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pebblysand · 5 months ago

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for @nosebleedclub october prompt #11 - "lawyer's office". i did write this yesterday, just horribly later posting ^^. .

lawyer’s office

They fill up the room that morning, the way young people always do. Hands shoved deep inside the pockets of washed out, baggy jeans, long torsos awkwardly hunched forwards, cotton jumpers with uneven strings peeking out at the base of their sternums and hoods thrown back like inverted necklaces around their shoulders. T-shirts with large logos and GAA colours. There is a pile of crumpled bank notes tossed against the scratched, ageing mahogany desk in front of them, hazardously left to die between the three-inch-thick Sweeney file and a copy of last year’s edition of Blackstone’s Civil Practice. They have emptied the full contents of their wallets, including the packaged condom one of them hastily hid back within the folds, a loud cough turning his cheeks red like a sleety, winter day.

‘That enough?’ Liam finally dares to ask. ‘We counted it up, should be about 120 -’

They can sit down, start at the beginning. The money will be a problem for later.

‘Well, it’s our landlord,’ another boy starts. He is short and broad, the nose of a boxer.

‘Yeah, he’s a cunt -’

‘Ah, stop -’

‘Alright, yeah. I’m just saying. So.’

It’s a house-share. Cabra, up in Dublin 7, six people crammed into the old bones of a brick-layered former two-up-two-down. There is an ageing extension, one that’s falling apart, and the foxes eat the mice in the back garden at night. ‘Now, your man, right? The one on the second? Well, he broke the floor of his ensuite shower, we’re not sure how, but -’

‘Probably shagging that girl who’s been - you know the one with the -’ another bearded one interrupts, miming large half-circles over his chest -

Liam shoots him a look. This is not the right place. In the silence that follows, he takes over from Shorty - his voice is softer and more cautious. Embarrassed to be here, almost. ‘Well, anyway. He’s not paying his end of the rent, so our landlord won’t fix it. Until he pays, right? But then every time he showers - well. It, like, proper rains in our sitting room, so -’ He smiles a little, shy. There is a moment of collective contemplation at the difficulty of this conundrum, at the relative guilt of consulting a lawyer behind the other one’s back, too. There’s probably a reason he’s not paying rent. Liam further adds that he tried to talk to their landlord, threatened him with going to the PRTB, but got laughed at in response. ‘Said he’d kick us out to do the renovation works. Fix the shower, then find twenty Brazilians willing to sleep on bunk beds and fill up the place, €500 a head, you know? So, I suppose we were wondering if -’

The young lad eyes the money again, nodding at it like it’ll respond. When he looks up, his gaze is pleading. ‘Anyway, we were hoping you could, you know, write a letter or something?’

A law degree is the right to use big words on expensive stationery.

Liam’s been here before, of course. He is familiar with the décor, the exhausted shelves that line the walls, the yellow glow of a banker’s lamp on winter afternoons, when the sky is too dark outside and the rain lashes against the windows. There is a faux-persian rug that frames the centre of the office and the lawyer replaced it once, back in the day. Perhaps, because of the old English setter that used to sleep in the corner and scratched it, and scratched it, and probably peed on it too many times. Perhaps, because of the dark stains that cups of tea and coffee had made over the years, or because of the vomit of a baby. This isn’t the kind of general practice that facilitates yearly visits by tracking heights or flu shots, but it is still the kind of general practice that watches people grow. Decades apart sometimes, the space in which they all happily go on to live their lives, but Liam’s crawled on the floorboards during appointments before, and as a teenager, he played on his tablet with his headphones blasting in the waiting room, dragged by parents who were worried sick, and often didn’t know what else to do with him.

The first time he attends, he isn’t even born yet. Playing football against her ribs under the soft curve of a rounding belly - she is a beautiful young woman, Louise. The brightest, kindest of blue eyes - pale skin and warm freckles on her skin, long blond hair that is definitely bleached but sure, you can’t have everything. She works as a secretary in an office - it is the early 2000s so probably pharma or tech or something - they don’t call her a secretary, she says, but an assistant. Her mother likes it. ‘Not that it’s any different,’ she corrects, polite and a bit shy, her fingers crossing over her stomach. She is small and thin, a stark contrast with the baby she carries. ‘It pays well, right?’

