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Badass Horror
(Click the book to buy it!) 
Badass Horror will bitch-slap you in the face, kick you in the teeth, and burn cigarette holes in your couch. These seven stories, written by some of the finest writers of modern fiction, will dull the pain that Hubert Selby Jr.'s death left in your bitter heart. |
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Tales from the Sweety Bottle
Part One -- The Badge
I don’t know what manner of beast we get in this shebeen, but I seem to spend more time cleaning The Sweety Bottle than serving drink. I was scooping fag ash out of a glass when Sam walked in. I say walked, but it was more of a stumble. Looked like he was too steaming to notice, so I spat in the glass to loosen a stubborn smudge, wiped it and filled it with his usual. Tonic wine. Or Wall-Climber as the punters had taken to calling it.
“You all right, JB?” he asked.
I nodded. “Aye, Sam. Dead on.”
He pulled at the knot in his tie and plonked his elbows on the bar. Sam never sat. Even when he was legless. He liked to hold court, you see. Attention seeker. He sang for his supper down the Dockers, but that wasn’t enough. He’d come here to unwind, but still sing and shout and spout off. That was just Sam. And sure, it faded into background noise after a while.
I handed him his Wall-Climber and he dropped a coin onto the bar, gave me a brief look of gratitude, then fixed his eyes on the prize. Next time he looked at me, it was through the bottom of his cloudy glass. He slapped it down and tapped the rim. I filled it up.
“Quiet tonight,” Sam said.
“Aye, the pubs haven’t shut yet. It’ll be another half hour before we come to life.”
Sam nodded and ran his fingers down the crease of his lapels. That’s when I noticed the dull brassy badge on his breast pocket. I squinted at it. A simple embossed profile of James Connolly ringed with a green band; the dates 1868-1916 stamped along it.
“I didn’t think you were political, Sam,” I said, pointing at his pocket.
He looked down and blinked as if he’d forgotten it was there.
“Ah, JB.” He patted his greased-back hair. “It’s not really the politics, it’s the sentimentality, you know?”
I tilted my head.
“This badge belonged to my da. And before him, his da. And he got it from his da who worked for the GPO down in Dublin when he was a wee lad.”
I did a quick calculation in my head. 1916 to 1974. Four generations of men in less than sixty years. They must marry young in Sam’s family.
Sam chattered on. “This badge is my birthright. An inheritance that means more than money. Priceless. Although, technically it’s an antique as well. The day my da handed it to me, I don’t mind telling you, I nearly cried like a wee girl. One of those touching moments that happen once in a lifetime. God. That’s the important stuff, you know, JB?”
I nodded slowly and he smirked.
“I’ll give you a brandy for it,” I said.
He slipped it off, kissed it lightly and handed it over.
“God bless you, JB. But make it a large one.”
Part Two -- The Mouse
So, John walked into The Sweety Bottle. I didn’t ask about his long face. Popping veins, clenched jaw and a stiffer-than-John Wayne walk; he eyed up his old enemy. The One Armed Bandit. John was a wee bit of a gambler, some said. I’d have said he liked to throw money away. Never complained, though. It was usually me that caught it.
“Anybody played this tonight, JB?” John asked as he hung his leather jacket on the lever.
I gave him the usual answer, “There’s only me and Sam here, John.” He knew Sam didn’t gamble.
John grabbed the aul rag off the sideboard/bar and got to work spreading the dirt around the tables. Then he collected some stray glasses, but not the one clasped in Sam’s sleeping death-grip. It was still early. Sam would be using it again after his nap.
John wasn’t much of a cleaner, but he tried. And it earned him the drinks he couldn’t pay for. He worked for a few tumblers of Wall-Climber and the odd tip. A very generous wage for shebeen-work. Did he appreciate it? In his own way, I suppose. He kept coming back to use my One Armed Bandit.
Sam jolted in his seat and John turned on his heel like the gunslinger he wanted to be.
“What’s wrong?” John asked. He wrapped the rag around his fist and stood slightly hunched, ready to box someone.
Sam chuckled to himself. “Sorry, John. Just a wee mouse.”
“A mouse?” John twitched.
“Aye. It ran over the top of my foot. Think it’s gone now.”
John scanned the floor, catlike; ready to pounce. In his own mind at least. To me he looked closer to wormlike. A bundle of nerves, you know?
