I Ain't The One

This is the first time I've ever written anything from a male POV, so apologies in advance for any bum notes. Anyone who's confounded by any Irishisms, please feel free to message me for an explanation.

*****

Who can bring a clean thing out of an unclean? not one.

Job 14:4

1980

Mercedes was 27 when I met her, a teacher at the local CBS. The staff drank in Tanners where I was working at the time. I was on a roll that year. Dolores, a barmaid, Carmel, the owner's wife, Marguerite, a sweet little bitch from the convent...Mercedes used to slag me about my reputation but I could tell that it excited her as well. She liked to flirt. She couldn't help herself.

One night, we got talking in the kitchen at a house-party for the tennis club crowd. I crashed it after the end of my shift. She was wearing tight jeans, a cream blouse, a blue satin scarf knotted at the side of her neck. Red lipstick on her teeth, the same colour as her Dunhills box. The lad she had come with had puked and was passed out in the front room.

We shared her pint bottle of cider. She smelled ripe, perfume and vinegar on top of warm decay, like she was on her period. Not drunk - she could hold her drink - but she'd had a few.

You know by a woman if you're in or not - the way she holds herself, a certain tone of voice. When she wandered off, I knew she wanted me to follow. I stepped past a row on the point of breaking out in the front garden and saw her leaning against the corner of the house. Just a shape and the tip of a cigarette. She pushed off with her shoulder and walked around the side. I followed the smell of her fag into the darkness.

I couldn't see her but I felt her. She came at me like an animal hunting at night. Her mouth was vicious, all teeth and raw, rotten meat. She grunted as her back hit the wall, clawing at my face. A big country woman, all angles. Hard to get a hold of but I knew that it was important that I did so. Even at that stage, I knew she wanted a man who was up to her.

She opened my zip as I felt her cunt through her jeans. She was wearing a pad. She said it didn't matter. Funkytown was playing inside the house. It still makes me hard when I hear it...

She jerked me off inside the grinding together of our hips. I could see the brightness of one eye as I hunted down her tongue with mine. Her bush was clotted into knots around her cunt lips but I found a way through. No virgin, but I already knew that. I put two fingers knuckle-deep into her, putting her off her stride for a second. I felt her stretch as she stood on her toes before coming down hard, her crotch working in sync with my fingers.

She knew when I was about to come. She spun me around so my back was to the wall and rolled off to the side without a break in the steady rhythm of her fist. I flattened my palms upon the pebble-dash, her mouth hot against my ear telling me to do it, to shoot my spunk into the dark. I heard shouting around the corner, the crack of a sweetly-delivered slap. My legs dipped and she started to laugh, placing her free hand over my mouth. I bit down hard on her middle finger but she didn't flinch...

You can also tell when a woman has had enough of you. She said we should go back seperately; that she would go back in first. I went to kiss her but she backed away, telling me to zip up my pants. And with that, she was gone.

I licked my fingers, tasting cunt and blood, a trace of piss. The air was cold upon my cock.

She freaked out when I rang her the next evening. Wanted to know how I'd got her number. I said it was in the local directory. She said she was going ex and not to phone her again. Then she hung up.

I was in a phone box outside the post office. I waited for my change to drop but nothing happened. Paper up the slot...I found it, pulled it out and hit the jackpot. They deserved to lose out for being greedy.

I took the money to Minogue's and put it towards two Baby Powers and ten fags, then hopped the wall to the Parish Hall field where I climbed into the cockpit of an abandoned JCB.

The first slug of whiskey made me gag. I didn't like games, if that was what she was at. She thought she was smarter than everyone else. I touched myself through my jeans, remembering her teeth on my lips, the tight knot in her scarf. She lived in Balderry, beyond the convent fields. Had her own house, her own car. A red Datsun. I'd seen her park it up in Aughrim Street, black tights coming out of the door. Rolling into the Bank of Ireland like she owned the place...

I finished the first bottle and opened the second. The deeper you get into whiskey, the better it tastes until it's so delicious that it makes you want to cry.

I wouldn't be made a fucking eejit out of. Not by her, not by any woman. She wasn't the only one who could play games.

