THE MAY SUNSHINE CUT LIKE A BLADE down Dublin’s Moore Street, the fishwives cursed the swarming flies, and Agnes Browne sat by her stall and reflected on the three months that had passed since Redser’s death. Her first Easter as a widow had come and gone. She now collected her weekly pension along with her fuel voucher for two free bags of turf. The children had settled a bit, although Mark seemed to be uneasy, fidgety – ‘a bee up his arse’ her mother would have called it, maybe it was the …
‘Penny for your thoughts,’ a voice cut across her reflection. It was Marion, carrying two mugs of bovril.
‘What?’
‘Your thoughts, a penny for them … you were miles away.’
‘Yeh … Mark!’
‘What about him?’
‘He’s not himself.’
‘Is he sick? Has he a temperature?’
‘Ah no, he’s as healthy as a pup. No, it’s somethin’ else.’
‘What?’
‘I don’t know, I’m tellin’ yeh. If I knew I wouldn’t be worried, would I? Look grab yer woman, she’s lookin’ at your bananas!’
‘Here, hold me mug.’ Marion hurried over to her stall where a ‘lady’ was indeed examining Marion’s wares.
‘Can I help you, love?’
‘Just looking, thanks.’
‘Oh they love that, they do.’
The woman looked at Marion who was barely visible on the other side of the stall.
‘I beg your pardon?’ she asked.
‘Bananas, they love it when you look at them.’
The woman held the stare, not knowing how to answer Marion’s statement. She blinked and went back to the bananas. She picked up a bunch of six, turned them this way and that, and then replaced them.
‘They look a bit pale,’ she remarked.
‘Yeh,’ answered Marion. ‘Ah they’re probably dizzy, they had a rough crossing from Jamaica.’
The woman stared again at Marion, then moved on awkwardly. Marion scurried back to Agnes and took her bovril back.
‘You do scare them off!’ said Agnes.
‘Ah me arse! Either she wants bananas or she doesn’t, I’m not going to play twenty bleedin’ questions! She was pokin’ them and squeezin’ them – they’re bananas not mickeys, they don’t get any better if you squeeze them!’
The two woman erupted in laughter.
‘Ah Marion, you’re a tonic!’
They both sipped their bovril and watched the passing shoppers. Marion turned to Agnes and was about to speak, but stopped, as if she was trying to find the words.
Agnes waited. ‘What is it?’ she blurted out finally.
‘What do you mean?’ Marion asked innocently.
‘What were you goin’ to say?’
‘Nothin’.’
‘Yeh were, Marion, now what was it?’
Marion prepared to speak and Agnes waited. ‘Do you miss it?’ Marion asked finally.
‘What? Miss what?’
‘Ah yeh know … “It”!’
‘The quare thing?’
‘Yeh, the quare thing!’
Agnes thought for a moment, and took a sip of bovril. ‘Nah.’
‘Are yeh serious, not even a little bit?’
‘Nope, not even a teeny bit … What’s t’bleedin’ miss? The smell of chips and Guinness being breathed all over yeh … his chin like bleedin’ sandpaper scrapin’ off’a yer shoulder and neck … and then the wait and the worry … am I gone again?’
‘But makin’ love, Aggie?’
‘Love, me arse! Makin’ babies, makin’ more worries, makin’ shitty nappies … makin’ him happy!’
‘And you, makin’ you happy too. You can’t say you never enjoyed it?’
‘Marion, will you get a grip! Enjoy what?’
‘You know … the organism!’
There was a moment’s silence in deference to the magical, modern-day word. Agnes sipped her bovril, and Marion glanced around sheepishly as if she had just spoken a national secret!
‘I never done one,’ said Agnes defiantly. ‘I don’t think they exist.’
‘They do, I swear, Aggie. I done two!’
‘What! When?’
‘One two weeks after your Redser’s funeral, on a Friday … and one last August!’
‘Are you sure they were organisms?’
‘Positive!’
Aggie sipped her bovril again, and Marion just sat glowing with the memory of her last statement.
‘What were they like?’
‘Massive, brilliant!’
‘Ah be pacific, ascribe it!’
Marion pulled the crate she was using as a seat closer to Agnes. Agnes reached into her apron pocket and pulled out a pack of Players Navy Cut, and they both lit up. Marion took a drag, removed a piece of tobacco from her tongue with a spit, and slowly exhaled. Agnes waited expectantly.
‘Well, first I didn’t know what was goin’ on! He was really drunk so it was takin’ him longer than usual. He was bouncin’ away, up and down, up and down …’
‘I know how that bit goes, get to the point,’ Agnes interrupted impatiently.
‘Oh right! Well, I was thinkin’ to meself, if this fella doesn’t evacuate soon, he’ll fall asleep! Next thing, I had this feelin’ … a wave came over me … like gettin’ ten early marks at the bingo and you know somethin’ good is comin’! A shiver ran through me body, me hips started jerkin’ all on their own. I closed me eyes and it was like an explosion. I could see colours burstin’ in me mind … like someone set off fireworks! Without me tellin’ it to, me mouth let out a yelp. He stopped and said: “Sorry, I didn’t mean to hurt yeh.” I could hardly speak. “Keep goin’,” I kinda whispered, but he just rolled over and said: “Ah, you’re all right, I wasn’t in the humour anyway.” He was asleep in minutes. I just lay there, and I don’t know why, but after a while I started to cry … I wasn’t sad or nothin’, I just cried … gas, isn’t it? That was it! What do yeh think?’
Agnes sat open-mouthed. Marion took another drag and again glanced around to be sure nobody was within earshot. Agnes was deep in thought.
‘Was that the first one or the second one?’ she asked finally.
‘Both … They were nearly the same, except on the second one I didn’t cry!’
‘Did yeh tell him about them?’
‘No way, are yeh kiddin’? He’d say I had worms or somethin’. Anyway, tell him and it would be all over the docks in no time!’
‘Yeh, you’re right. How long did they last?’
‘Just a couple of seconds … over in a flash!’
‘Jaysus, I could have had one, Marion, and not noticed it if they’re that quick.’
‘Nah, Aggie, believe you me, if you had one you’d notice it, for sure! Here, I’m off!’
Marion took the two mugs and went back to her stall. Within seconds her familiar cry could be heard all down Moore Street: ‘Ten pee a pound a’da hard tomatoes.’ Agnes sat and pondered Marion’s story and the enthusiasm with which she had told it. Just before standing up to add her sales cry to the Moore Street melody, Agnes’s thoughts were: Well, fuck you, Redser Browne, leavin’ me with seven orphans and not an organism to show for it.