Copyright

HarperCollinsPublishers

1 London Bridge Street

London SE1 9GF

www.harpercollins.co.uk

First published by HarperCollinsPublishers 2019

FIRST EDITION

© @BorderIrish 2019

Illustrations © John Taylor, with the following exceptions: egg; scales of justice; paper and tape; road sign; elephant print; thumbs-up emoji; telegram; five review profile images; pint glass emoji; TV set; Celtic border; four-leaf clover © Shutterstock.com

‘Like a sinner …’ song lyric taken from ‘Bat Out of Hell’, written by Jim Steinman and performed by Meat Loaf

Cover design by Steve Leard © HarperCollinsPublishers Ltd 2019

Cover photographs © Chris Clor/Getty Images (elephant), Shutterstock.com (grass)

A catalogue record of this book is available from the British Library

asserts the moral right to be identified as the author of this work

All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. By payment of the required fees, you have been granted the nonexclusive, non-transferable right to access and read the text of this e-book on screen. No part of this text may be reproduced, transmitted, downloaded, decompiled, reverse engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information storage retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereinafter invented, without the express written permission of HarperCollins e-books.

Find out about HarperCollins and the environment at www.harpercollins.co.uk/green

Source ISBN: 9780008356996

Ebook Edition © October 2019 ISBN: 9780008357016

Version 2019-10-17

Note to the Reader

Certain portions of text in this ebook are set in a specific font type to make it easier to distinguish between the different types of content in the book. It may not be possible to change the font for these pieces of text.

Contents

Cover

Title Page

Copyright

Note to the Reader

I am the Border, so I am

Glossary

Acknowledgements

About the Publisher

Howareye?

Well, now. How’s it going? C’mere to me, I was just minding my own business, being a largely invisible border that no one had thought about for years. And happy enough I was with that. It’s a tiring business, bordering. It’s a generally unhappy one too, at the best of times. But after decades of misery, there was me, semi-retired, a bit sleepy, carefree as a border can be. And then along comes Brexit.

BREXIT.

The very word makes me a bit green.

It caught me by surprise when it happened. You’re probably the same yourself. I woke up one morning and shook my grass, looking forward to another day of doing not very much, and there was a whole load of paparazzi, with the cameras flashing, shouting, ‘Hey, Irish Border! Look dark! Look threatening! Look sexy!’

Well, now, I’m attractive enough to look at, for a border, but it’s long since I appeared threatening to man or beast. I pulled the grass back around myself and tried to ignore them. They’re persistent, though, these fellas with the cameras, and they caught me a bit off-guard. So those early Brexit photos don’t show my best side. Then the journalists started to turn up, with all their daft questions: ‘How did you get here? Are you scared? How do you really feel?’ Hiding from British journalists sent by their editors to find me has been the only fun thing about Brexit. They write articles saying they’ve ‘straddled’ me (I know, the cheek of them) because they love to sound macho, but that actually means they couldn’t find me. So they guess I was somewhere in between all the windblown sheughs and the fields they got lost in before they wrote their article about me, holed up in a floral-curtained, swirly-carpeted Newry B&B while eating a saturated-fat local breakfast special.

Yes, I had thought I was going to go into retirement. I’d imagined a nice little EU-funded Museum of Myself in a few decades’ time, with a coffee shop and border-themed ice cream, but oh no. Along came Brexit, like some gobshite taking its first driving lesson, crashing all over the place. I took one look at Brexit and, says I to myself, ‘If a stop isn’t put to this soon I’ll be back to proper full-on bordering again. And I am a bit old for that kind of thing.’

‘How old are you, Border?’ I hear you saying, fictional reader. Well, now, there’s a question. It’s very hard to say. Do you ever think to yourself, ‘I’ll do this wee job as a stopgap, just to keep things ticking over until my creative career really takes off, and then 97-odd years later you look at yourself and you’re still doing the same thing?’ That’s me. I was meant to move after a few years, but you know what humans are like. Indecisive. Time passes fair quick, doesn’t it? But also very slowly, says you. And that’s the truth as well. But time has passed, and thank the Lord above for it, because time has had little enough useful to offer me this past century except the last twenty-odd years since the Good Friday Agreement. They’ve been grand, in comparison, those two decades of birdsong. But, in hindsight, now that I put my mind to it, and ponder recent events, maybe I was a bit too reclusive since 1998. Maybe I was a complacent border.

You know that way you put something down in a place and then that’s the place the thing stays? And then, you know that thing when something is really important and you put it somewhere obvious so you’ll remember it? And then you forget about it? And then later (let’s say, over 97 years later) you fall over it in the middle of the night? Yeah? That’s the British government and me. Completely forgot about me. Eejits.

