JULY 11TH 2004
AOIFE
JOEY NEVER SHOULD HAVE LET me talk him into going to that damn techno festival in Tralee on Friday night.
If he hadn’t, then we wouldn’t be here. Two days later, in a shitty B&B, on the side of the road, in the middle of the backend of Kerry. Not a penny in our pockets to rub together and dying slow deaths from the kind of alcohol abuse that turned a man’s liver yellow.
We were a disgrace, and my only consolation was the fact that it was all Joey’s fault for going along with my idea.
God, he was so damn impressionable sometimes.
“I think I’m hemorrhaging vodka from my dick,” he announced when he stepped out of the ensuite bathroom in our room on Sunday morning. “Seriously.” Standing in nothing but his boxers, Joey rubbed his hands up and down his arms, as he padded back to the bed. “I just took a piss that lasted a full two minutes without stopping and smelled exactly like what we were drinking last night.”
“So sexy,” I purred, rolling over to snuggle into him when he flopped back down on the mattress. “Hold up.” Springing up in the bed, I gaped down at the five lettered word inked on his chest. “What the hell is that?”
“What?”
“That.” I poked the piece of skin the covering his heart.
Aoife was written in italic scribe across the left side of his chest.
“What?” he drawled lazily.
“Did you look in the mirror when you were recording your personal best time for the piss-Olympics?”
“Huh?”
“Look,” I whisper-hissed, and then bit down on my fist in nervous anticipation.
Bleary-eyed, Joey pulled himself up on his elbows, glanced down at his chest, and released a frustrated groan before flopping back down on the pillows.
‘Well, I can tell you one thing for sure that I do remember about the past two days, Molloy, and it’s that this was your genius idea.”
“What?” I shook my head, at a total drunken, hazed loss. “No, it wasn’t.”
“That creepy tent with those hippies,” he grumbled. “You dragged me in there last night, demanding to be tramp stamped.”
“I did?”
“Yeah, you did.”
“Well, it looks like you’re the one with the tramp stamp, bitch,” I cackled, slapping my palm down on his tender chest. ‘Hard luck.’
‘That’s what you think,’ he grunted, shrugging me off, and then draping an arm over his face. ‘Check your ass.’
‘Huh?’
‘Your ass,’ he mumbled, voice raspy and hoarse. ‘I’m on it.’
‘No, you’re not.’
‘Yeah, I am,’ he replied, yawning. ‘If you’re on my heart, then I’m on your ass.’
‘Oh, cop on,’ I growled, narrowing my eyes. “That’s not even funny.”
‘You’re mine now, Molloy,’ he mimicked my voice. ‘Hard luck.’
Falling off the bed, I staggered over to the mirror on the back of the bedroom door and unceremoniously yanked my knickers down my legs.
‘Oh my god,’ I screamed, eyes glued to the red inked heart on the right cheek of my ass with the name Joey in black ink inside it. ‘Your name is on my ass!’
‘Like I said,’ he shot back with a yawn. ‘Looks like you’re my bitch.”
‘I’m on my period, you idiot!’
‘How is you being on your period my fault?’ His voice echoed out from under the pillow he’d draped over his face. ‘I’m not mother nature, Molloy.’
‘It’s your fault because you should have stopped me,’ I strangled out, gaping in absolute horror at the reflection of my red and weltered ass cheek. ‘Jesus Christ, I don’t know what’s worse,’ I wailed, reaching around to rip the cling-film off. ‘The fact that I got a tattoo of my boyfriend’s name on my ass like some slut, or the fact that I did it with a tampon string dangling between my legs!’
‘Do you have any painkillers?’ was his loving and supportive response. ‘My head’s in pieces.’
‘Screw your headache!’ I wailed, arms flailing. ‘How could you let this happen to me?’ I shook my head and fought back a whimper. ‘Joe, my dad is going to kill me.’
‘Why?’ he drawled, not one bit fazed by any of this, as he sprawled out and star fished the mattress. ‘Does Tony have a habit of checking the cheeks of your ass, Molloy?’
