Eat Your Heart Out (8 page)

And there she was. Kate. My beautiful Kate.

If ye had told me right then and there that this woulda been the girl to change my life, I woulda believed ya. People are always sayin', No way would I'da known if someone told me before. But I woulda believed you immediately. Pretty much everything in this story I woulda believed if you'd told it all out to me before like I'm here telling you.

Standing at that bar, she looked like nobody I ever seen before. She did not look like a regular Belfast bird, no way. She had this real natural gorgeousness to her and, no offence, but the birds aren't like that here.

She had this white skin, skin that was so pale you could almost see the blue of her veins under it. It was real delicate, but she had this happy glow to her, and so her skin shone a nice pink in her cheeks. And she had this short hairstyle. Her hair was jet black, and against her white skin she looked like some wood angel mixed with Snow White. Really special.

But the most prettiest part of her was her eyes. No question, like. Her eyes were unreal, so they were. They were violet. Never in my life had I ever seen someone with violet eyes before. I mean, fuck me!

Actually, she said, “'Bout ye?” twice because I was stuck staring at her for so long.

“'Bout ye?”

“Aye, Guinness?” I said that with this real faggot voice. I was so stunned and nervous talking to her that I lost my own voice for a minute. Luckily, I recovered fast. I like to pride myself on recoverin' fast.

“Got ya.”

“You been working here long?” I'm a proper faggot. Who asks somethin' like that?

“Nah, just a few weeks, like. You come here a lot?” she asked, turning around, smiling.

“Now and again. What're ya called, darlin'?”

“Kate.” Then she smiled again. Kate. That was the most perfect name.

“I'm Sean.”

“Ah, right then. Well, here's your Guinness.”

I knew the conversation might be done just then if I left with my Guinness and went back to my dumb mates, so I needed to find a way to keep talking to her. I had to get to know her, or at least smell her hair or somethin', anythin'. Really, I woulda been chuffed with anythin'.

“I'm gonna sit here for a bit and keep yourself company. My mates are talking about the match and I can't stand it a second longer,” I told her.

“You don't like football?”

“Now and again, but it's not my favourite topic, like.” And then I probably smiled at her like a ball bag. I was lying through my teeth too. I love football and I love talking about it, probably more than all else. But I wanted to impress her so I acted different than I really was.

“Not your typical man then, are ya?”

She smiled at me. I think she seen me for the first ever time then. She really took notice of me then, so she did.

“I'm the same. I think there's no point in being like anybody else.”

She was telling the truth there. She was not like anybody else. She was honest and beautiful and smart and way too good for me. Sad part was that I was more like everyone else than she knew, even than I really knew. Maybe things woulda been okay if I was my own man.

“So what are you like then, Kate?”

She laughed. She had this real perfect laugh. Big, and it vibrated through any space around her. She truly loved laughing, like.

“Sicka working here, I'll tell you.”

“Why's that?”

“Sicka Belfast, really. I want to travel, but I'm skint so I'm working here for the time bein'. How 'bout yourself? What's the craic with you, like?”

“Da's a coalminer. I work with him.”

“How old are ye? You look 'bout my age.”

“Twenty-three. Yourself?”

“Just about to turn twenty-one. You got a young face.”

“I'll take that as a compliment.”

Then she smiled again.

I felt elated. This gorgeous bird was complimenting me, the woman of my dreams thought I was not half bad. I was over the moon! Over the bloody moon!

I heard my mate Couch calling me. He always had horrible timing, God rest his soul.

“C'mon, faggot! This waitress is shite.”

My mates all had their jackets on, and they were all well pissed. It was pretty much my time to exit unless I wanted Kate to think I kept company with dozy fucken' muppets, which was the God's honest, but I didn't want her knowin' that, like.

When I turned back to her she was laughing her beautiful laugh, but I could tell she was a little disappointed the conversation was over. Picture how your man felt! I was gutted! I had to leave this perfect angel for my ball-bag, wanker, faggot, muppet mates.

“Well, looks like you've gotta go,” she said to me.