Back in the 1920s, a panel of ‘experts’ of different political persuasions were meant to re-draw me one day on a tea break. But they argued with each other, as official people do, and nothing changed. It wasn’t the first time, and by God it wasn’t the last time, that men in suits argued about where I should be, what I should do and how to cross me. I think this is why I’m so at home on Twitter; it’s full of people pretending they know what they’re doing but never getting anywhere.

When Brexit finally had my nerves completely wrecked, my friend Jean says to me, ‘Border, ah come on now, you’re going to have to speak up for yourself.’

Jean and I have known each other forever and she’s always worth listening to. Maybe not always. She’s generally worth listening to.

‘Jean,’ I said, ‘I’m a geopolitical line of demarcation between two countries in the EU. I’m also politically contentious, a bit pointless and totally covered in grass, ruminants of various shapes and sizes, roads of a major and minor kind, and I have a penchant for talking in overly long sentences when I get going. How the hell am I going to get myself heard?’

‘Twitter!’ Jean said. ‘It’s perfect for spouting about politics when you’re not really sure what’s going on.’

‘Grand,’ says I, ‘I’ll give it a lash.’

So this is me, @BorderIrish. I used @BorderIrish because Jean said it sounded cool and interesting, and @TheBorderImposedbytheBritishonIrelandAgainsttheWilloftheMajorityofthePeopleofthe IslandThoughNotAlltobeTotallyFairAboutIt is too long for a Twitter handle, apparently. Though it has never stopped anyone on Twitter suggesting I use it.

Jean told me I was made for Twitter. She’d read in a history book that when Michael Collins went in to Downing Street in 1921 to negotiate the Treaty, he said to Lloyd George, ‘The Irish are a sovereign people. We cannot accept the partition of the island.’

And Lloyd George replied, ‘Mr Collins, consider the metaphysical Twitter possibilities we would put in place for future generations.’ Big Mick hadn’t thought of this. Ten minutes later they were shaking hands and Collins had agreed to take the 26 counties while the sovereign people waited for someone to invent Twitter. Apparently de Valera sent Collins to do the negotiating because he knew it would end up in a stupid Twitter account and he didn’t want the blame for it. Then there was a civil war. Jean’s some reader, always with the book in her hand, so I’m sure this is all true.

That’s how I ended up on Twitter in the middle of this Brexit ruination. It’s how I’ve made myself heard and how, in my own small and insignificant way, I have totally messed up Brexit.

I have been pursuing the ironic strategy of having to shout to stay quiet, to be seen to be invisible, to be surreal in order to continue with my mundane reality.

This is how preposterous Brexit has made me. It’s very tiring – but oh, sometimes it’s worth it for the craic. Do you ever have the feeling that you’re talking absolute sh*te but the sh*te you’re talking is less sh*te than most of the other sh*te being talked, and way less sh*te than the worst sh*te being talked, so you might as well head on with yer own sh*tetalking? That’s Twitter.

Still, it’s important. I am a mere border. I have no brain, no feet, and definitely no robot lawn-mower like David Davis does, but I care about all my peoples on either side of me. And I do not completely believe anymore that the UK government does. I just want to be a subliminally existing and unobtrusive border giving vague definition to increasingly meaningless and nostalgically pointless political ideologies which no one can quite remember other than as a commodified feature of tourist kitsch. I am a GPS-confusing, soft-as-the-bee’s-wing-brushing-on-lily-petal, jingoism-defying, Brexit-blocking, human-loving, peace-miracle-working, physical-infrastructureless, data-roaming-contradicting, wryly-amusing, caught-in-a-very-bad-situation-comedy kind of border.

I have no idea what’s going to happen to me. Maybe there’ll be No Deal. I lie awake at night, thinking about No Deal. I look at the stars above, and remember the customs posts, and the men in uniforms, and the women with the butter hidden in places I wouldn’t look at. And then I remember the checkpoints and the soldiers. And the pain. The pain and the mourning. Every day. You have to stand up to people who disrespect you, who make promises and then break them, who think their agenda is more important than yours, who say they’re listening but are actually thinking about themselves while staring at you. You have to stand up for yourself.

So I am standing up for myself, online and in print. I’m a line, though not materially so, and that’s a little hard to figure. Think of me as grass shimmering gently in a heat haze and that will give an approximate sense of how overwhelmingly attractive I am. Think of my mind as being like an Irish Last of the Summer Wine but about Brexit and with a twist of Kierkegaard. Think of me as The Times crossword – solved daily, and yet next morning you open the paper and there I am again with no answers filled in.

