Shuggie Bain Quotes

Sadness made for a better houseguest; at least it was quiet, reliable, consistent.

Shug had seen it before, those with least to give always gave the most.

Flames are not just the end, they are also the beginning. For everything that you have destroyed can be rebuilt. From your own ashes you can grow again.

She had loved him, and he had needed to break her completely to leave her for good. Agnes Bain was too rare a thing to let someone else love. It wouldn't do to leave pieces of her for another man to collect and repair later.

She was no use at maths homework, and some days you could starve rather than get a hot meal from her, but Shuggie looked at her now and understood this was where she excelled. Everyday with the make-up on and her hair done, she climbed out of her grave and held her head high. When she had disgraced herself with drink, she got up the next day, put on her best coat, and faced the world. When her belly was empty and her weans were hungry, she did her hair and let the world think otherwise.

Rain was a natural state of Glasgow. It kept the grass green and the people pale and bronchial.

It was clear now: nobody would get to be made brand new.

He had long perfected the art of staring through people, leaving conversations to follow his daydreams through the back of their heads and out any open window.

The morning light was the colour of too-milky tea. It snuck into the bedsit like a sly ghost, crossing the carpet and inching slowly up his bare legs.

Shuggie heard the nurse say to a male attendant that she thought for sure Agnes was a working girl. “She is not,” said Shuggie, quite proudly. “My mother has never worked a day in her life. She’s far too good-looking for that.” The matted mink coat gave her an air of superiority, and her black strappy heels clacked out a slurred beat on the long marble hallway.

She’d looked as happy as he could ever remember, and he was surprised how this hurt. It was all for the red-headed man. He had done what Shuggie had been unable to do.

As I reached out for help, everyone shrank back from me; they pulled away from fear that the fire would return

am in flames, yet I do not burn.” He wiped the spit from the corners of his mouth. “That’s what Saint Agnes had to teach us. How even in the darkness there is still hope.

dunno. I think it’s what all alkies want anyways.” She shivered. “To die, I mean. Some are just taking the slow road to it.

The rubber tip had worn away from around the right heel, and although she had coloured the shoe in with an old black bingo marker, the sharp metal nail scraped the floor with the screech of hard times.

He locked the door that lay behind his eyes and walked away, leaving the body, the plaster dust, the flask of cold tea, and the angry gaffer behind.

Big Shug Bain had seemed so shiny in comparison to the Catholic. He had been vain in the way only Protestants were allowed to be, conspicuous with his shallow wealth, flushed pink with gluttony and waste.

The damp wind kissed her flushed neck and pushed down inside her dress. It felt like a stranger’s hand, a sign of living, a reminder of life.

Mammy, can you no help?’ and ah just turned to her and said, ‘I have raised my children. I. Am. Done.

To Shuggie, the aunties who came to visit were often worse. It was like Agnes’s worse qualities went out and found a friend.

wondered why he tolerated these other children but had left him.

No, hen, we’re drinking piss-cold tea,” scolded Bridie. “It’s only ye who’s neckin’ vodka like it was tap water.

What was once built to be new and healthful now looked sick with a poverty of hope.

There is no way Shuggie Bain can dance! Shuggie tutted. He wrenched himself from her side and ran a few paces ahead. He nodded, all gallus, and spun, just the once, on his polished heels.

had been a long time since he felt thawed all the way through, all of him warm at the exact same time.

George said. “I am on fire. I do not burn. It’s Saint Agnes’s lament.

If he got this and she got that, then what would they themselves do without? It was a mother's math.

I’ve never liked those AA places. They attract the lowest kind of people. God gave you a will. You should use it to save yourself.

How come ye don’t have a daddy?” His voice was already deep like a man’s. “I d-do,” Shuggie stuttered. Gerbil smiled. “Where is he then?” This Shuggie didn’t know. He had heard he was a whoremaster

He liked to roam alone in the darkness, getting a good look at the underbelly. Out came the characters shellacked by the grey city, years of drink and rain and hope holding them in place. His living was made by moving people, but his favourite pastime was watching them.

Howse aboots some light entertainment?

the city’s ills were supposed to disappear.

It would be drunk open mouths, hot red tongues, and heavy clumsy flesh. Pure Friday-night happiness.

The damp wind kissed her flushed neck and pushed down inside her dress.

to hold his arms tight. It

It looked like the lager beauties sometimes did, a careless printer and a misaligned screen, and suddenly the woman was no longer whole, just a mess of different layers.

Soon the greenish, brownish air filled with a dark tangy smell, metallic and sharp, like licking the end of a spent battery.

parsimonious

Once upon a time the wind whipping off the sea had turned the front of her thighs blue with the cold, but Agnes couldn’t feel it because she had been happy.

