The illusive pop

Henry was living with long covid. He was tired all the time, so he had been sleeping his life away for the guts of two years. It’s sad to see a young man in his prime knocked down by something the professionals don’t know much about because it’s so new. Before he contracted the condition, he had his dream job and was going to be the male escort for his theatrical students, planning to go to New York and Canada. The kids were to work with his idol, Michael Keaton, on one of the trips for three weeks. The reason he was Henry’s idol was because, in his mind, he played the best Batman character in the movie franchise. There was two things Henry loved more than anything, anything to do with Batman, and seafood.

As he was one of those comic book nerds, minus the comic books, Henry had a whole room to fit all of his collectables. They were all in mint condition and in their boxes displayed on shelves he had gotten in Ikea. When he finished collecting a set, he decided carefully about the next one he would begin to hoard, knowing he had only limited space in the room because he had so many. If he were to put a price tag on the collection, he would be up thousands of euro’s, but he just couldn’t part with them.

He had a deal with one of the major comic book shops in Dublin, where he would pay a certain amount a month, and they would keep his ‘purchases’ aside for him, sending them out when the full amount of the balance had been paid.

As his birthday came closer and closer, he was frantically trying to do everything he could to pay off the comic book shop so the figurines he ordered would be delivered and parcelled by Ruth to open on his big day. Henry always made his birthday longer than most. To him it was a birthday week and not just a day. The month before the birthday extravaganza, he got in touch with his sister Mia, who was working in Canada, and she asked him what he wanted to do to celebrate. All he really wanted to do was go to brunch on the Sunday before and book himself into a nice hotel in the city. When they were booking both, they were oblivious that Mother’s Day fell on the same day, so they got together and Mia fixed up the financial end of things to make it a nice day for their mother who happened to have a ball.

On Tuesday, his actual birthday, Henry facetimed Mia, who was working for an IT company, so she could see him open all of his presents. Of course, being the one that bought them, he knew what most of them were, but his sister came up trumps and got him his favourite cologne that they don’t make anymore, and other bits and pieces she thought he might like, mainly batman merchandise. Ruth had bought him clothes as his jeans all had holes in the wrong places, and a few shirts so he would have confidence when it came to possible interviews that were in the pipeline.

As Henry was opening up his gifts, his sister yawning, willing for him to hurry up so she could go back to sleep, he was genuinely surprised at each one that was unwrapped. He hadn’t looked in his basket since he put down the first deposit. As it happened, he got the full set of six gargoyle figures he had his eyes on and the last Pop Vinyl of a collection he had, making that set complete. He couldn’t get it before as it was always not a financially good investment, but when the comic book shop was having a sale, that particular Pop was reduced by 50%, so he jumped at it. Henry was good at bargains! So as well as shopping around, he was always watching the prices of what he wanted, like a stock broker.

There was one package left, and Henry had no idea if it was from the comic book shop, his mother, or his sister. When he opened it, he gasped, and gently placed it on the couch, careful not to handle it too much. It was a limited-edition Pop Vinyl that was bigger than those you would usually buy. It looked like an ugly piece of plastic, but to him it obviously meant something as he put his hand to his mouth and started to cry, remembering what he had paid for it. He also remembered that he thought it was too much money in the first place. Henry had spent €40 on the character. Usually, he wouldn’t ever spend that much, but he knew they only made a handful of this particular one, so he bought it as an investment. Ruth put her arm around him and wondered aloud, ‘is it not the right one?’

It made Henry end up on the floor in convulsions. Ruth quickly tried to sign off from her daughter to make sure he was alright. Henry could have been crying tears of joy, or sadness, or because he was simply overwhelmed! Ruth handed him tissue after tissue, as Henry was void of words. He had always cried when reading birthday cards, but never gifts, and never like the way he was in that very moment!

Eventually, thirty minutes later, he calmed down enough to explain to his mother that he had looked up the price of it a few days ago, wanting to buy it for himself with his birthday money from aunts and uncles, but that it was far too expensive. He was happy when Ruth decided to sit beside him on the floor, as he really needed a shoulder to cry on. He heard her arthritic hip groan but didn’t stop her as the reason for the tears was too great for him to process alone.

He lay in her arms and she swayed back and forth with him, just as she had done that very first day exactly thirty four years ago, and around the same time to boot. It seemed fitting for her to be cradling him. He looked up at her, his glasses foggy, and managed to get out the words, ‘it’s worth €2,500!’

‘What?’ Ruth asked, thinking he had paid that much for only one Pop Vinyl.

‘I only paid €40!’ he chocked before the water works began again.

‘Are you telling me that a Pop thing you bought last year for €40 is now worth €2,500?’ she asked.

He sobbed into her shoulder and shook his head. She pulled him in closely and told him that if he sold it, not only could he pay for the laptop he needed, as his had given up the ghost months before, but he could buy a phone too. At that minute in time, he was working off two phones, one of which was worse than the other. Henry just took three sheets of kitchen paper off the roll and blew his nose.

