New Fiction
4
story and photos by Joel Thomas Hynes
shore leave
Last few days offshore old man, cant concentrate on nothing else, cant take your eyes off the calendar or the clock, cant wait to get back in out of it. And by the time you’re back on board you’re that happy to be back on board it’s not even sensible. Never know what a week or two of shore leave got in store. Coulda landed myself in a spot of trouble there the last time, with the crowd next door, young punks. And me one of them whatcha call it, passive types. Normally I’m like an old dog, minding my business, you know. But. About a week after the old man passed away, that was.
Yeah, I got a little spot, little apartment just up on Freshwater there, nice little pad. Comes and goes as I sees fit. Shuts her down then when I gotta go offshore and I dont think twice about the place. Not like I got no woman or nothing and not like I wants one neither. Trouble is all they are, fuckin nuisance. I mean I got a piece of skin lined up any time I wants it, but that’s all I wants and she knows it too. So I comes and goes as I pleases, right. And I dont have to be bothered about the place while I’m gone cause there’s nothing there anyhow, nothing worth nothing, ‘less someone wanted to make off with the coffee table or a toaster or something, I dont know. Fuck em I says, if they needs a toaster as bad as all that they can have it. What odds?
So this was round about a week after the old fella packed it in, this bullshit with the lads next door. Nothing come of it or nothing, just, I don’t know, I surprised meself. I don’t normally go off like that, I don’t usually lose my temper. Something rose up in me though. This was, yeah, ‘bout a week after the old fella’s funeral and all that dirt with me brother. Ninety one, Father was. Few stories he could tell, fella that old, if anyone listened. I wasnt in touch much over the last years though you know, cause I gets in a way and after the wife took off sure they were all thinking I was this big fool anyhow. Or at least that’s what you get thinking that they thinks and you spins it into something it’s probably not. So I never was around much. I works outta Town anyhow. Not like we docks down in St. Mary’s now is it? And where I lost the license so often, you know. Well it’s a tangle isnt it, coming and going. What am I gonna do with a week on shore? Go down to St. Mary’s and put a face on and pretend I’m someone I’m not? Or stay in Town and get good and drunk and good and fucked? No contest really. But a funeral now, that’s different. Your old man’s funeral, that’s different. Not that I had no feelings around none of it or nothing like that, just, you gotta make an appearance for them sorts of things. Put on your suit and get yourself liquored up.