Think of me as something you can forget, though, and I’ll let you know you picked the wrong border to forget about.

I’m a functioning, actually-existing constructive ambiguity, an accommodation of irreconcilabilities. A post-borderist border who is staying post-borderist, thank you very much. That annoys people who want firm lines and certainty and absolutes and things that are singularly simplesimplesimple, but I can’t be that. I won’t.

If you read this here book, or follow me on Twitter, you’ll know I joke about it, but Brexit is serious – lives and limbs and loves and losses, mornings and mournings and moorings and migrations, jobs and lazy afternoons and evening kisses and lie-ins and tall tales – they could all change because of Brexit. If I could sing it’d be sweeter than the nightingale’s song, but I can’t. Still and all, here I am, so I am, and heard I will be.

Twitter Archive

| Bord26489713 @BorderStudent I did it! Graduated today from Bordering School! Stoked to be starting out on my bordering career in this febrile post-war world! 3:51 pm – 5 July 1919
| The Temporary Irish Border @BorderIrish Some personal news – just got new job as temporary Irish border. Excited to get bordering for real on the beautiful ‘Emerald Isle’! 9:42 am – 3 May 1921
| The Temporary Irish Border @BorderIrish Humbled to have become a (temporary!) international border. Wow! Look at me, Mum! 10:11 am – 7 December 1922
| The Irish Border @BorderIrish I’m going to be stuck in this deadend job forever, amn’t I? Boundary Commission my arse 11:26 am – 20 December 1925
| The Irish Border @BorderIrish New Year’s Day. Well woo-f***ing-hoo here I am still on this miserable, rain-sodden island with no one to talk to other than Flann O’Brien and 2 ducks 11:02 am – 1 January 1939

Bernie McFadden & Co Solicitors, so we are

Newry and Border Area Branch

14.2.18

Hello Border,

I hope you don’t mind me getting on to you and maybe we could forget that time with the stolen geese. I was only follwoing my client’s instructions. Here, I was thinking, this Brexit’s some piece of work and you might be needing a solicitor with a good constitutional background. I also have access to a bit of dirt on the some of the Brexity lads. What do you think? Pro bono, like.

Cheers now,

Bernie

There’s an ancient saying around here: ‘When the blossom is on the whitethorn, when the swallows return, your cack-handed attempt at re-animating the corpse of Reaganomics via rancid populism will founder on the rock of human goodness.’

Brexit Is Like …

It’s like the way this afternoon, there I was watching a guy in Pettigo trying to build a garden shed. He had it half built. Then it fell down. His neighbour looked over the fence and said, ‘Sam, are you ok?’ Sam said, ‘I’ve made a complete f***ing Brexit of it.’ And his neighbour said, ‘You have, surely.’

It’s like the way you say, ‘Regulatory divergence may mean some border checks’ but I hear ‘We’re going to make you wear flares and listen to prog rock and generally make like it’s the early 70s’.

It’s like the way you drift off to sleep and then suddenly wake up and kick the bedclothes off, as if someone’s attacking you, and then your heart races for a while and you’re all alert and can’t get back to sleep. That’s what being a hard border is like, over and over again.

It’s like when people say, ‘There must be an innovative technological solution to the Irish Border problem’ and I say, ‘Aye, there is. Get a specially designed centralised government computer system and type in the word BREXIT, so that everyone can see it. Then you press DELETE 6 times. Then RETURN.’

It’s like when Jim’s mum knitted him a jumper in purple with big long sleeves and she didn’t get the neckline quite right and he went out wearing it and the other kids laughed at him and his mum said they’re just jealous, Jim, but Jim wasn’t quite sure if that was true.

I’m like The Times simple crossword puzzle: easily solved every day by people who can’t be bothered trying the cryptic one.

It’s like that thing when you’re doing your job perfectly well and then along come some daft management consultants who know nothing about what you do and they make a complete mess of it.

Me

Brexit

Jim!

‘Jim!’ I blurted out. I couldn’t help it.

‘Yes, Border.’

‘What are you doing, Jim?’

‘Just standing here.’

‘I see that, Jim. There’s no disputing the fact that you’re standing there, and fair play to you, Jim, you’re excellent at it. And I don’t mind you standing there. You’re as well there as anywhere, and probably better. There’s worse places you could be standing than beside me, Jim. Nevertheless, and I hope you won’t begrudge me raising this with you, but I recall now that you said you were Leaving …’

‘I am.’

