Barry Tierney brushed dried vomit from his face. He couldn’t recall being sick, but there was no disputing the fact. At some point in his stupor, somewhere between taking the works from the Deil, going home to Vee, and shooting up, he’d thrown up. It was a milky sick, like a baby’s. He was familiar with the sight of baby sick lately, though this was a new occurrence and not entirely something he was happy about.
The child was crying again.
Barry pushed himself up. His sick-wet hand slipped on the greasy mattress and he fell towards the floorboards. The motion sent his brain swimming in his skull. He felt another heave in his gut; more puke rose in his throat and appeared in his mouth. He delivered the mouthful onto the mattress. He didn’t care whether it stained or smelled, he’d long since lost all desire to care about such matters.
The child continued to cry, loud breath-filled shrieks. She’d be hungry again. Why the hell did they need so much feeding and changing? Did it never end?
Tierney suddenly felt cold. He started to shiver. He wiped his mouth with the back of his sleeve and tried to rub warmth into his arms and shoulders with the palms of his hands. It didn’t seem to be working. The cold he felt was too deep. There was no heating in the flat — they had no money left for power cards after paying McArdle for their hit.
Several attempts later Tierney got up. He swayed on his feet, like a much older man, and clutched the wall for support. His vision was weak, tired. He could never understand this — how could his eyes be tired when he’d just woken up? He scratched at his eyelids with blackened fingernails. His eyeballs burned. He wanted to scoop them out, drop them in cold water, iced maybe. He wanted another hit — the aches and pains disappeared as soon as he had a hit. He looked around the room for Vee. He couldn’t see her. All he could see was the kid, lying in a drawer, crying again.
‘Shut the fuck up.’
He staggered to the other wall, felt his way to the door. ‘Vee… Vee, where are you?’
There was no reply. She was supposed to be looking after that kid, that was the idea — and it was her idea. Tierney knew he’d played his part in bringing the child into their chaotic lives, but he didn’t want it to be like this. He didn’t want to have to think about the hows and the whys. He only knew it shouldn’t have been like this — it was wrong, all wrong.
‘Vee… Get up to that kid!’
He dragged himself from the sitting room. There was no sign of her. Had she gone out? Where? If she had gone out she was whoring or scoring. Tierney tried to find strength to hit the wall but his dull thuds were barely audible. He saw the bathroom door ahead, sat ajar.
‘Vee… you in there?’ He edged closer, his aching limbs dragging.
At the door to the bathroom Tierney’s heart rate picked up, only a little at first, but as he touched the woodwork his blood raced. ‘Vee…’
He wondered if she was in there — why would she go in there? After last night Tierney could hardly bear to take a piss in there. ‘Vee.’
There was no reply. As he edged inside the door, the hinges creaked. The mat caught behind the door as he pushed it open, tugging and dragging. Tierney felt moisture gather on his brow — he was sweating. His hands felt clammy as he turned towards the bathtub. The shower curtain was drawn shut. Mould and mildew grew at the top but at the base, where the bleach had been splashed about, it was white, bright. Tierney paused before the unusual cleanliness. His mouth dried over. He could see Vee’s pale feet resting beside the taps. Oh Christ, what had she done?
He whispered, ‘Vee?’
His voice cracked but seemed above his normal range in the small room. Oh Jesus, what had she done? Was it too much for her? If it was too much for her, it was too much for him. Where would he go? What would he do?
He heard the child’s cries again. ‘Oh, Jesus, Vee… what have you done?’
Tierney gripped the curtain and pulled it back. Vee looked pale and still. Her head rested on the rim of the bathtub; Tierney could see the blue veins in her temples. He wanted to shake her, to poke at her and wail, tell her to get up and stop being so fucking selfish… It was all her fault, after all. Everything was her fault.
‘Vee…’ Tierney’s voice rose, became a growl. ‘Vee.’
There was a twitch in her brow, a curl of her lip, and then her head turned. Tierney leaned over her. ‘Fuck’s sake, Vee!’He grabbed her face in his hand, squeezed hard. ‘You’re out of it!’
Vee groaned. She seemed to try and open her eyes but her head lolled from side to side with the effort. Tierney pulled her hair, banged her head several times off the rim of the bathtub. Vee groaned, but failed to come round.
‘You selfish bitch!’ roared Tierney. ‘You lazy, selfish piece of shit.’ He drew a fist, aimed it at her face but stopped himself. ‘You’ll keep.’ He turned from her, went to the shower unit and flicked on the switch. Thin streams of water jetted onto Vee where she lay, fully clothed in the bathtub. She mumbled at first, then her mumbles became moans as she tried to wave away the water.
Tierney left her to come round. Somebody had to look after the kid; she wasn’t capable, that was clear. He pushed at the door. It stuck again on the mat. He struggled harder and freed it. As he forced his weight into the door the action made the hinges squeal, then a layer of dust was dislodged from above the frame as the door slammed into the jamb and rebounded back towards Tierney.
‘Fuck’s sake!’
