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Blood on the walls. Blood on the floor. Vacant blue eyes. Terrified brown eyes. Disappointed green eyes.
“You said six hundred?” Gibsie cut me off by asking as he retrieved a wad of cash from his coat pocket and placed it on my lap. “It’s all there.”
“Like I said, I can keep a secret,” he offered with a wink. “I’ve got your back, Mrs. Joey the hurler.”
I just don’t want you to judge my sister based on bullshit that she can’t control. She couldn’t be more different from the rest of our family.”
“Because I am.” With my skin itching and my body cold to the bone, I forced a nod. “Shannon’s the best person I know.”
“Oh, Joey love.” Sympathetic brown eyes locked on mine. “Why do I get the feeling that Shannon would say the exact same thing about you?”
“I’m your son,” I replied, giving her back her words. “Why do you hate me so much?”
“Hi, chickie,” I replied, voice thick with emotion as I pulled her skinny little frame into my arms and hugged her a little tighter than I should.
“You are a drug addict,” she cried out hoarsely as she swung around to glare at me. “You are killing yourself and you are killing me!”
“Yeah, and you love that shit you inject into your veins more.” She batted my hand away. “I don’t want anything to do with that kind of love. Keep your love for the drugs.”
He inspected every inch of her like she was of the greatest importance to him, and I watched as the big lad was overcome with emotion. “Shh, baby, shh.” Seeing her hurt affected him. No, it was more than that. It crushed him.
Because she had the nerve to put hands on my man.
“Does your skin itch so bad you want to tear yourself open? Has the cold gotten into your bones so deep you feel like you’ll never be warm again? What about the cold sweats and the nausea? Have you reached the stage where you would rather die than go without?”
“You’re living,”
“You have them?” Dizziness engulfed me as I tried to comprehend what the fuck he was saying. He had them? My kids? He had them? “You got them out?”
They’re safe. They’re safe. They’re safe.
“Aoife misses Joey, too.”
“Read the part where he was trusting his babies with you and John.”
“Because that’s what Ollie, Shan, Tadhg, and Sean are,”
“They’re his babies,
“I’ve always been a father!” I roared back, chest heaving. “And I’ve done a pretty fucking good job with the four I’ve raised. And yeah, I’m a mess, and yeah, I’m an addict, but I’m a good father! I’m a good fucking parent, Darren. I kept them alive. I kept them fed, and loved, and nurtured, and goddamn educated. I did that. Not you. Not him. Not Mam. Me. So, call me a junkie and whatever the hell else you want to call me, but don’t say that I’m too young to be a father!”
“I planted those,” I decided to tell them, pointing to a bed of black-eyed Susans, standing alone among a flurry of pink dahlias and hydrangeas. “Those ones are mine.”
“Our girl here is a MILF!”
“And when Joey the DILF gets home, there’s going to be explosions.”
“I miss my mother.”
date of birth: 30/08/05, time of birth: 02:22
“He has Shannon’s little nose.”
“Thanks for my baby, queen.
“His name is Anthony Joseph Lynch.” Smiling, she added, “AJ for short.”
This girl. Messy as fuck or not, this girl had my unconditional support.
I wasn’t sure about soul mates, but if they existed, then my nephew’s parents were a prime example. Joey Lynch and Aoife Molloy: both full of flaws and humanly imperfect and yet so undeniably perfect for each other.
