Hand in the Fire

Nobody moved. Each one of us trying to roll back what happened. But you might as well try and turn history into reverse. Soldiers taking crimes out from underneath their pillows and carrying them off to secret locations. Bullets popping out of people’s heads. Dead people jumping back to life and walking away backwards.

We were parked right on the verge of the quay. Any further forward and we would have ended up in the water. They would be lifting us out with a crane in the morning, out from among the floating condoms and beer cans.

‘You’ve got to be able to walk away,’ he said. ‘Big mistake to retrace your steps.’

‘Did your mother tell you that?’

She stared at him, extracting a forecast from his words, as though he had become a stranger to her.

We sat there, looking out at the black water of the port, the dark eyes of deep water staring back at us. We heard the sound of small waves going up and down the granite steps. We waited for the future to come, wondering if he was going to drive over the edge. We might as well have gone underwater as it was, driving away along the floor of the sea, through fields of brown seaweed, with mullet and luminous prawns swimming across the windscreen before us. Speeding through a silent landscape of rocks and barnacles and anchors and suspended lobster pots. I had the feeling that we were only waiting for the electrician to come and join us, limping or crawling up to the car, getting in beside me and putting his seat belt on. Dark worms of blood going in and out of his nostrils. Breathing clogging up in his chest. We would never get rid of him now, I thought. I imagined him speaking calmly, with moisture in his voice, getting ready for this long underwater journey that we were about to embark on together. ‘I was only having the craic,’ he would say, because he really wanted to be friends and keep the conversation going.

The engine started up again. I can remember thinking that he was going in the wrong direction, reversing instead of going forward. He drove in a rage once more, this time parking outside her place, rushing us away inside, into her basement apartment.

‘Stay there and don’t move,’ he said.

Then he disappeared again. We heard him walking away. Where to, we had no idea. We stood looking at each other. After a moment, her hospitality returned and she asked me to sit down.

‘I’m sorry,’ she said.

I didn’t know what to say to that.

‘I’ve never seen him do anything like this before,’ she said, more to herself.

To calm things down she started making tea. Then she put on some music. Balkan wedding music, of all things. She was trying to make me feel at home, but the music was so familiar that I was overwhelmed by homesickness and horror simultaneously.

I was instantly reminded of my sister’s wedding, the wedding that never took place because of the car accident on the way. The violence in the street had brought back everything I had been trying to leave behind. Now the music was returning me to the same fatal scene in which my parents had died, repatriating me to the country I had just escaped from. But how could I explain that to her? In any case, neither of us were really listening to the music, only staring at the floor, silently going over what had just happened and wondering what was laid out before us.

She said it was probably best for me to spend the night there and prepared a place for me to sleep on the sofa.

When Kevin finally returned, he looked at the two of us with great suspicion, as though we had been talking about him all this time.

‘What’s that music?’ he asked.

‘Where the fuck were you?’ she demanded.

It took him a while to answer. He went to the fridge first and took out a beer, then began to open it with his teeth, just to annoy her, it seemed, because she flinched and said, ‘Jesus, will you get an opener, Kevin.’ Then he took a long drink before he finally spoke.

‘The less you know, the better,’ he said.

‘I want to know what’s happened to that man,’ she asked.

‘He’s outside, waiting for you,’ he said to me.

‘Christ,’ she said.

‘Only joking,’ he laughed. ‘He’s alive and well. In the best of health, as a matter of fact.’

She turned and disappeared into the bedroom. He went in after her and they continued arguing, occasionally shouting at each other, sometimes mentioning my name.

I hated being involved in all this and felt like slipping out, making a run for it. I imagined the police arriving any minute. I even thought of leaving the money that he had given me to start the work.

They were arguing for a long while. At times they went silent, but then she raised her voice once more, calling him a thug and telling him not to touch her.

‘It’s the pissing,’ I heard him say to her. ‘That’s what’s getting to you, isn’t it?’

‘You don’t fucking care, do you?’

‘Come on, Helen. Admit it. You’re only worked up because I did a wee-wee on your car, isn’t that so?’

‘Wake up, Kevin,’ she said. ‘Think of what you have done. Assault, that’s what they will call it. You have just put your entire career in jeopardy and you think it’s funny.’

He paused. He seemed to be reflecting on what she had said.

‘Look, Helen,’ he said, finally, ‘I’m sorry for doing a wee-wee on your car.’

‘Asshole,’ she shouted.

Then he came out grinning while she slammed the door behind him. I suppose you could say it was a victory for him, sort of. Even though he got kicked out of the bedroom by his girlfriend, he was still able to claim that he had won. The world was falling apart around him, but he was happy holding on to the last laugh. He didn’t say anything more to me, just sat down in an armchair and dozed off, buried in sleep with a smile spreading across his face.

6 (#ulink_acbde521-95c9-5173-9548-943266de2502)

Next morning he stood above me with the sun behind him, ready to leave. He had a glass of water in his hand, which he drank down and put on the table with a clack, the equivalent of saying, ‘Come on, let’s go.’ There was no looking back. No retracing steps. No time to reflect on what had gone by.

‘Mental, last night,’ he said.

I couldn’t make out why he was not more concerned. But this was a new day and it was time to put everything behind us. Within minutes I was sitting in his car, speeding over to his mother’s house.

‘Listen, Vid. What happened last night – don’t give it another thought.’

My reading was that these things never go away.

‘I work with them,’ I said. ‘They know me, those guys.’

‘He’s not dead,’ he said with great confidence. ‘There’s nothing to worry about.’

‘What if they go to the police?’

‘You’ve done nothing against the law, Vid.’

‘Yes. But what about you?’

‘Look. This is important,’ he said, pulling in to the side of the road for a moment. ‘You cannot mention my name. I can’t be dragged into this.’

He had done me a favour and now it was my turn to return the favour, to put my hand in the fire for him.

‘You’re doing a job at my mother’s house, that’s all you have to say. If they come looking for information, you call me. Say nothing. They cannot force you to answer any questions until you have your solicitor present. You understand that?’

He drove on with the windows open and his elbow out, coaching me, assuring me that everything would be fine.