Read Online In Too Deep by Billy O'Callaghan - Free Book Online Page A
Authors: Billy O'Callaghan
Tags: Fiction, Fantasy, History, Short Stories, Europe, Short Stories (Single Author), Ireland, Marginality; Social
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confluence of the planets and stars. Whatever the reason, out beyond the obliterating smear of cloud, space continued on its merry way, worlds turned, and the sun broke free of its shadow-trap, one crack at a time.
White light sifted into the day and the darkness was broken down to twilight. Within a few minutes, unseen birds began to sing, tricked into concert by the sudden, unexpected return of day, and then the dogs settled and my backyard seemed to breathe with renewed vigour. After the darkness, everything seemed more vital and alive, colours appeared far more brilliant than before, even on an overcast late August afternoon.
I thought about Melinda and wondered if she was settling comfortably into her new life; if, with her new man at her side, she had stood at some window or in the middle of a garden space over on the other side of town to watch the unfurling of this astronomical sleight of hand. The idea of an eclipse would have appealed enormously to the old Melinda, the Melinda who had once upon a time loved nothing more than walking on storm-lashed beaches or watching the first arrival of the swallows, the Melinda who, a lifetime ago, had fallen headlong into love with me. But she had changed in a hundred years worth of ways over the past six months, ever since Jonathan had appeared on the scene to turn her head with his leery charm and to turn her mind on to all manner of small excitements. I estimated the odds lay probably better than evens that the newly matched lovers had foregone the wonders of Syzygy in favour of working through a bottle of celebratory champagne or enjoying a stint of bedtime acrobatics.
A day of two dawns, the day when lifeâs road split in two. Now, she had gone and followed her path and I was left behind to stray blindly along on mine. I found or made time to go and stand in my backyard for the better part of an hour, time that I chose to spend watching the sky, watching for the least shift, the most delicate slip of the light. But what does that say about me? The sun, moon and planets did their best to keep me entertained, of course, even if their tricks were all turned behind a wall-thick curtain of cumulus and stratum, but while the whole Syzygy business was undeniably impressive, at least as a notion, it spanned too brief a time to be in any way truly world-shaking. As much as I tend to feel like one sometimes, out of pace as I am with society in general, I am not an ancient. I am me, just one of the innumerable tiny shards of pain stuck on a spinning speck of dust, trying in the only way I know how to exist, and like everyone else, I spend my days and nights denying my insignificance, struggling to think up some vague crumb of worth in order to justify every move I make, every fantastic thought I have. Thatâs what living has become, at least in my corner of the world.
Too quickly, the darkness fell away and the day was bright again. The world was once more content to turn its face away from the whispers of magic and to settle instead for the stoicism of bill-paying and child-bearing, that state where equilibrium is everything and highlights are small and, generally, within reach; highlights such as the swirling beauty of a slow dance in a big room or the pure satisfaction of a steak dinner. If joy and misery are opposite sides of the scale, balance is to be found with the banal. Contentment really is worth its weight in gold.
Like Mel, I found myself free to go where I wanted and to follow my heartâs desires. What I chose to do was to go back inside and to sit and eat the sandwich Iâd earlier made and then abandoned. The bacon would be cold by now, the fat beginning to congeal. Which, actually, was just how I like it.
Little Indignities
In the old days, every village in the country had a man like Paudie OâReilly in their midst. Standing at just a shade under six feet in height and with the heavy, rounded shoulders of someone well versed in the distribution
White light sifted into the day and the darkness was broken down to twilight. Within a few minutes, unseen birds began to sing, tricked into concert by the sudden, unexpected return of day, and then the dogs settled and my backyard seemed to breathe with renewed vigour. After the darkness, everything seemed more vital and alive, colours appeared far more brilliant than before, even on an overcast late August afternoon.
I thought about Melinda and wondered if she was settling comfortably into her new life; if, with her new man at her side, she had stood at some window or in the middle of a garden space over on the other side of town to watch the unfurling of this astronomical sleight of hand. The idea of an eclipse would have appealed enormously to the old Melinda, the Melinda who had once upon a time loved nothing more than walking on storm-lashed beaches or watching the first arrival of the swallows, the Melinda who, a lifetime ago, had fallen headlong into love with me. But she had changed in a hundred years worth of ways over the past six months, ever since Jonathan had appeared on the scene to turn her head with his leery charm and to turn her mind on to all manner of small excitements. I estimated the odds lay probably better than evens that the newly matched lovers had foregone the wonders of Syzygy in favour of working through a bottle of celebratory champagne or enjoying a stint of bedtime acrobatics.
A day of two dawns, the day when lifeâs road split in two. Now, she had gone and followed her path and I was left behind to stray blindly along on mine. I found or made time to go and stand in my backyard for the better part of an hour, time that I chose to spend watching the sky, watching for the least shift, the most delicate slip of the light. But what does that say about me? The sun, moon and planets did their best to keep me entertained, of course, even if their tricks were all turned behind a wall-thick curtain of cumulus and stratum, but while the whole Syzygy business was undeniably impressive, at least as a notion, it spanned too brief a time to be in any way truly world-shaking. As much as I tend to feel like one sometimes, out of pace as I am with society in general, I am not an ancient. I am me, just one of the innumerable tiny shards of pain stuck on a spinning speck of dust, trying in the only way I know how to exist, and like everyone else, I spend my days and nights denying my insignificance, struggling to think up some vague crumb of worth in order to justify every move I make, every fantastic thought I have. Thatâs what living has become, at least in my corner of the world.
Too quickly, the darkness fell away and the day was bright again. The world was once more content to turn its face away from the whispers of magic and to settle instead for the stoicism of bill-paying and child-bearing, that state where equilibrium is everything and highlights are small and, generally, within reach; highlights such as the swirling beauty of a slow dance in a big room or the pure satisfaction of a steak dinner. If joy and misery are opposite sides of the scale, balance is to be found with the banal. Contentment really is worth its weight in gold.
Like Mel, I found myself free to go where I wanted and to follow my heartâs desires. What I chose to do was to go back inside and to sit and eat the sandwich Iâd earlier made and then abandoned. The bacon would be cold by now, the fat beginning to congeal. Which, actually, was just how I like it.
Little Indignities
In the old days, every village in the country had a man like Paudie OâReilly in their midst. Standing at just a shade under six feet in height and with the heavy, rounded shoulders of someone well versed in the distribution
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