Once it was dark, I took the fields to the back wall of her estate. There was a light on in the bedroom but the curtains were drawn. I dropped into her back garden and hid behind the shed. Sunday night...she had work in the morning. I pictured her reading in bed, eating Black Magic, fingering the red tassel of the lid. Maybe she wasn't alone.

I thought about her date from the night before, a maths teacher from the Tech, a farmer's kid like she was. Always rounded off the night with Black Russians; always made a fucking big deal out of it. He'd got smart with me one night but he'd backed off when I'd thrown it back at him. No balls and a messy drunk. They hadn't been an item for long. She obviously had her doubts about him.

I grabbed a pair of knickers and a pair of tights from the washing line and went back behind the shed where I took out my cock. The knickers were damp with dew, as cold against my knob as her voice had been on the phone. I remembered her mouth against my ear, the dirty words she liked to use. She called it a prick. Mm, shoot your fucking prick, shoot your spunk...Her fanny slimy with blood...

Hot wetness filling up cotton...Afterwards I hung the knickers back where I had found them. The load was so big that it would excite as much as disgust her when she found it. I knew what she was like. She might have had them all fooled with her Mary Tyler Moore act but she didn't fool me. It took a dog to sniff one out.

She came in on Thursday evening with a gang of teachers after a union meeting. I was on my own behind the bar. All of them piled forward at once, shouting and clicking their fingers at me. I took my time on purpose. The only crowd more obnoxious than teachers are guards. They're well suited.

Mercedes didn't come to the bar until later. She ordered two glasses of Harp and lime, paid in loose change. Not a flicker. She said I'd left her fivepence short. I said I didn't made mistakes. She wanted to see the owner. I told her he was off, that I was head barman and if she had a problem, she'd need to take it up with me. She wasn't used to backchat. Her cheeks were pale, sucked in. I took tenpence from my pocket and slid it to her beneath my palm.

Keep the change...

She was one of four left at closing. Herself, two alcos and Connie, a French teacher with a great arse but a face like a rear-ended bumper. I wanted them gone but they ignored my barking.

Are you right there ladies and gentlemen, please?

Mercedes was nursing a drip left in the bottom of her half-pint glass. When I tried to take it, she grabbed it protectively.

I'm not finished...

She didn't even look up when she said it.

Then it was just her and Connie. They sat close together, whispering, both of them looking serious. I imagined fucking the two of them at once, on the bar, like that barman and the two sluts in Playbirds. Why not? The doors were locked, the till was done...

But they were getting ready to leave. Connie went to the jacks. Mercedes put on her denim jacket as I cleared their table. She made a crack about first in, last out. Her blouse was pink, the button at her tits not sitting right. The clasp shutting on her handbag was like a gunshot in the silence. I stood my ground. She raised her eyes, as if to say, What? Her smile was a long time in coming...

It was after one when I got out. The town was dead. Aughrim Street, the Cross, Charles Street...Not a car on the road, not a sinner on the move. As I walked past the auctioneers on Stonepark Street, I saw the headlights approaching. The car pulled up opposite Hugh Conor's, its engine idling. I slowed down as I got closer. She was just an outline in the driver's seat, a black mass. The passenger side window was down. She told me to get in...

Back up Aggie's Place, right on to Garryard Street then left on to Tisdall Street. Neither of us spoke. The car smelled of Doublemint and deodorant. Skynyrd on the stereo, turned down low. We drove out Croseery and parked next to the hospital, outside the church. She threw her fag butt out the window and said that the hospital used to be a poor-house; the church its fever hospital.

Is that right?

I popped the button that had annoyed me earlier. She didn't move.

She was wearing two gold chains, a thin choker and a longer, heavier one that formed a U upon her chest. I picked up the second with my teeth and brought it up with me to her lips. Our tongues couldn't hold it. Our mouths were all spit. I had watched her eat at a function one night, her lips and fingers greasy with fried chicken. You could tell she liked her food. I put two fingers in her mouth, trying and failing to grab her tongue. Pure black eyes. Her spit ran down my wrist.

I saw you looking...

I opened her bra one-handed, buzzing off the give.

I know it was you...