But I knew I couldn't be a dozy cunt myself.

“Listen, would ye have dinner with me?”

She gave me her number. She had real nice handwriting too. Like a princess or something would.

“Don't go being like all those other lads and not calling me for a few days, leavin' me high and dry waiting by the phone. Call me tomorrow. And if ye don't call me, I'll cut yer wee balls off with a rusty knife the next time I see ye in this bar.”

Then she winked at me.

And right then, I knew it. I loved her.

A lot of
things have changed since then. Not like I don't love her anymore, that's not changed. That's not ever gonna change, not for me. But it was a real dirty time in Belfast then, “The Troubles.”

I always thought calling it “The Troubles” was a kind of laugh, like. We were trying to sugarcoat how fucking horrible it was then, so we were. Oh, just “The Troubles.” No. The “fucken'-cunt-shits” would be more like it. Or the “fucken' worst time in the history of Belfast” would be even more like it. Or “literal fucken'-cunt-shits Hell on Earth” would be even more-more like it.

But things are well different there now. At least they are from where I'm lookin' at it. I mean, we've got a fucken' opera house there now. Why the people of Belfast would wanna listen to someone else's tragedies is well beyond me, but that's what I'm sayin' to ye.

It ain't so tragic now. “The Troubles” are done now. There are Catholic areas, Hun areas still. There is still some distance separating us, ya know what I mean. Since the talks things have settled down but not ended. Never ended. But look, I mean, the Reverend Ian Paisley, that spectacular arsehole, he even said that we were on the way to peace, and all that blah, blah, blah.

And from up here, I got to be honest, he has a point. It looks better. I mean, me wee sister couldn't even go into downtown Belfast around the time I met Kate, and now, you got young girls running all over, not a care in the world. The luxury, like. We didn't have parks. We didn't have a post office.

It seems crazy now, it all seems so fucken' crazy now, but my actions, the actions of every involved man, they made sense in context.

I was fifteen when I joined the
IRA
. I was just a wee boy, but in my mind, I was a man. We all thought we were men then. The people that recruited us, they knew that and they took advantage of that.

Ah, nah, fuck what I just said. We weren't recruited, not really. I wanted to be a part of it. I wanted to fight for my people. I wanted to help the Catholics, and I wanted everyone who said, “For God and Ulster” to eat shit and die because they didn't have no business with God. That's how ye feel after ya seen yer big brother die at the hands of them. Truth is, my big brother died all over me.

So ya got to remember what it was like in 1971. There were people, my people, being killed every godforsaken day, for as long as I could remember, and that was before my brother, James. When I met Kate, they were lockin' us up for no reason other than they could, arrest without trial, Bloody Sunday was yet to come, and things were getting worse and were about to keep getting worse for Catholics. We were getting fucked up the arse, hard, left, right, centre. James had died for nothing because nothing was changing. Petrol bombs under cars, firebombs in homes, shootings, rubber bullets, real bullets, 3:00
AM
searches, hurtin' babies and raping women, beatings, killings, death. My people. Dead everywhere I looked.

Just imagine how that feels. Nah, you can't. If it ain't happened to you, you can't, and I shouldn't have asked you to because you can't.

But if James hadn't been shot three times in his head by useless fucken' cunt Hun thugs for no reason other than bein' Catholic, I don't think I woulda been involved. I know I wouldnta been. But after somethin' like that happens to you, after you see yer ma with that kind of pain, you see yer da turn away from God, after you see yer big brother in a coffin, well, a lot of your brain, a lot of the part that thinks, it shuts right down. Yer guts are sucked right outta ya and replaced by this angry, violent feelin', this feelin' like nothing matters except gettin' them back. Except tryin' to change things. Except doin' to them what they done to you. Thus buryin' that sufferin' in yerself.

As far as I was concerned, hearts only beat in Catholics. God only spoke to Catholics. Only Catholic mas cried. It was us versus them. So killing a Prod? Some poor Prod fuck losing his big brother at my hands? Thinking about a Prod as a person? It doesn't even enter your fucken' head.

