Sunday in Bogside

When Fiona came to, she was hit with a plume of smoke and the thick smell of her dad’s freshly lit Marlboro. She rubbed the crust from her eyes and stretched her neck - she fell asleep with her head against the arm of the couch with no pillow for support. It must have been at a 45-degree angle all night. 

Her dad, always well dressed, sat in her grandfather’s old Windsor chair positioned opposite the couch, The Irish News propped up on his one crossed leg and cigarette dangling from his mouth. The heat from his coffee met the hazy air, creating a typhoon of fog in their drafty flat.

Fiona yawned and moaned as she sauntered a whole six feet to the kitchen and opened up the refrigerator, searching for a morsel of breakfast her mother might have saved her. Nothing, shit. She then got the coffee pot going for a fresh brew. After last night, she was beholden to her splitting headache and begging for mercy. Only coffee could relinquish that kind of control. 

“Your mother left 50 pounds on the table. Run out to the market today - we’re out of bread, eggs and milk. And grab me a pack of cigarettes,” her dad said, never breaking his gaze from the black and white copy and the cigarette never left his mouth. He glanced over his horn rimmed glasses. “The whole pack.”

Fiona scooped the money into her right hand, pounded a cup of coffee with the other, then pulled back the curtain of the breakfast nook. Outside, a slight drizzle fell on passersby who ducked their heads into their coats like turtles to save them from the rain and scolded their children who insisted on plopping their boots in the puddles pooling on the sidewalk. In the distance, heavy hanging clouds masked the clock tower at Guildhall so that the hands of time were indistinguishable, but the resounding toll of the bell and the four somber dongs of “Westminster Chimes'' reminded everyone in Derry it was twelve noon. 

***

By the time Fiona got dressed and began her trek to the market, the rain had stopped, but the darkness of the day still lingered around street corners and clung to the tops of buildings.

Despite the dreariness of a damp January day, it was Sunday after all, so she ventured south to stroll along the walkway of River Foyle. Fiona wasn’t much for churchgoing, but did love God in her corner and when she could use Catholicism to justify secular and unsacred behavior, like sneaking out on Saturday nights to drink with her friends because Sunday was a day of rest or redeeming herself for all of the cussing, cigarette stealing and drugs with a few simple words in a cramped confessional: Forgive me, Father, for I have sinned…

Fiona arrived at the market just as John, the Irish News vendor who peddled papers on Sunday, was packing up his remaining copies. When he looked up to see Fiona standing here, he looked slightly surprised. 

“Why Miss Fiona, how about yee? I didn’t expect to see you today.”

John reached toward the top shelf of his cart for a folded paper. Gripping it with one hand, he passed the copy along to Fiona who unfolded it, revealing the full headline of the front page and a few loose cigarettes. 

“Thanks, John,” Fiona said, reaching into her pocket for a lighter and igniting the tip of the Marlboro. 

Puffing her cigarette, Fiona’s eye caught the cover story’s headline ON THEY MARCH and a large, black and white photo showed a man and woman not much older than she, thrusting homemade signs into the air with END INTERNMENT NOW plastered across them. Frozen in a single moment, the photo captured their gaping mouths, furrowed brows and inaudible chants.

John nodded his head toward the last stack of papers on the stand. 

“‘Supposed to be another one of those today up by Guildhall. You be safe on your way back home, Miss Fiona,” John said.

Fiona scanned the remainder of the front page before refolding the paper.

“I’m going to head on, John. See you next week.” 

John tipped his cap and Fiona gave him a quick smile before heading into the market.

***

Fiona headed home with the bread and eggs in one arm and the milk in the other.  The cold milk pressed against the ribs under her thin jacket, so she cut through the back alley that would eventually dump her onto Rossville Street - the quicker route. 

Zigging through the passageway to avoid puddled potholes and dodging the drops dripping off the fire escapes above, Fiona felt the rumble before she heard any commotion or saw the distressed bodies zipping past the opening of the alleyway. 

A visceral reaction came over her and in an instant, blood rushed from the top of her head to the tips of her fingers, and Fiona began to run. 

She could have turned and run back toward the market. She could have intersected with John’s pick up truck filled to the brim with extra copies of today’s paper and hopped in the passenger side for him to drive her home. 

She could have taken a hard right, dashing east toward the river and toward the path she took to get to this part of town.

But in moments of fight or flight, your body responds before your brain has time to catch up with words and reason. 

Instead, Fiona ran head on toward the rumble. 

The closer she got, the more frequent the booms and the higher the pitch of the shrieks. What once was a clear picture of people running north on Rossville suddenly became a chaotic shot of people yelling back at the tank roaring down the pavement, smoke billowing around the scene like a vignette. 

 As the buildings that she dashed between started to shake and she was sure their bricks would start tumbling down, she reached the mouth of the alley and her body spilled out onto the street. 

She quickly lunged backward so as not to get trampled by a fleeing northbound crowd. Paratroopers crouched from balconies above, waving colossal guns in the direction of the street dwellers, while others met protesters head on, screaming at them to move along and shoving the tips of their rifles into the shoulders of civilians, hard enough to leave a circular bruise if a bullet didn’t take its place.

Signs like the ones Fiona saw in the newspaper were ripped or tattered and thrown to the ground. The baker’s windows were shattered. A car on the next block over was on fire and a priest rounded the corner waving a bloodied white handkerchief, leading a group of people who were struggling to carry a wounded teenager. 

Fiona didn’t see the swing and the miss from the paratrooper wrestling the protester behind her. She only felt the blunt force to her back and an icy pain in her ribs, which, in her lucid daydream, she chalked up to cold milk.

***

Fiona woke up on the couch with a splitting headache. Her father was out of the Windsor chair, and both he and her mother were hovered over her body like a couple of seagulls about to lunge for a worm.

She heard her father say her name, but instead of his usual full, steady tone, his voice sounded tinny and distant. His voice got further and smaller until Fiona’s world went dark.

***

When Fiona opened her eyes, light poured in through her bedroom window and she sensed it was a new day. She attempted to get out of bed, but winced in pain - she felt completely bruised from the waist up. 

Slinking into her robe and slippers, Fiona shuffled into an undisturbed kitchen with the only sound the tick of the clock’s hands on the wall.

When the last trickle of coffee percolated into the pot, she poured a cup and slid into the breakfast nook, peeling back the curtain. Like her kitchen that Monday morning, the streets of Derry were still, the storefronts donned hanging red CLOSED signs. It was 8:58 AM. In two minutes, the clock tower at Guildhall would toll “Westminster Chimes” once again.