Dean Fee

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We finished the bag at half six and moved onto Mae’s depression medication. Senan lay upside down on the bed, his legs against the wall, and claimed it was a dumb idea. He had stopped taking drugs and only drank now. He had forgotten the desire to continue crushing and snorting.
………..It’ll do something, said Mae.
………..It won’t do anything, said Senan.
………..Better than nothing, I said
………..As Mae rummaged through her handbag, and the sun rose against the buildings across the street, Senan suggested that maybe we should just go home. He brought his watch to his face and said, It’s getting late.
………..Or early, he said, immediately dismissing his own pedantic point with a flap of his hand.
………..I rubbed at my nostrils with a forefinger and sniffed and hocked at the constant drip in the back of my throat, swallowing whatever phlegm it produced. I was definitely very high. My arms were tingling and I couldn’t stop flexing my fingers. I smiled to myself and watched Mae pop her pills onto her make-up dresser, catching each one under the dome of her hand before crushing them beneath a dole card we had found week ago at work. Some man named Fintan had left it on top of the cistern in the toilet, a fine line of white power along one edge.
………..Tonight had been a crazy night in work, one of the busiest of the year. The big tent had been set up over by the college and some big headliner had headlined. Afterwards the town was jammed and we got hit especially hard: five deep at the bar, people screaming to be served, to be seen, fights breaking out and everybody dancing. But it was over now—the festival, the weekend—and I’d no desire to go home.
………..Mae sat back on her hunkers and passed me the rolled up fifty to take my line. She rubbed her nose around the eye and let out a spell of disgusted air. Rotten, she said.
………..As I snorted, Senan asked her what she expected. He had turned onto his belly and was flicking through Spotify. The boop boop of the tracks changing turned something in my head sour and I asked him to please pick a tune. He asked me to give him a minute and we heard the start of four more songs before he landed on one. It was a beat driven and layered electro pop song that married well with my mood. I nodded my head along with it.
………..See, you’re happy you waited now, said Senan. He loves this song, he said to Mae, who was smoothing the skin around her cheekbones and staring off at nothing.
………..Are you feeling anything from that, I asked.
………..Hard to tell, she said. Will we do another one?
………..I dropped down to sit beside her at the table and said, Yes.
………..It felt nice down here, down on the ground where I would never normally sit. I felt like a child again. I lay down with my head at Mae’s knees and looked up at her as she went about crushing the next pills. After a minute she noticed me and smiled. She bent her head towards me and her hair fell from behind her ears and I reached up to touch the ends as though my mother were kissing me goodnight.
………..Mwah! she said – a faux kiss – and lifted away again.
………..She had read my mind.
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Mae was a little bit older than me and was in the last year of a PhD. I wasn’t sure what it was on because, like most people when you ask them about their PhD, she’d sigh and say it’s hard to explain. I pushed her on it once, at work, and all I got was a stream of words that meant very little to me.
………..See? she had said. It’s complicated.
………..When I first started there, I rarely saw Mae. She worked the day shift and I the night, so our time together was no more than an overlapping hour or two a weekend. I’d hang up my coat, duck in behind the bar and watch as she transitioned the place from day-time small plates and dinner, to what was ostensibly a nightclub. The odd time she’d come to the hatch with a drinks order from a table that were lingering after eating. Sometimes she’d ask me for a glass of water with no ice. She’d drink it on the spot and give me a look that said, Get me out of here.
………..When her shift would end, she’d come down in her normal clothes, stand at the end of the bar and count out the day’s tips, separating them into piles, and handing them out to the other waitstaff as they shrugged on their coats and left saying goodbye. Then, Mae’s boyfriend would arrive. He was tall and always wore a fur-lined, long green coat and a mild scowl. If Mae was running late, he might lean on the bar and talk to Senan. His voice was always low, his face unmoved, and when Mae’d come rushing out, needlessly apologising to everyone, he’d take her hand and they’d leave.

