the derry girl || james maguire

eight

Niamh's pov

Here we were, standing in mass, looking at all the kids who had come over from Chernobyl. Today was also the day I had to move out of Aunt Mary's, only until our Ukrainian had gone home. I was staying at Michelle's, you might think, why did Erin get a Ukrainian if there was no room? Well, she wanted to help and we can't really kick out Aunt Mary so here I was, having to go to Michelle's.

"Which one's ours?" Orla asked.

"She didn't send a photo. Her family probably don't even own a camera. She'll find Derry a bit overwhelming at first, just because of how advanced everything is here. All the cracker stuff we have." Erin boasted.

"They have some pretty cracker stuff where she comes from, too, Erin." Orla said.

"Oh, really? Like what? Disease? Poverty?"

"No. You can get this wee woman made of wood, right? You pull her apart and inside her there's an even wee-er wooden woman, and you pull the wee-er wooden woman apart-" Orla smiled.

"Are you talking about Russian dolls?" I asked her.

"And today we welcome some very special guests, the weans from Chernobyl, who've come over to give their wee lungs a bit of a clear out, because, ah, sure, there's all sorts wafting about in their neck of the woods." Father Seamus said.

"Lovely job so far, Seamus, but, you know, keep it moving. Raw Hide's on in 15 minutes. Now, one might well question the wisdom of sending you here, of all places. Out of the frying pan into the Well, maybe not the fire, but certainly a different type of frying pan. Or some sort of wok at the very least. But please don't worry yourselves too much about the whole civil war, sectarian conflict carry on. There's really only thing you need to know. We're the goodies.Welcome to Derry." Sister Micheal concluded.

-

"Your ma said we could come up and have a look at the Russian." Michelle said.

It was nice to be back in my own damn house.

"Ukrainian." Erin corrected.

"Is this her? Isn't she cracker? She's half mine." Orla smiled.

"No, she's not, Orla."

"Aye, she is.Mammy said so."

"You're so lucky, Erin. I begged my ma to let me have one, but she said we've no room now that we have my dickhead ballbag English prick of a cousin has moved in. Talking about you, James, in case you're wondering. But we got Niamh and that's not too bad"

"Yeah, that much was clear, thank you, Michelle." James mumbled.

"Cheers Michelle"

"Have you seen the one Jenny Joyce got, the fella? Massive, massive ride. I've been thinking, it might be time for me to lose the rest of my virginity. And he's definitely a contender." Michelle said, and then started taking to Katya. "You help me? You put in good word with your Cossack friend so we can?" And then she done some... gestures.

"Will you stop that?"

"I'm very sorry for all your trouble, you know, the whole hoo-ha at the power plant." Clare said.

"Okay" Katya responds.

"When you think about it, we've actually got a lot in common, cos we understand what it's like to be a young person from a troubled place." Clare adds.

"Hm, it is not the same. Chernobyl was terrible nuclear accident. You people like to fight each other and, to be honest, what person really understands why?" Katya said.