From where Eugene watched him, he looked like a half-shut penknife, a thing that should be sharp and useful, that was instead closed and waiting and rusting.

It was a relief in the same way old people enjoyed having a child in the room, because it gave them something to fuss over when they had nothing left to say to each other.

taking more space than was his to take and talking about himself with no modesty.

She’s no gonnae get any better, son. Come away from there.” Shuggie paused for a second, he looked over his narrow shoulder bone and shrugged. “But she might.

At the front door she pushed a jam piece and a peeled carrot into his hand and told him to go and play and not to come back till it was dark. She pointed out into the distance and waved her hand wide across the scheme, meaning he could go anywhere he pleased for all she cared.

She was sobering up. She stared silently out the window, trying not to think of the trail of fatherless children and the childrenless father they were leaving in their wake. In her mind it looked like a trail of viscous, salty tears being dragged along behind the black hack. The excitement had left her by then.

The red-headed ox was called Eugene. It was a good name, both old-fashioned and plain. It was the name mothers chose for first born sons, the ones that were to be solid and true, mother's pride but not her joy.

Shuggie always chose the same bright pink sponge pyramid, covered in red and white desiccated coconut and trimmed with a sugary sweetie on top. He would walk home very slowly in Wullie’s shadow, enjoying his spoils.

Agnes kissed him then. Eugene, solid and true. His lips were hard but tasted sweet.

He looked like a man made of graphite, like one of his own black-and-white drawings.

Everywhere he looked, McEwan’s Lager was spelt out in big white letters. Shuggie put his hand in his pocket and felt better feeling the dog-eared red book there.

Does your maw take a drink?” she asked abruptly. “Sometimes. Just a little,” admitted Shuggie. “How can you tell?” “You are too worried-looking.

She shrugged. “I dunno. I think it’s what all alkies want anyways.” She shivered. “To die, I mean. Some are just taking the slow road to it.

It’s hard to not know what you are coming in to at nights.” “Aye, but it’s never a hot dinner, is it?

Rain was the natural state of Glasgow. It kept the grass green and the people pale and bronchial.

Ego sum in flammis, ramen non adolebit. (frei übersetzt: Ich stehe in Flammen, aber ich verbrenne nicht)

Men were losing their very masculinity.

Colleen, you breathe like an old cocker spaniel. In the future when you phone someone to harass them, maybe you should try to shut your mouth and breathe through your nose.

He had been rubbing her back one morning as she told him she wanted to live somewhere she could have her anonymity back, a place her pride could be restored.

Shug would have liked to leave a sovereign print on his face.

A murdered young girl, and the best photo her family could provide was the extra copies she had done for her monthly transit pass.

From his real father he had inherited a gentle personality, quiet and pensive, lonesome and faraway.

Her brother had been gifted with legendary stubbornness; he just stared through you and floated away, leaving behind his frame to be pecked to pieces.

Whole housing estates of young men who were promised the working trades of their fathers had no future now. Men were losing their very masculinity.

Shug took the tip reluctantly. Fuck the English tourists and their bastarding Kodaks. Shug had seen it before, those with least to give always gave the most.

That was the problem with the young ones; they saw no reason to not expect better for themselves. She’d definitely have to go.

The day was flat. He nodded, all Gallup’s, and spun, just the once, on his polished heels.

Don’t let it bother you. They see the one thing that’s a bit more special than them and then they just pile on.

Agnes Bain was too rare a thing to let someone else love. It wouldn’t do to leave pieces of her for another man to collect and repair later.

She thought of the happy hours parked under the Anderston overpass, happy hours before they really truly knew one another.

Red-haired, stocky, and flat-faced, his head joined directly to his body as if a neck were an unnecessary luxury.

With a heavy blink Agnes drew her eyes over the officious woman. The end of her nose was pitted like a small strawberry.

They were silent a good long time after that. It grew so late it became early.

the

It gave me that much pleasure just to be proud of you.

What was once built to be new and healthful now looked sick with a poverty of hope.

He shook his head no, but his lips said, “What are they?” She came closer and set the bag between them like she was feeding a cautious beast. Then Joanie the Hoor took two steps back.

If I were you, I would keep dancing.” “I can’t.” The tears were coming. “You know they only win if you let them.” “I can’t.” His arms and fingers were still outstretched and frozen, like a dead tree. “Don’t give them the satisfaction.” “Mammy, help. I can’t.” “Yes. You. Can.” She was still smiling through her open teeth. “Just hold your head up high and Gie. It. Laldy.

she sounded bothered by the interruption. “Who’s your mammy, wee man?” “My mother is Agnes Campbell Bain,” he said. “C-can you tell her it’s Shu—Hugh.” He caught himself. “Can you please tell her I don’t have any custard left.” The woman leaned back into the noise of the party. “Haw, does anybody here know an Agnes?” she asked of the room behind her. There were other voices, and then she said, “Haud on a wee minute,

The torchlight shone up her skirt, trying to illuminate her gusset. They were taunting her, their voices pitched, ready to break, the dangerous sound of little boys coming into the intoxicating power of manhood.