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Once we realised the medication wasn’t doing anything, Senan and I said we’d go.
………..And what am I gonna do now? said Mae. I’m still wired.
………..Senan stood at the front door with his hands in the air, yawning. That’s your own fault, he said, and received a cold stare.
………..Mom and Dad please don’t fight, I said.
………..Mae smiled and told me I’d have to go stay at my granny’s and I howled in mock horror.
………..Go on then, she said. Leave me all on my own.
………..We hugged briefly and when she kissed my cheek, I kissed hers back. Goodnight, I said, and stepped out into the busy street and blinding sun. She and Senan waved goodbye and the door closed behind us like an ending. Senan asked if I wanted to stop into his for a nightcap but I said I’d better get on.
………..Drinks later then? Soon?
………..Yeah?
………..Yeah, he said. We’ll go on the roll-over.
………..I asked him what time and he said, In a few hours. Go and sleep, if you can, and we’ll meet back in town around two?
………..I checked the time on my phone: it was nine am. I told him it was a date, we hugged and went our separate ways.>>

 

Back at my house I couldn’t sleep. When I closed my eyes, all I could see were zig-zagging shapes like static from the TV. Faces floating up from a subliminal pool, howling or smiling. Characters from television, people I knew, people I didn’t. I couldn’t stand it, so I went and knocked on my housemate’s door. He opened it immediately with a broad smile.
………..Well hello, he said, buttoning his work-shirt. Someone’s had a good night.
………..I have, I said. I have, indeed.
………..He laughed and said, The jaw on you boy.
………..I didn’t bother trying to steady it. Listen, I said. Have you got any CBD oil? I can’t sleep. Keep seeing faces under my eyelids.
………..He rummaged through the sheafs of paper on his desk and unearthed a small brown medicine bottle with a dropper. Here, he said and tossed it underhand to me. Take three drops on the back of the tongue.
………..I did as he said and thanked him. It tasted like aniseed.
………..You just going to sleep for the day?
………..I had wandered out to the kitchen, to stand there in the sunlight, everything surreal. No, I shouted back. Just for a few hours. We’re all going on it again at two.
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We found a place with seats outside and Senan told me he used to do this all the time with one of his old mates. He said they used to head into town early to a sun-spot and drink all day and watch the world go by. I told him I liked the sound of that, and the sun glinted off our pints as we cheers’d.
………..Those were the days, he said.
………..Listen to you, I said. Those were the days. You sound like an auld fella.
………..I fucking am, man.
………..When he laughed the corners of his mouth cracked, leaving flakes of skin that dissolved in the cider of his next gulp. He wasn’t looking great today.
………..Did you get much sleep? I asked.
………..Nah, man, he said. Didn’t bother.
………..Are you not wrecked?
………..Are you not? You’re the one that was on the chop? And the fucking Lexapro.
………..Is that what that was?
………..It was, he said, and said no more.
………..Instead of talking about Mae’s evident depression, we settled into the silence of watching. The streets were crowded and noisy and I became intoxicated by the convergence of bodies, the spell only broken when Greta showed up. Greta was a chirpy barista that worked in the coffee place beside us. Like a lot of service workers around town, we traded freebies on the quiet and came together in unison to complain about our bosses and their pittance pay. Greta was studying too, but I couldn’t remember what for.
………..There’s two boys on the roll-over, she said, standing over us, KeepCup in hand.
………..Us? said Senan. Hardly. We’re good quiet lads.
………..Yeah, yous are yeah. How’re you keeping, Ryan?
………..I’m not too bad, Greta, I said. How’re you?
………..Sure look. One day at a time. You were over at the big tent all week, weren’t you? I was chatting to Kate. She said you were firing out the drinks.
………..I was indeed. Firing them into myself half the time.
………..One for you, said Senan. One for me. One for you, one for me.
………..Oh yes, said Greta. That’s the way to do it. Stick it to the bastards. Here, listen, I better head anyway.
