Sandman

Shay and Kieron sit apart on the stone slipway by the remnant of the old bridge.  The tide is on the turn as dusk creeps in.  The harbour water has stilled to a glass reflecting the sliver of a new moon.   The two small boys are quiet for a long time.  Then Kieron says

- I amn’t to play with you anymore.

- Why? says Shay.

 Kieron looks up at the sky.  Only the evening star is out.

 - Why? says Shay again.

 - My da’s taken the pledge.  That’s all I know.  

 - What’s the pledge?

 - When you give up the drink, going to bars and all that.  I amn’t to go round to your             house.

Kieron gets up.  

- Anyway, I’m away home for me tea, he says.

- Wait.

Shay trails Kieron as he walks, trots, then runs home to Butt Street.  Kieron disappears into the house.  Shay reaches the door and looks down the empty hallway.  Keep out, it says.

It’s getting dark.  By the high wall at the end of the road, he sees Ger and his gang.  The boys are all down on their haunches, under the lamppost where tinkers tie their horses.  They have cans they’re filling up with sandy dirt.   Shay wanders towards them.   

He squats next to Ger.

- What are you doing?

- Making rockets.

- Watch, says Colm.  He flings a can with both hands straight up into the air.  It leaves a                stream of dust on its way that looks in the light of the streetlamp like a wobbly jet trail. The can falls.

- That’s different, says Shay.

- Wait till we get to the moon.  That’ll be different all right, Ger says, and lobs another                 can high into the night.  The moon can barely be seen in the harshness of the lamplight.  

- Yeh’d need an engine, sure, says Shay.

- Yeh wanna bet, says Pádraic.  Watch this. 

He launches his can.  With a maracas shake of sand and stones it disappears into the black above the lamplight and for a moment there’s silence.  What the heck.  The moment over, they hear it land with a clatter on the other side of the wall.  The gang jeers and laughs.  Kieron hands a can to Shay, inviting him to have a go.  Several of the cans contain the remains of drink that turn the dust to mud.  Hands, faces, clothes become coated with the sticky mixture as the game continues.

An enormous shape looms out of the darkness, breath wheezing.  It hovers just outside the pool of light around the playground.  The boys stop, wait.

- Hi Shay, it says.

- Hi Peadar, says Shay.

The giant leans forward and lurches on up the street. 

- He’s your uncle, isn’t he Shay? asks Colm.                       

- Yeah.

- You wouldn’t want him to be after you, would yeh? Kevin whispers.

- He’s OK, says Shay.  Only, him and me mammy do be mad at each other a lot. 

Attempts to reach the moon continue.  

- Have you had tea yet, lads?

- Hours ago, says Ger.          

They pay him no attention as he says goodbye and follows the uncle home.

                                                                                     *

 His mother opens the door.  Her eyes are wild.             

 -  Shay!  Do you have any idea what time this is?  Get in here…  Dear God, look at the                            state of you.  Where have you been?  

His grandmother, Ma, emerges from the kitchen to see what the commotion is.  

- Janey Mice!  Did the Sandman get him?

- Get these filthy clothes off and into the bath with you. Then it’s straight to bed - don’t                      think you’re getting any tea now.  It’s past ten o’clock, sure! 

In the bath he holds his snuffles in to listen to the boom of voices from the kitchen below.  Peadar has lumbered down the stairs and joined the two women and the war of the goliaths flares again.  Shay’s mother is giving out to him, he’s not bothered, she’s getting madder.  

- He was only at the bottom of Butt Street, sure, he says.

- What do you mean? says Shay’s mother.

- Butt Street.  He wasn’t three hundred yards away.

- You saw him and didn’t tell me?

- Tell you what?  I thought you must have let him out to play again after his tea.

- Look at the time, sure.   

The voices rumble on.  Later his mother puts him to bed.

- Mama.

- I’m on night duty - I have to go to work now.  Go to sleep.

- Mama?

- What is it?

- Is the Sandman the man with the black cloak and hat?  Like on the bottles.

- That’s the Sandeman.

- Who’s the Sandman then?

- He brings children nice dreams but only if they’re good.  If they’re bold he makes them                  sleep with no dreams at all.

- He makes them sleep?  How?

- He puts dust in their eyes.  You’ll sleep like Rip Van Winkle the amount was in your                            own.  Time to close them.

 -  Kiss me, Mama.

 - Close your eyes.

 The cold lips of a stone titan brush the top of his head.

                                                                                            *

The festival lights strung along the length of the quay sway and jig.  Shay stands on the slipway, alone.  The late autumn sea is up, the wind cuffing him about the head, roaring in his ears.  Even in the lee of the jetty the water is rough.  

Kieron wouldn’t come out with him after tea, but he didn’t want to go home.  Anyway, the movement of the water has him in a spell.

Shay senses someone behind him.  He turns to see the hulking shadow.    

- Peadar.  Hi.

- Does your mammy know you’re here? Peadar shouts over the gale.

- Yes.

Peadar continues down the quay, dainty on his feet like a dancer.  It’s a Friday, he’s already well into his rounds and heading now for Clancy’s Bar.  He stops and turns back, minded to say,

- Don’t go too near the water now.  

Shay sees the uncle saying something.  He raises a hand.

- OK, bye.  

Peadar goes on his way.

As Shay edges further down the slip something catches his eye – a toy sailing boat bobbing about on its side.  It’s near a ledge along the wall of the jetty.  He steps up onto the ledge and shuffles along.  He draws parallel to the boat and stoops towards it.  When the big wave hits, he has nothing to hold on to.  He plunges into the water.  