She had loved him, and he had needed to break her completely to leave her for good. Agnes Bain was too rare a thing to let someone else love. It wouldn’t do to leave pieces of her for another man to collect and repair later.

Twenty. Five. Years. Out at the Dalmarnock Iron Works, and all he got was three weeks’ wages. Three weeks! I went up there maself, chapped on the big red gaffer’s door, and I telt him what he could dae with three weeks’ wages.

I had to see if you would actually come.” Agnes took hold of the neck of his jumper then. Shug picked up his money belt and kissed her with a forceful tongue. He had to squeeze all the small bones in her hands to get her to release him. She had loved him, and he had needed to break her completely to leave her for good. Agnes Bain was too rare a thing to let someone else love. It wouldn’t do to leave pieces of her for another man to collect and repair later.

Ah have been lonely fur years now. Lonely long afore ma wife died. Don't get us wrong. She was a guid wummin, a guid wummin just like our Colleen, but we were jist stuck in our wee routine. When ye think about it, ah've been under the ground most of ma life. There wasn't much in me for sharing at the end of a day. After twenty years, what do you talk about? But she was a guid wummin. She used to make me these big hot dinners, with meat and gravy, the plate scalding hot cos she'd warm it up all day in the oven. We ate big hot dinners because we had nothing left to say. Nothing worthwhile anyway. Ah'm forty-three. That's four years older than when ma father died, so I should've been done. I should've been retiring from the pits, living the rest of ma days out with her and with nothing to say. When I saw ye I wasn't looking. I didn't know of you then, hadn't heard our Colleen lift your name. That's wummin's stuff, isn't it? They don't talk to the men about that. Gossip. Telling tales. Chapel. That's their club. All I know is when I saw you sat behind that glass, I saw someone lonely too, and I hoped we might have something to say to each other. I realised then. Ah don't want to be done.

should just get the fuck on with it.” He slapped his hands and threw them open in a wide tah-dah gesture. “Get on wi’ yer fuckin’ life. Have a great life. Ah promise that nothing would piss the pig-faced baldy bastard off more. Guar-rant-teed.

I had a bad blackout last night.” Agnes then told Jinty the story of the bingo and the taxi and the driver pulling over into the Pit mouth. She lifted the sleeve on her jumper and showed Jinty the finger marks the rapist had left in her white skin.

Separately, the two women had spent whole afternoons hiding behind settees from the Provident man. It was like an odd synchronized swimming, the way the Pithead women all sank to the carpet and crawled across the floor. The Provvie was a thin man in a big suit.

At half past ten her hair and her make-up were already done, and although she wasn’t leaving the house she put on her low-cut jumper and a fitted grey skirt. She sat drinking the dregs of old lager and wondering where exactly her boy was hiding from his childhood.

Agnes’s face was very thickly made up, and it looked to Shuggie like the paint had been layered over several other faces she had forgotten to take off first. The boy followed her at a discreet distance, stopping now and then to gather up things that fell from the pocket of her matted mink coat.

Their donkey jackets were clean and their boots were still shiny as they jerked along the road. Shuggie stepped back as they passed, their heads lowered like those of tired black mules. Without a word, each man collected a handful of thin children, who followed obediently, like reverential shadows.

Shug smiled. She was only twenty-four and already his doormat. “I didnae think you were coming,” she said, climbing into the back of the taxi. “What did you call me out here fur?” “I missed ye, that’s all,” she said. “I haven’t seen ye in weeks.” She rolled her thick legs open and shut coquettishly. “You’ve no gone off o’ me, have ye?” She grinned.

Opposite the gates was a low concrete building. Dozens of men were spilling out of its windowless structure and stood in dark clumps on the Pit Road. At first it looked like they were leaving chapel, but as the diesel engine roared nearer, they turned as if they were one. The miners stopped their talking and squinted to get a good look. They all wore the same black donkey jackets and were holding large amber pints and sucking on stubby doubts. The miners had scrubbed faces and pink hands that looked free of work. It seemed wrong, these men being the only clean thing for miles. Reluctantly, the miners parted and let the taxi go by. Leek watched them as they were watching him. His stomach sank. The men all had his mother’s eyes.