………..Are you not staying for a pint?
………..I’ve love nothing more but some of us have to work. Enjoy yourselves.
………..And mind this lad, she said, pointing at Senan. He’s a danger.
………..I said I would and we watched her go out of sight before commenting that she was lovely.
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I don’t know much about Senan; he doesn’t say a lot about himself. I know that he has dual Irish and Spanish citizenship, on account of his mother being from Bilbao, and I know he used to go hard on drugs – I’ve heard whispers that he was a dealer – but doesn’t touch them now. Won’t even smoke a joint. Which is rare in this town. And I know his father is dead.
………..Later, at a party in a flat down on the docks, Mae told me more.
………..Senan and I were still going. We had moved around the town from pub to pub, eventually ending up down the west end and running into Mae and a few others who worked in the restaurant, before heading out here. Everyone was well on it after a busy week and there were bags of coke and ket going round. I held my phone at my hip and checked by bank balance. I hadn’t much but I asked Mae if she’d like to go halves on some chop.
………..I can’t afford a full bag, I said.
………..Don’t worry about it, she said. You can have some of mine. Come with me.
………..She took my hand and lead me up three floors of thin staircases to a room she claimed was her friend’s. The ceilings were low and only a lamp was lit. Clothes were strewn over a bed. Mae’s mouth was going. She dropped to a coffee table in the middle of the room and after dragging me down with her, pulled out a baggy from her hip pocket and threw it on the table.
………..Cut a few lines there, will you, she said. My hands won’t stay still.
………..I fished my bank card out of my wallet, tipped out a mound and started separating it.
………..This will wake you up, she said.
………..I fucking need it, I said. It’s been a long day of drinking.
………..I had the steady movements of an alcoholic. My hands moved slow and deliberate, scraping the coke to either side, forming perfect white lines that would be a shame to take. But we took them anyway. First me, then Mae.
………..Mae held onto my arm and asked me where Senan and I had been. In the middle of telling her what pubs we had drank in, she interrupted and told me she was quitting her PhD. She said she was tired and that she no longer cared about what it was. She said the only reason she was still trying was because she was so close to the end.
………..How many years left? I asked.
………..One, she said. Not even one.
………..She took the cigarette from behind my ear and lit it. Exhaling smoke and passing it to me, she told me that she no longer cared about how close she was. I don’t care about wasted time now. It’s all wasted time.
………..My phone buzzed in my pocket. A text from Senan. Where are you? he asked.
………..I showed it to Mae and she nodded knowingly.
………..Should I invite him up?
………..Go for it, she said, and lay back on the carpet with her hands flung out above her head. She drew long luxurious breathes that ended in contented noises. I told her we could talk about the PhD thing again, but she said there was nothing to talk about.
………..You just be careful with Senan, she said to the ceiling.
………..Why? What’s wrong with him?
………..It’s easy to fall in love with him. That’s all.
………..I didn’t respond, only looked at her. Her eyes were closed and she was scratching softly at her scalp.
………..He’s the type of guy that likes to shine his light on you, and then, next thing you know, he turns it out.
………..The room was silent but for the boom of the music below, coming up in short dull blasts, like something trapped underwater. My vision swam and I felt a million miles away. Moonlight came silent in the window.
………..That was something Malachy said once, said Mae.
………..What?
………..About the light shining.
………..Yeah? Who’s Malachy?
………..He hasn’t told you about Mal? Of course he hasn’t. It doesn’t matter anyway. Just be careful.
………..I text Senan back to say where we were and he replied saying to come down.
………..He wants us down, I said.
………..You go, said Mae, throwing an arm over her eyes. I’m gonna stay here a minute.
………..I got to my knees and peered over her and asked was she all right. She said she was fine, she just needed to catch herself a bit. I pretended I understood and left.
………..Downstairs I met Senan in the kitchen. He was wearing a different shirt than earlier and was talking to a tall guy with a huge beard. When he saw me he beckoned me over and introduced me to him. His name was Hammond and he was from Sligo.
