Read by Jeremiah O'Connor - podcast here (4th story)
He’s waiting for me when I come out of the hotel, stood in front of his black cab. Leaner than I remember, face a little more lined, hair now a gunmetal grey.
I thought he might be wearing one of those khaki field jackets – that unofficial uniform they all seemed to favour – but he’s wearing a neutral beige zip up and light grey slacks.
“Are you Gerry?” I ask him. “From Gerry’s Famous Belfast Taxi Tours?’
If he recognises me, he doesn’t show it.
“That’s me. Are you Billy?”
“Yes.” I don’t offer my hand.
“Do you want to sit in the back or ride up front with me Billy?”
“I’ll sit alongside you Gerry.”
Where I can keep an eye on you.
The cab is clean and orderly. There’s a notebook with Gaelic handwriting on the dashboard. Gerry starts the engine and manoeuvres the taxi out of the car park. As we pull away, he nods towards the hotel.
“So you’re staying in the Europa then? You know what they used to call the Europa?”
“The most bombed hotel in Europe,” I say.
And I was here to pick up the pieces once.
He glances at me in the rear-view mirror. “Have you been to Belfast before Billy?”
“I was here 25 years ago.”
“25 years? Well, back then, there were only three hotels in the whole of Belfast. You know how many there are now?” He puts the emphasis on ‘now’. “200. There are 200 hotels here now. Belfast is booming.”
Nice choice of words Gerry.
“What brings you back to Belfast now Billy?”
“I heard it had changed Gerry. Wanted to see for myself.”
“Have you been around the city much? Were you out last night?”
“I went to the pub over the road. The Crown.”
“That’s a beautiful old pub Billy,” says Gerry. “The wooden booths, the tiling, the stained glass. Did you have a good night there? Was it busy?”
“It was very busy Gerry. There was quite the atmosphere.”
Except I was sat in a dark corner, paranoid whenever anyone came near me.
We cross the Westlink and I see the Divis Flats, looming up ahead against a sky the colour of wet cement.
Then we’re on to the Falls. I’m looking nervously down the side streets, half-expecting to see kids picking up stones to throw, a balaclava-clad figure scurrying out of an alleyway, housewives with their arms folded, staring sullenly.
But there’s none of that. We could be on any inner-city street in Britain – betting shops, takeaways, tanning salons. Then I see a pub with a tricolour hanging outside and that Gaelic typeface they use. And I know I’m somewhere else.
Gerry honks his horn at an old man with ivory hair and a matching beard on a mobility scooter. He sees Gerry and gives him a thumbs up.
“Who was that?” I ask.
“Paul McKeown,” Gerry says.
“Paul McKeown?” I repeat.
“That’s right.” Gerry brakes suddenly, as a car pulls out in front. “Paul McKeown. He bombed the British Army barracks at Lisburn.”
And you were with him Gerry, weren’t you?
I say nothing, just scratch the scar on my cheek.
“He went to The Maze for that. Was released under the Good Friday Agreement.”
But you got away with it Gerry, didn’t you? We knew you were there, and you knew we knew. Only we could never pin it on you.
I grit my teeth and dig my nails into my palms, keeping my eyes on the road ahead.
Gerry stops the cab at some traffic lights. They give off a red glow in the gloom. A woman with a push chair, the hood up, crosses the road in front of us. She looks up at the sky, like it's about to rain.
As we move off again, I realise there’s something missing from the Falls. The murals. Those slogans I got to know by heart. ‘Brits out.’ ‘Disband the RUC.’ ‘Oppression breeds resistance.’ And the one that always stayed with me: ‘Our revenge will be the laughter of our children.’ But they’re gone.
“What happened to the murals?” I ask.
“They got rid of most of them,” says Gerry. “But they kept one short stretch of road where anyone is allowed to paint what they like. We’re coming up to it now.” He points to the wall across the street.
There are some familiar images. The hunger strikers. Long Kesh. Splashes of orange and green. One mural celebrates the black taxi: ‘Serving the community for over 50 years.’ But there are other causes too. ‘Free Palestine.’ ‘Support the NHS.’
The dissidents have also been at work. ‘You can kill a revolutionary, but you can never kill the revolution’ is scrawled over a map of Ireland. Gerry tuts and shakes his head when I ask about this one. “People who can’t let go off the past,” he says.
But have you let go, Gerry?
Further on, there is one mural I know all too well. It’s unmistakeable if you lived through the 80s and 90s. Robert Gerard Sands. His face adorns one side of a corner building.
“Why did they keep this one?”
