Page 8 of Heart of the Wren
Bookish was a word often used to describe Bullseye but I think that was mainly down to the glasses he wore. He’d never been a big reader, to my knowledge. We hadn’t exactly grown apart over the years, but once Bullseye started having children, his priorities changed. Which was only to be expected. I found I couldn’t relate to his marital difficulties or his parenting problems and so he stopped telling me about them. Instead of a peer, I was a reminder of simpler times. In a tiny village like Tullycleena and living on a remote farm, making new friends wasn’t easy. Whatever distance there was between us, my friend he was and so I took a gulp of Guinness and waited for a lull in the GAA talk. “Listen, there’s something I want to—”
“Oh, Jaysus.” Bullseye slammed his half-empty pint glass on the beer mat. “You’re pregnant.” He snorted a laugh.
“I’m trying to tell you what’s been happening to me.”
“Sorry, sorry,” he said. “You’re right. Go on.”
My ears flushed and I turned my pint glass between my fingers. “Lately, things have been happening.”
“Your voice is getting deeper, you’re growing hair in strange places…” He put his hand on my shoulder and laughed again, then he tickled my chin. “Mind you, you’ve already got hair in strange places. Will you not shave that awful thing off? It puts years on you. You look like you could be my dad.”
“Leave my beard alone, you.” I slapped his hand away. “Things have been disappearing.” I stuck one leg out, then the other, showing him my feet.
“Why are you wearing odd shoes?”
“Because I’m missing one from every pair. Just gone. Gone. No idea where they are. And stuff keep breaking.”
“What sort of stuff?” he asked.
“Stuff. Glasses. Mugs. Picture frames. Plates. All by themselves.” My cheeks were starting to burn. I think the Guinness had loosened my tongue more than I’d realised.
“All by themselves?” He gave me a particular look.
“I know it sounds mad,” I said. “But the other day, in here, I lifted a pint glass and it cracked in my hand.”
“You were too rough with it,” he said.
“I was in me hole,” I said. “I know how to lift a feckin’ pint, I’ve been doing it since I was fourteen.”
He tutted. “Big Tom must have been too rough with it. You know what he’s like. He’s not what one would call delicate.”
“I can hear you.” Big Tom glared over at them from behind the bar. “It took me ages to mop up your pint…”
“There have been accidents at home, too,” I said. “The other morning a cup shattered. I don’t know what’s doing it.”
“A cup with boiling hot tea in it, was it?” Bullseye asked. “Boiling hot tea that found its way into an existing crack and made it worse? Come on now, Lorcan. You’re too old to believe in this sort of stuff. What is it, Ghosts? Aliens? Or did you break the cup with the power of your mind? No, it’s fairies, isn’t it? Fairies sneaking around and smashing up your delf?”
“Funny. Dara blamed it on them too.”
“Who’s Dara?” he asked.
“New fella at the farm. His van broke down and he’s working with me until he can afford to get it fixed. He said fairies are messing with me. Breaking things…”
“Well,” Bullseye said, “he sounds like a feckin’ headcase.”
“He’s not.” I snapped back without meaning to. “He’s decent enough. He has his head in the clouds, is all.”
“Sounds to me like he’s away with the fairies himself.” He finished his drink. “Right, enough of this bollocks, I’ve got to get back up the road before Aine comes home.” He lifted his jacket and headed for the door as Pat Lynch walked in.
Bullseye stood back to let him pass. “Woo, careful now, Pat, or else Lorcan’s fairies will smash your specs!” He wiggled his fingers and laughedall the way out of the pub.
“Ah, it’s yourself.” Pat took off his flat cap and sat at the table. He nodded to Big Tom for his usual. “What was all that about?”
I didn’t have the heart to go through it all again so I sidestepped the question. Pat was another man I’d known my whole life, though he was older than me. He wore small, round spectacles — far smarter than Bullseye’s — had a neat white moustache, and a full head of silvery white hair. A short, stout man with a serious face which changed utterly when he smiled. He had this way of ducking his head down, accentuating his double chin, and grinning like a schoolboy up to all sorts of divilment. I’d always found it charming.
I bought him a pint and we spoke of his concerns for his daughter and her husband. “Sure there’s no work for either of them. They’re barely hanging on by a thread. I think they’re going to have to move back in with me, more’s the pity. I’ll never get a minute to myself again.”
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