Chapter One

What will become of all your realisations Branagh, your soul searching and finding yourself at the end of the day? The cliched ‘shabby chic’ wooden wall hangings meant to be inspirational fall kind of flat in the soupy darkness don’t they? ‘Live, Love, Dream’ my arse. Eat, sleep, drink, s**t, cry, menstruate, beg, plead, borrow, pray would be more apt. It’s Maslow’s Hierarchy of Needs inverted, this finding yourself bollix we’re all brainwashed with nowadays. Don’t have food, water, shelter, security? Don’t sweat it. Just take a selfie. Make sure your furry tongue is sticking out so that you’ll look nonchalant, like a young one not giving a f**k, then add a good filter, preferably with butterflies and hearts flying around your stupid head ensuring that your eyes have that Avatar glow about them. Now type ‘This is me’ in big bold lettering up top, ‘I might not have everything, but I have enough’. To hell with that - I Am Enough! Press Post. The first few votes are in. That gobshite up the road has hit the like button, but then again she likes everything. Someone’s leaving a comment. Your heart rate quickens. It’s Susan “Exactly, you go girl. Much love” F**k off Susan. Much love? Where’d she pick up that one liner from, Housewives of New Jersey? She lives in the Midlands. If you met her tomorrow on the street she’d say ‘Mind yourself now’ as you parted. The red notifications are starting to slow, droplets of blood after a pin prick or a nose bleed. 37 likes in total. Everyone thinks you’re a twat now. The momentary high starts to sink down to your toes and out through the tips of your fungus infected nails. Put whatever color polish you want on them love. In a few years from now some twenty something year old in a nursing home is going to have a face like a slapped arse on her while she clips and pares away at them, trying her best not to vomit on the blue, patterned carpet, occupying her mind with thoughts of Martin or Mick and the way he’ll stare at her in the short skirt tonight in the pub. She’ll be a thousand miles away from you and your old mildewed feet and hairy, road mapped legs which she couldn’t know once tripped so lightly over summer grasses on your way back to mammy from school, as the sun splattered across your golden head and lit the way home on those soft, hope filled evenings. Don't do it Branagh, don't go back there again and again and again!