“It’s all right, son,” I said. “Leave the wee thing alone. It’ll do no harm.”
I poured him a glass of Wall-Climber and managed to call him off the scent. He came over to me and had a gulp. Sam straightened to his unsteady feet, and staggered over for a top-up. But no matter how drunk Sam got, it never dulled the mischief in him.
“I didn’t know you were afraid of wee mouses.” The slurring sounded deliberate.
John, predictable if nothing else, said, “No I’m not.”
“It’s nothing to be ashamed of, like,” Sam said.
I thought about telling the pair of them to shut up and drink up, but figured it might be more interesting to sit back and see what happened. I poured myself a brandy.
“How am I afraid of wee mice? I’m afeared of no man.”
“So prove it,” Sam said.
John puffed out his chest. “Don’t need to prove it. I’m telling you.”
Sam pulled a few coins out of his pocket. John glanced at them, then at The Bandit.
“Catch the mouse, Johnny-boy, and you can feed these to your machine.”
John licked his lips.
“He’s over there,” Sam said, and pointed to a furry huddle in the corner.
John tugged at the waistband of his jeans and twiddled with his shirt cuffs. Then he lifted a pint glass from the sideboard and crossed the room, chin jutted in determination. Sam turned to me and winked. I topped up his Wall-Climber.
In the corner, John hunkered down and grunted. In fairness, he moved very fast. Seconds later, he held the pint glass over his head, one hand on the rim to keep the mouse inside. He marched over to us, smiling. Sam held out the coins.
And John took his hand off the rim of the glass to collect them.
The mouse scrabbled out of the glass. It landed on John’s wrist and ran up his sleeve. He jigged on the spot. I watched the little bump in his shirt scurry up one arm, across his shoulders and down the other. The mouse leapt as John flapped his hand. It landed in the glass of Wall-Climber John had left on the sideboard. Disappeared with a soft plop.
I caught the mouse by its tail and threw it out into the backyard. Seemed to me he’d earned a second chance. It took a while, but John got his breath back and Sam wiped the tears from his eyes, his belly-laughter calming to a snigger.
“Oh, that was brilliant,” Sam said.
John snarled. “Shut up.”
Sam wiped a sleeve across his mouth and huffed through his nose one last time.
“John?” he asked.
“What?”
“You going to finish that Wall-Climber?”
Part Three -- The Missus
Eileen, my wife, shoved open the door like it had offended her and strode into the Sweety Bottle with intent. I should have expected it. Earlier, Sam had traded me a ‘family heirloom’ for a brandy and John had danced with a mouse and then dropped it into a glass of Wall-Climber. It was one of those nights.
“Hiya, Eileen,” John said, barely glancing up from The One Armed Bandit.
“It’s Missus Brennan ‘til you hit your twenties, wee lad.”
“I’m twenty-four!”
Eileen rolled her eyes back. Her lips moved silently and she bobbed her head. Then, mouth set in determination, she nodded. “Still less than half my age, though. So, shut you up.”
John mumbled, but put a halt to it when Eileen gave him the eyeball. I almost felt sorry for him.
Sam, supported by the bar/sideboard, cleared his throat. “I’ll give you twenty-five pence for a brandy, JB.”
It looked like Eileen was about to answer for me. I got in there first. “This particular brandy is forty pence a glass, son. The best in the West.” And for all I knew, the Russian label said that exactly.
Sam blinked and counted the change in his hand again. It hadn’t multiplied.
“I’ll give you twenty-five pence for two Wall-Climbers, then,” Sam said.
“Ach, Sam,” Eileen said. “Is one of them for me?”
“What? Sure JB owns the place. You can drink for free here.”
“You’d think so, wouldn’t you?” She shot me a glare.
I shrugged. “Do you want me to take food out of the kids’ mouths too? There’s nine of them now.”
“Eleven,” Eileen said.
“I wasn’t counting the ones out of the house,” I said. Pretty quick thinking on my part.
She folded her arms, but I think she believed me.
“Right, then. Since you’re such a devoted father, I need money to buy our Patrick some shoes.”
“Again? Did we not get him some a few months ago?”
“Our Gerard’s wearing them now.”
“So give Patrick somebody else’s.”
“Aye, dead on. Madeline’s will fit him. And I can give Madeline a pair of Patricia’s if she doubles up her socks.”