She wants it to stop, though. Wants to know if they can sack her if she says something to HR. ‘The other girls won’t talk,’ she adds, rolling her eyes. ‘I mean he’s doing it to all of us. It’s not just me.’ There were the comments and the jokes and the ‘accidental’ gropes - he even tried to force himself on her in his office once, kissed her and shoved his fingers inside her pants. She was too scared to do anything - thank God his boss knocked, interrupted, she caveats again, shaking her head quickly at the memory. Since then, she’s managed to avoid him. ‘He won’t look at me now, anyway,’ she shrugs, smiling and caressing her belly again. ‘Not with the baby.’

She wants to make sure she’s protected. It’s what her friend told her, that they couldn’t let her go until she’s back from mat leave. ‘He won’t even have us close the office on our own, says there needs to be a man present at all times to supervise, that we’re not capable.’ Louise bats her eyelashes quickly and blows her nose into a tissue. ‘Oh, you’re very kind. I don’t think there’s a need to go to the guards for that, honestly.’ Her mouth forms a laugh but no sound comes out. It may very well be a criminal offence, but getting the police involved? It’s not like her, and they have much more important things to deal with, surely. He’s just an arsehole. ‘I suppose I don’t want it to start up again when I’m back though,’ she sighs. ‘And, for the others, you know?’

She answers questions carefully, dutifully. She has the facts down and has made note of the dates and of the emails, and yes, she thinks there may be CCTV in the corridors, at least. She doesn’t know what the retention period is. And, no, she has not told her husband about this. ‘He’d just be raging. Can it stay between us, please?’

She has a charming smile, Louise. And a law degree, sometimes, pays for the welcome sound of silence rather than that of the advice.

He is injured when she reappears, a few years later. It is 2004 or 2005, by then, and he is hoisting himself up the stairs on crutches out on Merrion Square. She is holding the door open, politely shaking hands, and yes, she is still working at that same job, she confirms, chit-chatting as he labours up. This isn’t the right time or the right place to ask what happened with HR and it turns out that a lawyer’s office is rarely one of finished stories. Moments in life are stacked like bricks, like files on shelves, and the spines list client numbers rather than names, themselves always a secret.

She is crying proper, this time around. Was so scared when the hospital called. Their son, Liam, is crawling on the floor now, bright red hair and freckles - four-years-old and vroom-vroom-cars-I’ve-a-blue-one-and-a-yellow-one-did-you-see-that? He pets the dog, slow and gentle - Charlie’s an old man, you know? Darren almost died, Louise explains. She speaks low and covers her mouth, constantly throwing looks back at the floor behind her shoulder, trying to convince herself that her son isn’t listening to them. Darren, on the other hand, is silent and mellow. He looks down, uncomfortable on the faux-leather upholstery of the chairs that face the desk. His legs extend, then retract - once, twice. He massages his knee. He does construction, he explains in a grunt. A wall fell on top of him. He’s fine. ‘Stop it,’ Louise snaps. The doctors weren’t even sure he’d walk.

They’re saying it’s his fault, now, though. The company. They’re saying he wasn’t wearing the proper equipment. ‘No one does. It’s a joke,’ he groans. They just don’t want to pay.

There are norms specific to personal injury in those types of circumstances, apparently. A question to answer as to the burden of proof, too. Do they even have proof? And: do they have to prove Darren wasn’t wearing the equipment, or does he have to prove that he was? It’s probably lost somewhere within endless volumes of workers’ regulations. In terms of public policy, it’s hopefully the former. It would make sense. That could be looked up.

‘Well, we don’t want to burden you too much,’ Louise smiles, sniffling. She is holding her husband’s hand like a lifeline and he is stiff in his posture. They don’t have the money to be too much of a burden, it turns out. They were doing so well, so much better than the generation before theirs. The boom of the Celtic Tiger years and a delusional belief in trickle-down economics - they had a nice house and a baby, and they were thinking of having a second, eventually. ‘I’m obviously still working,’ she adds, now, swallowing, ‘but Darren’s on benefits and with the mortgage…’

It’ll be okay. Something will be arranged. The trainee can have a look. If there’s something, a no-win-no-fee route is always a possibility. It is a route that will not be preferred by the short, balding man who comes in once a month to grumble at the office books and pick up VAT receipts, but maybe that man was just born sad, who knows? The conveyancing side pays well, people down in Sandymount have too much money on their hands. Darren agrees. When he’s better, he’ll come back to incorporate his own business, maybe. He leaves smiling. She nods and sighs at the same time.