‘And similarly, and correct me if I’m wrong, Jim, I recall that you said this three years ago. In the year of our Lord two thousand and sixteen to be precise.’

‘That’s right.’

‘Years ago now. And yet, one might say, without intended criticism of your lack of activity on the Leaving front, you’ve been standing there since then.’

‘And doing nothing, Border.’

‘Doing, as you say yourself, Jim, nothing.’

‘I’m Leaving, Border.’

‘Ok, Jim.’

Now, look, you know me by now. I’m not going to stop anybody Leaving. Nor, within reason, am I going to stop anybody standing still doing zilch. It just struck me that there was something of a gap between Jim’s belief that he was going somewhere and the fact that he wasn’t. Clearly Jim is, in his own mind, a Leaver, but his Leaving skills seemed a bit underdeveloped. It’s interesting, in a mind-numbingly paralysing way, to think about this Brexity paradox.

It crossed my mind that maybe he needed a little help, or at least that it might help him to talk about it. The UK negotiators kept using the phrase ‘reach out’. They’d say things like, ‘I’m going to reach out to the Irish side,’ which I thought was weird and probably illegal the first time I heard it, but eventually I realised they just meant ‘talk to without shouting at’. So I reached out to Jim, idiomatically.

‘Jim.’

‘Yes, Border.’

‘Have you thought about how to Leave?’

‘In what way?’

‘Moving is not really my area of expertise, Jim, but just off the top of my head, you could go that way, or that way. You could walk or run or even take a plane.’

‘You’re being difficult now. I’m Leaving.’

‘Ok, Jim.’

Meeting Rupert, Who Is Not Olly

What to do? There’s Brexit, yakking away to itself with its thumbs in its waistcoat like some out-of-work barrister practising in front of the mirror in its bedroom, and I’m lying here thinking, do these people not realise that my whole existence as a semi-retired geopolitical boundary is now in question?

It turns out some of them do, though. They’re not all as thick as the neck on Barney’s best bull.

This lad turns up one day not long after the referendum looking a bit shifty – but too well-dressed for diesel-laundering.

‘Howareye?’ says me, non-committal but friendly, like.

‘Ah, hello, are you the Irish Border?’ he says. He sounded posh. ‘Only, it’s rather odd, talking to something invisible.’

‘Better than talking to a wall’, says me.

‘Yes’, he says, ‘quite so, but we wouldn’t want to …’

‘Aye, I’m only messing,’ I says. ‘What’s that in your hand there, fella?’

‘My passport. I thought that maybe you’d need to see it, you know, being a border.’

‘You’ve a lot to learn about this border, mate. You don’t need it. Nice suit, by the way.’

‘Thanks. Actually, I wanted a word. I’ve been sent on behalf of Her Majesty’s Government to … I suppose … to negotiate with you.’

‘Ok. That’s nice. I thought yous had all forgotten about me.’

‘We had. Then you tweeted that photo of the elephant and said, “There’s me at the Brexit negotiations,” and …’

‘They sent you here. I see. Well, if we’re going to be negotiating we better get to know each other. What’s your name?’

‘I’d prefer not to say.’

‘Can I call you, oh, I don’t know – Olly?’

‘What?! NO!! How did you know?’

‘What about Mr Robbins?’

‘No.’

‘If I can’t call you Olly then I need a name for you. You look like a Rupert. You look like you went to a school full of Ruperts. You carry yourself like a Jasper, or a Quentin, or a Whimpleberry, or a Rupert. Can I call you Rupert?’

‘If you must. Chatham House Rules apply.’

‘So no tweeting our discussions then, Rupert?’

‘No tweeting.’

‘Not even a wee allusion to the fact that such discussions are being mooted?’

‘No tweeting.’

‘How about if I do it as a fictional dialogue between the two of us that will be published in a book at a later date, after the time when Brexit is meant to have happened, but when it’ll probably still be dragging on tediously?’

‘No.’

‘There would be interesting digressions from our endless and pointless discussions.’

‘I’m not sure we have time for that. Brexit is quite urgent.’

‘You’re a funny man. We’ll all be here for years talking about this. 800 years of Ireland trying to leave Britain is about to be repaid by 800 years of Britain trying to leave Ireland. There’s no rush. Alright, Rupert, you go first.’

‘We’d like to propose a range of measures which would mean that there is no return to the border, I mean to the you, of the past … Are you ok?’

‘Sorry, I fell asleep. You’re being boring. Did you bring ice cream?’

‘Ice cream?’

‘I can’t negotiate without ice cream.’

‘You’re kidding.’

