THE OTHER HALF

OF EVERYTHING

He woke in a tiny bed-sit, the picture of his son's face falling

away from his eyes like a hologram of emotion drifting into the

filthy walls. In a state of confusion he clambered into his clothes

and took the three flights of stairs, standing on the cat that

scared him and jolted him closer to the front door.  The fear of

what that dream of his son might mean drifted through his

mind. 

The pub was quiet for a change the drunks and junkies were

asleep or still locked up in the cells after the raid.

He ran to the end of the street where the kebab van parks

and sat on the wall awaiting the girl to exit the phone booth. For

fucks sake hurry up he told her silently, my motives losing

momentum.  He turned looked up the main road and watched

the creeds of the world clamber along, among them the lost and

the lonely released into the community, the mad one's the real

people.

An old lady with a white painted face shoved a shopping trolley

along the middle of the road the traffic swerving to miss her. Elvis

in a sequined coat (the mad one) posing for a shout singing, you

aren’t nothing but a hound dog to the street.

A man in a long black coat who never spoke to anyone walked by

with a scrunched up ball of paper in his hand wiping crayons

taken from his breast pocket across the page.

He met him once in the Irish cafe and like a tourist he bought him

a cup of tea and asked could he have a look.

Without a sound and half a smile he handed him his sketchpad

while another appeared instantly from within his coat and he

began drawing the scene outside.

He watched him draw half a man, half a car and half a street like

the aftermath of a blitz. The other ones, with crayons he said,

and he took the ball of paper from his pocket and rolled it across

to him on the artificial marble Formica topped table. As he

unfolded the ball of paper Monet’s, water Lillie’s, Van Gogh’s trees

and Vermeer's light filled his eyes, he looked at him and saw in

his eyes the other half of everything.

He rushed past the girl and shoved the coins in the slot his heart

beating wildly like electronic codes gathering in his head, a dead

tone. He took the rejected coins and shoved them home again

and again only to hear the same dead tone ringing like a

thumping headache, she must have changed the number, he

thought returning to the little room. Feeling caged like an animal

in the tiny bed-sit trying so hard to concentrate on a book that it

only brought confusion. Unable to erase the sight of the picture of

his son appearing like that and the worrying thoughts attached to

it. Your conscience is the prison of the mind, no matter how hard

you try you just can't out run it, Oh how he wished at that

moment that he was one of the dispossessed shuffling through

life, oblivious of any moral obligation.

He thought of his father trying to out run his bastard past, each

one of us six children born in a different town and staying no

longer than a year in each town. North Belfast during the 60s-

70s being the longest we stayed anywhere it only struck him that

it was probably one of the safest places in the world for him,

what past would want to find you in Belfast during the nightmare

of the troubles.

When he gave up running from his past a secret family

appeared after thirty-one years of marriage to my mother and

showered down on us like emotional shrapnel, sending the family

to the four winds to lick they're wounds. Killing his father and

devastating his mother with three strokes. He always swore he

would never be like him and here he was in a fucked up town in

England while everything was across the Irish Sea.  He discarded

the book with a vengeance into the corner of the room took his

coat from the only chair and left the still madness of the room

and joined the frantic streets. It was warm summer's evening,

which didn't help much as the town's grim sights clashed with the

elements and his void. He called at the Asian shop and purchased

a bottle of overpriced wine (uncorked), without a care for paying

over the odds, anything to suppress his inner lament and to

awaken his mind to simpler things. He walked south of the town

intent on not opening the wine until he reached his destination.

Beneath a filthy old railway bridge he uncorked the wine and took

a deep swig while in his mind he told the roaring train thundering

overhead to fuck off. He passed the roundabout where the cars

waited impatiently for their little piece of space in a mad hurry to

get nowhere.

Dusk fell on reaching his destination, his space by the river, he

went there often to clear his head of the modern filth. He sat by

the rivers edge smoking and chugging the wine, a warm slight

breeze blew with the river flow creating short sharp waves that

gleamed with the red dye injected sky.