I laid my hand on the cashbox. Cold but comforting. There was enough for the shoes in there, but I couldn’t give it up that easy. As soon as I flipped the lid Martin would need this, Sharon that, and Michael the other. Then the older kids would hear about it; John, Bridgh, and Joseph, wherever he was. Baby Vincent would probably tap me with his first words. No. No way. I shook my head:
“I don’t think there’s enough in here.”
“Why don’t you check?” she asked.
I tapped the side of my head with one finger. “I’m keeping account.”
John cursed and slapped the side of the Bandit. I turned to shout at him. Sam distracted me by falling in heap. I whipped my head back to see him sprawled out on the floor. A stool clattered to the ground and rolled away from him.
“You all right, son?” Eileen asked. Somebody had to.
Sam groaned but didn’t move. I called to John for some help and we sat him in a corner for another wee nap. While we struggled with him, I glanced over my shoulder and spotted Eileen with her hand in the cashbox. She didn’t notice. And she thought I didn’t know she’d kicked the legs out from under Sam when John had distracted me. I waited until she tucked the money away. Then I barked:
“Eileen!”
She gave me a look of angelic innocence. “Yes?”
I sighed. “Pour me, you and John a brandy.”
“On the house?” she asked.
“Aye, love.” I sneered for effect. “And a toast to you and the kids too.”
Part Four -- The Mexican
Manolito dragged Fast Traffic through the front door of the Sweety Bottle. The greyhound struggled against my equally skinny friend’s efforts. I poured Manolito a tall glass of Wall-Climber, his reward for taking the dog out for a bit of exercise. He called over to me;
“Look at the muscles in his legs, JB. He gets stronger every week.”
“Good work, Mano,” I said. “We’ll lift a packet with this one yet.”
Sam, self-proclaimed expert on everything, piped in. “No point building those particular muscles.”
“Go back to sleep, you,” I said.
“Seriously, JB. That tug-o-war business is doing the dog no good. Not unless you want him to run backwards.”
“That’s his fighting spirit showing,” Manolito said.
I nodded. “That’s right. Fast Traffic’s a winner.”
John took a break from pulling on the One Armed Bandit’s lever. “Fast Traffic? Red Light, more like.”
Aye, you get plenty of comedians in a shebeen. Even on a slow night. I threw a rag and hit the back of John’s head. “Make yourself useful. Give the tables a wipe.”
He muttered, like he always did, but he got to work. How else would he pay for his drinks? He needed his money for gambling. I turned a blind eye to the fact that he stopped halfway to sit with Sam for a chat. It’d keep the pair of them out of my hair for a bit. Now if they’d pulled my missus into the conversation, me and Manolito could have had a quick one in peace. No such luck, though.
“JB, just look at the state of his shoes,” Eileen said. She jabbed her finger at Manolito’s feet as he ushered Fast Traffic out into the backyard.
Manolito scratched his baldy head. “You can’t keep your shoes clean when you’re chasing a greyhound around the park.”
“I never trust a man with dirty shoes.”
“Perdón, señorita.”
“Senior Rita?” Eileen screwed up her face and turned to me. “What’s wrong with him, JB?”
“He’s talking Mexican again.”
“What for? Sure he’s from Raglan Street.”
I rolled my eyes. I was fed up explaining Manolito’s quirks to her. But if I didn’t, she’d know she’d wound me up.
“It’s because he looks like the wee Mexican off Bonanza.”
“The High Chaparral,” Manolito said.
I waved my hand in the air. “Same thing.”
Manolito bristled. “No it isn’t!”
“All right, calm down.” I handed him his drink. “He’s Manolito off The High Chaparral, so he speaks Mexican. All right, love?”
Eileen pushed her glasses up her nose and squinted at Manolito. “He looks nothing like him.”
“Aye, I do!” Wall-Climber sloshed out of his glass as he hopped on the spot.
“The real Manolito has lovely, thick brown hair. Only thing on your head is dandruff. How you can get dandruff on a baldy head, I don’t know, but you’ve managed it. Would you not rub a flannin over it?”
Manolito looked at me. His eyes begged me to rescue him from Eileen. I sighed and lifted a pound out of the cashbox.
“Eileen, would you go and get us all a fish supper, will you?”
She plucked the note out of my hand and skipped out the door. My stomach rumbled. I went to the big pot of stew on the hob behind the bar/sideboard and scooped out a couple of bowls for me and Manolito.
