Thin Places Read online

  Table of Contents

  Inside

  My Imaginary Friends

  Let Me Introduce Myself

  Parental Advice

  Out of Place, Out of Time

  Save Me from Myself

  That Was Then

  Polite Introductions and Such

  Rattled

  Boy Alone on a Park Bench

  Testing One Two Three

  Rude Awakening

  Vega

  And Now You Get to Meet My Mom

  Introducing My Dad

  On the Bus

  Upside-Down Universe

  Help

  Clues

  Research

  Boy on a Mission

  Not Just a Pile of Rocks

  Uncle Seamus Remembered

  The Phone Call

  And Then Something Strange Happened

  The Story So Far

  My Parents’ Ireland

  My Irish Blood

  Eight Things Not to Do in Ireland

  One Thing To Do in Ireland

  Girl in My Bedroom

  Travel

  Loneliness Squared

  English Class

  Help me, Jonesy

  Flying to Knocknarea

  Report Card

  Parental Battleground

  A Turn of Events

  A Theory for Everything

  But

  My Father’s List of Things to Do and Not to Do in Ireland

  33,000 Feet

  Like Coming Home

  The Bus

  The Long Way Home

  First Night in Ireland

  Warrior Queen

  Knocknarea

  After Knocknarea

  Seamus Speaks

  Paths to Nowhere

  Saved by a Horse

  The Lonely Man

  Hauntings

  Belief

  Beaches

  The Coasts of Sligo

  Call from Home

  Down and Out in Ballyconnell

  Streedagh

  The Sand, the Sea, the Sky

  The Cove

  Night

  Morning

  Rebecca

  The Past

  Time

  Rebecca’s Tale

  Belief

  Liam

  Life at Streedagh

  Rebecca Speaks

  What I Know

  Words

  Uncle Seamus

  Introductions

  Seamus Speaks

  Time to Leave

  Return to Streedagh

  A Fire of Peat

  Never-Ending

  Sad Days in Heaven

  Time

  Drink of Darkness

  Unfolding Story

  The Arrival

  History

  The Dreamer Awakes

  Return to Knocknarea

  Inside

  When you are young

  you have

  imaginary friends

  right?

  You

  make them up and

  hang out with them

  have adventures you can

  never have

  with real people.

  I had a whole crowd

  of friends who

  didn’t exist

  outside of my head.

  Real people were

  well

  boring.

  Adults were the worst.

  They say How are you?

  And I usually say nothing

  because I know they can’t handle

  the truth.

  Some askWhat do you want to be

  when you grow up?

  And sometimes I answer

  I want to live in my own kingdom

  an island filled with amazing beings

  only I can imagine.

  My Imaginary Friends

  They

  spoke to me

  and told me stories

  urged me to do crazy things

  like

  make parachutes out of sheets

  and jump from

  the shed roof.

  They suggested I should learn

  to juggle knives

  and study the nature of

  fire.

  They told me where to look for

  ghosts

  and demons

  and sometimes they

  were not lying

  although sometimes

  they just wanted trouble.

  (My father said he had a plan

  to destroy

  my imaginary friends.

  That made them very angry.

  But I said

  I would never let that happen.)

  Mostly

  late at night

  they spoke to me

  of amazing places

  that could not possibly

  exist.

  The voices were always clear

  and

  sounded like me.

  I guess they were really

  just me

  or parts of me.

  Let Me Introduce Myself

  My parents named me

  Declan Lynch

  Names are important

  but

  it’s also important to

  remember

  that someoneusually your parents

  just made up your name.

  You were not born with it.

  Think about that.

  You

  were justyou

  when you came into this world.

  My mom and dad were the Lynches

  living on an average streetMaple Terrace

  like the tree

  with the little helicopter seeds.

  The Lynches had their first and only kid

  me

  and said I looked like my great-grandfather

  whose name wasDeclan Timothy Lynch.

  I only saw pictures of my great-grandfather

  much later

  when I could focus my eyes.

  I didn’t look anything like him

  but

  the name stuck.

  Declan

  or Deck sometimes

  or Declan Patrick Lynch

  when I was bad

  which was often.

  Just jumping from shed roofs

  getting lost in malls

  hiking deep into the tangled forest

  behind my house

  always determined to not come home on time

  chasing ghosts and demons

  and listening for the next bit of advice

  from the voices in my head.

  Parental Advice

  My mother told my father

  it was just a phase

  I was going through

  a very long phase

  and I would grow out

  of it.

  (But she secretly told me

  that she understood the voices

  and that I should learn the difference

  between the good voices

  and bad ones.)

  My father

  was a sworn enemy

  of my imaginary friends.

  Your imagination

  he said

  plays tricks on you

  dirty tricks.

  When I asked him what he meant

  he tried to explain

  but grew frustrated

  and stomped away.

 
I heard him say to my mother in the kitchen

  Sometimes, Fiona

  Sometimes I think

  that boy is not our son

  at all.

  Maybe they made a mistake

  at the hospital

  and gave us

  the wrong

  child.

  Out of Place, Out of Time

  I think I might have been about twelve

  when

  one of my imaginary friends

  Garth

  told me I didn’t belong here.

  Wrong time

  wrong place

  was his way of explaining it.

  Garth looked like a cartoon character

  except he was real

  well, he felt real

  and talked real

  (with a voice that sounded just like me)

  but seemed much wiser than I was.

  Declan

  he told me

  have you noticed you are different

  from everyone else?

  Yes

  I said.

  But there’s not much I can do about it.

  That’s true

  he said.

  But I think someone or something

  goofed

  and you were supposed to be born

  a long time ago

  or a long time in the future.

  Definitely not

  here and now.

  Which could explain why I never felt like

  part of the crowd

  like other kids.