‘I,’ sob, ‘know,’ sob.

‘Well if that’s not a birthday surprise, I don’t know what is!’ Ruth smiled and kissed the top of her son’s hair sprayed head.

‘I forgot I bought him!’ Henry voiced as he began to calm down.

‘Thank god I didn’t dent the box!’ Ruth joked, making Henry rise to inspect the condition of the Pop. It was indeed perfect!

After he helped her off of the floor, the tears all washed away, he beamed down at her and hugged her. He dare not say that maybe things were starting to turn around. He was keeping that for news regarding the long covid clinic.

When they heard his sister say, ‘em, hello?’ Henry was transported back to the present and how his mother knew nothing about technology and, in fact, hadn’t hung up on his sister, so she had been on the phone that whole time. He had accidentally made €2,500 for himself. He quickly looked at the phone in his hand as Mia was suddenly wide awake, unable to put words on what she had just heard. Henry just looked at her and she began to say goodbye as he was starting to tear up again. Everyone in the family knew he was a crier, so instead of waiting for him to stop again, she signed off and wished him a wonderful birthday and that she’d ring them later.

Henry was a very sensitive man who wasn’t afraid to cry or talk about his feelings as other men his age might. He looked at the Pop once more and cried one final time before Ruth asked him, ‘what time do you want to go to Howth at?’ to change his focus onto something he had been looking forward to for weeks.

Howth was a fishing village which had shop after shop of freshly caught fish. He had asked his mother if they could get some fish there and have a few nibbles in some of the shops along the way weeks ago. He knew from going before that he could sit and compose himself when he was unable to walk no more because of the long covid.

‘Before we go,’ Ruth said, ‘I have one more surprise!’

He thought his tear ducts were dry, but he conjured tears to roll down his pasty face when she presented him with a black forest gateau from Thunders. It was his favourite cake in the whole world! He joked that he was going to eat it all on his own and went to the cutlery drawer to take out a fork to make a dent in it as he recuperated from the shock.

In Howth, they went from fishmonger to fishmonger, Henry writing down the price of the whole salmon and the prawns on a little notebook that he kept in his jeans pocket. When he became tired, they stopped and went into a small restaurant to get some scampi. In the end, they had gotten the whole salmon and the prawns and when they brought them home, managed to make a good go at cutting the salmon into portions. They were asked in the fish mongers if they had wanted it done for them and refused because Henry wanted to improve his knife skills.

When Mia rang back at a normal hour for her, they were in the middle of cooking the prawns two ways, one fried with butter and garlic, the other battered and deep fried. Mia asked if he had a nice day and the pair of them looked at each other and laughed. They explained that they were hacking away at the salmon for over an hour!

The dreaded question was asked, the one Ruth had been wanting to ask all day but didn’t have the courage in case the waterworks started up again. It was down to Mia to ask, ‘are you going to sell it?’ referring of course to the limited edition Pop.

‘Well I do really, really, really need a new phone and laptop!’ Henry replied.

‘If I may give you some advice?’ she offered, to which he nodded. ‘Do you honestly think that the value is going to increase or decrease over the next year?’

Henry thought deeply for a minute, realising what his sister was trying to say. ‘I’m not sure!’ he answered honestly.

‘You’d probably kick yourself either way,’ she advised, ‘but if it will buy you both of the things that you really, really need, isn’t it a good time to sell?’

She had a point. She was so accurate and blunt, but Ruth agreed with her.

‘If I’m honest,’ Henry confessed, ‘the money would buy a better laptop than the one I was about to buy and a better phone to boot!’ he looked into the distance for a second, ‘I guess I won’t miss what I ever had!’

Ruth and Mia smiled into their respective screens, thousands of miles apart, happy to have each other and know that finally, Henry would be getting the essentials, one of the things that might bring him closer to getting back to his dream job, or any job really, where he would have a pay check bigger than what the government are expecting him to get by on.

Mia stayed on the phone whilst they ate until another call began to come through. ‘I’ll ring you back in a minute!’ Henry told her.

‘Hello, this is Henry!’ Ruth heard him answer in his upbeat phone manner. It was the long covid clinic offering him a time and date for the study he had been waiting a whole year for. ‘Hold please when I check the calendar!’

Henry moved closer to the calendar that was affixed to the side of the fridge. He knew he had no appointments on the day they were offering, but Ruth looked after his elderly grandmother every couple of weeks for a few days and he wanted to be sure he had her there to bring him and collect him. Thankfully she was free, and he jumped at the chance of the date, writing it into the calendar there and then and graciously thanked them as it was only three weeks away.

He quickly rang Mia back, and told his mother and sister together as he inhaled the rest of the prawns.

‘Well, hasn’t this been a day for positives!’ he said to Ruth as he smiled into his phone at his sister who just smiled back.

‘A good day for positives indeed!’ they said in unison, the three of them delighted with themselves for different, yet the same reasons!