 When
I’m sad, she comes to me
with a thousand smiles, she gives to me free (Little Wing- Jimi Hendrix) Part Three It was a blur getting home, but the walk did me some good. At least I stopped crying anyhow, even if I couldn't stop looking at him- wondering what he thought of what he saw now, and what on earth he wanted from me. With some effort of will I pulled myself up and tried to stop the - well what? SCREAM! Yeah that should about cover it the main points of it. A scream of frustration, happiness, anger, disappointment, embarassment, and pure lust that was threatening to escape. Maybe the last one was the most troublesome- I wish I didn’t want him, wish I didn’t feel the same, and I wish that my body would stop betraying me. I can barely look at you Joe. Hell there is a load of things I thought I would never do, like walk the Great Wall of China for instance, but having him sitting the other side of the coffee table is the dog’s dinner. After all those dreams and wishes and nights spent thinking about every single move he would make, how it would be to touch him again- here he is. And now I can’t sit next to him, I just can’t, I don't know how to be. So I pull my legs up into the chair and smile “Have another whiskey Joe, you look like you need one.” “Aye.I think I will.” “So how did you find me?” How’s the weather there? How IS your mother? And the boys? How have they been? Fuck, you know what actually I don’t care - I can’t stand it. I can’t stand how much it excites and pains me both to see him, sitting there, all long thighs and curls and perfect. And me, well, I am just me. Pull your stomach in Eva. Fuck, I am not vain, this isn’t about perfect, this is about nearly 30 years. Ages past, differences, changes. “I went to the Royal Mail first, I couldn’t think of where else to start, it was a shock I can say to find it all boarded up. Jerilderie itself come to think on it, give or take a few old barnacles! The old fella in the Telegraph Office, well he gave me the forwarding address for Cat, and I just followed the trail down here. What?” “So it wasn’t the rock then?” even as I say it I can feel the poke in my thigh, like its laughing at me too. “Hahah Eva, you don’t believe…Aye, yes I am sure it was the rock, led me straight to the bar, nuttin’ at all to do with the directions Cat gave me.” I can’t help but grin at him, it is funny after all. Carrying around a bit of stone. “Yeah, there’s always a better answer eh? Than magic.” He looks strangely hurt. Like I just negated him being here. “Joe…Christ” Oh for fucks sake Eva just talk, when did you ever stop at the hard stuff? “I really missed you, miss you…I don’t think I ever quite got over it all…you.” He is frowning a bit “But you can’t be unhappy Eva- with all this?” His hand sweeps around the room, the too full room and my mind wanders guiltily to the fridge, packed I am sure, with food that will be thrown out before I get to eat it. I haven’t even offered him anything- least I could do eh? “It’s just …things...” Before it is out of my mouth I can feel myself wince, and I hurry on, embarrassed to be moaning about years that he doesn’t have “No, I haven’t been unhappy, I just didn’t ever quite settle.” I take a long look at him, watch his face. “No fella hiding out in the backroom with a shotgun?” his eyes are crinkling a bit at the edges. “No, me and Cat we just…” I don’t bother finishing the sentence and he doesn’t ask anymore; instead he takes another gulp and sits back against the plush sprung sofa “How about you?” Stupid question. “Well I haven’t had much of a chance…to settle down and all, it being all of a few weeks and us being on the run…” My eyes are filling up as I grimace at myself. “No, no of course not” and I guess he got that the complete and overwhelming sadness gates were about ready to fully open. “Eva, will yer come sit next to me at least?” And I am across the table in a second. Who knew eh? Perhaps the Olympics aren’t beyond me after all. I can’t tell you solid he feels, like nothing could ever be any different, that he couldn’t ever ‘not be’. I take huge a lungful of air to breathe him in as my arms snake around his body. He is just overwhelming and I mutter almost to myself “Joe, I really did miss you, and I am not sure that you should have come back.” He doesn’t speak again for a bit and I just sit, absent-mindedly wringing my hand in his. “I don’t know about all that lass. It’s just… the traps are on to our trail. Aaron is playing some game that I can’t fathom out, although I know…I know how it ends and there’s no stopping it. Is the way things are, and I was remembering how it felt to be away from all that, just how you made me forget for a bit anyway.” Oh. A well-deserved jab in the ribs. I lift my head up to look at him and whisper “I am sorry”. I don’t think it gets far out of my mouth. Fuck Eva you are a fool. A few fucking wrinkles, not to