We present an extract from Contentious Spaces, the debut novel by writer, playwright and performer Rosaleen McDonagh.
The Traveller families who live in Saint Rita's are on borrowed time. In just a week they will be evicted by the local council, threatening not only their homes but also their history and the stories that have shaped them.
Charlene, a proud young beoir, suffers a humiliating betrayal. Her mother, Kate, is left to navigate unbearable loss while holding the family together. Her cousin, Sheena, strives to find her place in a new environment that is quick to dismiss her. Her uncle Tommy fights despair as his teenage son spirals out of control. As eviction day draws closer, the families struggle to preserve their dignity, finding strength in one another as they navigate an unknown future. Unflinching, Contentious Spaces is a haunting story about identity and loyalty, shame and resilience, grief and love, and the defiant power of voices that refuse to be silenced.
From Repercussions
Thursday, 28 November 2024
Gerard O’Donovan avoided eye contact with himself as he inspected his face in the mirror, checking to see if he had missed a patch. Still holding the electric shaver, he moved quickly from the bathroom to the kitchen and switched on the kettle. Another reminder of how you can take the Pavee out of the site but not the site out of the Pavee. Andrea, in the early days, had sourced Irish tea bags online, Barry’s Gold Blend. The kettle gurgled, and his right hand shook with the frenetic buzz of the shaver. His brain was in full flight, filled with jobs that needed to be done.
Boiling water splashed onto his left hand. He cursed under his breath, told himself to slow down – one minute, one hour, one day, one job. He switched the shaver off and rubbed the scalded area of his hand.
It was 5.15 a.m. in his dingy fifth-floor walk-up Manhattan apartment. The kitchen-press doors were barely hanging on, and the skirting boards were marked with grease and grime. They’d been living there for about four years. Andrea made an effort to paint, polish and hang up pictures to make it more comfortable, but it made little difference as the apartment hadn’t been renovated since the early 1970s. That was how they could afford a place in an area like this. The unspoken deal with the landlord was as long as there were no complaints to the Department of Housing Preservation and Development, they could keep their relatively reasonable rent.
A stale funk rose from the bin that he’d wished he’d put outside last night. He had felt so crappy when Andrea left that he decided to just go to bed. He slurped a quick cup of tea, then dressed quickly.
The noise of the garbage trucks on the street and the men shouting at each other seeped through the closed window. Gerard grasped the black sack from the bin, put a quick knot in it. He grabbed his keys from the table, slung his work bag over his shoulder and ran down the hallway to the steps, taking two at a time, hoping one of the guys would let him throw the sack into the lorry.
*
The early shift started at 6 a.m. in Fitzpatrick Hotel. Gerard worked in the kitchen, prepping for senior chefs. He had been given no title but he told everyone he was a sous-chef.
Andrea had left the city for the weekend to celebrate Thanksgiving in Hoboken. She’d left crying. The row had started because she wanted him to meet her family for the first time. They knew she was seeing someone Irish and that there was an issue with his visa.
Over the years, whenever Andrea had tried to persuade him that it was the right moment to meet her family, he’d always refused. He knew her family would be disappointed with his Caucasian appearance and his career choice.
During these arguments, he would grab his jacket, leave the apartment and walk at a furious pace until it was dark. Central Park was his go-to place.
Andrea was in her early thirties; she wanted a future, something stable with him. Her parents would eventually get over his skin tone. They sometimes attempted to introduce her to their friends’ children, who were doctors and lawyers. They wanted someone professional. Someone who was her equal. Andrea had mentioned her parents’ tactics to Gerard and told him that she’d recently been avoiding conversations with her mother about him. He listened carefully to what she said. He understood their point of view. He wouldn’t want himself for a son-in-law either.
'You’re a bit old to be the rebellious daughter. Go find someone they’d love, that you’d love.’
Andrea said, ‘But I love you.’
That stopped Gerard in his tracks.
He pretended the information and invitation from her family for Thanksgiving was new to him, despite the fact she’d been telling him about it for months. The thought of celebrating, of being amongst a family . . . he just couldn’t.
They’d been together for eight years. Andrea was pushing for something more. She wanted him to get his visa. The words security, future, babies, marriage had been a substantial part of their conversations of late.
Seeing her upset made him feel like s**t but acting like a selfish cunt came easy to him. He’d let her down so much, yet she resisted ending it. Him breaking up with her wasn’t going to happen. He didn’t have the capacity. He planned for the break-up, though, for the day it came, because surely it would come. Gerard was always waiting for her to wake up and see how inadequate he was, how incapable.
His recovery plan was already in place – some of the Chinese lads from the apartments on the next floor up would move in, help him with the rent. This exit strategy, if you could call it that, was about the practicalities: where and how he would live. It made him feel safer to plan for this eventuality. Andrea probably had her own escape route. That’s what he told himself.
The emotional stuff, the heartache of missing her, he didn’t have a strategy to cope with that.
Contentious Spaces is published by Skein Press
