Beatlebone (10 page)
Authors: Kevin Barry
J
OHN
Actually you're tripping me the fuck out here, love.
Wind-rasp; sea-sigh.
And Sue runs lightly a thumbnail across his lips.
J
OHN
I said would you please mind fucking the fuck off, love?
But she leans in closer still and aims a lover's breath to the side of his neckâbreath-of-seaâand she smells of chamomile, green youth, base cocaine.
J
OE
Have in, Sue.
F
RANK
Have in, John.
J
OE
Where did shy ever get you, John-kid? Fuck the little witch.
She comes closer again. She makes to kiss Johnâthe un-shy poke of her tongue emergesâbut John risesâJohn's upâand he paces fast on the Amethyst boards.
J
OHN
I said fuck off!
But Sue follows him, walking swankily, with her palms laid on her tiny hips, all lady-likeâLady Godiva, a swagger and swayâbut it's in mockery of him.
J
OHN
I said behave and back the fuck off, witch!
S
UE
Say you don't want to do me, John.
J
OHN
Oh come on, love! I could be your fucking dad!
S
UE
What are you scared of?
J
OHN
Ten types of fucking gonorrhoea!
J
OE
Leave him be and sit for now, Sue.
Sue pouts and blows a raspberry taunt; she retreats and sits; her neat chin juts saucily; Lady Godiva.
J
OE
I think we need to remember that John suffers. Let's remember that he's a great man is John. Let's not forget. He's made a big difference has John. With his little TV appearances. With his little wafty speeches and his fucking chants andâ¦
John shakes his head and smiles. He drifts to the corner of the room where the candle burns; he looks at the flame and on the saucer of delft the hardening beads of waxâthere is a thumbprint in the wax.
J
OHN
Here we fucking go.
John walks back to the circle and sits again; he smilesâit's as though he can take it.
J
OE
â¦his hatred for his own self and all that he's made of because he's nothing now, not anymore he's not, he's just a fucking richman wormâ¦
Joe closes his eyes to make the words: Joe Director is charismatic, hog-fat, dark-as-fuck.
J
OE
â¦a spawky fucking Irish peasant worm with his new money and his faggot hands andâ¦
J
OHN
Oh fuck off!
S
UE
We're getting closer.
J
OE
â¦his fear, all the fear he's got inâ¦
J
OHN
Oh fuck off you fat fucking goon!
F
RANK
Truth is cruel, John.
J
OE
Is that a little colour in your cheeks, John?
J
OHN
You don't fucking know me!
John rises again and he moves towards Joe Director, and now Frank lets loose a Scream, and now Sue thumps the floor with her palms, and Screams.
J
OHN
You don't know the first fucking thing about me! I said not the first thing! You want to remember I've been down this road many fucking times. I've spent months going at myself and bloody hard and with the fucking best of them. I've been harder on myself than anyone else could ever fucking be! I've sat with Dr. Janov him fucking self. He was my friend! In Californiaâ¦
Sue stretches the word, a mockery of himâ
S
UE
Cali-fo-nee-yah!
J
OHN
And you can fuck off and all with your daft fucking tits and your daft elfy fucking eyes!
J
OE
Have a go, Frank.
Now Frank risesâFrank's upâand he comes close to John; they are face-to-face, chest-to-chest.
J
OHN
Oh back off, child!
J
OE
Go, Frank.
The boy shimmers with the threat of violence.
F
RANK
You're just a whinging fucking bitch!
S
UE
Tell him, Frank!
J
OE
Be a fucking man, John! Stand up!
John pushes Frank hard at the chest and he screeches at the boy and Frank stumbles back, and now he retreats, and sits again; he smiles.
John breathes hardâwith his hands on his hipsâand he looks at them.
The way they stare back at him, smugly, expectant, amused: a family of three.
Outside, the waves' slow boom and collapse.
Something gives.
J
OHN
Do you really want to know what I am? Do you? Well I'll tell you exactly what I fucking am. I'm fucking anxiety. And I'm fucking lust. And I'm a fucking booze hound and I'm a fucking dope fiend or I was and I'm a fucking sad Scouse sentimental bastard and I'm the most competitive prick on the face of the planet actually and I'm a jealous greedy black-hearted English cunt full of bitterness and fucking poison and fucking rage and I'm the sweetest fucking angel, too, while we're fucking here and while we're fucking at it or at least sometimes I am and that is who I fucking am and that is what I fucking am and yeah I miss me dead fucking mam and yeah I want to piss on me dead fucking dad's fucking bones coz he didn't fuck her enough and he didn't make her fucking happy and you know what that makes me?
A delighted silenceâthree breaths are held.
J
OHN
It makes me fucking special fucking no-how!
J
OE
Exceptional, John.
J
OHN
Me dead fucking dad? I tell you now I want to go down to fucking Brighton or wherever that twat's laid to rotâ¦
J
OE
Oh this is very nice.
J
OHN
â¦and I want to scrape his peasant fucking eyes or what's left of 'em from the sockets of his skeleton head and tear his fucking bones apart with me fucking teeth or what's left of his fucking bonesâ¦
J
OE
I'd suggest more of this, John. Plenty more.