Go on, look after yourself, yeah? A law degree isn’t a medical one.

There was some money in the settlement. Not much but it covered the bills and the physio appointments, and Darren was able to pour the rest into the launch of Roddy’s Construction Ltd the moment the painkillers allowed him to stand up straight again. They couldn’t eternally survive on Louise’s salary and it gave him something to do other than sit on the couch, drinking cans and wallowing. They were happy for a bit, until 2008 rolled its ugly head around, that is. The equity became negative on everybody’s lips and within two years, Roddy’s Construction Ltd was forced out of existence. It was 2011 and their child was ten and in the lawyer’s office again, the clerk passed around an old Game Boy for him to wait. Louise’s tears were now dry as she signed the papers on the desk with a tight smile. ‘Well, I suppose at least this will allow us to keep the house a bit longer, right?’

Her mother died. Breast cancer, it turns out. There was €43,752 in the estate, which her brother in America is graciously letting her have in full. ‘He’s, er -’ Louise presses her lips together. Has aged a little, soft lines on her forehead and her hair cut to her shoulders. ‘They don’t need it,’ she states. ‘He and Lauren, they’ve - they’ve done quite well for themselves. Even with the crisis, it’s -’ She shakes her head again. There is a hint of irony and something else in her voice when she suggests: ‘Maybe I should have gone to America, do you think?’

Darren isn’t with her today. He didn’t believe it was necessary for him to attend anything past the funeral, and even that, he probably only attended because the notice on RIP.ie announced there would be a gathering at the pub afterwards. He has lots of friends there. The owner, in chief, maybe because her husband keeps the business running. Holds the walls with his presence, like a pillar on the stools at the bar. No, she’s being mean. He’s tried to take on a few odd jobs in a meat-packing factory near his parents’ in Drogheda a few months back. But: his knees are killing him and Louise says she feels guilty sometimes, with her functioning limbs and all the things she can’t understand; he is frying his brain cells with weed to make it stop. Maybe, oops, she shouldn’t have told the lawyer that. ‘I dunno how he pays for it,’ she lets out. ‘It is what it is, you know? Thanks, anyway. For the will and everything, I mean.’

She grabs her son’s Cars backpack off the floor by the entrance and they get a move on. With another tired smile, she closes the door behind her.

A law degree is the sigh that follows.

Liam is fourteen, now. They’ve left him outside again, though for once, this is ostensibly about him. Perhaps, he should be here. ‘You’ll talk to him, right?’ Louise pleads. ‘Please -’

‘What the fuck will the lawyer talk to him about?’ There is the voice of outrage in Darren again, his arms thrown up in the air. ‘I’m the one who should be giving him a fucking lecture, I’m his father -’

‘Yeah, and where the fuck were you? Countless times I tried to ring you -’

She was the one who had to get the bus to pick Liam up from the Garda station, last night. Their little baby boy. Got caught trying to nick a bunch of Canada Goose puffer jackets off a shop - the two older kids he was with were held up for the night. Liam being younger, though, and it being the first time - the guards weren’t stupid, for once. They called his parents rather than a judge, and -

‘I was fucking busy.’ Darren is defending himself. The best defence is always attack, that’s what they say anyway. ‘And, it’s you - you’re too kind to him. Always buying him shite he can’t pay for -’

‘He’s in school. He’s fourteen -’

‘Well, I worked when I was fourteen -’

‘Well, you certainly don’t work now -’

She is being unfair, he claims. He and his friend Darragh are opening up a new car repair shop down in Rialto. She easily clocks off at six from her cosy corporate gig every day, but he has things to do. Their son gets arrested for stealing now, and what’s next? She is too lax with him. That scene she made the one time (one time!) he dared yell at Liam. Boys need discipline. What’s next? Selling drugs?

‘Oh, and you wouldn’t want the competition in the house, would you?’

He storms out. Leaves her alone to silently cry again on the chair with the squeaky plastic leather that has scarred overtime. It’s okay. The officer on speakerphone echoing in the lawyer’s office confirmed they wouldn’t be pressing charges. There is no need for her to worry. She apologises. Shouldn’t have said that. Not here. She insists (insists, insists and promises) that Darren doesn’t sell drugs, she just said it like that. There is silence. Darren hasn’t been employed or had a successful venture in years. They’ve managed to keep the house. They’ve got a new car, a Mercedes that roared down the road when her husband took off just now. Neither he nor Darragh know how to fix cars, and everyone knows the kind of crowd that hangs around in Rialto. She works as a contractor for Facebook now, reviewing flagged content for days on end on a computer screen. It pays €24,000 a year. They required an undergraduate degree on the job posting, which she faked on her CV, and she’s been scared they would find out ever since.