‘I am not. Would you head in to Newry there and get two 99s and then we can negotiate when you get back.’

Rupert got lost in Newry. Maybe he’d have fared better as Olly, or maybe he just didn’t know his way around. The 99s were a bit drippy by the time he came back.

‘So as I was saying …’

‘Yeah, Olly, sorry to interrupt but you dropped some ice cream on your suit there.’

‘It’s Rupert. And bugger.’

‘Dry cleaning is the only solution, Olly/Rupert.’

‘Can we please get back to the negotiations? Now we’ve been looking at other borders around the world as possible models for how a post-Brexit you could function seamlessly and frictionlessly …’

I drifted off a bit while he talked.

Jean is a friend of mine from way back. During the darkest of days she’d stop by and we’d put the world to rights and we’d despair and laugh together about the general state of things. After the Good Friday Agreement we ended up talking about normal stuff – vets’ bills, the number of Maltesers in a packet, how to avoid PowerPoint presentations, that kind of thing. We’ve seen good times and bad times. She’d be a philosophical kind of person, in a direct sort of a way. Rupert was still talking when Jean came along, walking her wee dog, and I thought, Jean will help me out here. Rupert’s a nice lad but he talks like a dishwasher manual sometimes.

‘Hello, Border.’

‘How’s it going, Jean?’

‘Woof.’

‘How’s it going, wee dog?’

‘Who’s your man there, talking to himself?’

‘He’s talking to me, Jean.’

‘But you’re not listening.’

‘I wouldn’t say that. Jean, this is Olly.’

‘Rupert. We said my name is Rupert.’

‘Do you not know your own name?’

‘It’s a codename, Jean. Olly wants Rupert to be his codename.’

‘Olly’s a fine name.’

‘Can we stick to Rupert?’

‘Nice suit, Rupert.’

‘That’s what I said, Jean.’

‘You know it’s got a stain on it?’

‘He does.’

‘Would it be ok if we got back to negotiations, Border?’

‘Is this a Brexit thing, Border?’

‘Oh yes, very secret. Rupert-who-used-to-be-Olly has been sent by the British government. Jean’s good on the subject of Brexit, Rupert. You should listen to her.’

‘This Brexit thing is desperate bad, Rupert.’

‘It’s unseemly, Jean, that’s what it is.’

‘Unseemly’s the word, Border.’

‘Scundering for us all.’

‘Scundering, Jean.’

‘I don’t really understand.’

‘We know, Rupert.’

‘I’ll be back soon, Border.’

‘Fair play, Rupert. You can get that suit cleaned in Newry, you know.’

‘He’s gone, Border.’

‘He’ll be back. What are you reading there, Jean?’

‘It’s a kids’ book. I’m off to see the nephews.’

‘Is it a good one?’

‘It’s ok. It’s called The EUffalo.’

‘Would you read me it, Jean? It’d calm me down.’

‘I’m not sure it will, but ok …’

A border took a stroll through a deep, dark wood

Liam Fox saw the border and the border looked good

‘Where are you going to, little soft border?

Come and play a role in my new world order’

‘It’s terribly kind of you, Fox, but no

I’m going to have lunch with a EUffalo.’

‘A EUffalo? What’s a EUffalo?’

‘A EUffalo? Why, didn’t you know?

It has Donald Tusk, and free trade laws,

And the ECJ at the end of its claws’

‘Where are you meeting it?’

‘Here by these rocks.

And its favourite food is roasted Fox.’

A border took a stroll through a deep, dark wood

A May saw the border and the border looked good

‘Where are you going to, seamless frontier?

Can you be solved by the end of this year?’

‘It’s really not possible, May, you know

I hear more sense from the EUffalo.’

‘A EUffalo? What’s a EUffalo?’

‘A EUffalo? Why, didn’t you know?

It has a flag and a customs union.

(It nearly had a constitution)’

‘Where are you meeting it?’

‘Here by this hay.

And its favourite food is pickled May.’

‘Aw, that’s nice, Jean. The nephews’ll love it.’

‘I’d say so, Border. Isn’t it a grand evening, now?’

‘I’ve always specialised in sunsets, Jean.’

‘That you have … Do you think you’ll do grand sunsets after Brexit, Border?’

‘I will, Jean. But maybe for a while, not so …’

‘Luminescent, Border?’

‘Not so luminescent, Jean. Not for a while.’

‘Goodnight, Border.’

‘Goodnight, Jean.’

‘Woof.’

‘Night night, wee dog.’

Off she went. And the wee dog. And silence descended.