“Are you not going to wait for your fish supper JB?” Manolito asked.
I shook my head. “If you think she’s going to spend that money on fish suppers for us, you’re a bigger mug than I am.”
Part Five -- The Rabbit
Things can get out of hand in the Sweety Bottle at times. As they say, when the drink’s in the wit’s out. Usually it starts with something small. A discussion about how The Sweety Bottle’s greyhound hadn’t won a race in his life, for instance. Fast Traffic, the dog me and Manolito had been training for the last few months, had been renamed Red Light by John at the shebeen.
“I’m telling you,” Sam said. “The dog needs to be blooded. It’s a primal instinct thing. That’s why they send the hare round the track.”
“The hare’s just something the dog looks at,” John said.
Sam sniffed. “A visual focus? Aye, that’s part of it, I’ll grant you. But for a real edge on the track, the dog needs to have tasted the thrill of the hunt.”
“The thrill of the hunt.” John rolled his eyes. “Aye, right. Red Light’s a tube, sin é.”
“Look, I think I’m more of an authority on this than you are.”
It’d be an impressive statement, if he didn’t slur it seven times a week.
“An authority on hunting?” John said. “Since when?”
Manolito sighed and tipped his empty glass towards me. John had just given Sam all the invitation he needed. Would that young lad learn nothing?
“Look, John. It all dates back to ancient times...”
I poured a Wall-Climber for Manolito and one for myself. Sam droned on. Me and Mano clinked glasses, as much to interrupt Sam’s flow than anything else, but he bulled on with it. John was fidgeting already.
Then the door creaked open. It only creaked when it was pushed slow. It was only pushed slow by the not-so-regulars. And the not-so-regulars usually called a temporary halt to all discussion.
Tommy Hale, my son’s mate, slipped in. His eyes darted behind his glasses. He’d a white shoebox under his oxter and I could smell the Brut off him from the other side of the room. Still, it was good to see him. His entrance had shut Sam up for a second.
“Hiya, Mister Brennan. Is your Joe in?”
I shook my head. “Haven’t seen him in ages.”
“Really? He told me to meet him here tonight.”
I shrugged.
Sam cleared his throat. “Tommy, isn’t it?”
“Aye. Hiya, Sam.”
“What’s in the box, mate?”
“A rabbit.”
Sam sat bolt upright. “What? A rabbit?”
He turned to me and said, “What’s the chances of that, JB?”
“Aye,” Tommy said. “A wee white one. It’s a present for my wee brother. Got it down Smithfield.”
Sam got off his stool and weaved his way to Tommy. He led him to one of the bus seats we’d bolted to the wall. Manolito turned to warn him but I tapped him on the shoulder. “Let’s just see where this goes,” I said.
Wee Tommy sat sandwiched between Sam and John on the bus seat with the white shoebox on his lap. His shoulders were hunched up to his ears.
“You seem a very intelligent fellah, Tommy,” Sam said. “Those big glasses and all. Maybe you could help me and John settle a debate?”
“What are youse debating?” Tommy asked, a slight tremor in his voice.
“Let’s not rush it, eh?” Sam said. “JB, will you get Tommy a drink here? My treat.”
“Have you any money left?” I asked.
“Sure, I’ll pay you tomorrow.”
I nodded to Manolito and he slipped a wee docket into the cashbox for me while I rinsed a glass from the sink.
“What are you having, Tommy?” I asked.
“Do you have any crème de menthe, Mister Brennan?”
Manolito coughed and Sam smirked.
“Closest we’ve got is Pernod, son,” I said.
“That’s grand, thanks.” He looked around him. “Is Joe in at all?”
“Never mind Joe,” Sam said. “If he’ll be here, he’ll be here. Just enjoy a wee drink for now.”
A wee drink quickly became most of the Pernod we stocked in the shebeen. Drink in, wit out.
Tommy blinked, one eyelid at a time. “What were we talking about?”
“Primal instinct,” Sam said. “Give us a wee look at that rabbit, will you?
I’d like to tell you I stopped it right there. I really would. But hadn’t Sam bought Wee Tommy an awful lot of Pernod? Well, I say bought, but you know what I mean. And besides, I was beginning to wonder if Sam’s blooding theory had anything going for it. As Tommy’s lids drooped, Sam slipped the shoe box off his knee.
I said to Mano, “Go and get the dog.”
