Galway Girl

Mid-April, we had three days of lovely weather, so the country bought barbecues, gallons of ice cream, sunglasses, and the beaches were thronged.

I was standing at the top of Eyre Square, a vast mass of people grabbing every spare area of grass. I’d never seen so much white skin, skin gasping for vitamin D. Gone were the days when you might have said,

“’Twas black with people.”

The PC police would be all over your white arse.

A man was standing beside me, said,

“Did you see Britain’s Got Talent?”

I knew him from somewhere and the feeling was that it had not been good.

I answered,

“No.”

He continued with great excitement,

“Father Ray Kelly, sixty-four years old, he fucking blew them away with ‘Everybody Hurts.’”

Father Ray was officiating at a wedding four years ago and he did a storming version of “Hallelujah.” It went viral and everybody knows him.

I tried to hold back on the bitterness leaking over my reply,

“Save me.”

He was not to be stopped, said,

“They’re already saying he’ll be the next Susan Boyle.”

This was so open to a nasty line that I skipped it.

He rolled a cig: papers, pouch tobacco, the works. He did it with fluid expertise, then lit it with a large match, from the kitchen issue box.

He said,

“A fellah like that priest could do more for the Church than bringing the pope over, which will cost us forty million.”

Then he gave me a curious look, said,

“You might want to buy me a drink.”

I gave the look right back, said,

“I don’t think so.”

He gave a sly malicious laugh, said,

“I’m Amy Fadden’s husband.”

He tapped a foot annoyingly as he waited for me to catch up.

Amy Fadden’s daughter was killed by the mayor’s son; I was briefly arrested on suspicion.

I said,

“I’m very sorry for your loss, even sorrier that I didn’t find any justice for your family, but with all due respect I have nothing more we can discuss.”

He sneered,

“With due respect.”

There was something evil in his nature, and I wanted little more than to get the hell away — that, or kick him in the balls.

“Take care,”

I said, shortly.

He let me get about five steps away then near whispered,

“Amy killed him.”

I followed him to Crowe’s bar, the pride of Bohermore.

Ollie lined up the pints and, smart as he is, he knew this was not a drink of celebration. We took a table near the garden and watched the rain lash down, killing the heat wave. The pints settled.

I ventured,

“Lemme guess, you and your wife are not on the best of terms.”

He drained half the pint, left a foam mustache,

Then he sat back, said,

“Aren’t you the clever dick?”

I waited as he sank the remains of the pint, said,

“Another, and a small Paddy.”

Paddy.

That’s whiskey.

Not an Irishman of challenged stature, though the two have been linked on occasion.

I did.

Ollie put them on the table, muttered,

“Thanks would be nice.”

And got a mocking laugh.

“So,”

I said.

“What’s the story?”

He stifled a yawn, not covering his mouth, said,

“Amy hired you, knew you’d be in confrontation with the mayor’s bastard son, and you did just that but, most important, in front of witnesses. Then she killed the young bollix without batting an eye but you — who could have known? — had a fucking alibi.”

Pause.

“With a priest, no less.”

I interjected,

“A nun.”

He was aghast, asked,

“How d’you know a nun?”

I said, with all the sanctity I could muster,

“She is helping me return to the church of my youth.”

This seemed to be more appalling for him to swallow than the murder of children.

I asked,

“What do you think I’m going to do about it? That’s why you’re here, some sort of nasty payback on your wife.”

He smiled like the devil himself was proud of him, said,

“The bitch, she kicked me out of our home, that I worked for, and had the bank stop me using our joint credit card.”

I was on my way, more out of anger than curiosity. I asked,

“I know your wife, she works for the Post Office, but you, your own self, what do you do?”

“I’m between jobs just now.”

I pushed,

“Before, before the between?”

His face took on that angry riled how dare you expression of the fundamentally righteous. He said,

“I don’t have to answer that.”

I gave him my knife smile, said,

“You just did.”

Leaving him, I went to feed the swans.

Sat on the bench across from the long walk where a young man had lain dead for eight months in his apartment in the city that cared.

We had a new cinema that cost eight million. We needed a new cinema? When two hundred people lay on trolleys in the hospital for days due to a bed shortage?

Our gay Indian government leader launched the Yes campaign, the referendum to legalize abortion.

I thought about Amy Fadden.

She’d hired me to find out who killed her daughter, and then planned to frame me for the ensuing murder of her daughter’s killer.

What should I do? Which door to choose?

Revenge

Acceptance

Confrontation

Tell the Guards?

Or do what I did best:

Fuck all.

I could simply let it go.

         M

          A

           Y

            B

             E.