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Ireland's political and cultural magazine
76 November 2020
76
November 2020
H
E COULD truly remember his
Dad from the day he was
actually born, though he never
called him Dad. He used no
name. He was uncomfortable
with the relationship. It was so one-sided.
It made him uncomfortable. No reciprocity.
His Dad had liked winners more than
anything. From birth they’d been in
competition. For food, attention, his
mother. He was strong even as a toddler,
wouldn’t take correction even when his
Dad beat him, narrow-eyed. Sometimes he
felt it bad. His Dad was always keen to give
tough correction and never praised him.
He didn’t care, knew he was great, better
than that bastard. His Dad told him that life
was about winning. His Dad didn’t tell him
he’d actually be a winner. His Dad didn’t
seem to think he would be a winner. Often
he saw hatred. He remembered his Dad
only ever started conversations that were
about becoming a winner. It was all about
taking out the competition before they
took you out. Trust nobody. No-body. His
Dad succeeded despite being an outsider.
Sometimes he got into trouble at school..
He had to leave a couple of them. The
teachers were, like, assholes. Finished up
in a military school. He sorta liked that.
Flags and prayers. He got involved in some
hazing and was beaten once or twice. He
liked the violence and the discipline. He
mostly stole his schoolwork. His Mom was
soft and she was no force in his life, she
had her own battles with his Dad. The only
thing he had in common with his Dad was
the work, and from his earliest days he
loved to go on site. By the time he was a
teenager he was driving trucks and even
operating a crane. He was fabulous at it
and all the boys loved him. Loved him. To
be honest there was a distance and every
so often his stuff would get stolen or the
phone would go and he’d just hear stupid
laughing on the line. It didn’t matter, they
were losers who worked for his Dad. They’d
eventually work for him. He wanted to be
a winner, they wouldn’t be any part of it.
They were rude, ridiculous and sad. He
really didn’t care, knew he was great,
better than that bastard. He went to a big
college and scraped through, avoiding
‘Nam somehow. He was very smart, very
excellent IQ. Very excellent. He always
knew what would be on the papers, or got
what he called a sit-in. He knew the people.
His Dad died and he took over the fi rm.
INTERNATIONAL
They hadn’t spoken in months and before
that when they spoke it was hard, bitter.
Jealousy probably. The boys called him
Mister now. He made it bigger and
expanded it into the city, never paid anyone
where he didn’t have to, took some big
risks and made the business and its new
owner famous in the city. By now he had
lots of girlfriends. He was good-looking
and liked to fuck. And they liked his
money. He was worth a lot of money, tens
of millions. Maybe a hundred. A lot. He got
a reputation as a phenomenal socialite. He
expanded the firm abroad, became a
national fi gure, got involved in the media,
bought some awesome buildings but was
given bad advice and had to start again.
He did it, pressured the banks, he was the
only one who knew what to do, where the
bodies were buried. He married a beautiful
model. Then another and a third. Lots of
kids. Four. Five. He treated them like his
Dad treated him. The eldest girl though
she was special, she had the genes. The
family all had the best genes. People said
they had the best genes. Swedish genes.
The girls were tall and blonde, like him.
Beautiful. He wrote his own book, got his
own show. Incredible. His own helicopter,
own plane. He was worth a billion, two
billion, a lot of people said fi ve billion.
Many, many people. He was famous too,
the most famous man they said. His Dad
had just been a builder. He went into
politics. He was a winner, a tremendous
winner. He stood for the Presidency, the
most famous man in America from his
reality show, for his billions and for the
babes. Grab them by the pussy, he said he
would, with his dick fully half as big as he
knew it was. The funny thing was he didn’t
really want to be President, never had,
couldn’t see the point except as something
to have, but one day he’d been to a big
event, and the President, a black dude,
took time out to tell jokes about him. The
lowlife was telling jokes about him. The
audience, all around him, they laughed at
the joke, laughed at him. He was caught
on international tv, rictus as the applause
of the elite rippled and rerippled around
the auditorium. These dummies didn’t like
him. Of course he really didn’t care. But it
had not been a winner. That damn laughter.
Horrible. He paid people to tell him what
people who might vote for him wanted to
hear and then he simply said whatever it
was. Against the odds he won the
Presidency. It was easy, show no
weakness. Call people names. The blacks,
the gays, the muslims. Fake news. If only
his Dad were there to see him win this big.
His Dad hadn’t really been much of a
winner. Overrated. He was diff erent. He
was self-made. Big-league. Money, power,
women. Fame. The American Dream, they
said. The President didn’t really know what
to do with the success. It didn’t really suit
him being President. All these people had
ideas that made no sense to him, ideas,
principles, policies, books: redtape stuff
they made up because they envied his
endless triumphs, and to make him feel
bad. Responsibility. It was stuff his Dad
wouldn’t have recognized and it seemed
they were just using it against him. It was
like the way they ridiculed the signature
gold bathrooms he put in all his great
buildings. He was a perfect President
making America great again, a wonderful
place to do business. Winning again. The
stock market soared, he kept the American
way of life alive. his Empire, in the hands
of his kids, was doing huge. He built a
wall, took on China in trade, rattled the
system. Rattled it. He liked being called
Mr President. Liked it more than anything
he’d ever seen or heard. The elite laughed
at him. Sniggered at his orange head and
sun-goggle marks. He really didn’t care.
Then came a plague, an actual plague. He
didn’t understand it or how to stop it. He
knew it would vanish in the sunshine, with
bleach. With positivity. Why not? It killed
230,000 people within eight months.
Worse, it diverted media attention from the
Presidency. He got it himself but took a
cocktail of what you’d call a cure and got
immunity. Actually he felt nothing about
the plague, the deaths. He really didn’t
care, knew he was great, better than that
bastard. He needed to get elected again
and half the population were outraged by
the deaths. He faced the worst, sleepiest
opponent in the history of politics. He left
it too late to get a vaccine, start a war, stop
the election, jail the contender. The
election was a landslide against him. He
tried to pardon himself and was
helicoptered out. He served one year of his
three-year sentence for conspiring with the
enemy, remembered only as a punchline.
On his death bed as he took his last breath
abandoned by friends and family the last
word he heard spat in his head by his Dad
was, inevitably…loser.
