‘I know you’ve been strapped for cash since your shop went . . . But I can give you more money. I can buy you actual Corn Flakes, spelt with a – is it a C?’
THINK THE WHOLE divorce thing is storting to get to Sorcha. I'm checking out her iPod and I can't help but notice that she's arranged all of her breaking-up-with-me songs into an album, which she's called — hilariously — A Woman's Heart.
I'm just thinking, by the way, is there a worse line in any song than: "The tears that drip from my bewildered eyes taste of bittersweet romance"? I remember that was her song the time I broke it off with her the night before her finals. I Think I Better Leave Right Nowwas from the time I slept with her little sister — Idina or Urko or whatever the fock she's called. The Closest Thing To Crazywas the time she caught me beating the mattress with Eskaterina, the nanny from Belarus.
There’s enough songs here for a focking 12-CD boxset. In the end, I have to stop turning the click wheel, because I stort to feel – well, not very good about myself at all.
Sorcha suddenly arrives into the kitchen. She says she closed her Bank of Ireland account yesterday – as a protest against the whole, like, secret bonusesthing? I give her my old man's line – about bankers being, by their very nature, greedy, unscrupulous fockers – and when they stop behaving like that, that's when we should really stort to worry about this country's future.
She stares at me like I'm a floater that just won't flush. "And you're happy," she goes, "that that's the world you've brought your daughter into?" The thing is, roysh, I'm not here to get into one of my famous big intellectual debates. This is one of my days of unsupervised parental access. I'm here just to collect Honor. "All I'm saying," I go, "is that it's another way of looking at it." She shakes her head – okay, it's a word I've invented – but pityingly? Then she bends down to put the breakfast things into the dishwasher. She goes: "The thing I don't understand is – oh my God – where is the anger?" Out of the corner of my eye, I get that flash of knicker that no man can resist, no matter who the woman happens to be, riding over the waistband of her skinny Sevens.
“As in, why aren’t people out on the streets, Ross, demonstrating their anger about injustices like this, like they do in other countries?”
I’m trying to work out is that a G-er she’s wearing or just the regular Diana Vickers.
She stands up again. "We're – oh my God – so passive," she goes, "as, like, a people?" I give her one of my hey-ho-what-can-you-do looks, then I go, "So, er, is Honor ready?" which immediately reminds Sorcha that the girl isn't even out of bed yet. She walks out to the foot of the stairs and shouts up to her. "Honor Angelou Suu Kyi Lalor! Switch off that television this instant and come down for your breakfast!" and then she turns around to me and goes, "She's – oh! my God! – addictedto that entertainment channel." I'm tempted to remind her whose idea it was to bring her to LA for the first two years of her life. Except I don't.
The next thing I hear is Honor tramping down the stairs, going, “Ryan Philippe is, like, so hot!” – can you imagine, five years of age? – and then she steps into the kitchen, cops me standing there and pretty much jumps into my orms, going, “Daddy!” It has to be said, she is a total daddy’s girl.
She’s like, “Where are you taking me?” I go, “I, er, thought we might check out maybe a museum or an ort gallery today,” then I give her a big wink, to let her know that I’m only yanking her cord. It’ll be Dundrum Town Centre like it’s always Dundrum Town Centre.
Sorcha goes, “Honor, eat your cereal,” which Honor is actually just about to do, when she suddenly stops – her spoon frozen in mid-air between her bowl and her mouth – and a look of, like, total confusion on her face.
“Mommy,” she goes, “what are these?” Sorcha’s there, “They’re Corn Flakes, Honor. You’ve had them before.” Honor goes, “But why is Corn spelt with a K?” See, that’s where she takes after her old dear. I could have stared at that box all day and not copped that.
Sorcha doesn't get a chance to even answer, roysh, because Honor goes, "Oh my God, did you get them from, like, Lidl? Eeeuuuwww!" Sorcha ends up totally losing it with her then. "Honor," she practically roars at her, "just eat your breakfast!" Honor's like, "I'm not eating anything from Lidl. It's for focking povs." "Honor!" I go, even though Ithink she has an actual point. "Possibly try notto use the F word, if you can?" The next thing I know, roysh, I've got the two of them throwing a total and utter shitfit in the kitchen. There's, like, tears and shouting and oh-my-gods being thrown back and forth. Then, roysh, Honor grabs her bowl and tips it over, spilling cereal all over the table, and runs back upstairs to her bedroom, calling her mother a sap and a wagon.
Sorcha pretty much breaks down. I take her in my orms and try to, like, comforther? "Don't worry," I go, "I'll get her waffles or something when we're in Dundrum." Except she pushes me away then. "No!" she practically roars at me.
“Ross, she has to learn!” I’m like, “Learn? Learn what?” “I’m trying to teach her to lower her expectations, Ross.”
" Lowerthem? Why would you do that?" "Because – in case you haven't noticed, Ross – we're not longer living in the same world that you and I grew up in." I'm telling you, it's those break-up songs bringing her down. Mary Black. Katie Melua. I'd focking prosecute the lot of them.
"Look," I go, "I know you've been strapped for cash since your shop went tits-up. But I can give you more money. I can buy you actual Corn Flakes, spelt with a – is it a C?" She looks at me like she's suddenly given up on me. "Okay," she goes, "you bringher to Dundrum. Buy her Belgian waffles and keep telling her that it's still 2005," and then she says something that rocks me back on my pretty much heels. "Has it occurred to you yet, that in, like, 15 years' time, we're probably going to be stood at the departure gate at Dublin Airport saying goodbye to her?"
rossocarrollkelly.ie, twitter.com/ rossock