Friday Reading

In her latest letter to her missing sister Lucy describes a wild weekend by the sea . . .

2 August 1980

The smudges on this page aren’t tears. They’re raindrops. Daire’s van leaks but otherwise it’s cosy enough, once you get over the smell of rotting veg. We’ve got sleeping bags and blankets and camping gas – just like the Famous Five without Timmy and the lashings of ginger pop! The only trouble is trying to sit up straight – not that we need to, we’re mostly horizontal. Right now I’m scrunched up in the corner scrawling this while he’s out ‘foraging’ for food at the local shop. You’re probably wondering have I eloped. Nope. Just a weekend away from the house of gloom.

  Here’s what happened:

  Last Wednesday I was walking home from work (BORING – stacking shelves in Quinnsworth) when I heard a car slow to a crawl beside me. Like the good girl that I am I ignored it and continued walking. Then I heard my name and when I looked around there was Daire’s head poking out the window of a crocky delivery van with Glasraí painted on the side.

  After we’d snogged a bit, he said, D’you fancy coming away for the weekend?

  For real? In this?

  Yeah. What’s the problem? He looked at me with his fuck-the-world expression and suddenly I couldn’t see why not.

  Of course as soon as I opened the kitchen door I walked smack into two problems. I tossed out the suggestion over tea, that I’d go away for the weekend with some of the girls from school.

  Ma and Da exchanged a look, as if they’d been waiting for this moment. Then Da did the tortoise – you know the way he goes, tucking his head in and looking down at his plate. Leaving it up to Ma. As per usual.

  You’re too young to go gallivanting around for the weekend.  

  Gimme a break, Ma. I know all about your gallivanting when you and Betty and Noel and Cormac went down to Roscommon to stay with your Gran for the summer. Climbing out the window to go to the dancehall, staying over with your friends down there. Betty told us everything. You were wild. And I’m entitled to my freedom.

  The more I said the more Ma steamed up, her face going red, her eyes flashing until she let rip and told me I was inconsiderate, selfish, brazen blah blah blah. You’re too full of yourself Missie, she ended. You’ll come a cropper one of these days.

  The truth, and I knew it all along, was that it was your fault she didn’t want me to go away. It’s not enough that your sister has vanished into thin air but now you want to leave us too, she said when she turned on the waterworks.

  It’s only a weekend, Ma, I went to her and hooped my arm around her shoulders. I’ll be back for work on Monday morning. I don’t like Deb being gone any more than you do. Anyway I need the money.

  She sniffled a bit then reached her hand back to hold my arm. Go on, she said. Be careful.

  I kissed the top of her head, where her roots are showing. I will.

  Later that evening Da knocked on the door of our room. I opened it to find him standing there with a fiver in his hand. Take this, he said. Have a bit of fun. You deserve it.

  Thanks Da, I hugged him. I will.

  After peace had broken out I felt a bit guilty for lying to them. But whatever about coming round to me going off with some of the girls they’d have locked me into the bedroom if they thought I was going with a fella.

I met Daire after work yesterday evening and we drove out to Balbriggan. He pulled a big plastic bag out of the back of the van and hauled it down to the beach. The sand was still warm. Bliss. I kicked off my sandals and wiggled my toes into the heat. We spread out a towel and I lay back looking up at the sky. Children’s voices rose from the shore. I shut my eyes and let my mind drift away.

  Here, Daire nudged me, and passed a joint.

  I sat up and inhaled, slow and deep, held down the smoke and let it work its magic through me. Just what the doctor ordered, I said when I finally exhaled. Is this what you sell out of the van? I asked him.

  Yeah. How’d you guess. He laughed and toked. Old Pennypinch Lynch wouldn’t know what it was. A spliff would do him good all the same. Loosen him up.

  We strolled along the beach for a while picking up bits of driftwood and dried seaweed for a bonfire. Once Daire got that going we had a feed of toasted mushrooms (yes, that kind) and sausages (just the regular Denny’s) followed by toasted marshmallows, washed down with some cider. We couldn’t move after all that food so we lay back and watched the sky change colour. Or at least it looked like it was changing colour – psychedelic pinks, blues, purples and yellows all shooting around the place.

I must have drifted off to sleep because the next thing I knew I was alone on the towel but I could hear Daire’s voice talking and laughing. I pushed myself up on my elbow to see who was there. The beach was empty. All the families had gone home to tea and The Late Late Show. Gradually I made out Daire’s shape. He was crouched on the hard sand looking down at something blathering away. Uh oh. I thought. He’s flipped and I’m stuck out here with a maniac. Maybe Ma was right. I got up and began moving slowly towards him. When I got close I said his name. But he didn’t hear me. He was deep in conversation with a pair of crabs.

  Daire? I said again. Are you ok?

  No way, he was saying. No fucking way. That’s fucking amazing. And what did you do then?

I was afraid to touch him for fear the shock would be too much for him.

  Next minute he cracked up laughing at something hilarious that the crabs had apparently said and fell back on the sand. I want to be a crab, he giggled.

  I went back to the towel, lay on my back and stared at the sky again. I might have even said some kind of prayer that Daire would come down off his high soon. If I did, my prayer was answered, for a wonder. If only they were all answered. If only I knew who or what I was praying to . . .    

       

When the colours faded and the sky went black, Daire returned to me and started to strip. Come on, he seized my hand, hauling me to my feet. Time for some primal therapy.

  Wha?

  Take off your clothes. Let’s dance. He ran back to the van, grabbed the ghetto blaster and carried it under his arm like a football down the sea’s edge.  

  We danced for hours. I’ve never felt so free in my life. Nothing on my ass, nothing in my head. No one else around. Nothing beats it! To cool off we plunged into the sea and I swear it sizzled, striking sparks off our bodies.

This morning the church bells pounded my head with pain. It took me a few minutes to work out where I was, what I was, who I was. Daire was snoring beside me. Good job. I wasn’t in outer space although it felt like it. Or if I was at least I wasn’t alone, trapped in my little capsule circling the earth into infinity. Okay, okay. I know you’re saying Get real Lucy. Come back to earth. Stop it. You told me enough times I was a space cadet. Today I really did feel like one.

  I sat up and looked around. The beach was cold and grey. The sky was cold and grey. I pictured the church where the bells were ringing and it was cold and grey too. Lazy waves flopped onto the shore. I worked my way back down the sleeping bag – Daire had zipped two together – and curled up against him, wrapping my arms around his waist for warmth. That woke him and he turned around and we were hands and mouths and flesh all mixed up in one big long fuck. Afterwards, lying there inside our cocoon, feeling one another’s breath, our bodies still glued together, we drifted to sleep and I felt myself sinking down into the sand, my body dissolving and trickling away. And it felt good. Weird, I hear you say. True, I say.

  The next thing I knew was icy cold water licking my forehead. I snapped awake and looked up, thinking Daire was messing. But he was still asleep, all curled up in a ball like a child. I peeked out of the sleeping bag and as I did a wave splashed over my face. The tide was coming in. I shook Daire hard.

  Wazzzgoindown? He grumbled.

  The sea. It’s coming UP! I yelled at him, scrambling out of the bag.

  Shit! He shucked the bag away and jumped to his feet. Come on. He grabbed my hand and dragging the sleeping bags behind him legged it up the beach to the van. The odd wave lassoed our ankles as we ran, as if it was a game. Once we were safe inside the van we laughed and dried one another off until our skin was red from the chafing of the towels. Then there was only one good way to warm up . . . Anyone passing the van must have thought the carrots and spuds were having a gang bang!   

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I hope you’re continuing to enjoy Family Lines. From the first week in June I will be posting a new chapter/letter every Friday.