Chapter 31
AL
Al drums his fingers on his desk. He’s surrounded by bridges, literally and figuratively.
On his walls, behind him over the Liffey, and in his heart and mind.
He has already built an emotional bridge and is over it.
He’s on the other side looking back and not recognising who he was.
Or who Walter and Tara were. Or how bizarre and unhealthy his relationship with Walter was, and the living arrangements.
And how he played a part in their relationship by constantly bringing the three of them together.
Because Tara wasn’t enough, he needed a friend in Walter, and Walter alone wasn’t enough and he needed Tara.
He’s looking back at the darkness of December and January and glad he survived it. Some nights he didn’t think he would.
And though he should probably lick his wounds a little longer, be by himself and figure himself out, all he can think of is Melody.
He shouldn’t embark on anything serious, he almost just married the wrong person, Walter saved him from that, but Melody has consistently cheered him up, made him laugh while also engaging in honest personal revelations.
He appreciates that. And he’s concerned about her.
Right now, her world is revolving around the love locks that he removed from the bridge, leaving her feeling even more vulnerable, and he might be able to do something about that.
He’s conscious of all eyes on him as he makes his way to Walter’s office.
He raps on the door respectfully, Walter looks up and flinches, as if expecting a punch to be thrown from the other side of the room.
He looks even worse now than he did before.
The neat new haircut is messy and grown out.
His curls have always been unmanageable, hair gel never had any effect.
His eyes are red as though he’s been crying.
He could do with a shave. Again, Al’s conscious of the eyes on them and Tony in the nearby office with full view of this.
Everybody knows what happened now, there are no secrets anymore.
‘Walter, the padlock keys in the Camac River, what’s the situation on that?’
Walter seems surprised that it’s work-related. ‘We can’t do anything about them. It’s up to Dublin City Council. They’re conducting a river rehabilitation and flood alleviation scheme so it’s their portfolio, not mine.’
‘Okay,’ Al says. ‘Who do I contact there when they dredge the bed?’
Walter checks his emails and calls out an address, Al takes it down. ‘Grand, thanks,’ he says and leaves.
‘Al,’ Walter calls out.
Walter’s lip quivers, his Adam’s apple works as he attempts to say whatever it is he wants to say.
Feeling sorry, saying sorry, is a physical thing, not just words.
Al can see it in him. Walter is sorry but he still did what he did, and is still doing it.
Al waits patiently, he’s not going to ruin this with an outburst but he’s not going to make it easier for Walter either. Al deserves this. So does Walter.
‘I’m sorry I called the guards in. I was angry. These women have been contacting me night and day, and my shoes, and my shirts, and my boxer shorts.’ His voice trembles. ‘I know it’s been hard for you, I know.’ He rubs his face and his hair. ‘But it’s been a nightmare for me.’
Al holds his stare. He’s not apologising, but his insides shake. He’s acutely aware of Melody’s insight. It’s Walter who broke his heart more than Tara did. They were like brothers, and the betrayal nearly ended him.
‘We didn’t even get to tell our friends and family first. My dad,’ Walter says, running his fingers through his curls, with trembling nail-bitten fingers. ‘You know what he’s like. Tara’s sisters aren’t talking to her. She can’t deal with it.’
Al has little sympathy. He once loved these people, maybe he still does and that’s why it hurts so much, but they made their choice.
‘What did you expect, Walter? When you do something like this, what did you expect?’
Al is baffled that Walter would ever have expected any other response.
He has no doubt that in time friends and family will come round, that Tara and Walter or Walter and Tara will be welcomed as a couple and there’ll be no looking back.
Al will be that ex from that time of their life that’s vague, and messy, but if Walter saw this as a moment to shine, to step out of his shadow and be back-slapped by the people in their lives, then he was wildly misguided.
Al was never the bad guy. Walter looks as broken as Al felt since before Christmas.
‘You and I are not friends,’ Al says. ‘And we won’t ever be again. But we’re not enemies either.’
Walter’s lip quivers, sad at the loss, and he nods.
And a line is drawn under that.
But he’s still no closer to getting the keys to the locks which means he needs to go in the other direction. When he returns to his office Natasha is blocking his door with her arms folded.
‘What now?’
‘I called Evolution Metal recycling centre,’ she says, accusingly. ‘Just to be sure that the locks were really gone.’
He sighs. ‘Yeah?’
‘They said they never received them.’
It’s the third Thursday in January, that miserable day that Al had arranged to have the love locks removed from the Grace Plunkett Bridge.
It’s cold and grey. It’s drizzling and the rain is picking up, and getting heavier.
The perk to this weather is that the bridge is quieter than usual, there aren’t as many people out walking.
Mikey and the boys are helping him remove the love locks as agreed by Tony after reading his report.
Loaded with bolt cutters they each take a different section of the bridge and begin cutting.
As soon as the locks are released they drop them into large plastic containers.
The locks make a loud bang as they thud into the containers, then clink and crash as the containers start to fill up.
‘Some of these are tricky to reach,’ Mikey says to the lads. ‘For the difficult positions use an angle grinder.’ He looks at Al. ‘It would be easier if we could just lift out the entire grid, instead of cutting the locks individually.’
