Pure Wrongheadedness

All is chaos and strife at my house. Last night, after Marie and Claire headed home and we all settled down to a pleasant evening watching golf with the sound turned down while Aoife played all her favourite CDs and roared at me whenever I ventured near the stereo, trouble broke out in our quiet Santry home. Burt decided (on his sixth bottle of Stella) that Aoife was no friend of his. Aoife decided (on her fourth half-pint of vodka) that Burt was no friend of hers. Burt stubbornly ignored Aoife for three more bottles then took to saying loudly 'Oh, you want to know what my problem is! What! My! Problem! Is! Ha! That's a good one!'. He commandeered the stereo and put Mario's Let me Love you (his current favourite song) on repeat, while Aoife chain-smoked and glared. David tried nervously to concentrate on the golf and Sharon wisely fell asleep. So the crisis had to be handled by Lucy. Excellent.

Burt tried a different tack; namely, patting me kindly on the knee and whispering in my ear. Trying to make Aoife jealous, you see.
'You're my real friend, aren't you, Lucy?'
'Yes, Burt.'
'Loooo-seeeeee-'
'Yes, Burt?'
'-is your name.'
'Yes.'
'Lucy, put on a song you like!'
'Aoife won't let me.'
'Lucy, d'ya know what: fuck Aoife.'

So I got to put on my current favourite song which is track one from Bloc Party's Silent Alarm, an album title that describes Burt's perturbed young face fittingly on hearing the song. Unfortunately he had to stick by me, now that he had firmly opposed Aoife in putting it on.
'This is your favourite song?' scoffed Aoife. 'This tosh?'
'I think it's brilliant.' Burt choked out, meeting Aoife's gaze defiantly.

Aoife, reduced by now from a sudden scarcity of vodka to swigging from a mug of Dutch Gold, responded in kind. She found Burt's SuperValu short break tokens, which he was stockpiling to pay for a piss-up in the summer and stuck them all over the stereo, table-cloth and dining chairs. Two hundred of them. On me too, when I went over to try and persuade her to give it up. 'I am teaching him a lesson' she ground out.

The funny thing is, neither could remember what they were arguing about. Neither can today either. Burt started it, Aoife thinks, but Burt maintains Aoife did. It is all very traumatic for me. I feel like the kid in Kramer vs Kramer. Except not so cute or blonde.