Some night you should come here, lay yourself down beside me and put your ear to the sod. Then you can listen quietly to the voices of the things that are buried, shallow and deep, within me, and you will learn from the yarns they spin, and the sadnesses they recall, and the wisdom they speak. Then, if you don’t know it already, you’ll see why I’m so pissed off with Rupert and his Brexit.

RADIO BORDER

192.1FM

Today at 5pm:

 If a seagull sh*ts on you is it a Brexit thing?

 How to train your Leaver

 ‘Yer Head’s Cut’ – Jean’s advice column

Still Here, Jim?

Jim was still here. Where else would he be, I suppose? He had nowhere to Leave to, no hidden Leaving skills that he had suddenly unleashed, no map which would take him on the path to Leaving. No, Jim’s Leaving now involved being very unLeft.

‘Border.’

‘Jim.’

‘This is quite boring, isn’t it?’

‘…’

‘Did you ever hear tell of a lad called Samuel Beckett, Border?’

‘Oh aye. Went to school round here. Quiet lad. Why do you ask?’

‘It passes the time, Border.’

‘It would have passed anyway, Jim.’

‘…’

‘Still Leaving, Jim?’

‘Still Leaving, Border.’

‘Ok, Jim.’

Jim can stand there for hours, days, weeks on end, in the process of Leaving. I admire his persistence.

‘Are you looking forward to Leaving, Jim?’

‘Oh yes.’

‘Why’s that, Jim? Is it the prospect of freedom? The journey into the unknown? The horizons of expectation which you can push back, finding endless potentiality within yourself and your fellow Leavers?’

‘No, it’s the weather, Border.’

‘The weather?’

‘It’s going to be sunny when I’ve Left, Border.’

‘Sunny uplands?’

‘Yes, Border, that’s it, I think. Sundry uphills.’

‘Sunny uplands, Jim. When you Leave there will be sunny uplands.’

‘That’s it. I’m Leaving for sunken funlands.’

‘Ok, Jim.’

Time for Jim to get into a telephone box and put on the Brexitman suit that Jean knitted for him.

Croissants and Pasties

I saw Jean hurrying towards me one evening in an awful rush, with the wee dog being dragged along behind her on the lead, bouncing off the footpath with the eyes bulging and the claws click-clacketing on the tarmac. Jean was fairly panting by the time she got to me, and the wee dog was disgusted with life.

‘Border,’ she says.

‘I’m here, Jean.’

‘I know that,’ says Jean. ‘Oh, I haven’t a breath on me, Border.’

‘Is something wrong, Jean? Is Strabane vanished again?’

‘No. No, Border, that was fog. No, I was watching the news there and was just about to put the wee dog’s dinner in front of it …’

I looked at the wee dog. The wee dog definitely remembered the dinner not actually getting to the front of it.

‘… and the man on the news said there’s a delegation from the EU coming to visit you tomorrow.’

‘There’s never a day goes by but some lad in a suit comes along and gets his picture taken beside me, pointing, or standing with one foot either side of me. And I never look up, Jean, I never look up.’

‘I know, Border, and you are to be praised for your restraint. But that man on the news said that tomorrow it’s Monsieur Barnier.’

‘Well, now, amn’t I glad I got my grass cut this week, Jean? And sure, by tomorrow afternoon I can do a good trim and tidy and be ready. It’s a big deal, all the same.’

‘But, Border, the man on the news said Monsieur Barnier is coming for a “working breakfast”.’

There was a silence. I looked at Jean. She looked at me. The wee dog looked at Jean. And then at me. And me and Jean said together:

‘CROISSANTS!’

‘Jean, where in the name of hell and all that’s holy are we going to get croissants for Michel Barnier’s breakfast? It’s 7.13pm the night before he arrives and we’re standing in a field outside Muff.’

‘That’s a fair question, Border. The good shops are shut. The shops that are open are croissant-free zones. We could get a sliced pan handily enough in a petrol station.’

‘Jean, if I give Michel Barnier toasted sliced pan and peanut butter for breakfast he’ll have customs posts on me before he’s back in Brussels. And who would blame him?’

‘Woof.’

‘What’s she saying, Jean?’

‘Woof woof woof woof woof woof.’

‘The wee dog says she’ll go and find a breakfast suitable for the EU’s Chief Brexit Negotiator and his team.’

The wee dog was going round in circles now. ‘Off you go, wee dog,’ I said, ‘find some exquisite pastries. Also, freshly squeezed orange juice. And probably muesli.’ And off she scampered.