At that, it dawned on John what was going on. “Ah youse dirty bastards.”
Part Six -- The Ladies
It had been an eventful night at the Sweety Bottle, even by shebeen standards. I’d sent my mucker Manolito out to get something that’d clean rabbit blood off a wall. Don’t ask. Anyway, his absence left me with the unfiltered idiocy of a Sam-versus-John conversation. I checked my watch and saw the bars would be closing soon enough. Then the place would fill out a bit and those two would fade into the background. But soon enough just wasn’t soon enough.
“I’m telling you, John,” Sam said. “Ladies night at The Sweety Bottle is a ridiculous idea.”
I didn’t mention that it was me who’d first floated the notion. I didn’t want to be sucked in to the discussion.
“It could take off,” John said.
“Drinking clubs are for men. End of.”
“It’s 1974, Sam. Times are changing.”
“Not by my reckoning.”
“And there’s women here all the time. Most of them hold their drink better than you do.”
“You’re talking rubbish, John. Twaddle.”
“Twaddle?”
“Aye, twaddle.”
“Who says twaddle?”
It went on like that for a while. So when the door finally opened, I was smiling from ear to ear, eager to engage in an intelligent conversation. Of course, it had to be Geraldine who walked in. And she took my smile personally.
“It’s great to see you too, JB. You’re looking well.”
“Right,” I said. It didn’t do to encourage that kind of talk. Not that she needed much encouragement.
Sam wolf-whistled. “You’re all dolled up tonight, Geraldine. What’s the occasion?”
She tugged at the hem of her skirt. Her very short skirt. And it wasn’t just her legs she was showing off. I tried to look her in her face, allowing myself a quick glance when she blinked. The two younger men didn’t share my restraint. I think John might have even giggled a little, like he’d just found one of those magazines. You know the kind I mean.
I gave her glass a little more than a spit-shine and reached for the wodka a wee Russian sailor had sorted me out with. Her usual, unless actual vodka was going cheap. She’d become a regular in the last year or so. My wife, Eileen, said I was to blame for that. I didn’t think you could blame anybody for it. Encouraging good custom, I mean.
She took a long sip and left a lipstick mark on her glass. By the end of the night, there’d be more on that glass than on her lips. Well, if it had been a normal night, that’s how it would have happened. But this wasn’t a normal night.
“We were just talking about you,” Sam said.
Geraldine laid a hand across her cleavage and fluttered her makeup-heavy lids. “Who, me?”
“Well, not you specifically. Ladies, in general, like.”
I’d heard Sam talking about Geraldine more than once. This was the first time he’d referred to her as a lady.
“I wouldn’t get into it with him, Geraldine,” I said.
She turned back to me, planted her elbows on the bar/sideboard and gave me an eyeful. To be honest, it wasn’t entirely unwelcome, but it was a bit much.
“You’ll have to entertain me, then,” She said. “What’s the craic with you, tonight?”
I didn’t know where to start. And when Manolito raced in, I felt relieved and reached for the Wall-Climber bottle. But then Eileen followed seconds later, wielding a long-handled broom. A smart remark died on my lips. Eileen was in a bit of a mood. She jabbed the broom at Manolito. He yelped and broke for the back door.
“If you send this wee eejit into my house again I’ll...”
Her voice trailed off and I knew she’d spotted Geraldine. Her grip tightened on the broom. I set the bottle of Wall-Climber on the bar/sideboard and held my hands up.
“Take it easy, love,” I said.
Her eyes narrowed. “Did you call me love?”
I shrugged. “Maybe.”
“Aye, you’re feeling guilty, then.” She turned to Geraldine. “That’s a lovely top, wee girl. It’s lasted well since your confirmation.”
Geraldine tilted her head, not entirely sure she’d been insulted.
“Hi, Eileen,” she said. “I was just about to ask JB how you were. Fighting fit, I see.”
Everybody but Geraldine saw it coming. I don’t know if that broom ever swept a floor, but it was a deadly weapon in Eileen’s hands.
As John tried his best to hold Eileen back from inflicting further damage, Manolito did what he could to tend to Geraldine. Sam stepped around the chaos and reached for the Wall-Climber. He took a nip from the neck of the bottle.
“So, about this ladies night, JB...”
I shook my head, poured myself a brandy and thought about closing early. Maybe I’d talk about it another night.
END
Copyright Gerard Brennan 2009