Tina, the mother of my first-born, asks me if I want another one of those beers that I drink. She makes three or four attempts to read the name off the can. “Hymenken,” is the closest she gets to it. If they sold it in Lidl, at €5 for a pack of six, she’d know how to say it.
“It’s joost if you don’t fiddish them,” she goes, “thee’ll only be thrun out.”
I’m there, “Well, I wouldn’t want that,” grabbing a fresh one from the fridge.
Sorcha tells Honor to stop holding her breath, which is something she does whenever we visit Ronan at home. As soon as we cross Tara Street Bridge, she storts breathing in and out only at, like, 30-second intervals.
“I’m conserving my oxygen,” she goes. “I don’t want my brain full of lead.”
I blame Sorcha for showing her her entry for the 1994 Young Scientist of the Year Exhibition, which was a comparative study on the air quality between the northside and southside of Dublin. That’s just ammunition for someone like our daughter.
She goes, “What are we even doing here?”
I’m there, “You know why we’re here, Honor. We’re here to say goodbye to your brother slash half-brother.”
Ronan leaves in the morning. I haven’t mentioned it yet – in a lot of ways I’m still trying to come to terms with it myself – but Manchester United have invited my son to join their academy for a year. Apparently, it’s a massive deal, because Ronan’s 16 now and these English soccer clubs generally have children signed up before they’ve even washed the afterbirth off them. I suppose it’s a bit like Blackrock College in that way.
The gaff is packed with people, all here to see him off. I’ve been trying to have a word with him, except I haven’t been able to get anywhere near him. He’s over the other side of the kitchen, chatting to his two friends, Nudger and Buckets of Blood. They’re telling him that he’ll have to give up his famous rollies if he’s going to make it as a professional footballer.
“Ine gonna smoke me last one outside the airpowert in the morden,” I hear him go. “Then Ine done with them forebber.”
Sorcha puts her hand on my shoulder and goes, “I can’t believe how quickly those years went,” as if reading my actual thoughts.
It seems like no time at all since he was six years old and shouting, “If it’s a war you’re wanting, then bring it on!” at the community Garda in Finglas.
She's actually here, I notice. Everyone loves Ronan. It's going to be weird not having him around.
"Ross," Sorcha goes, "we really should make tracks. If Honor keeps holding her breath like that, she's going to actually faint?"
I go, “Okay, fine,” and I manage to catch Ronan’s eye across the kitchen and I give him a wave goodbye. “We need to make like shepherds,” I go.
He’s like, “Not without saying a proper goodbye you’re not. Mon outside,” and he nods in the direction of the kitchen door.
I follow him out to the gorden. He sits on the back wall and storts rolling another cigarette.
“I heerd you’re back woorking as an estate agent,” he goes, making conversation.
“Yeah, no, I’m back in the game,” I go. “The world’s oldest profession, as they call it. How are you? Are you excited?”
“Ine moostard, Rosser. Ine arthur been gibbon a chaddence here, you know yourself. Nebber thought it’d happen for me. Ine gonna gib it me best shot.”
I sort of, like, nod. I got the general gist of what he said.
I’m like, “I hope the money’s good, is it? Not that I’m prying.”
He’s there, “Ine gonna be on a hondord a week.”
I'm like, "A hundred?" in genuine shock. "Are you sure that's per week?"
“Per week, yeah. And that’s steerlen, but.”
“I don’t care what it is. You couldn’t board a dog for that kind of bread.”
“Ah, it’s enough. Ine gonna be getting all me meals in me digs.”
“Did you say digs?”
“Yeah, Ine gonna be lodging in a gaff in Cheadle. The landlady’s veddy nice.”
All I can do is just stare into space. He’s stepping in to a whole other world. “A hundred snots a week?” I go. “A landlady? It’s like you’re going on some prison release scheme or something.”
He laughs. “Ine gonna miss that,” he goes. “Having the slaggings wit you.”
I’m there, “I’ll miss it, too. Anyway, look, I had this little, I don’t know, speech prepared that I was going to give you, except I don’t know if I can deliver it without getting a bit choked up. You know me – I can be unbelievably emotional.”
“You’re an embaddassment, Rosser.”
“Thanks, Ro.”
“Blubbing like a babby at the slightest fooken thing.”
“Yeah, I’m well aware of what I’m like, Ro.”
“The state of you.”
"Anyway, what I was going to say was mostly that I'm proud of you. I know that'll come as a major surprise to a lot of people who expected me to produce a rugby player. I know there's a lot of people out there – my critics, mostly – possibly whispering and pointing the finger at me, going, 'That's the dude whose son is going to England to become one these soccer players.' I don't actually care. I've stopped even denying it to people. I'm actually proud that my son is going to be a soccer player."
“Your voice is going all quivery there, Rosser.”
"In fact," I go, "I wanted to give you this," and I push something into his hand – the one that isn't feeding nicotine into his lungs. "It's for luck."
He looks at it and he’s suddenly speechless.
“It’s my Leinster Schools Junior Cup medal,” I go. I’d give him my senior one, except I was famously stripped of it for doping. “That piece of metal is the most precious thing in the world to me – after you and your sister, obviously. Well, it’s possibly more precious than Honor. It’d be a close run thing. I want you to have it, though. Keep it with you always. It’ll bring you luck. And don’t forget us, okay?”
I end up having to walk away because I’m on the point of genuine tears here and I can’t trust myself not to make a complete orse of myself in front of him. I reach the house, and, as I do, I chance a quick look back over my shoulder, in time to see my son staring at the medal and wiping away tears with the back of his hand.