s unreal. Seriously, Georgie, you could get ten lines out of that, especially if you’ve been dry this past while.’

‘As a bone,’ she said.

She wished she had figured out sooner that young merchants were the way to go.

Maybe, too, young punters.

It was a bad thought to come roaring in after two months of Christian healing in the arse end of nowhere; she hadn’t killed off the whore, not entirely. She told herself she had yet to bring her thinking back in sync with the rest of the world. The longer she stayed out of sight in flowing garments in West Cork, the more likely the stench of sin would be obfuscated by contrition’s perfume, until repentance diluted her history, until all but lupine senses were confused by her spick, span self.

But the thought was there now and the ghost of who she was an hour ago bleated its dissent.

She’d heard of fathers bringing their sons out for a taster, and wasn’t Hollywood always eking out the comedic charm in golden-hearted hookers and the desperate young virgins who found more than surrender in their welcoming depths? Oh yeah, it was really noble. Popping cherries all around her, that would have been the way to go. Charging them fifty quid to bob, red and tearstained, on top of her with her sworn guarantee she wouldn’t laugh at the size of their winkies. Ridding them of the burden of inexperience so they didn’t make fools of themselves when their pretty little girlfriends finally granted them entry. Before they fixed on their own perversions and started getting grabby.

She bent over the Bible with a rolled-up fiver and snorted her line.

What difference would it make to get them young? They were animals soon enough.

She passed the Good Book to Ryan, and as code dictated he accepted.

‘Never did one off a Bible before,’ he said, pinching his nostrils and blinking.

She took the book back. ‘Mass produced and made of dead trees; there’s nothing special about them.’

‘It’s a bit mean though, isn’t it?’

‘What?’

‘Snorting coke off your Christians’ favourite book?’

‘It’s not like they’ll ever know.’ She tucked up the wrap and dotted the residue from the book’s cover with a licked thumb.

‘Are they not nice to you?’ he asked.

‘Eh?’

‘The Christians, like.’ He gestured at the book. ‘There’s a bang of vengeance off that.’

‘That’s not it at all,’ she said. ‘I didn’t even think, to be honest.’

‘So they’re not bad to you,’ he said. ‘They’re not asking you to change anything but your wardrobe.’

‘Well, and my wanton ways.’

He pushed the chair onto its back legs, folded his arms and looked at the ceiling.

‘That’s it, though,’ he said. ‘All the judging. Doesn’t that put you off?’

‘They’re not really judgemental,’ she said. ‘They’re meek and mild and shapeless. They think God has a plan and that all they need to do with their lives is follow it. Live in the country and milk goats.’

‘No wonder you were aching for a bump.’

‘I wasn’t, really. I was convalescing. Coke doesn’t go with convalescing; I needed my feelings, you know?’

‘You don’t anymore?’

‘I’m sick of having feelings.’

She was joking, and he smiled as he should have, but he said, ‘Seriously though, Georgie. You’re looking well, like. Don’t fuck it up.’

‘Oh my God. A dealer’s telling me to stop doing drugs.’

‘Dealing doesn’t automatically make someone a cunt, is all.’