The Japanese People

As evening came, a gregarious mood resumed.  Frances Buckley was in the kitchen teaching Abby Kane the Offaly way of making stew and in the front room some drank tea and chatted while others had gathered around the record player as Knox played a new LP of Japanese people screaming. 

The rain was pounding now and the wind howling, beating the land raw and depriving it of its natural colours, which would surely return once the storm was done, but for now a paleness hung over the land, everything grey and white and groggy like bad reception on the television set, a pseudo-reality.  Long Gully and Steever had the look of two depressed turtles being pelted to their deaths on a cold beach, the bushes and trees on the hillsides bent and blown out like cheap umbrellas tussling with a blizzard.  Birds were no longer to be seen being flung around in the sky.  All creatures appeared to have dug in deep to protect themselves.

Across the country everyone was moaning as usual about the horrendous conditions but you could also hear them singing the praises of Seamus Miller the weather forecaster for wasn’t the man absolutely spot on and correct, even with bad reception.

Elder encouraged everyone to listen closely to what he referred to as the nature spirits as they came with nourishment for the Earth but when someone suggested they go outside to feel those spirits upon their faces he humbly objected on account of it being too wet.  Imogen was glad to see glimpses of commonsense under all his flatulence, for there was comfort in knowing Elder hadn’t turned into a crazed swami or demigod just yet.  And comfort there was in that front room too with a log sputtering on the fire turning the place into a safer haven than usual, a feeling of shelter and calm being indoors away from the storm.  Except for Japanese people screaming. 

Imogen noted Devin’s newfound interest in the house as he had now begun questioning Elder on the building’s history and architecture.  For a man with no interest in such things previously, it could only mean he had plans and these were even more transparent to her following his awkward decision to pop the question, which she hadn’t taken so seriously; being as the suggestion had materialised during an exercise, an ‘experiment’, Imogen had viewed his proposal lightly and filed it somewhere close to regular drunken tomfoolery.  But here and now he was all about real estate, it would seem.

            It’s all about real estate, it would seem, he said.

            It is, said Elder.  In this day and age especially. 

            And at my age.

            And your age?

            Twenty-six.

            Contemporary society would proclaim it a requirement at your age but that is not what I mean.  Personally, I wouldn’t impose such hard constraints on your life span.  But there are other constraints in our time.  You do not need me to tell you how unkind the market forces are. 

            I’m sure they’d have something to say about me getting a place like this.

            If you set your mind to it, I’m sure you can fight off the market forces. 

            Don’t get me wrong, I can afford to take out a mortgage with the money I’m on, but it would have to be something smaller than this.

What is it that appeals to you about the abode?  The size?

            That, yes, but also it’s more plush than anything I’ve seen before.  I think it’s kind of...fun too.  It’s a ways from the usual, for sure.

            Tis.  The house was designed specifically with the future in mind.

            Futurisme, added Ismay Tasse, expressively.

            Somewhat.  Originally the thing was to convey something technologically novel while at the same time having one foot in the past.  The dome shape at the top you might say is a rather primitive design but when seen from the sky it might throw you off being as it is this uncanny bauble in the rough.

You’ve seen it from the sky? asked Devin.     

            It has been photographed.  It’s in last year’s Marco Polo pocket guide.  Just check the midlands section.  The helicopters fly past here all the time. 

            Not just helicopters, said Ismay, cryptically.

Imogen moved nearer to the Japanese people screaming where she marvelled at Knox with his eyes closed and nodding his head finding hidden rhythms in the screeching and wailing; and she was moved to chuckle when she saw Crispin Collins staring at the record player dumbfounded.  The Japanese people would soon stop screaming and Janis Joplin would take over for a while.