I’m driving through Ballsbridge when I spot something that causes me to almost wrap my front fender around a lamppost outside the Horse Show House. For a second or two, I continue driving, wondering did I really see what I
thought I just saw? Then I end up wondering did I maybe imagine the last six years of basic misery that we've all lived through.
I pork the shredding van outside the bank centre – which I like to do anyway, because it really pisses them off in there – then I stick the hazards on and walk back to the village. It turns out that my eyes weren’t deceiving me, because it’s definitely there, two or three doors down from Crowes, a humongous window with, like, pictures of gaffs in it, then above it, in big, shining capitals, the words, “Conroy & Son Estate Agents”.
I laugh. It's, like, an automatic thing? JP and his old man are back.
I push the door and walk in. The office is fitted out just like it was when I worked there back in the day. There’s, like, 10 or 15 desks with actual people sitting at them, all with headsets on. And JP’s old man is standing in the middle of the floor, giving them one of his famous Monday morning pep talks.
“I’ve spent the last five years of my life,” he goes, “listening to the experts say that it was all over for people like me. That the days of property values increasing logarithmically were gone forever, because we’d learned our lesson as a country and it would never be allowed to happen again . . .”
He lets that just hang in the air, then he just bursts out laughing. Everyone else laughs. He’s good. There’s no doubt about that. Then he’s suddenly serious again.
“One of this country’s best-known politicians,” he goes, “once said about me, under the protection of Dáil privilege, ‘If the human population of the world is ever wiped out in a nuclear holocaust, within five years, Barry Conroy will be back in business, hawking grossly overpriced property to scorpions and whatever other invertebrates survived the catastrophe.’
“It is the single greatest thing that anyone has ever said about me. I had those words engraved on a brass plaque and fixed to the ceiling above my bed, so that every morning, when I wake up, it is my first thought of the day.
“I want everyone in this room to check their pulse. Go on, do it, right now – check your pulse. Now, let me ask you a question: do you feel dead?”
The staff are all like, “Er, no, actually.”
He’s there, “I said, do you feel dead?” except he says it even louder this time.
And the staff all shout, “No!”
He smiles. He's there, "No, I didn't think so. You're alive. We're alive. Now let's go and do what we were put on this earth to do. Let's buy and sell property."
It’s pretty inspirational, it has to be said. There’s, like, a collective whoop from the staff and even the odd high-five. I feel like nearly pulling up a desk chair and snapping on a headset myself.
That’s when Mr Conroy all of a sudden notices me. He goes, “Is that Ross O’Carroll-Kelly I see standing before me or am I still suffering from the delirium tremens?”
I was the best estate agent he ever had – this was, like, back in the days of Hook, Lyon and Sinker.
I’m there, “Yeah, no, it’s definitely me.”
He goes, “Have you come back to me? Tell me you have!”
“Unfortunately not. I’m happy to stay in the old shredding game for now, Dude.”
“You’re wasted doing that. You know, I always talk about you when I’m training people in. I’ve got your big, ugly on my Power Point presentation. ‘This kid,’ I tell them, ‘has no conscience whatsoever. If he has a heart, it’s only for beating blood around his body to keep the thing heated. Which made him perfect for this business.’ You were the best, Kid. Come back to me. Name your price.”
“Like I said, I’m happy doing what I’m doing. I just saw the sign and I popped in to say, you know, fair focks. I think Ireland has genuinely missed you. You being back is a sure sign that things are improving.”
“Well, at least say hello to JP while you’re here.”
I suddenly notice J-Town waving at me from the far end of the office. I tip down to him. He happens to be on a call at the time.
He’s going, “Yes, thank you for your offer, Alan, but I think it’s only fair to let you know that we’ve had a counter offer.”
He gives me a dirty big wink. God, it’s just like 2003 all over again. At the same time, he pushes the prospectus across the desk at me. I pick it up. It’s for a two-bedroom aportment in one of those giant ant farms overlooking the M50 – well appointed, inventive use of space, blahdy blah, convenient to many things, especially the enormous crane that should be completing work on the block next door but hasn’t moved since the autumn of 2008.
Honest to fock, if you boarded your dog in this gaff to go on holidays, you’d spend your entire two weeks wondering how you could ever apologise to the animal.
The asking price, I notice, is 240Ks.
“No,” JP goes, “I’m not inventing that counter-offer. I’ve had a genuine bid of . . .” He looks up at his old man, who flashes two open palms at him, meaning to tell him 10 over the asking price.
Except I suddenly hear myself go, “Two-hundred-and-sixty-five. Tell him the counter-offer is for 265Ks.”
After a moment’s hesitation, JP repeats what I said down the phone, then pulls a face, obviously thinking that he’s possibly pushed it too far. But then his features suddenly light up and he looks at me the same way he used to look at me when we played rugby together. In other words, in total awe.
“Cards on the table,” he goes. “If you were to offer me €266,000, it’d be yours – right now . . . Okay, that’s excellent.” He gives us the thumbs up.
JP’s old man goes, “Ross, you’ve got to come back. You can’t let a talent like that go to waste.”
I’m like, “Sorry, Dude. I’m double-porked up the road. But like I said, on behalf of the country, welcome back.”
ILLUSTRATION: ALAN CLARKE