It’s ice cold.  He gasps and swallows brine.  He’s tumbled upside down, a muffled roll of thunder in his ears.  He opens his eyes.  Up, down and around – everything is black.  His arms and legs flail.  Another churn of water puts a foot in touch with sand and stone.  He manoeuvres to get both feet under him, gives a push.  He senses the rise to the surface –rumble giving way to hiss and fizz.  His head clears the water, desperate to take a breath. The air makes him cough and the thump of a wave from behind has him under again.  He’s flipped over in a tumult of bubbles, pebbles and sand.  Becoming mired by the undertow he is dragged further out.

Moira and Enya are out for a walk, the last of their annual break from the big-city grime and the grey routines of work.  They take a detour to the harbour, catching the drama of the storm on their way to the opera house.  Passing the slipway, Enya sees something in the roiling water.

- Moira, stop.  What’s that?  It’s not a child, is it!

- Oh my lord, quick, we can get him.

- Oh god, Em, I hope it’s not a body.

- Come on.

Holding hands, they negotiate the slippery ramp into the water, wade in, grab an armpit each and haul the little boy back up to the top of the slipway.  On the way, he vomits and coughs.  The women are relieved at this vigorous sign of life and deposit him at the top of the slip.  Enya gets down alongside him and talks to him until he’s ready to get to his feet again.  

                                                                                                      * 

His mother opens the door.  There in the street in front of her: two women, strangers, about her age, wet from the waist to their shoes, and between them a boy – Shay, her son - wet, shivering, draped with wisps of seaweed.  

- Are you Shay’s mother?  

- Oh dear God!

- He had a little accident on the quay and fell in.  But he’s fine, says Moira.

- Janey Mac!  And you’re wet too.

- Ah, the waves are something, I’m telling you.  Wild, you know? says Enya.  

- And cold as bejasus, says Moira.  He’ll need to get his togs off and into a bath, I’d say.

- What am I doing? says his mother, her arms out.  Come in, come in.  Sorry.  It’s the shock.               Come in to the warm.

- We’re just round the corner…

- Ah please, I haven’t even thanked you.  Come in and have a drink.

                                                                                             *

Shay is out of the bath and in his pyjamas, eating supper in the kitchen by the stove.  He listens as the women talk about the festival and the big city and places far away.  One of the women is drinking tea strengthened with whiskey, the other a large glass of port.  A bottle of Sandemans is out on top of the press.  

At the end of an hour, Shay notices that Moira and Enya’s cheeks are red and their eyes dance.  He sees Moira raise her eyebrows at Enya and smile.  Enya winks and smiles back.   Moira leading, they rise from their chairs.           

- Well, you’ve been so kind.  We’d best be off.  It’s the early train for us back to Dublin –                     up  at six.  You know?

- We won’t keep you, so.  Well, it was great to meet you.

-  The circumstance was a bit out of the ordinary, now, wasn’t it? says Enya.  We won’t                         forget this night in a hurry, will we Em?  Bye now, Shay.  I’d say you’re going to be an                        adventurer.  

-  Travelling the seaways.  Don’t be falling out of the boat though, will you? says Moira,                       ruffling his hair and the two women and his mother laugh and Ma smiles.

-  Lovely to meet you Mrs Lannigan, says Enya.

-  Ma.  Everyone calls her Ma, says his mother.

-  Well.  Goodbye Ma, says Enya.  And goodbye, Muirna.  Can’t wait for next year’s festival               already.

-  Make sure you call in.    

-  Oh, we will.  We will.                                                                                                            *

-  Nice people, says Ma.

-  Ah, lovely people.  Did you hear – no, sure you were making the tea - they call                                       themselves ‘Em’ and ‘En’.  Like in the alphabet, says Enya: in the middle of it and always                   together.  Aren’t they a gas?

Ma fidgets.

-  They were surely right in the middle of it tonight. 

Muirna turns to her son.

-  Right.  To bed.                                                                                                           * 

-  Mama?

-  Yes.

-  Are they witches?

-  No!  Where did you get that idea?

-  They came out a nowhere.  When I was in the water.  They must a flew in.  

-  Peadar was supposed to look out for you, tonight.  Did you see him?

-  Yeah.

-  You did?

-  I did.  

-  What did he say?

He snuggles down the bed and from under the covers intones

-  Fee-fi-fo-fum, I smell the blood of an Englishman.

-  Ah, stop that.  

Shay re-emerges from the bedding.

-  It was too noisy.  I didn’t hear…  He woulda saved me if he’d been a minute later.  He’d a                  been the hero then, wouldn’t he? 

-  Go to sleep now.

-  Kiss me, Mama, he says, sitting up.

She gives him a long, long hug and, after a quick kiss, though she’s not working tonight, she runs from the bedroom like there’s a banshee after her, but he’s already seen the tears in her eyes. 

                                                                                                            *

Later he wakes from a nightmare to hear the familiar sound of bottle against glass.  She’s in her bedroom next door, in the company of Mr Man in the Black Mask Hat and Cloak.  

Thoughts wash in and out like the tide.

-  Sleep with no dreams? - for being bold?  What’s that about?...

-   Kieron Fecking O Shaughnessy…  

-    Smiling, they were, and blushing and winking.  And what was all that about?

-   The pledge, my hole…

He starts to fly through the kaleidoscope tunnel that tells him sleep is near.

And then: Peadar in tails and top hat, dancing on the quay, singing

- Does yer mammy know you’re here, me boy?  Does she?  

And him joining in the song and dance under the swinging coloured lights:

- Yes, my mammy knows I’m here and, yes, she loves me… Oh she loves me… Yes, she loves             me.

                                                                                            ENDS