Vee had started to react to the pelting of the water on her. She screamed out, seemed to have found a surprising amount of strength. ‘Turn it off… Turn it off.’
‘That’ll be right.’
‘Barry. Barry, get that off.’
He started to laugh as Vee tried to fumble for the shower, hands outstretched like a blind woman; the scene was comical to him. ‘Serves you right, leaving me to mind that kid.’ He left her slipping, stumbling, ungainly in the bathtub, trying to escape the pounding of the thin jets of water.
Tierney plodded back towards the hallway. He found himself coughing loudly after his exertions. A wisp of mucus trailed from his mouth as he raised a hand to steady himself on the wall. There was no strength left in him. He found his head ached once again. There was a dizzy spell queuing behind his eyes and he needed to sit down. As he stumbled towards the living room he put his hands out in front of him in preparation for a flop onto the filthy mattress he had left only a few moments ago. Once he was inside, the baby’s cries attacked Tierney like jabs. He couldn’t lock them out. The child was Vee’s responsibility, not his, he thought. But somebody had to see to it. He couldn’t let any harm come to the baby — there was far too much at stake for that.
Tierney walked over to the dresser. The baby lay there in the top drawer, wrapped in an old coat. Her cheeks were puffed and the colour looked too red to be natural, like a plastic toy. The little hair on her scalp was stuck down. He leaned over, picked up the child — she felt damp. ‘Fuck’s sake.’ She was wet again. He raised her on his shoulder, gently patted her back. She was a young child and cried all the time. ‘Come on now, settle yourself down.’ He’d heard somewhere that the thing to do was put a drop of whisky on the baby’s dummy, put them fast asleep apparently. He’d heard that from a woman he once knew, so it had to be true. Women knew about babies, they were the ones to look after them, not men. ‘Vee. Get your arse through here!’
He heard movement in the hallway. The shower had stopped. That made him smirk again. He bared a row of cracked teeth at the child; already the baby seemed to have settled somewhat in his arms.
‘Vee… get through and feed this kid.’
The handle of the door to the living room turned slowly. As Vee came through she was still dripping wet but now she was wrapped in an old, fraying blanket that was dotted with stains and cigarette burns. She carried herself like a figure from a tragedy. Her thin, pale arms, exposed above the blanket, were bruised and scarred and her eyes were bloodshot and tired-looking. Tierney looked her up and down; he saw her feet sticking out beneath the blanket. He had always hated her feet — they were too big and her toes were crooked after years of forcing them into smaller shoes with high heels she wore to walk the Links. The sight of those feet was like incitement to Tierney. He wanted to knock her down for bringing them before him. He knew it wasn’t just the sight of the feet that poked the anger in him, it was the sight of her, what she had done to him and what she had made him do.
‘Get this fucking kid off me.’ He handed Vee the child and she put a hand under its legs, raised it onto her shoulder.
‘She’s hungry,’ said Vee.
‘Well, fucking feed her.’
Vee craned her neck to the side, as if she was trying to hear something far away, said, ‘The bottle’s in the kitchen.’ It was only when she spoke that Tierney realised she was indicating that he was to prepare the milk. He watched Vee with the child for a moment and felt something stir inside him. It was a feeling he wasn’t sure he had known existed before. It was close to duty, but he knew he wasn’t doing it for Vee, or the child.
Tierney dragged his legs back into motion, made for the kitchenette and started to fill a pot with water. There was a small gas burner with a blue canister. He lit it and placed the pot over it to boil. As the water heated he walked back to Vee and the child. ‘The Deil better sort us out.’
‘Do you think he won’t?’
He shook his head. ‘He’s not sure.’ He raised an arm, a thin finger extended towards the child in Vee’s arms. ‘About that.’
‘He was before.’ She seemed nonplussed, already looking towards the possibilities.
Tierney nodded. ‘He’s not sure now… He said he was, but then…’
Vee moved the child to her other shoulder, jutted her jaw. ‘But then what?’
Tierney heard the water boiling up, turned. Vee grabbed his arm as he moved. ‘But fucking what, Barry?’
‘Got to get the milk.’ He pulled his arm away.
As he went to the kitchen, Vee followed him. She watched him take off the saucepan, drop in the bottle of milk.
‘Barry, we can’t mess this up. We need to get sorted out or he’s going to lose patience. You know what that means.’
Tierney faced her. ‘I know.’
He didn’t want to think about being in debt to Devlin McArdle. He’d seen what happened to people who had run up sums they couldn’t pay back to the Deil; the idea he might join them scared him. He had thought he had the answer but now he wasn’t so sure. It had all gotten out of control, so much so that he couldn’t think of a way out. He couldn’t see any possibilities.
As the pair stared at each other there was a loud knock on the door. It sounded twice, then became a thud. Next was the sound of the post-slot being rattled and a familiar voice yelling in for them, ‘Open the fuck up!’
Vee stopped patting the baby’s back. She was the first to speak: ‘It’s him… the Deil.’