Colm Brady

The Prom is en route

The van had been parked outside the residence of Prometheus O’Reilly for some time now. Last night the Prom had landed home from town in a minicab – the driver and he had an arrangement. The Prom got a discount on the large fare if he could refrain from talking about politics or local hurling. The taxi-driver knew that either subject would make for a belligerent passenger who would question his own parentage and quibble over the charge from his inner city local to his out of town residence.
Naoise blew the horn again and finally the front door opened. A tall dishevelled figure emerged looking aggrieved.
“You don’t have to lift the roof with that yoke you know”
The driver knew from that first greeting it was going to be a long day. The tone of his employer’s day was set in the first seconds after waking.
Mrs Prom stuck her be-towelled head out after them.
“Naoise remember to get him back from the job straight after work – I want those hedges cut – he was meant to do them last week”
The prom lifted his head above the vans roof and snorted.
“You don’t need to be giving him orders too”
“Well if you still had your driving licence you wouldn’t need a driver and I wouldn’t have to give him orders”
“If we didn’t live out here I wouldn’t have been caught.”
“Did you really want to live in that godforsaken estate for the rest of your life?”
“Maybe I would; at least I would know my bloody neighbours!”
The twitching of curtains up the road indicated the neighbours knew a fair bit about him even if he had little interest in them. They were used to the fractious departures of the van early in the morning and its frequent return after closing time. The Prom shook his shoulders in defiance and got into the van beside the young lad. At least this lad would work – not like his own rotund offspring.
This morning he had spotted Prom junior eating a sausage roll while playing a video game. He had enquired as to the likelihood of coming out to work for a day. A grunt and shower of pastry indicated the answer was in the negative. That kid took after his mother he reckoned.
“Onward to the Statoil” came the daily order.
Van, Owner and Driver were supplied with Diesel, Breakfast Roll and Cereal Bar respectively. All were happier and Naoise turned on the radio to discourage conversation from the Prom. He turned it to a Pop station but the Prom reached across and knocked it back to Radio One.
“Leave it, I cant be listening to that housey housey rubbish - me head is lifting”
They got through the main roundabouts as the presenter introduced a man who claimed to be addicted to old socks – other peoples’ old socks.
After the bypass they approached city limits and instantly became stranded among a flotilla of trucks and tradesman’s vans all heading for a day’s work.
Naoise tuned from the smelly sock station to one that carried traffic news. He often wondered at the origins of the accents of the announcers. They had a mid-Atlantic drawl that placed them firmly around the Azores. It even stirred the Prom from his pig-in –a-bun.
“We start with Dublin and the Rud Kyow Rahndaboowt”
“Sufferin Jaysus get on to Galway so we don’t have to listen to this shite!”
“..Building up in Cork at the Jok Lynch Tunnel while the Kinsale Rud Rahndaboowt is backed up”
“Do you remember that wan that used to do this and ended up on the telly”
“Was it Olivia O’ Leary, was it?”
“Nah some younger wan, I never knew Olivia O’Leary did the traffic news..”
“Yeah we did it in History in college”
Prom looked suspiciously over at Naoise who was finishing his cereal bar.
“I don’t know how you can eat that hippy crap. I mean how the fuck do you get yoghurt into a bloody bar?”
“That cholesterol bomb you just had, three kinds of pig and enough calories to feed a village in Botswana for a week.”
“Two eggs, two bacon, two sausage….”
“Aw man, every morning you have to sing the damn song!”
“Sorry man, I mean dude, no I mean man”
This all took place in the shadow of a large white van with copper piping on the roof. The prom had dumped the breakfast roll wrapper in the back and was texting happily on his mobile with his booted feet on the dashboard. They crawled to the next roundabout and then the plumbers van ahead stalled and missed its chance to take off. The Prom reached across and hammered his fist on the Horn angrily.
“Now what did that achieve exactly?”
“It made me feel a whole lot better”
The traffic eventually started to move and the van ahead faltered for a moment .The Prom hit the horn again but this time the van stopped totally. Naoise gulped as a very large man got out. Very large didn’t do this guy justice, he was big and angry and about to kill them. The giant was aiming his comments at the driver’s side of the van and was starting to froth at the mouth.
“He is coming at me, what the hell do I do now?”
“Drive like the hammers of bejaysus, NOW”
Naoise thought about reasoning with the large man for a millisecond then floored it up the road. The prom extracted a piece of white pudding from the folds of his work trousers and laughed to himself.
“Some people in this world you just can’t reach “
“That’s out of a film and if you had left things alone…”
“If me aunt had balls she would be me uncle. I suppose you would have talked him down using your logical skills and all that.”
Prom shifted to a more superior stance as they pulled into their latest tiling job.
“Do you remember meeting my big cousin Gerry Tree trunks at all”
“No, I hear enough about him in McNamaras from Skipper and the old timers though”
“Well you just met him. That’s who I was texting when we were behind his van.”
“But I think I ran over his foot”
“Fair chance, they are size fourteen “
“You are a real funny man, we will see how funny you are when your missus has you clipping hedges instead of in the boozer this evening”
“Ah C’mon, just a couple of pints after work, she will never know”
Naoise stopped the van outside the next house for its identi-kit tiling job and opened the back for the tools. If the Prom wanted his after work scoop he was going to have to be nice to Naoise all day– sweet.

posted by Colm Brady @ 7:40 PM 0 comments