A broken, teary smile as she reaches for the tissues on the desk again. She has calmed down. It’ll be alright. A law degree on the wall doesn’t turn an office into a police station. Actually, perhaps the opposite.

It is somewhat inevitable. It funds most of the small, general practices around the world, after all. She says: ‘It’ll be amicable.’ There is a pause. ‘I hope.’

Louise came alone this time. Liam is in school. She does not need the tissues, she is grand, thanks, jokes that she has grieved already. The lawyer’s office is the bearer of bad news: they will have to live separated for four years before the divorce is pronounced. Many people don’t know that, it’s an odd quirk in the law, the state finding it hard to cut off the many, winding tentacles the Catholic Church has wrapped around it for centuries. It sucks the blood out of people and families. Louise smiles. They at least got gay marriage last year, didn’t they?

Liam is living with her, she explains. They found a small one-bed in the Liberties. She sleeps on the sofa. ‘I’m applying to work for Facebook proper, now,’ she smiles. Hopefully it’ll pay more. ‘I love him,’ she explains. But she got married at nineteen and had the baby at twenty and didn’t think it would be this hard. ‘Maybe, didn’t think at all,’ she admits. ‘He’s a good kid. He was just a bit stupid for a while. Acting out. He’s been doing better since we left home, since it’s just the two of us. He doesn’t want to see Darren anymore, I -’

Her friends tell her it’ll be fine. She is thirty-five. She is still so young. There is irony in her voice again when she says: ‘Maybe I’ll meet someone, right?’ She doesn’t sound like she means it. She sounds like she wants to be left alone. She nervously toys with her wedding ring, still at the base of her finger. ‘I loved him,’ she declares, then. ‘I love him. I always felt that if I left, I was abandoning him. He changed. After the accident, you know? Or maybe I did. I can’t save him. He doesn’t want to be saved, I don’t think. D’you remember when we first came to you? When we bought the house back in 2000?’

It was an easy purchase and conveyancing is always a good way to rope new clients in. They got the lawyer’s address off of Darren’s sister, back then. The seller loved them. They made a good offer, had stable jobs and a decent interest rate. He worked in construction and she was an assistant. They’d found a property they liked in a gentrifying residential area in Drumcondra. He was from Kildare and she’d grown up in Meath. They’d met through friends in the city. Were just about to get married. Her ring was big and shiny and showy, even if it was just moissanite. He wanted people to know - see - that he loved her. He took her on a trip to New York that winter.

‘There’s someone else I think,’ Louise admits, then. Another pause. Her bright blue eyes look up again. ‘I don’t know. I don’t want to know.’ She shakes her head. ‘He is begging me to stay.’

She doesn’t. She gets herself a decent lawyer and she doesn’t stay.

Liam is nineteen now. His friends file out of the office in a concert of jokes and playful shoves, an army of bikes locked around the streetlamps outside.

His mam’s good, he nods, once. Moved out to Bray a couple years back and she likes it there. Has set up a small shop that sells artisanal jewellery and does the markets. He hasn’t seen his dad in a while, but on the phone he sounded alright. Got in a bit of trouble with the guards a few years back, but - ‘It is what it is, like.’ There is not much else to be said; this is watercooler conversation, not the real kind, and the lawyer’s office isn’t a doctor’s office, and it also not a therapist’s. The lawyer’s office focuses on Family law, Criminal Law, Employment Law Disputes, Personal Injury, Wills and Probate; it says so on the website. A law degree is not one that saves anyone, it’s just a prism through which to watch hundreds of lives go by.

Liam’s lips curve a little further to one side; he bites his lip with something daring in his gaze. ‘I’m doing law. In college, you know?’

And, perhaps, the landlord will fix the shower. At the very least, right?

#tw: sa #lawblr #writeblr #short story #original writing #original fiction #contemporary fiction #family drama #workplace harrassment #financial struggles #divorce #coming of age #irish fiction #emotional conflict #realistic fiction #lawyers #workplace injury #character-driven #slow burn

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