Jean went home and I settled down for the night, but I knew I’d not sleep. I was worrying about becoming a hard border. I was worried about meeting Barnier and having to make my case to him and to remember all that stuff about tariffs and checks. I had to remember to ask him about the SPS, and to plead with him that I not end up too proximate to chickens or the internal workings of ruminants. Most of all, I was worried about the croissants. I felt that my future probably depended on the croissants.

At about eleven I heard the distinctive lolloping of Jean’s wee dog, its name tag rattling as it ran, its ears pinned back in the bordery wind as it tore towards me – with a blue plastic shopping bag in its mouth. Thon’s some mutt, I thought to myself, though as she got closer I began to feel a little sceptical about the shape of the bag. Still, I thought, croissants in Muff near midnight. That would be a miracle. Miracles are in short supply where Brexit is concerned, as you may have noticed yourself. ‘Grand job, wee dog. Tip out the croissants there,’ I said, ‘til we have an inspection.’ The dog tipped up the bag. Custard Creams. Bourbons. Jammie Dodgers. And all of them, not to put too fine a point on it, a bit slobbery.

I looked at the wee dog. She was delighted with herself. ‘Is this what you got me for the breakfast, wee dog?’

She assented, in a wee doggy way. ‘Wee dog, I am grateful for your help, truly I am. But this is not a breakfast fit for the EU’s Chief Brexit Negotiator. He’s a man of sophisticated tastes. Leaving aside the canine saliva in which they are marinated, the contents of a box of Family Circle biscuits are not how he would choose to begin his day, and I need him to be in a good mood, otherwise it’s physical infrastructure for me and rabies injections for you [technically this wasn’t true but I had to put the frighteners on the mutt]. Did you just go home and steal these biscuits from Jean’s cupboard?’ The wee dog said nothing. ‘Wee dog, please take these back and, if you can, find me some croissants. They’re like puff pastry things.’ The dog went off, a bit more slowly than before and I felt that my hopes of putting on an impressive continental breakfast had probably gone with it.

I must have fallen asleep for a while. I dreamt that David Davis was dressed in a devil costume and riding around on a souped-up lawnmower trying to find me so he could cut my grass. And some time, probably around midnight, was when it must have happened. I’m not proud of this, dear reader, but you must understand it was an accident. Somewhere, along the length of me, and I’m a bit hazy on the details, a lorry ‘shed its load’, as they say on the radio, and the load was, I believe, kegs of beer. I woke up with a start and a surprise and I was, I think it is fair to say, absolutely plastered.

I do not recall much of the rest of the evening. I know the wee dog came back with another bag. I spoke to it fondly, if a little incoherently. I may have said that it was the best f***ing dog in the whole f***ing world and if anyone said otherwise they’d have me to deal with because there’s no other dog I’d rather have as a border’s best friend than you wee dog you lovely wee dog c’mere ’til I give you a pet but don’t be lifting your f***ing leg near me.

I know I sent Jean a few texts, because I saw them on my iPad the next morning:

Thursday 00:15

oh Jean a lorrrydropped a keg on me an it split so it did n I think I might be a bit ahhm pissed or something xx border

Delivered

Thursday 00:23

it seeeeeeped in I couldnt held it help it fing autocorrect

Delivered

Thursday 00:47

I love you jean you are my best friend like did I ever tell you I love you but god I hate brexit

Delivered

Thursday 00:49

I mean Brexit whats it like a big pile of crap but sure I have you your my best friend. oh wait the wee dogs here

Delivered

Thursday 00:54

the wee dog brought the croissants Jean it’s a wonderdog so it is i’m going to kiss yer dog

Delivered

Thursday 00:54

might boke see u in morning bring jam

Delivered

You know the way, when you wake in the morning with a bit of a hangover – let’s call it for what it was – you know that way, and nothing much is working except your sense of smell, but it’s working overtime because everything else is taking the day off? Well, my sense of smell was telling me that whatever was in that bag had come from the general area of Macari’s chipper. I nudged the wee dog. It woke up slowly and it did that dog thing where they stretch their legs out in front of them like they’re going to catapult themselves into dogland. When she’d wandered off for a leg-lift and come back I says to her, ‘Wee dog, is there any chance we’re at cross-purposes here with the croissants? Maybe show me what’s in the bag, because it sure doesn’t smell like the best Parisian viennoiserie pastry to me.’

The dog looks indignant and tips out the contents of the bag as if to prove how well she’s done. Oh My Sweet Lord. Pasties. Not pastries. Pasties.