When I signed up I was proud. I was proud that I was a soldier for my side. And I think if I had it to do all again, I probably woulda. I don't see how I couldn't have.

Unless I knew about Kate. If I had known about Kate beforehand, nah. No fucken' way. Even if they had still took James, no fucken' way, I never woulda.

Because ya know that part of you I said that shuts down forever? The thinking part? Well, I felt that comin' back with Kate. I felt that comin' back a little durin' the short time we got ta spend together. It scared me shiteless, like, but it came back wit' her.

So, yeah, had I known about her, nah, I woulda avoided it much as I could.

But this is a love story.

I called her
up the very next day. And not jus' because she told me too, I was dyin' to, like. I had to do everythin' in my power to not call her again and again and again all night 'til she picked up. I waited 'til probably half noon that day and I rang her. I'd be lyin' to ye if I said I wasn't a bit pissed, but in my opinion, there's nothing wrong with a few for good luck.

When she picked up, my heart skipped near eighty-three beats.

“Hullo?” She sounded even lovelier on the phone than I had remembered.

“Ye, hullo. Alrigh', Kate? It's Sean.”

“Oh, Sean. Ye called. Good thing fer you. I was just sharpenin' me knife here.”

That's one thing I really loved about her, she was mad and I loved it, all of it. Because all people are mad and it takes a real brave one to be mad and honest 'bout it.

“Wha?”

“I'm only foolin' with ye! What's the craic?”

“Nuttin, like. What's the craic with ye?”

“Juss getting ready for work.”

“When are ye done tonight?”

“Around nine, I'm leaving early actually, me mate is playin' a show. It's just a wee small set.”

“Oh, nice one.”

“You wanna come with me?”

I remember thinking then that this was not how I had planned things. I was supposed to be asking her, not the other way 'round. But I'm not such a dozy cunt that I didn't see a good openin' and take it. I really admired that she had more balls than me.

“Yeah, I'd love to, like. I'll pick you up when yer done?”

“Say 8:45. I got to put me face on before seein' ya.”

“Yer face is perfect just how it is.”

I could hear her go silent on the other side of the conversation. I know this is a crazy thing to say, but I could feel her smiling all the way through the phone.

“Okay, well . . . see ya tonight.”

“I can'y wait. Bye, now.”

“Bye, Sean.”

I waited until she hung up before I hung up the phone. And when I did, I could feel meself gettin' the nervous sweats. It was only seven hours 'til I saw her, and this date had to go perfectly or else I'd be cursin' myself forever, like.

Ever since I'd met her I felt the feelin' in my stomach that I used to get as a wee boy before anything bad had happened. When I was running down a hill at full speed that was too steep for me and I knew I would fall flat on me arse, and fall hard, any second, but I was laughing the whole way down.

When I picked
her up outside the bar after work, she looked even better than I remembered. She had on this lovely red dress and it matched the red in her cheeks. She wasn't wearin' no makeup, but believe me, she didn't need it. Her eyes looked like beautiful flowers on her face.

“You look gorgeous, so ya do,” I told her as soon as I saw her.

“Ye aren't so bad yourself.”

I smiled and then I took out a cigarette. I offered her one, but she said that nah, she was too clean for that stuff.

“The bar is just a wee dander that way,” she said.

Then she started walking fast along the Falls, and I hurried to keep up. I kept me eye out for whoever might recognize me.

“So how was yer day, gorgeous?” I asked her after avoiding the eyes of a few mates across the road.

“Shite, really. I hate that job. But it's lookin' up now. How's you?”

“I'm grand. Spent my day thinking about you, really.”

“Are ya this nice to all the girls?”

“Nah, only when they are as lovely as you.”

Then she hit me on the shoulder, like she was pretending to be mad at me, but the hit had some bite behind it, let me tell ya.

“Only slagging!”

After that, conversation just flowed so naturally that I didn't even have to think before talking to her. Words just came out and I was being my total best self, and she thought I was interesting and funny and smart. It was just so easy, like.