J
OHN
â¦and yeah, you're right, Joe, I can't get over what I've fucking come from and Iâ¦
J
OE
Would you like to burn off some base, John?
J
OHN
No, I fucking wouldn't coz I don't do that no more and I don't do fucking junk neither and I don't hardly drink neither! Coz I'm a good little boy who bakes the bread and has a fag and minds the kid and minds his business and minds his own fucking yard.
J
OE
Do you get sour thoughts often, John?
John goes to the windowâ
He leans out and tries to suck all the air from the night.
He feels a breath on his neck but it cannot be.
He opens his mouth to Scream but he cannot.
He turns back to the circle: a family of three.
Sue turns her hands to display on the insides of her wrists the raw scars and the welts there.
Frank Screams.
John is thinking: What the fuck is this exactly some suicide fucking death cult fucking caper?
And Sue Screams so hard she brings a green bile up.
J
OE
That's a useful effort is that, Sue.
The Barnsley or the Blackburn of him; the Lancaster busman of him; and Sue risesâSue's upâand she goes to the window and spits all the bile and spew away.
The birds outside fall silent as the night thickens.
Sue returns to the circle. She is placid again. John watches her carefully as she sits down on the boards.
Now John returns to the circle and sits, too.
He is worn, pale, drawn, opened.
J
OE
Let's talk some more about your mam, John.
J
OHN
Oh come on. I mean, please. I'm thirty-seven years old. I'm fully fucking grown. Do I really need to yodel on about me dead fucking mam and me dead fucking dad all the time? Is it not enough that I live back there half the time? Back in nineteen thirty what-fucking-ever? Can I not just get on with my life now?
A sally of breeze comes through the room; the flame of the candle wavers and rights again.
Joe Director speaks but softlyâ
J
OE
Why don't you tell something about them, John?
J
OHN
Oh, I see. We've moved on to the tender bit, have we?
J
OE
Well why not?
Joe Director works the quietness that settles on the room.
He holds John's gaze and loads trust on the line that runs between themâthe weight takes and holds.
J
OE
What's to be afraid of, John?
Frank's head falls onto Sue's shoulder and with her fingertips she touches his face and he shudders.
S
UE
Oh come on, John.
F
RANK
Tell us something, John.
The silence holds for a slow beat; thenâ
J
OHN
Are you lot for fucking real?
J
OE
You know that we are. Come on, John.
J
OHN
Oh fuck off.
J
OE
Come on.
J
OHN
You're really serious?
J
OE
Come on.
Something gives; the room lightens; John deflates.
J
OHN
What kind of fucking thing?
J
OE
First thing comes to mind.
J
OHN
About them?
J
OE
Yes.
J
OHN
I don't fucking know.
J
OE
Anything? First thing?
J
OHN
They were tiny.
J
OE
Oh?
And John is in the drag of the past.
J
OHN
He must have been what? Five foot bloody three or something. Coz he'd worn leg braces as a kid. He was a regular fucking gimp arse. Fucking Freddie. And she was smaller again.
J
OE
A neat little pair. Where's it they meet?
J
OHN
This I knowâ¦It was Sefton Park.
J
OE
A roll in the bushes?
J
OHN
I don't fucking know, do I? I mean whatever you weren't supposed to do, that's what she'd go and doâ¦They were excitable little people, my mam and dad.
J
OE
Excitable how?
J
OHN
They'd get carried away on a notion. They'd make lots of fucking plans. They were daft bloody schemers.
J
OE
Kind of plans?
J
OHN
They were going to open a pub together. Or was it a café? There'd be music and dancing and all sorts. It would go on all night. Some kind of bloody cabaret was the notion.
J
OE
Tell about him.
J
OHN
He's from Irish. He's got left in the Bluecoats like a fucking orphan. I could do you the violin.
J
OE
Why's it his mark's on you still?
J
OHN
How should I know?
J
OE
Why's it both their marks on?
J
OHN
How should I fucking know? Coz they played the fucking banjo?
J
OE
The fuckingâ¦
J
OHN
Banjo. I know! The pair of 'em played fucking banjos.
Joe Bloody hell. And did they sing?
J
OHN
She'd do her Vera Lynn. He'd do his Al Jolson.
The vaudeville halls; the North-of-England. The Lancashire-Irish. The pug faces. The waft of sick and ale. The fagsmoke. The sawdust. The smell of piss and chips.
J
OE
What happened to them?
J
OHN
I don't know. Whatever it is that happens to people.
J
OE
She fucked around on him?
J
OHN
You've been reading the nasty papers, Joe. Tinpot guru sat on Achill Island with his
Daily Mirror
and his bag of shite cocaine cut with fucking rat poison.
J
OE
She's fucked around on him, John?
J
OHN
Oh I don't fucking know, do I? And I mean who cares? I mean everybody's fucked everybody else by now, haven't they? I mean it's 1978!
J
OE
Was he jealous of her?
J
OHN
I don't fucking know. He'd went away, hadn't he?
J
OE
He'd went where?
J
OHN
He'd went to sea. Where else do they bloody go? Merchant fucking seaman.