A treat for his eyes after the usual week of air-conditioned

factories, traffic jams and everywhere the sight of built up Grey

areas filled with drunks, junkies, and perverts clambering the

streets in search of some temporary nirvana. That vexed feeling

came fleeting back at the sight of the riverboat pumping along

Unnaturally like filth on the river, it's cheap coloured lights

flashing and cutting the reflection of the line of trees from the far

bank like a chainsaw. Idling towards the boat were a train of

swans at point was a beautiful white bird followed by four black

cygnets, guarding the rear was the majestic male. Pleasantly they

blended with the scenery, belonging.

The bright lights of the boats exterior and the lights within

clashed creating silhouette shapes from within that pranced

around out of sync with the nightclub thumping beats. Mans

celebration driving like a nightmare on the surpassing river.

He recalled a night he was on board that very boat, The Princess,

a cruise or so he thought and pleasure dreamed. One of the

girls in work arranged the trip. In anticipation he pictured the

scene, relaxing on the starboard bow with a beer mellowing with

the sights and the natural flow of nature passing by. Most of the

people he worked with were assholes their form of chilling out

after work was glued to the box in the corner that pumped

garbage into their minute recesses.

He's an odd-ball, they said because he couldn't make a comment

on the latest goings on in the soap operas or who scored the vital

goal in the football or give my opinion on the lunatic on the news

that murdered twenty seven men and women and ate their

genitals.  No thank you they can keep their electrified dementia,

I'll stay quietly insane.

He got a beer and left the swarm of people within, he sat on the

deck ready for the world's natural flow. The disco beat pumped

decibels of thumping sounds through the hull, echoing tremors

through the river capacity. It's no wonder it's a good river for

fishing they want to be caught and have their necks smashed on

the nearest rock, he was so pissed off he wanted to catch the

hook pull back on it and be hauled to freedom. He was starving

wanted to hear classical music and let my mind wonder off to

take it in then out on paper, poetic lines like Carver.

He tried his best to relax and push those stupid sounds away,

just when he thought he had it sorted one of his fellow workers

broke his flow of concentration to talk shop. He had riverboat

sickness, leaving the deck he returned to the madness and sat

with his fellow used and the pretense of beer and whisky flowed.

The booze took its toll and he was no longer in control, letting it

flow with the filth of the boat on the river.

As the train of swans met the boat two silhouette shapes stood

on deck drinking from glasses that flashed in the moonlight,

pouring their substance from the glasses down on the flock, their

strict security broke in shock. I yelled at the shapes, you think it's

fucking funny, ya mindless wankers. In his rage he didn't notice

the swan swimming towards him bolting onto the bank honking

and hissing wildly flapping it's outstretched wings.  He stumbled

back and ran for cover behind the trees with the echoes of

laughter from the boat. He zigzagged the line of trees and by the

time he reached the rivers edge again after finishing the wine it

seemed the moon and stars were out for his benefit only.

Mellowing in solitude pondering circumstance watching the

shadows from the far shore rippling a picture for the album of his

mind, until something caught his eye. He turned to see the swan

silently coming along the river edge. He was about to get up and

run when he told himself to stall, relax, his heart beat wildly and

he shook like the flowing river when the majestic bird broke the

water with great ease onto the bank and idled towards him.

The massive bird came strolling along the grass verge. For a

second they made eye contact before he lowered his head braced

himself. he felt the strength of it's breast as it pressed against his

crossed legs, it's cold beak brushed his forehead and flowed to

the nape of his neck with the affection of a lovers touch and a

sensation flowed through his mind and body, a new sensation,

something he had never experienced before, clearing his mind of

every trivial thought he ever had.

He rose up, left the river and returned to the town, got his gear

together from the corner of the filthy room and left. On the train

he thought maybe I should leave her alone, maybe their better

off without me.

On the boat crossing the rough Irish Sea political parties

condemned murder in the TV lounge.

As he sipped a pint of Guinness, he thought, It's winter in

Northern Ireland all things are dying, the rain and the sea spray

cut with the coldness of steel.

Adrian Fox.