Wullie and Shuggie were sitting at the round dining table eating soft eggs and soldiers. Sixty years apart, they were huddled together in the far corner like old drinking pals. Leek was upended on the settee, his bare legs up and over the back, a sketchbook in hand. When he saw his mother, he got up very quietly and passed her with a polite nod, like a stranger in the street.

That morning she had tilted her head forward and asked Catherine what she thought of her new mascara. The mascara looked too heavy for her eyelids, like she was on the edge of sudden sleep. Now, as the taxi pulled out into the main road, Agnes made a show of looking back and waving mournfully through the rear window with a long, heavy blink. She thought it was a cinematic touch, like she was the star of her own matinee.

When are you coming home?” “Look, don’t upset yourself. Doesn’t Mammy deserve a party? It’s been that long, Hugh.” Her voice trailed off. “I’ve been promised that many parties in my day. Why are you trying to ruin my party.” She was repeating herself now. “Mammy, I’m scared. Where are you?” “I’m up at Anna O’Hanna’s. Away to your bed, and I’ll see you when I get home.” This part was ominously vague. The line went dead, and it took him a while to replace the receiver.

She was pleading now. “When I found out I took every Askit powder I could get. Great big handfuls of it. It was just. It was just too late.” “I don’t need to know, Lizzie.” He took her face in his hands and kissed her then. It was the first kiss she had been given since he had kissed her at Saint Enoch’s on the day he left. She had never let Mr Kilfeather kiss her, she felt she had to tell him that. He said, “I’m sorry I was away so long.” Then Wullie took the pram, and the strange baby, and went out into the mild spring morning.

With curious fingers he started to stroke the metal watch chain that hung from her pocket. “Do they leave on a bus for heaven?” A patronizing smirk crossed her lips, and she reached out a scrubbed hand to pat him on the head. He ducked instinctively and tutted, “Please don’t do that! I just had it parted.” With a sullen look he came closer again and resumed twisting the interlocking links. Sister Meechan’s hand wavered awkwardly in the air, unaccustomed to not being in command. “Ye are a very tidy little boy.” “My mother says it doesn’t cost anything to take pride in your appearance.

He gave a snide toot to the boys and drove on lower towards the river. Rain was the natural state of Glasgow. It kept the grass green and the people pale and bronchial. Its effect on the taxi business was negligible. It was a problem because it was mostly inescapable and the constant dampness was pervasive, so fares might as well sit damp on a bus as damp in the back of an expensive taxi. On the other hand, rain meant that the young lassies from the dancing all wanted to take a taxi home so as not to ruin their stiff hair or their sharp shoes. For that Shug was in favour of the endless rain.

Agnes put her head in her hands. She listened to her parents roar with laughter at some effeminate English comedian. Her eldest two were out, who knows where. They always seemed to be gone now, ducking her kisses, rolling their eyes at everything she said. She ignored Shuggie’s light breathing, and for a moment it was like she was not nearly forty, not a married woman with three children. She was Agnes Campbell again, stuck in her bedroom, listening to her parents through the wall. “Dance for me,” she said suddenly. “Let’s have a wee party.” She stabbed at the alarm clock, and the cassette squealed forward, the slow sad music speeding up to something happier.

At first Shuggie had recoiled and looked like he had never heard a worse idea. She had cried in the bath later that night, trying to dig the oil out from her skin and feeling like a fool. Shuggie had heard her there, sat in the cold water, crying to herself. She had been mostly sober, and to him it was different from the drunken poor me’s. He resolved to show an interest in the fishing, anything to make her happy again. He fixated on the planning of the day, the organizing, the list making and the list checking. He planned the lunch and the clothes, the things he would put in his school bag and the little things he would put in each pocket: tomato sandwiches, a toy robot for sharing, a little plasticky pair of sunglasses, and a Christmas cracker whistle. When he had laid out all the preparations and put everything neatly in its place, he sat on the edge of his bed like a patient little dog.

Before he could answer, it started. It sounded like a murmur, and then someone said it out loud, and the whisper became outright laughter. “Is eht Gaylord?” said a rat-faced boy at the front. The room erupted. “Big Bobby Bender?” said another. Shuggie tried to talk over them. His face burned red. “It’s Shuggie, sir. Hugh Bain. I’m transferred here from Saint Luke’s.” “Listen tae that voice!” said another boy, with tight curly hair. He opened his eyes wide like he had hit the bullying jackpot. “Ere, posh boy. Whaur did ye get that fuckin’ accent? Are ye a wee ballet dancer, or whit?” This went down the best of all. It was a divine inspiration to the others. “Gies a wee dance!” they squealed with laughter. “Twirl for us, ye wee bender!” Shuggie sat there listening to them amuse themselves. He took the red football book and dropped it into the dark drawer of this strange school desk. He was glad, at least, to be done with that. It was clear now: nobody would get to be made brand new.