She had a fucking body on her and she knew it. Her skin was like the cream of good porter. Not an ounce of shame, either. I breathed on her nipples, her tits all gooseflesh in spite of the heat inside the car. The windows were already fogged up.

Her throat was a perfect fit to my hand. I said she knew nothing.

Nothing...

Her eyes closed as she said it...

She felt my cock through my slacks, excited at finding me commando. She knew what she was doing. I'd been with older birds than her who still fucked like virgins. You could feel the lash of the nuns, from way back, in their uptightness. Mercedes wanted to fuck. She wasn't into rebellion. She wanted to fuck like I did, because it felt good. Because there was so much power in letting go.

Puzzle, scorn, joy...I watched one after the other in her face after she unzipped me.

Oh Jesus, you're wearing them...

She tore through the nylon of her tights with her nails.

You fucking dirty bastard...

I wormed into the back seat and helped her over, on to my lap. Her bones were sharp. She'd do some damage...I pushed her skirt up to her waist and reefed off her knickers. Her period was finished. I knew she'd be tender so I took it slow. She ripped the crotch of the tights till it gaped then grasped the stump of my prick, working along with me, riding her cunt lips up and down against the tip.

Just put the head in...Uh, Jesus...Oh, you dirty fucker...

We kissed, less savage now, our mouths taking up the rhythm set by our bodies. She dragged back on her bush to tighten her box. The lip of my knob flicked against bone. Even two-handed, it was hard to get a hold of her arse. The best meat comes from down there. Loins, thighs, flanks...My cock a captive bolt, ready to let fly.

She lowered her hips, taking the guts of me into her. The rear axle of the car dipped. I lifted her, just to show her that I could. The stretch caught her off guard. She went slack and I picked up the same, fucking her slowly, showing her it didn't need to be all about aggro. She made a bridge of our tongues and fed me her spit. I'd never felt such a sweet cunt. It made me want her mouth but both of us knew there wouldn't be time.

Don't come in me...

It was a close thing. She spat me out and made a cage of her hands about my knob.

You must have been saving it up...

She had me fetch her a yellow duster from under the passenger seat. I was pissed off that she hadn't come but she seemed happy enough.

We straightened ourselves up, getting in each others way. The silence was awkward. She offered me a lift but I refused. I kissed her before I left and told her she was beautiful.

Are you good at keeping secrets?

I said there were no secrets in this town.

She said we could change all that...

It was weird at first. We had to act like we were still on the same terms, barman to punter. Our thing, she called it. The kick was in the secrecy. That was what she got off on.

During the day she was Miss Giltinane, a credit to her family and the Sisters of Mercy. I used to see her at mass of a Sunday, all dressed up, her palms folded upon the red missal in her lap. More often than not, he was with her. Anthony. She was still stringing him along. I hated the sight of him.

The night was our time. She never had me in her house or anywhere in the town. We drove into the countryside, where, on roads we had to ourselves, we found the private places she loved. Old graveyards, lost boreens, an abandoned boathouse by the lake at Farlagh...She used to wear a tracksuit or a blue woollen dress that came off easy. We had a blanket in the boot, a bottle of Power's I kept topped up from an optic behind the bar. She'd been to see Doctor Horrigan, like I'd told her to, complaining about her periods. He told her that women didn't have to suffer anymore and wrote her a prescription for the pill.

Now we're free...

Sometimes I think we weren't ready for it.

Whenever Anthony came up, we fought. She said I fucked better when I got thick. She said they'd only kissed a few times; that he was a virgin, a mammy's boy, afraid of his shite. I asked her what was the point of him and her so. She said he was a useful idiot. A single woman her age drew attention to herself. Besides, his father had over two hundred acres. He paid for everything when they went out.

I said that made her a whore. She agreed.

One night, I lifted a necklace off a bird who'd passed out scuttered in the Ladies. I gave it to Mercedes when we parked up by Donemony Bog a few hours later. She wanted to know who the girl was. I said she was a Cardiff from Barry Street.

What was she wearing?

I told her how the crotch of the girl's white jeans were dark with piss; how there was sick down all the front of her top.

I know her to see. A fucking little prick-tease. You should have rode the hole off her. She'd never have known.

