Authors: Kevin Brennan
As Ray’s gaze swept across the lads the reminiscent smile faded, the bottom lip quivered and the eyes watered. His next sentence barely made it through his broken voice. “He was a man of many adventures, our Vinno. He’ll be missed terribly.”
My eyes were watering, my lip was quivering and my voice was gone. I did well to get two words out as I raised my pint. “To Vinno.”
Ray found a lungful of air through the emotion and managed to belt out, as he moved his raised pint in an arc to encompass all. “To Vinno.”
All conversation in the company stopped, all eyes watered and every pint was raised. “To Vinno.”
I could feel tears streaming into my pint as it reached my mouth and I thought I could actually taste them as I gulped long and hard on a pint that wasn’t as nice as the ones that I was accustomed to.
Vinno was saluted and praised, acclaimed and applauded, honoured and blessed many times by many people who all agreed that it was a funeral to be envied and aspired to. I genuinely hope that when I die my funeral will be exactly like Vinno’s.
The respect bestowed on Vinno was a true reflection of the huge esteem in which he was held by all. He was fondly remembered in many, many adventure stories, a high percentage of which were sparked off by the mementos that we all decided to wear.
Pints and tears flowed freely, laughter and smoke rose slowly as we regretfully regaled ourselves while drinking sub standard Guinness grimacingly and smoking what we wanted to cautiously, except in the case of camouflaging cigars, when we smoked what we had to puffingly.
I was at the bar getting pints for myself, Ray, Paddy and Al when my attention was drawn to the sound of a child screaming angrily over on the family’s side of the pub. It was Aoife screaming at her red eyed mother, who had a pleading demeanour about her that told me she needed help dealing with the consequences of her child’s pent up negative emotions.
I dropped the pints to the table and purposefully made my
way over to Jackie and Aoife while calculating my course of action. By the time I got there Aoife had progressed to a sulk.
“Hi Aoife.”
Her eyes acknowledged me but she managed to maintain the sulk as if I didn’t exist. I shot Jackie a sympathetic half smile before returning to her daughter.
“Do you want to come outside and look at the bikes?”
Aoife, like most couriers’ children, was bike mad. Her expression softened somewhat, but she still maintained her sulking countenance.
“We can have a look at the Gizzard’s tyre and see what sort of damage he did to it outside your grandparent’s house.” That got her. She did her best to keep her sulk on, but it transformed into an adorable pout as she held out her hand to be led away, as a little princess might allow herself to be led by a subject who was doing his duty.
I looked to Jackie for approval before taking the proffered hand and was happy to see her smiling through her tears as she nodded her consent.
“Did you ever see so many bikes in one place before, Aoife?”
“Just in photos.” Her daddy’s holiday photographs!
I was beginning to feel like a fish out of water here. “Look at the state of this one. The man that owns this is called Mad Tom. He never spends money on his bike as long as it is still going.”
“The RS is able for that sort of neglect.”
I could hear her father in her words. “Very good, it is an RS. What’s that one?”
“Revere.”
“That one?”
“CG.”
“That one?”
“XBR.”
“You certainly know your bikes, Aoife!”
“My daddy used to own every bike you pointed out.”
Of course he did. If I had wanted to catch her out I would have pointed at the Gilera.
“You know, you’re a landlady now.”
“Am I?”
“Yep. I’ll be paying rent to you from now on.”
“My mammy will probably take it.”
“No she won’t. Even if she had a right to she wouldn’t. She’ll probably get me to put it in the bank for you for when you grow up.”
“Oh.”
“ I’ll drop the lodgement slips around if that’s the case. D’ye want me to give them to you personally?”
“I s’pose.”
“Okay. So I’ll be visiting you regularly from now on. That might be fun.”
“Okay.”
“Look at the state of the Gizzard’s back tyre! See the lumps gone out of it? He’s lucky it didn’t pop.”
“Why did he do it, Uncle Sean?”
It was a good sign that she asked me a question. Beginning a conversation was usually the first step in opening up to your emotions. I felt very nervous and took a deep breath before replying slowly and carefully.
“There’s a few different reasons, sweetheart. Gizzard was very close to your daddy for many years. I suppose it was the best way he knew to say goodbye, but also to get everybody’s attention to let them know that his best friend was passing. Also to leave a mark to remind people of your daddy – that’s why we all joined in also. Every time anybody drives or walks past your nanny’s house they will remember your daddy. Are you okay with that?”
“Yes.”
Now came the tricky bit.
“It was a release of emotion for the Gizzard also, like a scream or something.”
“A scream?”
“A scream?”
Careful Sean!
“Sometimes when people are very sad it builds up as a big scream or something, like steam coming out of a boiling kettle. Kinda like the way you were shouting at your mammy.”
“Oh.”
That’s enough! Comfort the child. NOW!
“But it’s ok, honey, it’s all right to be angry on very sad days, everybody understands.”
The poor child! Look at her eyes welling up. Oh shit, I can feel mine going too.
“I’m not angry, Uncle Sean, I just really…”
Oh God.. hold it together.
“….really wish that ….”
Here comes the floods – and she’s going to cry too.
“….my daddy wasn’t…”
Get ready to hug her
“…Dead!”
“C’mere angel.”
She flung her little arms around my neck with her head on my left shoulder and bawled her eyes out, while a constant stream of tears gushed down both of my cheeks.
I didn’t attempt to stem the flow – it would have been pointless – but focussed all of my attention on keeping my breathing as regular as possible so as not to sob and also to facilitate the comforting phrases I whispered to her as I patted her on the pack.
