So this dude Isaiah predicted the economic blahdy blah – and that affects me how, asks ROSS O'CARROLL-KELLY
SO THERE’S A new sign up over the door of what was Hook, Lyon and Sinker this week. We’re talking Last Resort Asset Reclaim. People like JP’s old man – and even mine – they don’t go under when it’s, like, a depression, recession, or whatever you’d call this sudden vibe. They change shape and come back as something even more evil.
“You looking for work?” a voice suddenly goes and I turn around to see Mr Conroy pointing straight at me. I’m like, “Work?” I think I actually laugh? “I don’t think things are ever going to get that bad. No, I’m actually waiting for JP.” “Shame,” he goes, checking out my biceps and giving my abs the old left to right as well. “We can always use muscle around here. And you’ve got no heart – I always liked that about you. When I close my eyes, I can see you, repossessing an X5, putting that sledgehammer through the front windscreen, three little kiddies in the back, screaming. Mommy! Mommy! Mommy!”
“That’s nice of you to say,” I go.
He’s there, “Well, I’m not blowing smoke up your hole either. I mean it. I’m going to tell you something I never told you when you worked for me.” He looks over his shoulder. “You remember Joyce, used to do reception? Well, she was one of these spirit mediums – used to contact the dead, all sorts of shit. Anyway, you remember you were in here on work experience?” I laugh again.
“Transition year?” I go. “Yeah, some work experience that was. I spent the entire month on the shredder.”
“Well, you learned a skill,” he goes. “One that certain financial institutions in this town would pay you serious poppy for. Anyway, I’m telling you about Joyce. See, you weren’t in the door five minutes when she comes running into me, tears, the works. I says, ‘What’s wrong?’ She says, ‘That fella out there – he’s got no aura.’ I says, ‘What?’ She says, ‘I’m telling you, it’s like he’s dead inside.’ Well, property was really starting to take off at the time, so I took an immediate interest in you.”
“That’s, er, nice,” I go. He looks suddenly sad, then. “You heard about Joyce? Had to let her go. Gave her statutory and she sues me – get this – for the way I’ve been speaking to her for the fifteen years she worked here. If you’re a handsome guy, it’s flirting. You’re ugly, it’s sexual harassment. Tomato, tomayto . . .”
JP suddenly appears behind him. I give him some five and Mr Conroy goes back inside but not before telling me that if I ever change my mind, blahdy blahdy blah.
I tell JP I’m bringing him for a Liquidity Lunch. Celebrate the Grand Slam and whatever else. JP, as everyone knows, is a ringer for Luke Fitzgerald. I was going to suggest putting his orm in a sling to get free drink for the afternoon and maybe pull a couple of Deirdres from the bank centre.
“No can do,” he suddenly goes. “Ross, I’m up to my towns in there,” and I’m there, “You can’t take even a few hours off?” He turns around then and goes, “It’s all right for you – you don’t have to work,” but he means it in, like, a bad way? Which is why I end up going, “This isn’t you, I hope you don’t mind me saying. I mean, repossessions? Come on, JP, you’re better than that,” and he looks away because deep down he knows I’m right. “It’s, like, being an estate agent was one thing. Yeah, we were selling people into a lifetime of debt they probably couldn’t afford but there was no real harm in it. But this? Sledgehammers? Mommy? Er, can I just remind you that you studied for the priesthood?”
He carries on staring into space but goes, “Those who accumulate houses are as good as dead. Those, also, who accumulate landed property until there is no land left, and you are the only landowners remaining within the land . . .”
“Okay, which one is that?” I go, trying to stop him before he gets on a roll. We’re on the Merrion Road, remember.
“The Lord who commands armies told me this: ‘Many houses will become desolate. Large, impressive houses will have no one living in them. Indeed, a very large vineyard will produce just a few gallons. And enough seed to yield several bushels will produce less than a bushel.’
“Those who get up early to drink beer are as good as dead,” which is a definite dig at me. “And those who keep drinking long after dark until they are intoxicated with wine. They have stringed instruments, tambourines, flutes and wine at their parties. So they do not recognise what the Lord is doing. They do not perceive what he is bringing about. Therefore, my people will be deported because of their lack of understanding. Their leaders will have nothing to eat. Their masses will have nothing to drink.
“So Death will open its throat. And open wide its mouth. Zion’s dignitaries and masses will descend into it, including those who revel and celebrate within her. Men will be humiliated. They will be brought low. The proud will be brought low.”
I give him a round of applause, but in, like, a sarcastic way? “That’s Isaiah,” he goes. I’m there, “And you think he was talking about the Current Economic Tiger?” and I actually shout it, not knowing at the same time exactly why I’m so upset with him? But I calm down and try to reason with him. “Do you think if God wanted you to be sat in there, chasing people for money who haven’t got it, He’d have made you look like Luke Fitzgerald in the week that Ireland won a Grand Slam?” He thinks about this and, for a minute, I think he’s actually weakening. He takes a couple of steps in the direction of Cullen’s, then changes his mind and disappears back into the office.
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