I was like, ‘Yeah – and I’d say your best man was her old man’s sawn-off’
I heard someone on the radio recently – it was probably David McWilliams – say that by the time this recession is over, everyone in Ireland is going to know someone who’s working class. And of course the dude’s ended up being right about that like he’s right about everything else. Mine is sitting next to me in the front passenger seat of the van – Kenneth Tuite, the father of my son’s girlfriend and the newest employee of Shred Focking Everything, Ireland’s fastest growing document disposal service.
He also shared a landing with my old man during their time in, like, Mountjoy Prison, Kenneth for insurance fraud, my old man for tax evasion and conspiracy to bribe members of Dublin County Council.
“A strategic fit,” is what the old man called it. “Quote-unquote. Start Monday.” Which was, like, easy for him to say. He’s pretty much retired from the company. I’m the one who’s going to have to spend every minute of every day with Tuite, listening to him, like, reminiscing about his prison days with Shawshank or making wedding plans for Ronan and Shadden, who’s a lovely girl, by the way – Finglas or not – but they’re only, like, 14 and 16.
“V . . . V . . . Vaddentine’s Day be coming arowunt s . . . s . . . soon,” he said to me the other morning. He’s got a pretty bad I-Can’t-Believe-It’s-Not-Butter, by the way. “B . . . B . . . Be interesting to see what your young f . . . f . . . fedda gets her.”
“What do you mean it’ll be interesting to see what he gets her?” “Well, it’s their f... f... foorst Vaddentine’s thegedder, idn’t it? M . . . M . . . Might end up getting her a ring.”
I ended up pretty much levitating off the seat. “The ring?” “No, a ring.” “You said the ring.” “I d . . . didn’t. I said a ring. Jaysus, you’ve v . . . v . . . veddy sensitive, so you are.” We were, like, porked in Fitzwilliam Square, by the way, ten minutes early for an 11am collection.
I took a breath. “Look, I’m sorry,” I went. “It’s just, well, I’m just against the idea of Ronan getting too serious at such a young age.” He was like, “N . . . N . . . Nothin wrong wirrit. Me and Shadden’s mudder were engaged at 16.” I was like, “Yeah – and I’d say your best man was her old man’s sawn-off.” He went, “Soddy?” And I was there, “Er, nothing,” because you have to known how far you can, like, push it with a man who’s done time.
I was like, “My basic point is that Ronan’s got his whole life ahead of him. He’s, like, two IQ points away from being considered officially gifted. He’s got college to look forward to and all the rest of it. Possibly even UCD. And hopefully he’ll have as much fun as I did back in the day. Jesus, I went through that Orts block like foot-and-mouth disease.”
His face just fell. “Shadden be v . . . veddy disappointed to hear you t . . . t . . . talk like that. He toalt her thudder night that he wanted to s . . . s . . . spend the rest of he’s life wirrer.” I actually laughed. He’s definitely my son alright. When I heard about the high IQ, see, I did consider asking for a second paternity test.
I was like, “That’s just a line, isn’t it? Anyway, it’s nearly 11 o’clock. Off you go.” “Soddy?” “Sixteen bags of documents. That’s the address there. The black door.”
“Here, s . . . s . . . stall the ball, will ye? What’s the huddy?”
“The hurry? I’ve paid you for two hours work so far today and you haven’t lifted your orse off that focking seat – oh, except to stink the van out with your forts.”
“Ine rotten, I know. Them s . . . s . . . sausage rolls we got in the petriddle station.”
“Sixteen bags,” I went, nodding in the direction of the door. “Go and get them.” He just, like, glowered at me – if that’s the right word – then he opened the door and got out, doing everything slowly just to piss me off. “I’m thinking of j . . . joining a union,” he went, then he went into the building and storted bringing out the bags – two at a time, by the way, when he was more than capable of carrying, like, four?
When he’d finished, he went, “What’ll I do now?” I was like, “Er, it’s a confidential shredding service? What the fock do you think you do? I spent two hours last week showing you how to use the machine, didn’t I?”
He shot me another serious filthy. “I could have you up for b . . . b . . . buddying in the woorkplace, you know that?” Then he went around the back of the van and, like, 20 seconds later I heard the machine sort of, like, grumble to life.
It was at that exact point that my old man rang. “How’s the new recruit?” he went.
I laughed. I was like, “Er, how the fock do you think?” “Hasn’t threatened to join a union yet, has he?” “He has actually, yeah.” “Ignore that. He always does that on his first day in a new job — he told me that when we were in prison.” “Why are we even employing him?” “Well, you said it yourself, Kicker – you needed an assistant.” “Er, yeah, I was thinking in terms of, like, Oisinn or Christian or any of my other friends who are currently on the Cheryl Cole.”
“Come on, Ross. This is a nice thing we’re doing. Helping out a chap who was a very good friend to me when I was lingering away inside in Joshua Jebb’s folly. The dude only has, like, four fingers on each hand. You know what happened to the other two, don’t you?” “He cut them off.”
That’s actually true. The Irish Insurance Federation nicknamed him Edward Scissorhands. And now he’s working for us.
“Oh,” the old man suddenly went, “Meant to say, Ross, it might be prudent to keep our friend away from the, er, shredding machine.” I was like, “What?” “Well, it’s kind of a compulsion he has, you see. Wouldn’t be wise to put temptation in his way.” I let a sudden roar out of me. I was like, “Noooooo!” and I hung up, jumped out onto the road and raced around to the back of the van. I threw open the door just in time to see Kenneth getting ready to stick the four remaining fingers of his left hand into the actual shredder.
“Er, there’s been a change in your duties,” I went, quickly switching the machine off. “I’ll do the driving, the collecting and the shredding. You just sit in the passenger seat all day and try not to sustain too many personal injuries.” And he was like, “G . . .G . . . G . . . Gameball.”
