Page 34 of Our Song

It’s hope.

It’s the hope that all this chemistry between us could mean something on top of the magic of making music.That hope was always there in the past, whenever we played together, despite everything that was going on in our lives.The hope that when we caught each other’s eye it meant more than a musical connection.The hope that every joke, every confidence sharedmeant more than friendship.The hope that he felt the same way about me that I felt about him.

And after what happened that night I know for sure he didn’t.He never did.

But that doesn’t matter, I tell myself.The music is enough.It was always enough.The hope was just the glitter on top.And yes, I can register that he is still very attractive.Yes, when he rolls up the sleeves of his shirt, the sight of his forearms as he plays the guitar is, to a shocking degree, having the same effect on me as it did twenty years ago.I still fancy him.But that’s just a basic, chemical response.I can’t help it.It means nothing.

When it comes to Tadhg Hennessy, I have no expectations or hopes at all.

Chapter Fourteen

2002

When I was eighteen, I got my heart’s desire for Christmas.

After years of hoping and sometimes begging, my parents gave me an electric guitar.And not just any electric guitar, a beautiful Danelectro, bought at a bargain price from my dad’s friend’s son.When I saw it under the Christmas tree, along with a miniature amplifier, I burst into tears of joy.

‘Now, you’d better not let this distract you from your college work,’ said my mam, when I’d stopped hugging her.

As it turned out, she needn’t have worried.For three years, I didn’t spend nearly as much time playing that guitar as I’d hoped.

For months after we left Coláiste Laoise, I yearned to see Tadhg again.I looked out for him on Grafton Street every time I went into town, but he was never busking there.He’dsaid he wanted to study music in university, and when Katie and I started at Trinity that autumn, me studying English and French and her studying history, I was convinced we would find him there.But we didn’t.Dublin feels small sometimes, but it’s also possible to go for a very long time without bumping into someone.

I settled in quickly at college.I made new friends.I developed an unspoken crush on a hot boy who sat near me in the library every day.I even briefly joined a classmate’s band, the dreadfully named Fennel, a month after I got my Danelectro.That was when I discovered there’s an alchemy to creating a good band.You need the right mix of people, and it’s harder to find than you might think.But we did play one gig before I left the band, and that night I got proof of something I’d only suspected when I played that gig in Coláiste Laoise and saw how boys looked at me on stage: if you are a pleasantly average-looking person and you want to, if only briefly, know what it’s like to be really, really hot, then just play a gig, act like you’re confident and don’t be totally terrible.

After I left the stage that night, more boys than I could count came up to tell me how good I’d been or just to give me their phone number, and I was so unused to this sort of thing I didn’t know what to say to any of them.Then my library crush, who had shown no signs of being aware of my existence until that night, came up and asked if he could buy me a drink and, to cut a long story short, his name was Fiachra and we went out for the following nine months.

Over the next few years I’d sometimes think of our band at Coláiste Laoise, and Tadhg, and how lucky I’d been to find, even briefly, a band that worked so well, and I’d wonder what might have happened, on many different levels, if that bus hadn’t broken down.It almost became a joke between me and Katie – the boy who got away and the band that got away.Her romance with Brían, or Brian as we called him now, had fizzled out by the time we started college, but he was studying science in Trinity now and we’d stayed friends.

Then, in the spring of third year, Brian got a drum kit from his cousin, and I discovered Katie’s classmate Joanna could play the bass, so the three of us started messing around in Brian’s family’s garage every week.Katie declined our offer to join the band because she was already working onTrinity News, the college paper.She’d also just got together with Tina, her first girlfriend, and between the paper and her love life she didn’t have time for music.

The only problem with this new band was the fact none of us could sing.I wrote vocal parts for all the songs, but there was no one to sing them.And so, by the time I arrived back in college in the autumn of 2002 for the fourth and final year of my degree, I was in a band and also not in a band.

‘I’m basically Schrödinger’s guitarist,’ I said to my friend Ruairí, who was studying philosophy and psychology and so would hopefully appreciate such highfalutin references.

‘Do you know who you should talk to?’said Ruairí.He was one of life’s fixers – he was involved in a bunch of college societies and was always organising things.‘My old friend Tim.’

‘Um, why?’We were sitting on the big felt-covered blocks in the Arts Block that everyone inexplicably called the chocolate boxes.

‘He’s a really good musician,’ said Ruairí.‘He’s just moved back to Dublin to do the Music and Technology master’s.’

I’d heard of this new postgrad degree in Trinity.It was very hard to get into, and the students worked with prestigious composers.But being an expert in experimental plinky-plonk music didn’t mean he was right for an indie rock band.

‘Can Tim actually sing?’I asked cautiously.

Ruairí laughed.‘He definitely can.He started a band when he was, like, sixteen.’

‘Why didn’t you introduce me to this genius last year?I needed a singer then.’

‘I told you, he just moved back here,’ said Ruairí.‘He’s been doing a music degree down in Cork for the last three years.And his gorgeous Cork girlfriend dumped him just before he left, so he’ll need some cheering up.’His face brightened.‘Why don’t I text and ask him to meet us in the Buttery later?’

I shrugged.‘Sure.’It couldn’t hurt.

It was the first Thursday of term, and the Buttery bar was busy enough when I arrived.Ruairí was there before me; he’dbagged a corner table and already had a pint in front of him.The mysterious Tim had yet to arrive, but Ruairí promised me he’d be there.

‘I didn’t tell him about you being here, though,’ he said.

‘What?’I stared at him.

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