Page 5 of Heart of the Wren (Haunted Hearts: Season of the Witch #2)

LORCAN

I SLID a forest green felt pouch with a slender leather strap across the bar. “Dara asked me to pass this on to you. For your cold.”

Big Tom cupped it in the palm of his hand and sniffed it. “A scapular? I didn’t think he was the religious type.”

Instead of a picture of the Virgin Mary or one of the saints, a Celtic knot adorned the pouch, carefully embroidered. I wondered if Dara had done it himself.

“He made it for you and said it would help,” I said. “He was out in the woods first thing this morning, looking for moss.”

"That was good of him.” Big Tom hung the strap around his neck and tucked the pouch into the nest of black chest hair under his shirt. “I’ll try anything at this point.” He sniffed hard and swallowed with a squelch. It made me queasy.

After a quick chat with Paul Regan, the local butcher, I joined Bullseye at his table.

My oldest friend, Eoin “Bullseye” Dolan and I had been born around the same time, in the same hospital.

We’d gone to school together and for most of our youth, we’d spent every weekend together.

I’d been best man at his wedding and was godfather to two of his children.

While I’d felt honoured, a part of me suspected he felt sorry for me, being, as I was, a confirmed bachelor with no children of my own. Nor was I ever likely to have any.

Bookish was a word often used to describe Bullseye but I think that was mainly down to the glasses he wore.

He’d never been a big reader, to my knowledge.

We hadn’t exactly grown apart over the years, but once Bullseye started having children, his priorities changed.

Which was only to be expected. I found I couldn’t relate to his marital difficulties or his parenting problems and so he stopped telling me about them.

Instead of a peer, I was a reminder of simpler times.

In a tiny village like Tullycleena and living on a remote farm, making new friends wasn’t easy.

Whatever distance there was between us, my friend he was and so I took a gulp of Guinness and waited for a lull in the GAA talk. “Listen, there’s something I want to—”

“Oh, Jaysus.” Bullseye slammed his half-empty pint glass on the beer mat. “You’re pregnant.” He snorted a laugh .

“I’m trying to tell you what’s been happening to me.”

“Sorry, sorry,” he said. “You’re right. Go on.”

My ears flushed and I turned my pint glass between my fingers. “Lately, things have been happening.”

“Your voice is getting deeper, you’re growing hair in strange places…” He put his hand on my shoulder and laughed again, then he tickled my chin. “Mind you, you’ve already got hair in strange places. Will you not shave that awful thing off? It puts years on you. You look like you could be my dad.”

“Leave my beard alone, you.” I slapped his hand away. “Things have been disappearing.” I stuck one leg out, then the other, showing him my feet.

“Why are you wearing odd shoes?”

“Because I’m missing one from every pair. Just gone. Gone. No idea where they are. And stuff keep breaking.”

“What sort of stuff?” he asked.

“Stuff. Glasses. Mugs. Picture frames. Plates. All by themselves.” My cheeks were starting to burn. I think the Guinness had loosened my tongue more than I’d realised.

“All by themselves?” He gave me a particular look.

“I know it sounds mad,” I said. “But the other day, in here, I lifted a pint glass and it cracked in my hand.”

“You were too rough with it,” he said.

“I was in me hole,” I said. “I know how to lift a feckin’ pint, I’ve been doing it since I was fourteen. ”

He tutted. “Big Tom must have been too rough with it. You know what he’s like. He’s not what one would call delicate.”

“I can hear you.” Big Tom glared over at them from behind the bar. “It took me ages to mop up your pint…”

“There have been accidents at home, too,” I said. “The other morning a cup shattered. I don’t know what’s doing it.”

“A cup with boiling hot tea in it, was it?” Bullseye asked.

“Boiling hot tea that found its way into an existing crack and made it worse? Come on now, Lorcan. You’re too old to believe in this sort of stuff.

What is it, Ghosts? Aliens? Or did you break the cup with the power of your mind?

No, it’s fairies, isn’t it? Fairies sneaking around and smashing up your delf? ”

“Funny. Dara blamed it on them too.”

“Who’s Dara?” he asked.

“New fella at the farm. His van broke down and he’s working with me until he can afford to get it fixed. He said fairies are messing with me. Breaking things…”

“Well,” Bullseye said, “he sounds like a feckin’ headcase.”

“He’s not.” I snapped back without meaning to. “He’s decent enough. He has his head in the clouds, is all.”

“Sounds to me like he’s away with the fairies himself.” He finished his drink. “Right, enough of this bollocks, I’ve got to get back up the road before Aine comes home.” He lifted his jacket and headed for the door as Pat Lynch walked in.

Bullseye stood back to let him pass. “Woo, careful now, Pat, or else Lorcan’s fairies will smash your specs!” He wiggled his fingers and laughed all the way out of the pub.

“Ah, it’s yourself.” Pat took off his flat cap and sat at the table. He nodded to Big Tom for his usual. “What was all that about?”

I didn’t have the heart to go through it all again so I sidestepped the question.

Pat was another man I’d known my whole life, though he was older than me.

