When I was a few years married, myself and four friends used to go to the Bonne Bouche Café during children’s allowance week. At that time, it was a little bit fancy with white tablecloths and flowers as a centrepiece in a small vase. We used to enjoy our night out while our husbands would babysit. It was our little treat. We’d order chicken and chips with salad and tea or coffee. We wouldn’t drink as it was outside our budget. And as there were four of us, one was either pregnant or just after having a baby, so the talk was mostly baby talk. We’d sit there for two hours or more gossiping about the latest scandal, which wasn’t much back then.
We all had cars, and one night Aggie was looking for her keys when she realised she’d left them in her car. We all trooped out to her car and looked in at the keys securely locked inside. We talked for a bit about what we’d do. I suggested calling the guards as they might have spare keys. We called them and they duly arrived after a few minutes.
Two young fellows, they tried all the doors and even the boot, but had no success. We stood for a moment thinking about it, then one of the guards said to the other, “If we had a knife, we could slide it in between the glass and the button might pop up”. Kathy said that she had a knife and, to our surprise, slid it out of her sleeve. She had seen Billy, her husband, doing it before, and took the knife with her on the way out of the restaurant. Kathy had been born with one arm. Her sleeve from her elbow down was buttoned up and that’s where she had put the knife when we were figuring out what to do.
The guards looked at her and one of them took the knife and, lo and behold, when he tried it, the button popped up. We all moved off towards our cars. The younger of the guards asked Kathy if she wanted the knife back and she said no. The guards got into their car and one of them said, “We’ll keep the stolen property”. They were still laughing as they drove away. Aggie always kept a knife in her bag after that!
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This essay was published in The Irish Times Fighting Words magazine, a collection of stories, poems and essays by young and international writers.
Written as part of the Did I Ever Tell You? project, a storytelling initiative which aims to collect the thoughts and memories of older individuals in HSE healthcare settings across the counties of Kildare, Offaly and Westmeath. The full collection can be viewed at fightingwords.ie