  Never felt

  truly at ease at school

  comfortable in groups

  or even at home

  in my own skin.

  Save Me from Myself

  Garth’s news scared me at first

  because I knew

  I would never fit in

  and might never

  be happy.

  So I started trying to fit in

  to be normal

  have normal conversations

  say things like

  Hi, how are you?

  and always got predictable answers

  so instead I’d ask a kid at school

  What is your favourite planet?

  or

  Where were you before you were born?

  But

  the harder I tried to fit in

  the worse it got.

  People looked at me

  with scrunched-up faces.

  The voices in my head got louder

  angrier.

  Garth said

  You can’t deny who you are.

  I said

  But I don’t know who I am.

  And I had an image of myself

  unzipping the body I was in

  and travelling someplace else.

  A war began inside me

  between the me who wanted to be normal

  and the me who wanted to leave

  and go somewhere else.

  One day I screamed it out

  in the middle of that tangled forest

  Please!

  I shouted.

  Someone save me!

  But no one did.

  There was only one voice.

  The voice was me

  saying I was doomed

  to live in a world

  where I did not belong.

  That Was Then

  It’s a weird thing.

  You find yourself

  to be sixteen years old

  and the voice in your head

  changes.

  It’s not your voice

  anymore.

  (Where did my voice go?)

  (What the hell is happening to me?)

  It’s the voice of

  a girl.

  Yes, a girl.

  Her voice is beautiful

  and she’s talking to me.

  Yes

  talking directly to me.

  It went like this:

  I was walking home from school

  not thinking

  about much of anything.

  My mind was empty.

  Relaxed.

  This was a totally new thing

  for me.

  I was always agitated

  about something.

  Now this extremely weird

  calm.

  And then

  boom. I hear her.

  Declan

  she says.

  Declan.

  I’m sorry to

  barge in like this.

  It didn’t seem like a voice inside.

  I was sure it was someone talking.

  I looked around but there were only cars and trees

  and a cat

  but I was sure it was not the cat

  talking.

  It will take a while

  to explain myself

  she said.

  She had a soft and kind voice.

  A most wonderful accent

  and some kind of funny, beautiful

  way of speaking.

  Who are you?

  I asked.

  Rebecca

  she said.

  How do you know my name?

  Well, I’m inside your head, aren’t I?

  Are you real?

  Yes, very real.

  Then let me see you.

  Close your eyes.

  I closed them.

  Can you see me?

  Holy shit.

  Is that good or bad?

  You look like a normal girl.

  I’m not really.

  Not really what?

  Normal, I mean not

  normal in the normal sense.

  Why?

  We should get to know

  each other first.

  Polite Introductions and Such

  I said

  I have to sit down

  So I found bench

  sat down

  and tried to remember

  how to breathe.

  I’ve scared you

  she said.Sorry.

  No.

  I mean yes.

  I knew this would be confusing for you.

  How did you know?

  I know because I know you.

  I’ve known you for quite a while.

  How can that be?

  It will be hard to explain.

  Try.

  Let me start by saying

  it took a long time to make this connection

  this bridge.

  I looked around, my mind reeling.

  What bridge?

  The one between me and you.

  It’s how you can hear me

  see me.

  None of this was happening out loud.

  It was all in my head.

  But when I closed my eyes again

  I could still see her clearly.

  How do you do this?

  I built the bridge

  to be with you.

  Why me?

  And I guess I must have said that out loud because

  guys from school were walking by and they

  looked at me like I was crazy.

  Weirdo

  one said.

  Nutjob

  said the other.

  Rattled

  Yes, rattled.

  I wanted the girl

  the girl voice

  the girl image

  to leave me alone

  so I could think
straight.

  Do you want me to go?

  she said.

  No.

  Yes.

  Wait.

  Can you read my thoughts?

  Yes.

  But …

  I know. But it’s okay.

  I know you.

  But I don’t know you.

  You will.

  If you let me.

  And then

  she was gone

  and the voice in my head

  (my own voice)

  was just me saying

  What the hell is going on?

  Boy Alone on a Park Bench

  I’ve often felt lonely but this was worse.

  This was alone alone. Exponentially alone.

  And I didn’t understand why.

  I felt like someone had pulled the plug

  that made me me.

  I needed to talk to a flesh-and-blood type human being.

  So I called Jonesy.

  John Jones is his real name but everyone calls him

  Jonesy.

  He is smart and sad; that’s his thing.

  He gets an A in every class

  even in math and chemistry

  but he’s never happy with himself or with the world.

  You look at him and wonder what he is thinking

  why he seems so unhappy.

  When he answers his cell phone he just says

  Ullo.

  Just like that.

  And it’s like he’s expecting bad news.

  Ullo.

  Jonesy, it’s me.

  Deck?

  What’s wrong?

  I explained about the voice in my head.

  It’s really a girl’s voice?

  Yeah and I can see her too.

  What’s she look like?

  Normal. But kind of hot.

  Normal but hot. Hmm.

  I think I’m losing it.

  I think I’ve gone over the edge.

  I know the feeling.

  It passes.

  What should I do?

  Is she still there

  in your head I mean?

  No, she thinks she scared me.

  So she left.

  Where’d she go?

  I dunno.

  Think she’ll come back?

  I hope so. I got a lot of questions.

  Deck?

  What?

  You’re either mentally ill

  or very lucky.

  Testing One Two Three

  Yes, that’s what I heard her saying

  in the middle of my dream.

  Is it okay to be here?

  she askedin the middle of a dream.

  I had been dreaming about being on a boat that was on fire.

  Then you are just part of my imagination

  I said.

  Well yes and no.

  Which is it?

  I have to explain about the bridge first.

  Right, the bridge.

  This is an experiment.