Ronan’s troubled. I can see it. I’m having lunch with him and the old man in the Horse Show House when two Gords walk into the bor and he doesn’t shout anything abusive at them. Which is how I know there’s something on his mind.
The old man cops it, too. “So,” he goes, “how long until the big day?” and he means the wedding.
Ro’s like, “Fowur weeks – the end of Jewint.”
“And you’re not nervous, are you – about the commitment you’re about to make?”
“No, Ine moostard, Grandda. Moostard, so I am.”
“Let me give you a bit of advice, Ronan – the same advice that my father gave me before I stood in front of the proverbial altar. A happy marriage is the union of two good forgivers.”
When a man is asleep at night, a woman somewhere is lying awake, thinking about 100 different ways to ruin his life
I end up having to say something?
“Yeah,” I go, “you’ve got two failed marriages behind you.”
He’s there, “That’s a little unfair, Ross.”
"I'm just saying you're in no position to offer anyone advice about marriage. It's like me trying to lecture someone on, I don't know, trigonometry. Actually, is there a thing called trigonometry or did I just make that up?"
The old man goes up to the bor to pay for our lunches and I decide to just have it out with Ronan. “So what is it?” I go. “Is it guilt?”
He’s like, “What are you on about, Rosser?”
“Ro, there’s two Gords over there having a bowl of stew each. Usually, you’d be shouting at them. It’d be, ‘Breathalyze this, you bogger with a badge!’ or something along those lines.”
“I ditn’t eeben see them come in.”
“I know you didn’t. That’s why I’m worried about you. Are you feeling guilty about having sex with that woman on the stag?”
“Who, Melissa? No.”
It’s not guilt he should be feeling anyway. The woman is married to Grievous Bodily Horm, one of Ireland’s best-known ex-pat criminals, who Spanish police believe is responsible for as many as nine murders.
I’m like, “Are you scared, then?”
He looks away.
I’m there, “We all make mistakes, Ro. The important thing is that we learn from them. Just try not to sleep with the wives of any other psychotic gangland killers.”
Sometimes the best advice we can give our children is the most obvious.
But then he ends up saying the most unbelievable thing. He goes, "She wants to see me again, Rosser."
I’m like, “See you again? What is this, the last day in Irish college?”
“She says she’s arthur fawden in lub with me.”
All I can do is just, like, shake my head.
I'm there, "She couldn't be in love with you, Ro. You had sex with her once – in the back of a Citroen Picasso."
He goes, “She said I made her feel things, Rosser. Things she’s nebber felt with Grievous.”
“You see, that was your first mistake. If you’re going to sleep with someone else’s wife, make sure you do it in a way that leaves her sexually unsatisfied. That way, she’ll never going to want to see you again.”
I had a feeling he was setting a high bor for himself. He must have been 20 minutes in that cor with her.
I’m there, “This is page one of the philanderer’s manual, Ro.”
He goes, “She wants to come oaber.”
I'm like, "Oaber? Oaber where?"
“Oaber to Oyerlint. To see me. She wants us to be lubbers, Rosser.”
“Ro, you can’t do it. You’re about to get married.”
"I've no bleaten choice in the mathor. She says if she caddent be with me, she's godda tell Grievous about what happened in Estepona. "
I kick myself for never warning him about the importance of leaving your one-night-stands underwhelmed in a sexual sense
Oh! My God! Look, I have nothing against women. The sheer number of them I’ve loved in my life speaks for itself. But when a man is asleep at night, a woman somewhere is lying awake, thinking about 100 different ways to ruin his life.
I’m there, “Ro, you need to change your mobile number or something.”
He goes, “It woatunt stop her tedding him. And when she does, he’s godda come arthur me.”
I’m there, “Well, at least he’s in prison”, because the last time I saw Grievous, the Spanish police were throwing him and his son, Actual, into the back of a van.
He goes, “He’s not, Rosser. He wadn’t cheerged with athin. Thee lerrum out.”
Marriage advice
The old man comes back from the bor. He goes, “The other advice I’ve just thought of regarding marriage, Ronan, is to keep your eyes fully open before you go into it – and half-closed thereafter!”
He doesn’t know the half of it.
Ronan’s like, “I’ve to, er, head back to coddidge.”
“I’ll drop you back to UCD,” the old man goes.
I just stare at my son. I want to say something that'll help him believe that everything is going to work out okay, but I don't know that that's even true? Off the two of them head.
I walk back to the Hook, Lyon and Sinker office, quietly kicking myself for never warning him about the importance of leaving your one-night-stands underwhelmed in a sexual sense. I feel like I've possibly failed him as a father.
As I reach the office, a black Merc suddenly pulls in and mounts the kerb beside me. As a matter of fact, I end up having to jump out of the way to avoid being hit by it?
The driver and another dude get out. They’re, like, big dudes as well – their orms and necks covered in tattoos.
I'm like, "What the fock?" because it's Ballsbridge.
The rear window on the passenger side opens and I suddenly find myself face to face with Grievous Bodily Horm. He goes, “Howiya, Rosser? Hop in here beside me – wanna hab a chat.”
I’m there, “I wish I could, Grievous. But I’m supposed to be showing a house in Dortry at half two.”
“You’re getting into this keer,” he goes. “Eeter into the back hee-or wit me – or you’re going in the boot. The choice is yoo-ers.”