“It’s the Sinn Fein office,” Gerry says.
He pulls the cab over in front of the mural. “Just need to say hello to a few people,” he explains.
A group of men greet Gerry as he gets out. They shake his hand in turn. The most animated is a wiry youth in a black tracksuit with gunslinger eyes. He offers Gerry a cigarette.
I watch carefully but they’re speaking in Gaelic so I can’t follow what they’re saying. Gerry is explaining something to the group and gesturing to the cab. They look at me. One of them says something to Gerry and everyone laughs. Instinctively I slide my hand inside my jacket pocket.
Then Gerry stubs out his cigarette and starts walking back to the cab. As he gets in, I realise I’ve been holding my breath; I breathe out and take my hand out of my jacket.
“Just catching up with some friends,” he says, doing up his seatbelt.
The next generation, Gerry?
He waves to the group as he pulls away and the tracksuited youth gives him the thumbs up. I see Gerry’s eyes flick up to the mirror and when I look over my shoulder, I see him watching us from in front of the Sands mural.
I scratch my scar again.
We carry on up the Falls, then take a right turn on to Lanark Way. The houses are low rise, red brick. I see a poster for a Sinn Fein councillor pinned to a lamp post. She’s young, pretty, smiling.
Ahead of us, the road passes through some open gates. Gerry gestures at them. “They’re locked at night.”
“Why’s that Gerry?” I say.
To keep the animals in?
He doesn’t answer at first. Then he turns to me and says: “It has to be better than having soldiers patrolling the streets, doesn’t it Billy? A uniform around every corner?”
I look at Gerry’s beige jacket.
There was never any point to the uniforms Gerry.
As we drive through the gates I look back and see they have a message daubed on them: ‘There was never a good war or a bad peace.’
Now we’re on to Cupar Street. On one side, respectable suburban semis. On the other, a barrier of concrete and corrugated iron, covered in graffiti, and then a chain link fence rising to about 40 feet high, the kind you might see around a five-a-side football pitch.
Gerry pulls up by the curb and turns off the ignition. The engine dies. There are no other cars or people about. It’s quiet, peaceful even. In the rear-view mirror, I see an old man come round the corner on a mobility scooter.
“Let’s get out of the cab, Billy.”
Gerry’s already got out and slammed the door before I can ask why. He stands in front of the fence.
“This is the peace wall Billy.”
He sees me looking up at how high it is and says: “It’s to stop people throwing things over.”
This is what peace looks like Gerry?
“Bill Clinton came here and signed the wall in 1995. It was a big statement.”
A black taxi comes down the road, slowing as it passes us, then accelerates.
“The wall’s been signed by millions of people since then Billy. Millions.”
A woman with a pushchair goes past on the other side of the street. She stops and starts fiddling with the hood.
“More people come here than to any other tourist attraction in Northern Ireland.”
Over Gerry’s shoulder I see the old man on the scooter getting nearer.
“And you know something Billy? We still have peace here.”
The woman has pulled back the hood on the pushchair. The baby in the chair, now able to see the world, giggles and claps its hands together.
“After 20 years, we still have peace.”
The mobility scooter’s horn sounds. I turn and see it’s not Paul McKeown driving. It’s a different old man. We step to one side to let him pass and he gives us a nod and a thank you.
“What does Paul McKeown do now?” I ask suddenly.
“He’s retired Billy,” Gerry says, looking after the old man on the scooter. “All of us have. What about you?”
I shrug. “I suppose I’m retired too.”
Gerry reaches inside his jacket. I tense. He brings his hand out and extends it towards me. He’s holding something. A pen.
“Will you sign the wall, Billy?” Gerry says. “Will you sign the peace wall?”
I reach out and take the pen.
I feel Gerry’s eyes on my back as I write on the wall. Then he’s standing by my shoulder. I sign my name and hand the pen back to him.
“Well done, Billy,” Gerry says.
(c) Will Mann, 2022
Will Mann began writing short stories two years ago, after taking a City Lit class, and joined a creative writing group organised by a Liars’ League former winner. He has been a business journalist for most of his career. He grew up in Worcestershire and now lives in south-east London.
Jeremiah O’Connor is an Irish actor whose credits include the BBC’s Call the Midwife, Waiting for Godot at the Cockpit theatre, & a stint as James Joyce & Tristan Tzara in Patrick Marber’s Travesties at the Apollo. He’s also worked with immersive theatre group Punchdrunk, the central London recreation of the Crystal Maze & spent time as a Tudor cook at Hampton Court Palace.
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