‘The grids have to stay,’ Al says. ‘Tony’s orders. There’s no budget for replacement grids.’
Mikey snorts, it’s nothing new to him, then puts his head down and doesn’t speak for the duration of the job. He’s a man of few words and a solid worker.
‘Ever put a love lock on a bridge, Mikey?’
Mikey gives him a shrivelling look that lets Al know where he stands on that, and slams another lock into a container without love, care or tenderness. Al grins. He knows how Mikey feels.
Al runs his eyes over the locks in the container by his feet. He picks them up and studies them. Names, dates, some quotes. Initials. Different information but they’re all pretty much the same. He drops them back into the container.
Two women cross the bridge and stop by Mikey to inquire about what they’re doing.
Mikey points at Al with his bolt cutter as if it’s a weapon, which it is, then gets back to work.
‘We’re protecting the bridge, doing some maintenance.’
‘What are you going to do with the locks?’ one asks, leaning over to look into the container.
‘Sending them to recycling.’
‘That’s a shame,’ one says. ‘All those people.’ They take a moment to read a few locks on the bridge, a respectful silence before the locks are taken away forever.
Then between them they start reading some aloud, awwing and ahhing at the sentiments, laughing at the quirky ones.
Al listens to them and then, when they’ve moved on, he looks again at the padlocks.
Suddenly they’re not locks. They’re people. He wonders if he could find Natasha’s.
A press photographer arrives to cover the story. Wanting to avoid a photo, Al removes his high-vis jacket and moves closer to Mikey’s vehicle, allowing Mikey and the team to take centre stage. Mikey is not one for being centre stage. He barks at the photographer to hurry up.
‘Are you wallpapering your house with these photos?’
The photographer, finally satisfied and intimidated, leaves.
Al doesn’t have to stay here. He has given the instructions, overseen the plans to remove the locks, he should head back to the office.
But he doesn’t want to be there, not with Walter there.
Avoiding him has become energy-sucking. Or he could go to the house.
Al and Tara are both at work, he could have time to get up to mischief, but his heart’s not in it today.
Sabotaging the love locks on this bridge will have to be how he gets his kick today.
He takes a spare bolt cutter from the van and proceeds to clip the shackles of the padlocks, then drops them into one of the containers.
It’s satisfying work and he gets lost in the flow of severing each lock and time passes easily, the most distracted from his personal problems than he has been in weeks.
When the containers get heavy, they transfer them to heavy-duty construction bags in the van.
Al continues cutting and looking for Natasha’s lock, and lo and behold, front and centre of the bridge where he should have expected to find Natasha’s padlock, he finds it.
A padlock with two linked red hearts, just as Natasha described with her initials NK, and PG.
He’s about to cut into it with the bolt cutter but realises Natasha will break him if he damages it.
‘Hey, Mikey, do you know how to pick a lock?’
It takes Mikey ten seconds and the padlock is open. ‘Used to be a locksmith,’ he says, with a cheeky wink, dropping it into the palm of Al’s hand.
Al smiles, feeling pleased; he’ll give it to Natasha tomorrow.
Even though he’s found her padlock, he wants to continue.
There’s something therapeutic about removing the locks, about clearing the space.
He clips a padlock and studies it before dropping it into the container.
This one has a photograph of a baby on a key ring attached to the love lock.
Another has a photograph of a family. He discovers a photograph of an older couple, the padlock with a tribute to them and their love.
Married sixty years. The padlocks are a combination of all kinds of love, not just romantic.
He pockets the padlocks with the photographs, it doesn’t feel right to destroy them but soon his pockets become heavy with the weight of the locks he’s saving. Why should he choose who’s worthy to be saved and what does he know?
‘Hey, Mikey, do you still have that barn out the back of your land?’
Mikey grunts. ‘Yeah. Why?’
‘Mind if we keep the locks there? Until I figure out what to do with them?’
Back in his office, Natasha is staring him down, toned boxer’s arms folded across her chest. He knows he’s caught out.
‘Funny you should mention that, I was just about to deal with it now.’
‘Oh yeah?’ she asks disbelievingly.
Al crosses his office to his desk drawers. Natasha doesn’t have access to his personal drawers.
‘I was waiting for the right moment,’ he says, taking out the padlock with her initials and sliding the drawer closed.
Not giving it to her was more out of fear than anything else.
The longer he left it, the angrier he knew she would be.
She was out sick on the Friday following the removal of the locks, and then the weekend came and went and when he returned to work on Monday she was crying about breaking up with Pedro.
He didn’t think the timing was right to give her the lock.
And then Melody arrived with her theory and he doubled down with Tony and everyone on the locks being melted down.
He didn’t want Natasha to have any inkling that he had held onto the locks, which are currently in storage in Mikey’s barn, because he didn’t know what to do with them.
He just knew that as angry as he was, as hurt as he was, as determined as he was to never love again, he wasn’t ready to destroy a symbol and celebration of the love of so many others.
He holds his closed fist out to Natasha, and opens his palm. She steps forward slowly, as if expecting a trick, preparing for something to jump out at her. Her fists are closed and ready to attack. She peers into his hand. He didn’t need to be worried about her anger. It melts right away from her.
‘Al!’ she gasps, fists dissolving and hands flying to her face.