………..Hammond, I said.
………..Yeah, I know, it’s an odd one.
………..No it’s cool, I said. I like it.
………..His parents were Vikings, said Senan.
………..I looked at Hammond and he simply shook his head.
………..Senan had passed from the sleepy drunk of day drinking to the energetic buzz of party drinking. He derived a lot of his energy from people, moving through groups at will, striking up and joining conversations as though it was his second nature. People gravitated towards him with smiles and handshakes, pats on the back and offers of drink and drugs. He took everything but the drugs, made an impression and then moved on. Now he pat myself and Hammond on our arms and moved further into the throng and we both watched him with a sense of loss and admiration.
………..I held my finger to Hammond, to signal I’d be back, and ran after Senan.
………..Hey, I said, tugging at his shirt sleeve.
………..Hey, what’s up? he said. Everything alright?
………..Yeah, yeah, I said. Just I’m not sure Mae is doing so well. She seems down.
………..He rolled his eyes in exasperation.
………..What?
            This is just Mae being Mae. She’s always with the woe is me shit. What is it today? Has she quit college or has Jack broken up with her?
………..The blood rose in my neck. College, I said.
………..He held out his hands as if I proved his point. Well, there you have it, he said.
………..He put his arm around my shoulder. His breath in my face stank of beer. Listen, he said. I know you’re worried about her but she’s fine. She does this all the time. Especially when she’s lit. Like a crying baby, it’s best to just let her wear herself out.
………..But she’s sick, man, I said. The Lexapro. She’s depressed.
………..And?
………..And what if—
………..It’ll never come to that, mate.
………..He reached up and pulled my face to his. Look at me, he said, and I did. She’ll be fine. She’s always fine.
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After the owner of the house kicked everyone out, a select few of us were lead up to the top room where we found Mae passed out. For a split second I thought she was dead but before we could even rouse her, she woke up. She scanned our faces sleepily until she landed on Senan’s and smiled. He crouched down and whispered quietly to her and she nodded over and over in sad agreement. People threw themselves down, on the floor, on the bed. One couple cradled each other on a computer chair. I crossed my legs under me and lay back against the wall.
………..I didn’t know half of these people a few hours earlier, but the drugs were doing their job and we had all spilled intimate details about our lives. The guy to my left, a baldy guy wearing sunglasses in the dark, told me that he only masturbates at the weekend and he can’t come through penetration. The two girls to my right said they had a plan to go around at night and castrate men who have gotten away with sex abuse. They’re currently campaigning to make it a legal punishment. A deterrent, they said smoking. I told them about how when I was ten I prayed my dog would die so I’d have a reason to cry. I wanted someone to console me. I admitted after one of them rubbed my upper arm, that I still wanted it, in a way.
………..Did he die? asked one.
………..Yeah, I said. But no one consoled me. They said he was just a dog.
………..At some stage I was passed a joint that sent me to the bathroom puking. There had been cocaine in it and no one had said. The sulphurous vapour did not agree with me. I puked for about ten minutes, my stomach rolling and my head on fire. Senan came in briefly to see if I was alright and I told him I was fine. In the giddy haze of my high I was proud of the evidence of my overconsumption. From the toilet bowl I could see him in the mirror where someone had lipsticked take me home. It lay over his reflection like a desire come from the depths of me.
………..When I returned I collapsed down in my spot and waved away the joking offer of another drag of the joint. My night was wanning, and I accepted that I was going to sleep here tonight. My ear caught the music, something more mellow for this time of night, and it began to lull me. Before I closed my eyes, through the warble of smoky air and double vision I saw Senan and Mae, her head on his shoulder and his face turned to kiss the hair on her head.

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Dean Fee is a writer and editor based in Donegal, Ireland. He has been published in The Dublin Review, The Stinging Fly, The Tangerine, & more. He is the editor of The Pig’s Back literary journal and is currently working on a novel.