Billy Keane The Ballad of Mo

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.The Ballad of Mo & GBilly KeaneContentsTitle PageDedicationThe owners of dogs related …The Olsen family kept …In the beginning, Mo …Mo confronted Dermo, …I called to see Mo …The attack took place …Mrs D died the …I grassed from an internet …Mo didn’t know it …Mo told me of her …Mac Sorley Homes went …Dermo got into the …I fixed up Skype for …Maureen moved Mo into …All three of Mo’s alleged …The Dobermans were staring …There was no going away …In the end, the Doberman …Maureen said she would …Maureen was Mo’s mammy …Mo had been in a car …I made my way home …There was a knock on …I have difficulty in recalling …About the AuthorCopyrightFor Tim O’CarrollThe owners of dogs related to wolves always say, ‘Ah Fido.Ah but my poor old Fido wouldn’t harm a fly.’Well dogs don’t eat flies, do they? Unless they swallow one by accident.The Olsen hounds stalked the Compound.All day and all night.Silently, on soft pads.Mo imagined the dogs were keeping her under house arrest, like a political prisoner.Even though I wished it was me she was married to, I was still hoping Mo would be happy ever after with Dermo Olsen.That was until the violence started.I loved her that much.Can you believe that?The Olsen family kept their fighting dogs in a secret concentration camp.At the far end of the Olsen land.Well in from the road, in a dip, hidden by ivy-strangled trees and a doodle of climbing thorn bushes.We wandered down to the fortress when the guard dogs were at the vet for shots.That morning Dermo kissed Mo goodbye and told her he was off to Wales on a driving job, in his big lorry.The eight-strong litter of Doberman pups were playing behind strands of barbed wire attached to concrete posts.A saggy brood bitch with a mangy coat, as well worn as the dole office mat, sat in the centre of the circle.Her puppies were climbing and falling off a dead donkey with the glassiest, saddest eyes you ever saw.The manic babies tore at the tattered flesh of the sinewy ass.Every now and then the pups broke off from the donkey and jumped up at a rabbit hanging by the neck from a sycamore branch.The rabbit was suspended just a few centimetres over the pups’ maximum reach.The Dobermans were leppin’ up, trying to snatch at the meat they could never quite reach.Two and three would jump together, like footballers contesting a high ball.The rabbit hardly took his own life.It must have been Dermo.He must have been the one who hanged Bugs Bunny.Stripped carcasses, old bleached bones and fresh dog dirt were scattered all over the filthy run.I was barely able to breathe and Mo, who was suffering from morning sickness, threw up.We left the runs but the stink followed us up the hill.Then, as we reached the second grove of trees, about half-way up, there was a revved-up chain saw noise.We listened for a few seconds, without moving.It was Dermo.He was driving fast across the fields, hopping and bumping on his quad bike, as he hit every bump and hollow.We hid ourselves further into the trees.Dermo pulled up suddenly outside the runs.The bike skidded round and back in the direction in which it was coming from, leaving a track in the mud in the shape of a semicolon.It was as if he was showing off in front of the Dobermans.Dermo grabbed the small dog by the back of the neck from a cardboard box.He dipped the little dog in a bucket of blood.It was a Papillon, a butterfly dog.With long, limp ears and short legs.Red dripped and mixed with the cow-brown patches on his white coat.The Papi barked and barked.We didn’t intervene in any way.Well we couldn’t, could we? It happened so quickly, we didn’t have time.Dermo threw the little Papi over the high wire and into the Dobermans’ den.The flying butterfly dog, with his clown’s ears flapping and his chicken legs kicking, tried to pedal his way upwards on an invisible bike.Gravity kicked in.The mother sprung to life.She intercepted the Papi just before it hit the ground.The dog screamed.It was a human sound of absolute terror.Then the pups attacked when the mother casually dropped the convulsing Papi and walked away towards a stainless steel water bowl.She took a drink and then looked back at her pupils.The small dog was torn asunder like a Christmas cracker, with one of the killers pulling from the head end and the other from the tail.We couldn’t watch anymore.As we moved quickly through the trees and down the other side of the hill in the direction of the Compound, we could hear Coach Dermo shout, ‘Drink him, drink him.Ye little vampires, ye.’His loud, amplified laughter echoed from the old fort as it chased us into a run.‘Ate him, lads.Go on boys, ate him.Go on.Ate him up.’Dermo’s roaring followed us up and over the hill like a cloud of poisonous gas.The Dobermans were barking in a nonstop frenzy.We stopped when we were well out of sight of the runs on the far side of the hill.‘How did I end up with him? How, G? Jesus, G.How?’Mo sat on her heels as she rocked back and forth with her hands on either side of her head.I knelt beside her and put my arms around her.We both knew the answer.It wasn’t as if Mo fell in love.Dermo made Mo pregnant.His foreplay was a case of lager.She too was very drunk on the night they made the baby.Deliberately so on her part.It was the way.I can only do it when I’m pissed.Barriers fell before the flood of booze.She could hardly remember.Up against the wall.Somehow it was in her head she should be doing it.Like as in I’m twenty-two.I should be having sex.Everyone is.And what is it anyway?What’s it to anyone?When it’s over, it’s over.‘It took 2.2 minutes approx.’A man who polished his zips with Brasso would have to be quick.‘It wasn’t the best shag ever,’ Mo said, ‘but it was definitely the fastest.’No condom.Forgot to buy a pack in the shop.Machine broken in the club, as usual.‘I’ll pull out,’ he promised.He didn’t hold her.Zipped up his shiny zip and fucked off.The morning-after pill was taken two mornings after.And it failed.In the beginning, Mo liked the idea of living in the Olsen Compound.She figured if it’s a Compound, it must be safe and agreed to move in without a preview.Mo was three months pregnant and she had nowhere else to go [ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]

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