Diarmuid Breatnach

(Reading time: 3 mins.)

I slowed the car as we went past the Lotts but kept the engine running – the water was a foot high in the street and I didn’t want to have trouble starting it again.

What the jayzus are they building? asked Noah Parker (you can guess his nickname, though to be fair, his nose was hardly noticeable).

He was only voicing what was a general question in the neighbourhood. The Lotts, and I say the Lotts, because this was the acknowledged main branch of the clan here in Dublin, the other two being known respectively as the South Lotts and the North Lotts, were always a bit strange and secretive. And it’s not easy to combine those two qualities.

Strange but hard workers, all of them in one of the trades: carpenters, welders, electricians … Mrs. Lotts being the exception, into animal management. She had a nickname in the area from an idiosyncrasy of hers, of regularly glancing over her shoulder. ‘Backlook’ it was, though never mentioned in front of any of her brood, for self-preservation reasons.

Around their yard and their house there were cages, pens and runs for rabbits, chickens, geese and ducks but there was also an owl box on a tree, a pair of gaudy parrots flew around the house when it wasn’t raining, two llamas stared disconsolately from their pen at the rain and from somewhere a donkey brayed.

Holy Mother of God said, said Parker, will ya look at that giant rat?

It’s a coypu, replied Mary, who never took exception to the invocation of her namesake. They’re from South America.

Another one appeared and they began to run around one another playfully in the rain. Until one caught the other, climbed on top of it and began to … I blushed and looked in the rearview mirror, caught Mary’s stony glance and looked away hurriedly.

As well as all the animals, the yard was full of materials, sheets of metal and wood, planks, plastic sheeting and tarpaulin covering whatever the Lotts were building. I thought the shape was familiar in some way but couldn’t quite grasp what it was.

Stop the car a minute, will ya? said Parker, bringing down the window on his side. I tapped the brakes but kept the engine running.

You’re letting the rain in, complained Mary. He was too, but then he leaned the top half of his body out the window and, heedless of the rain on his head and shoulders, hailed the Lotts – or at least one of them.

Hey, Job, a fine soft day, wha’? called Parker.

Job Lott, trudging across their yard with some kind of machinery or tool clutched to his chest, his broad shoulder hunched, turned.

Ah, Noahsey, how’s it goin’? Then, peering into the car and nodding: Mary, Racker.

We nodded back.

What’re ya buildin’? Looks like a bloody big boat, Parker again, with a laugh and … something fell into place in my brain.

Job stopped dead, as if he’d been struck or walked into an invisible wall.

A moment stretched. The rain fell, a donkey brayed, parrots squawked.

Mister Lott – nobody called him anything but ‘Mister’ since he’d been a magistrate – hurried out with his wife from underneath a huge tarpaulin, put his big hand on his son’s shoulders and pushed him forward.

Sorry lads, we’re really busy right now, he called back over his shoulder. Job was glancing back at us as the three of them disappeared under the tarpaulin.

Parker pulled his wet torso back into the car and sent the window closed. We were silent in the car for a moment, the rain drumming on the roof and running down the windows, the engine idling.

Weird, commented Parker, unusually at a loss for words.

Did you notice, I began, Mrs. Lott …?

Mary nodded. She didn’t look back, not once.

End.