“There, there…that’s it, let it all out…..it’s good to cry…. you’re a brave little girl…. Everything’s going to be all right.”
God love her, she had a lot bottled up inside her. She cried and cried for ages until my shoulder was drenched with tears. Even after she had sobbed herself dry she clung onto me for a while.
When she finally leaned back sniffling she seemed surprised to see the tear streaks on my face.
“Were you crying too, uncle Sean?”
“Of course sweetheart. I’m very sad too. We all are. Everybody cries if they get sad enough.”
“Oh.”
“Here, wipe your face on the sleeve of my t-shirt. You can blow your nose as well. It’s okay.”
As she used my sleeve to tidy herself up I had to bite my lip to stop myself from blurting out promises that I would call in to see her regularly, that I would take her places, that I would look after her as best I could in place of her daddy.
In these situations it is human nature to make these promises to people, but instead of blurting them out to Aoife, I kept them to myself as a solemn vow. I would never, ever come close to replacing her daddy, but I would take whatever action I could to do my very best to fill a little bit of the void left in her life by his absence.
To this day I have remained true to this vow.
“Uncle Sean…”
“Yes sweetheart?”
“How come my daddy’s friends are laughing so much today if they’re so sad?”
“We all had a lot of good times with your daddy. There are lots of happy stories being told today because he left us with so many wonderful memories. We cry when we miss him, angel, but we laugh in memory of all the happiness he brought into our lives. It’s very important to laugh through the tears.”
“It’s not easy.”
“I know, sweetheart, but we have to do our best.”
“Okay, I will.”
“You’re a very brave girl, Aoife, your daddy was always very proud of you.” I made a promise to myself that someday when she was older, I was going to tell her how her daddy was thinking of her when he died.
“I think I need a little bit more of a cry, honey.”
“There, there, Uncle Sean.”
A little blurt of a laugh escaped with my tears as I put my head on her shoulder. “Thanks honey. Are you ready to go back inside?”
“Okay.”
“I’m glad we got a chance to have this little bit of time together.”
“Me too.”
“I think when we go in that your mammy would really love a big hug.”
“From you?”
“No, silly, from… you’re messing with me!”
“Hee, hee.”
“You’re a great kid, Aoife, don’t ever forget that.”
“I know Uncle Sean. I won’t.”
It was truly heart warming to see her run up to Jackie and give her a big hug as soon as we went back inside.
The crowd started to disperse shortly after that. First to go were most of the Letter Express couriers, who went back to work. Two of them that stayed on, Seventeen Ollie and Twenty Tony, were fired, but both of them got jobs in Lightning Express straight away. The general consensus was that it took two couriers to cover all of the work that Vinno had done.
Then the people with children began to leave. Jackie was the last of these to go and it took her ages to get Aoife off the premises due to the amount of couriers that had to hug her goodbye. It was particularly poignant to see tears roll down Gizzard’s face as he hugged her. Most of them promised to call in to see her from time to time and all who promised have remained true to their word.
Every week Aoife has an average of ten plus visitors on two wheels.
The bulk of the crowd then dispersed in dribs and drabs as the session descended towards sloppiness. Gizzard picked his moment carefully and when he felt that the numbers were right, he declared a session back in his house.
There were still some of Vinno’s family and their closest friends in the pub, and we bade them heartfelt – though sloppy – goodbyes before departing.
Despite being well beyond any logical or legal excuse for driving in our condition, all 24 bikes and three cars succeeded in bringing us safely to the Gizzard’s house five miles away on the outskirts of Dun Laoghaire. The session there is mostly a blur to me due to my advanced state of drunkenness, being stoned
and emotionally exhausted.
I awoke, very hungover, lying sideways on the Gizzard’s stairs in a similar pose to the one that I used to adapt when doing my duty as an altar boy all those years previously.
Because we had been shown then how to comfortably lie on the steps leading up to the altar, I suffered no pain or discomfort that morning. Except, of course, the pain of having put my best friend ever into the ground the previous day.
Dundrum Main Street 10.45 am Friday morning.
Fucking buses! Go now, nail it! Okay – Dundrum Business Park, then Milltown, then back to UCD, RTE and then in-. Oh shit! Ooomph!!!
As I made my way along the outside of the traffic, mostly on the wrong side of the narrow street, but legally because of the broken white line - occupied with my route, a blue hi-ace van, upon realising that he was just about past the turn for Dundrum Office Park, swung right suddenly without looking or indicating. Despite braking and swinging the bike to go with him, I couldn’t avoid hitting him, breaking my left mirror and winding myself in the process. The bike also landed on my right foot. This hurt plenty but the boots prevented any real damage being done.
He was left with a big fucker of a dent in the side of his van just behind the driver’s seat. Obviously shaken, he was quick out of the van and over to me where, with the help of two pedestrians, he picked the bike off me.
I was considerably less than impressed and, despite laborious
breathing, had begun roaring abuse at him before he even got to the bike. “What…the…fuck…are you…at? What d’ye think… that fucking bit…of shiny glass…sticks out of….your machine for?”
“I’m really sorry, man, I always get the Office Park and the Business Park mixed up. I was on my way down to the Business Park when I should have been going in here and I only realised it when I saw the sign.”
By this time the bike was off me. The pain in my foot almost disappeared immediately. Despite now being more aware of lesser pains in my left elbow and hand my anger dissipated considerably, aided by the van driver’s repentive attitude and the rapid regaining of my lost wind.