Now, it occurs to me that some of you may not be familiar with the pastie. A traditional dish of Belfast, but available elsewhere in Northern Ireland, and beyond – though not far beyond, for who would want it? – the pastie is traditionally made from pork mince, with potato, onion and some spices, moulded into a substantial burger shape and then covered in batter and deep fried. Usually it is eaten in the ‘pastie supper’ form, that is with chips, and usually when the consumer of the pasty is pissed, because otherwise you might pause to think about what you’re eating, what’s in it, and what it actually tastes like. A croissant it is not.

‘Right,’ I said, though ‘right’ didn’t really reflect what I was thinking. The wee dog was sniffing the pasties and seemed ready to tuck in. Jean appeared.

‘Pastie suppers, Border?’

‘Pastie suppers, Jean.’

‘The wee dog thought you said pasties, didn’t it?’

‘So it would seem, Jean.’

‘Shit.’

‘Ah, bonjour, vous êtes la frontière? Et c’est votre ami, Madamoiselle Jean?’

‘Monsieur Barnier, bonjour. S’il vous plaît, prendre un … petit déjeuner, I guess.’

‘We can speak in English, Border. What an usual breakfast. A local speciality?’

‘Erm, yes. Yes, we often have this for petit déjeuner, Jean, don’t we?’

‘Oh aye, at least once a week.’

I had an idea. ‘Actually, Monsieur Barnier, we are very concerned that this traditional dish will be threatened by le Brexit. It depends, for example, on ahm … help me out here, Jean …’

‘… on cross-border pigs.’

‘Yes, exactly. The distinctive spicy flavour of la pastie is achieved by having the pigs criss-cross the border eating herbs from either side of me. And, well, you know yerself, Michel …’

‘Mais oui, le Brexit threatens all our livelihoods. I shall do all I can to maintain the tradition of la pastie, and everything else about you, Border. I will personally ensure that la pastie – like Roquefort, like Champagne – receives the full legal protection afforded by EU regulation. It shall have Protected Designation of Origin status. Now, let me try some of this delicacy.’

You’re not going to believe this. He liked it. He took some away with him for his mates in Brussels. I’d say that place fairly smelt of chip grease and vinegar for a few days after he got back. They’ll not be forgetting about me over there for a while.

So we had the bantz with Michel and that was all grand. He’s on our side, sure we know that, and he was very reassuring about the animal welfare issues.

‘You will not be needing the long-armed gloves, mon ami,’ were his very words.

And he went off happy. As his motorcade purred off towards Dublin I began to really feel the effects of the spilt drink.

‘Well, that went well, considering, Border.’

‘It did, Jean.’

Brexisnt.

Could I sue Brexit for damages?

Aye, sure, go on, rain on me, as if that could make things worse.

I have a little sign on my desk to remind me and my visitors of my responsibilities. It says ‘The Backstop’s Here’.

Don’t let me keep you now.

Ambridge Analytica manipulate rural voters.

I was going to call this book Fuckoon.

I’m Brexasperated.

SPONSORED CONTENT

The 7 Habits of Highly Effective Leaving

Jim

World expert on the process of Leaving. Drawing on three years’ experience of Leaving and going absolutely nowhere

Special Brexit edition

ABOUT THIS BOOK

Do you want to Leave? I mean really Leave. Leave absolutely and completely. Leave so there’s no coming back. Yes? Good for you. Me too.

My name’s Jim and I’m a Leaver. I’ve been Leaving since 2016. I’ve put in at least 25,000 hours of Leaving over the past few years and now I’ve distilled my vast experience into a book so you too can be a Leaver. A BeLeaver.

There are seven steps to Leaving:

1 You must BeLeave in BeLeaving.

2 Tell yourself you’re going to Leave. Don’t think about how, just tell yourself that it’s going to be easy.

3 Tell everyone else you’re going to Leave. If they object, tell them they’re Leaving with you whether they like it or not.

4 Find a safe place from which to Leave.

5 Stand in that place.

6 Wait. Something will come along soon.

7 Be calm. Becalmed.

In this book I’ll take you through the 7 steps and then you’ll be ready to Leave. You’ll be standing, becalmed, alongside me. I know you’re excited about standing around saying you’re going to Leave and not actually Leaving. I am too.

Let’s Leave! Soon! Really soon!

Конец ознакомительного фрагмента.

Текст предоставлен ООО «ЛитРес».

Прочитайте эту книгу целиком, купив полную легальную версию на ЛитРес.

Безопасно оплатить книгу можно банковской картой Visa, MasterCard, Maestro, со счета мобильного телефона, с платежного терминала, в салоне МТС или Связной, через PayPal, WebMoney, Яндекс.Деньги, QIWI Кошелек, бонусными картами или другим удобным Вам способом.