He wore small, round spectacles — far smarter than Bullseye’s — had a neat white moustache, and a full head of silvery white hair.

A short, stout man with a serious face which changed utterly when he smiled.

He had this way of ducking his head down, accentuating his double chin, and grinning like a schoolboy up to all sorts of divilment. I’d always found it charming.

I bought him a pint and we spoke of his concerns for his daughter and her husband. “Sure there’s no work for either of them. They’re barely hanging on by a thread. I think they’re going to have to move back in with me, more’s the pity. I’ll never get a minute to myself again.”

???

The Monk, Pat, and I were the only people in the pub when Big Tom called last orders. We drained our glasses and plodded outside. The night was bright and clear, with a hint of frost in the air.

Pat waved goodnight to the Monk who, as usual, gave no indication of having noticed and carried on walking up the road, towards the row of cottages where he lived.

When the Monk was out of sight, Pat wandered around the corner of the pub and lingered in the dark.

I took a quick look around to make sure there was no one else around and followed him.

Pat leaned against the stone wall of the pub and reached out for my coat, pulling me in.

I let him do it. Our lips touched. His breath was warm and hoppy, and his hands held me tightly.

A blissful few moments we spent there, in each other’s arms, under the stars, where everything else melted away.

He grabbed my crotch and squeezed. I returned the favour, manipulating his stiffening prick.

“You’re living dangerously,” I said. “What if the guards see?”

“Then I’ll get another fine,” Pat said. “Do you want to come back to mine for an hour?” He brushed his other hand over my belly. “It’s been ages since we…”

I exhaled and shook my head. “Not tonight, Pat. I can’t tonight.”

“Are you sure?” He squeezed me again. “Because it feels like you can. And if my daughter moves back home, I don’t know when I’ll get another chance.”

“Ah, my head’s not in the right place at the moment.” I kissed him again, quickly, and took a step back. “We might be able to use my house next time. Dara won’t be here for long.”

Pat straightened himself up and fixed his flat cap. “Right you are.” He gave me a wink and a tap on the arm. “Goodnight, so. Safe home.”

I waved and crossed the road, headed for the farm. There was almost no chance of encountering any cars at that time of night so I walked in the middle of the lane, mostly to avoid stumbling into the hedgerows. Pat had gotten my head turned and I shut my eyes, trying to shake him out of my mind.

He had been my first. Pat had been in his thirties at the time, and I was barely eighteen, I think, but I’d been the one to initiate it.

I was a shy lad. I kept myself to myself, for the most part.

I was a nervous wreck all night but for a while I’d had an inkling Pat would be up for it.

I made my intentions known one evening at a summer céile in DeLacy’s farm.

The whole village showed up for it, drinking and dancing until all hours of the morning.

Pat had a mop of black hair back then and his moustache was longer at the sides.

He was wearing tight jeans and I’d been admiring his short legs and pert arse all night.

We found ourselves at the back of a rundown barn, a fair bit away from the festivities.

I pretended I needed a piss and got my langer out.

I was young and sure of course I was stiff as a rock.

I only half-heartedly tried to hide it but Pat was staring at it and grinning.

Next thing I knew we were both on the ground with our trousers off.

My first time with a man had been an actual roll in the hay.

We were never a couple. He’d been married since he was 16.

Over the decades, we’d meet up once in a blue moon for a ride.

I think I became his backup plan for when he couldn’t get sex anywhere else.

I didn’t mind. And he was still a handsome man, was Pat.

Distinguished. A proper country gentleman with a genuine warmth to him.

Widowed now, these past two years. He always said his wife knew what he got up to but they never talked about it.

She didn’t appear to mind so long as he was discrete.

Sure wasn’t that always the way of it. Don’t rock the boat.

Don’t upset the status quo. Just keep your head down. Just keep going.

???

The dogs met me at the front door. I hung up my coat and cap, and set my hands on the hall radiator to take the chill off them.

With no sound coming from the living room, and no light on upstairs, I assumed Dara to be in bed.

I went to the kitchen to make a sandwich when I became aware of a light outside.

Squinting, I carefully approached the kitchen window.

Someone was up in the top field with a couple of lanterns.

I balled my fists and ran to the back door, flinging it open.

I ran out and got as far as the cottage where, ready to call for the dogs, I stopped.

The figure outside, by the big holly tree, was stark naked.

I stepped back inside the house and closed the door.

I switched off the kitchen light, took a pair of binoculars from a shelf, and returned to the window.

It took a moment for my eyes to adjust and to realise the naked figure was Dara.

He walked slowly around the oak tree, hands held high, pausing every now and then to speak a few words, judging by the clouds forming around his mouth.

Built like an Olympic shot putter, his hefty, beautiful body was creamy and pale, with a patch of hair in the middle of his beefy chest and a deep gingery bush around his genitals.

His arm and shoulders were painted with tattoos, his legs were thick and unblemished, his arse high and muscular.

He suddenly stopped and dropped his arms, and I ducked down.

I had no idea what I’d say if he knew I was watching, so with a raging erection and a healthy dose of embarrassment I crept out of the kitchen and went upstairs to bed.