Across the room, John’s snores climbed. Every so often, Ivor spoke in his sleep, mumbles Billy couldn’t make out. Tricia was on the other side of the wall. It sounded like she was pacing their bedroom, that floorboard that creaked going off every few seconds. Billy longed for her. For the way things used to be. For all the things gone from them. He shot up on the narrow bed, remembering the clothesline he’d cut down and had yet to dispose of. He rose in the dark and went outside.
He walked through the fields, toward the band of trees behind the football pitch. The same path Michael had taken that terrible night. Billy dragged the end of the rope along the ground like a snake, similar to how he imagined the previous clothesline had trailed Michael.
He stopped in front of Michael’s tree. Pitch-black, he couldn’t see Michael’s initials. He reached out, his fingers feeling the tree trunk for the letters, like reading Braille.
He uncoiled the clothesline, letting in a stampede of feelings. He knelt on the ground and took the gas lighter from his coat pocket. The rope caught, and burned and twisted. He watched it blaze. Liked how it lit up the dark.
When he returned home, the world still in deep black, he went straight to the bathroom. He weighed himself. Three hundred and forty-eight pounds. Jesus. He’d put on another pound, making a total gain of four pounds since the march. His resolve faltered, but only for a moment. He was done with wallowing. He opened the medicine cabinet and removed the electric shaver. He took the razor to his head, shaving the sprout of fresh curls to oblivion.
*
Billy easily spotted the journalist among the scatter of locals and visitors down by the quays. Tall, lean, and well dressed in beige khaki trousers and a starched white shirt, he was pacing up and down, talking on his phone. Billy remained inside the safety of his car, watching the sun again make the gray-blue river glisten.
Jack Dineen had responded favorably to Billy’s e-mail and wanted to profile him for the Independent, in their coveted Sunday edition. The news should have delighted Billy, but ever since he’d found out he felt riddled with fear and confusion, his need for publicity always pitted against this urge to lie low and hide.
He was vexed with himself for not doing more with the media before the march. Then he would surely have drawn a much bigger crowd. The truth circled him. Maybe he hadn’t sought more publicity because he knew people rarely took him, or anyone of his size, seriously. Worse, deep down he’d feared he would fail and that the more public he made his diet and the march, the more public he would make his disgrace.
But what of it, these small-minded notions of success and failure? What did they matter? He saw the elderly Dublin widow in the meeting after the march, her damp blue eyes. He also saw the parents of Rachel, unable to put their pain into words, and the parents of Finn, unable to say they now had only two children. Billy needed to push his fear and shame aside. He knew what really mattered. From here on out, he would rev everything up. He would circulate his pledge sheets ever wider and make phone calls to friends, neighbors, businesses, politicians, and the greater community. Everyone and anyone he could think of.
Jack Dineen finished his call and looked up and down the quays, his air impatient. Billy hauled himself and his dread out of the broken driver’s seat. He plodded toward the thirty-something, pulling down on the cling of his T-shirt and wishing Jack didn’t look quite so young, lean, and attractive. They shook hands, Jack’s grip strong, his smile wide. His eyes, though, held a hint of contempt. “Nice to meet you.” Before Billy could respond, Jack looked him up and down and, frowning, said, “Perhaps we should sit someplace?” He charged toward the row of benches painted that signature dark green.
When they were both seated, Jack placed a recording device on the bench between them. “Do you mind?”
Billy, still winded from his best attempt at a quick-march and trying not to breathe so loud and fast, stared at the machine. The device, not much bigger than a mobile phone, sported a dimpled silver ball at its top, like the decapitated head of a microphone.
“It also has video capability,” Jack continued. “Maybe we can—”
Billy’s hands shot up. “No, no, audio is fine.”
Something like glee flashed in Jack’s eyes. “So! Yours is quite the story, thanks for giving us an exclusive.”
Billy balked. “‘Quite the story.’ You said that with a bit too much enthusiasm.”
Something close to contrition crossed Jack’s face. “Sorry, I didn’t mean to sound insensitive.”
Two young women, loud, laughing, walked past in heels, blouses, and dark, tight skirts. Jack glanced at them, admiring. The auburn-haired girl, the prettier of the two despite the heavy makeup, spotted Billy and immediately sobered, casting him a look of utter pity. Billy turned his attention back to Jack, the blood rising in his cheeks. “What do you want to know?” he asked sharply.