mention grey hairs, a pound or several extra, a drama out of getting old when at least you are. “Joe- is there nothing you can do? Ned must know…” “Aye that he does, we all do. But it doesn’t alter the facts now does it? His mother in jail and the coppers still being the bastards that they are, and us…well, it’s like I said before. We can’t just leave, we are stuck in that place and that time and that’s the truth of it.” I hold his beautiful face in my hands just for a second. “I am tired Eva, I wanted to find yer because I don’t want to have to explain, don’t have to think about it anymore, you know it all already. I can just lie down and be quiet for a bit. I don’t have to be Joseph Byrne outlaw, cop killer, organiser- not anything. I heard that some rich folks go away for a holiday, to take the different air or summat. Well maybes I am on my holidays, just for a bit eh?” I can’t help but laugh as the thought of a postcard runs through my head. ‘Dear All, weather the same as back home but the accommodations are cracking on a bit.’ "Alright then". Though I don't have any bathers to hand, nor icecream either. I swallow a gulp at the thought of Joe half naked on a towel at the seaside licking a '99 cone "But no we didn’t ever talk about what happened, I mean happens, much.” Like a huge white elephant with a gun in the room eh? He grins a bit, glances out from under those curls with a cheeky smirk. Fuck Joe, you are going to be the death of me. “Aye because we didn’t need to, and anyways there was not much time fer that eh?” “No...Not with all the...” “Messing around with each other we did.” Christ I swear he turned the heat up. I can’t tell if he is teasing me, coming on to me, or whether he is just enjoying me blush at my own confused and tangled up thoughts. Perhaps he doesn’t know himself. Perhaps he just wants to be here anyhow. It is hard to sit next to this man and not consider all the possibilities even if some of them are just too far fetched. Still, imagination was never my problem was it? “Do you have any tobacco Eva?” “Bit late for a post-fuck smoke…” Oops now that might just give my thoughts away huh? I like hearing him laugh, though perhaps it wasn’t that funny. I like it even better when I can feel him laughing. “Aye perhaps it’s taken a while to catch me breath eh?” Joe…Joe…you are going to have to stop saying stuff like that, or I may not be responsible for where my fingers end up. I reluctantly stand up and go rummage in the drawers of my desk, sure I had some somewhere, might be a bit dried up but should taste ok, hahaah, yeah. Get a grip Eva. “You remember us in that tent under the covers?” Yes, I can feel the memory of it right now, frankly. I sit back down and hand him what is a poor offering, but he seems cheered enough, rolling the thin paper in his fingers, a touch of it to his tongue before he sticks it in his mouth and looks round expectantly. Oh, for a light though. “Of course I do.” I am not so sure that my hands won’t shake so I hand him the lighter and just watch him pull the smoke into his lungs, closing his eyes for the briefest second as he does. “I was thinking about that just last night.” Funny enough I am sure it crossed my mind once or twice. But I am holding my breath so hard that I can’t respond to say so. “I liked it in there, cosy wouldn’t you say?” Those eyes are glittering at me again as he sits there smoking the dust. “Jesus Joe…Are you trying to wind me up?” He looks a bit confused now “Am I trying to what?” Oh just a cultural historical thing then “Make fun of me…take the piss.” “Now why would I do that? Come all this way to be uncharitable to yer? There’s plenty I could amuse meself with back home, Steve for one.” “Joe, look at me! I am old, well nearly…and you…aren’t. You are still beautiful and strong and the best-looking man I ever saw. Why on earth would you want me?” While I sit incredulous, he just stares awhile, a frown between his brows, searching for a piece of the jigsaw that he has obviously mislaid somewhere and deciding perhaps that it is well and truly down the back of the sofa. Defeated, surprised even, rather than overcome with lust it has to be said and I can hardly blame him either “You are still Eva aren’t yer? I don’t know that I am sure about anything, I just know that it was you I came to find. Ah sure, well maybe the years made things more complicated, I understand now. I’ll not bother you with it all.” No no NO! “But anyways, I’d appreciate a lie down all the same, if that’s not to much trouble that is, I am fair done in.” Fuck. This better and worse than I even dreaded. He, well, he has no time to speak of and I have what’s left of a lifetime to sit around regretting that I didn’t grab him with both hands and kiss him right now. Have you completely lost your fucking mind Eva? You know you’d make a good Dharma Bum Joe? Ha! Perhaps you are already. I got it now. |