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A Peatbog Soap Opera
Sweet love bloomed, fresh as a spring flower, and Laura played the bodhran better than ever before. But the Hog wasn’t happy. He couldn’t stand other guys in pubs watching her with hungry eyes when she was onstage. He wasn’t able to keep an eye on her permanently (when he found himself in a pub, he liked not only his sweetheart, but also his bottle, which had unfavourable effects on his concetration) and it grieved him sore that he wasn’t sure whether guys were watching her with hungry eyes only, or if they tried touching her with hungry hands as well. It was a neverending torment for him.
So one day he promoted pretty Laura to his manager (and his personal Muse) and banned her from performing (claiming that such conduct is below the dignity of a manager). She stayed at his cozy cottage, he treated her the best he could and entrusted her with such crucial tasks as deciphering his lyrics (which he penned in bouts of inspiration on scraps of paper) and transcribing them in a readable way. And yet it was Laura now, who wasn’t happy. She wanted back her bodhran career, she wanted some fun, she wanted it badly.
However, before the pretty flower could have wilted, she discovered that managerial life had its charms as well. As a manager, she got to mess here and there, with promoters, booking agents, various sharks of showbiz. It was all new and exciting, refreshing like a morning dew. And on top of all that, one day she met a colleague manager...
Actually, when she met that mess of a guy, let’s call him Joey, she didn’t even know he was a colleague. But he was. And even a fresh flower can enjoy some messiness. She didn’t mind his company, as he was quite entertaining. And as soon as she found out that, apart from his managerial tasks, he had to occasionally get on stage and disgrace himself with whistle playing, she started helping him, supplying him with tutorials and things, enthusiastically promising him private bodhran+whistle gigs. He took her books and CDs, made arrangements for rehearsals... But somehow they always ended in a pub... or on a bench in a park, who knows why.
One day though, a turning point came. Joey introduced her to his client, nobody else than the Irish Treasure himself. It was meant to be just a bit of innocent socializing... but as soon as she was introduced to the Treasure, she forgot about everything, the Hog, her whistling colleague, her favourite bog... simply everything. Actually, she continued to meet the colleague and to chat with him, but all that meeting and chatting revolved around a single subject – the Treasure.
Whenever the Treasure left for England, she made the colleague call him, bring him back to Ireland, bring him to her. Whenever the Treasure was around, she was most pleased to keep him company. Joey bitterly regretted ever letting such a pretty thing near his client, but it was too late.
Anyway, she was still the Hog’s manager and she didn’t neglect her duties. Such duties as industrious transcribing of songs. And that particular task gave her a brilliant idea...
When the Treasure’s birthday came – coincidentally, it fell on Christmas Day – she had a lovely present ready for him: The Hog’s best songs, transcribed in the most delicate calligraphical manner by her own loving hand, tied with a green ribbon of the softest silk. She loved the Treasure dearly, but there was a threat permanently casting shadow on their relationship: the Treasure had a girlfriend. Let’s call her Vicky. Actually, Laura was losing track of when the woman was his sweetheart, when she was his friend, when she was his nurse and when she was the „fucking bitch that broke his heart“, but one thing was certain: the woman simply was there. Laura hoped, with all her heart, that such an outstanding present (and so suitable since the Treasure had been suffering from a writer’s block recently) would make him part with Vicky once and forever.
The Treasure took the present but didn’t leave his true love. Without even unwrapping it, he rushed to Vicky’s Christmas party...
On the way to the party, he finally untied the lyrics and started singing the first song. He enjoyed it. He enjoyed it quite a lot, in fact. At the party, he surprised his true love Vicky by singing it to her... And she fell in love with him once and forever.
What else to add?
The Hogs recovered from losing their manager as quickly as they had recovered from losing their bodhran player. The frontman noticed that his brilliant songs were gone – but not for the life of him could he figure out what might have happened. He had been drowning his sorrow in Guinness a tad too often lately, which could have played its role. When the Treasure’s new album was released, some of the songs (actually most of the songs) sounded a bit (actually more than a bit) familiar to him, but still he couldn’t be sure. Maybe he got some suspicion... maybe the suspicion even included his lost Muse and such shameful conduct as stealing... but at those moments, he just consoled himself with the fact that his songs were so brilliant that geniuses didn’t hesitate to call them their own. His wounded heart took some time to recover, but finally it did, the band switched to playing Irish trad and gained greater fame than ever before.
Laura was broken-hearted when she realized that she couldn’t win the Treasure back. She even felt pangs of regret for having deserted the Hog (only now she realized that she had known him since her very early childhood: they used to play together in a sandbox, nah, actually they used to cut turf together – with their tiny children shovels). She whole-heartedly blamed her colleague manager for everything – but it didn’t stop her from going out with him from time to time. She got addicted to showbiz and couldn’t live without messing with celebs, backstage events and such, and the colleague didn’t mind showing himself with a nice blonde. Despite the glitzy world she found herself in, she didn’t forget about her trusty bodhrans and her old dreams, and industriously messed with musicians, hoping that somebody would take her in a band. She loved playing, she loved the stage.
The Treasure and Vicky floated on pink clouds of eternal love... and rumours about an upcoming wedding started to emerge.
And Joey? Well, he missed his pretty flower a bit, despite the occasional meetings. He got his share of fame too, certain events allowed him to parade onstage again, to show his mighty naked shoulders and attract flocks of birds. But those glorious moments took place across the Atlantic... and not all birds can fly, they are often like kiwis. His blonde girl had been closer, at hand. He kept telling himself that managers should always face challenges to keep alert and in top form, and that it was now a challenge for him to attract some local kiwis. And that the bird who flew away added an important note of melancholy to his life, which could inspire him to songwriting... no, even better, to script writing. He briefly considered writing a role for her to lure her back, but soon discarded the idea, realizing that she was a lady, and no lady would play such roles. But maybe she could record the soundtrack. A lovely female version of Donegal Express...
THE END
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