She took my cock from under the hem of a pair of knickers I had robbed off a neighbour's line and looped the necklace around my balls. I cupped the back of her dipping head, telling her how it would be - how I would spike the girl's drink with Roches; tie her up and put her in the boot of our waiting car; take her to the empty barn we'd found up the mountains...

I fingered her from behind as she sucked me, one in each hole. The more messed-up the story, the wetter she got. I rubbed the finger from her arsehole down her nose before putting it in her mouth. She reckoned it tasted like dog-food. She'd ate it one night in college, for a bet.

The necklace broke as I came in her mouth. I was fuming but she said it didn't matter.

It's only tat. It would have given me a rash...

I don't think she realised how horrible she came across at times. She was so fucking full of herself.

It was a nice thought.

She lay back, an upside down v of fingers pushing open her cunt.

You're soft under it all...

She talked to me as I licked her out. Told me how to do it, her country accent coming out strong. Her bush was ripe, like scutch against my face. She went the colour of liver when she was turned on. I'd never seen a woman get as wet. It was like spit thick with sugar, the kind that goes all over you when you try to get rid of it. Soft but hard underneath it all...

She came like a sap to the head. Over and over, her body up off the seat, my mouth held fast, crushed against her pubic bone so I couldn't breathe. A lifetime of frustration in every shiver. What did she have to be so angry about?

Suffocation forced the blood back into my cock. I finished off inside her, a miserable second load. She was pure white beneath me. Coming made her pale, which was strange. Marguerite used to go red as a back flannel...

Jesus, and it's still so hard...

When I saw she had been holding on to the broken chain all along, I didn't know how to feel. She wiped the mess from my face with a licked tissue and kissed me with a warmth that came out of nowhere.

If we could stay like this forever...

Her chest was damp with cold sweat against my ear, her heart a kick-drum. I told her I wanted to fuck her in sunlight. Just once.

She said where was the crack in that.

It was the first time she'd invited me to her house. I should have known something was up.

We'd arranged for her to ring me at the payphone in Aughrim Street at eight, when I was on my break, but there was someone in it when I got there. A young lad, ringing his sister in London. A big stack of fifty pences. I felt like dragging him out and kicking the fuck out of him. Instead, I just stood there in the pissings of rain.

He was in there for over twenty minutes. Looked at me funny as I took his place inside. Another thick cunt. The town was full of them.

London...The thought of the place gave me a horn. Her and me in London...I stared at the phone, feeling my need for it to ring as a pain around my heart. I prayed to God to let it ring...

When she finally did, she was sour. She said she'd been ringing every five minutes since eight but it was always engaged. When she heard the rain on the roof of the phone box, she softened.

You'll catch your death...let me make it up to you tonight...

Strict instructions. I was to come in over the back wall at one o'clock exactly. She would leave the back door open. Bring her twenty fags and she'd pay me.

I went back to work, which was Monday night dead. Every time I looked at the clock, it seemed to be going backwards. I had to pull my wire twice before closing. Then Pa, the owner, wanted me to stay for a drink. He liked an audience for the sound of his own voice. It wasn't wise to say no to him. The miserable fucker had sacked people for less.

It was twenty past one when I arrived. The dog next door started to bark as I ran for the back door. Mercedes was waiting for me in the front room. Sitting on a rug in front of the fireplace, an ashtray and a face-down book next to her. A tall lamp in the corner barely lit the room. Heavy red curtains drawn shut.

She watched me approach, opening the buttons of her dressing gown, her face scrubbed clean of make-up. The tip of her nose shining like glass...

We'd never had as much space, as much leisure. She spent an age undressing me, saying she wanted to have a decent look at me for once.

You're beautiful...

I thought she was being smart.

Kneeling before me, she kissed my cock until the nylon around it was soaked through. I'd never had a look at her either. Her parting, her long back, the width of her thighs...She blamed the pill and had been threatening to bin it. None of her clothes fit her any more, she said. She was sick of it.

I told her she was nuts. They used Latin at mass of a Good Friday. Looking at her body that evening gave me the same kind of feeling as hearing it did. I was in the presence of something I couldn't or didn't want to explain...