Racconto inviato | Submitted story 10

Racconto inviato | Submitted story 10

The Brown Parcel

It was one of those damp, Belfast evenings where the rain didn’t fall but merely hung in the air, soaking everything in an ashed mist. McGurk’s pub has ever been there. Its low ceiling clouded with smoke and voices rising in waves of drunken cheer. Dim bulbs from the walls, painting the room in shades of ochre. At the corner table near the window, Ciaran Malone leaned back in his chair, a cigarette dangling from the corner of his mouth as he surveyed the room with a lazy sort of satisfaction. He was young, just turned twenty-three, with the wiry frame of a man who’d seen enough hard work. Tonight, he sat among his mates: two old school friends Seamus McGrath and Cillian Declan and two workers he met when he entered the party, Patty and the hulking, gentile brute they called Hog. The talk was cheap, and the pints flowed without them even realizing.

“Here’s to a free Ireland,” said McGrath lifting his pint full of fervor.

“God bless it,” Ciaran replied, his voice firm.
Seamus gave a noncommittal nod. He didn’t care much for politics, though he’d pretend when the need arose. Right now, though, all he cared about was the froth on his pint and the small wad of crumpled notes in his pocket. The others could fight their battles; he’d stick to what he was most capable of — poetry.
The others at the table raised their glasses and drank. For the Hog, the “Christian cause” was not a matter of choice but of birthright. He’d been raised to believe that God’s grace lay on their side, that their battles and sacrifices were divinely justified. It wasn’t a hatred of others that filled his hear, more like an unshakable certainty. There was no greater calling, no deeper love than that for Ireland and God.
The clock ticked toward eight, its hands crawling through thick, cigarette-stained air. Ciaran let his eyes wander the pub as Patty rattled on about some meeting the following week. He wasn’t much for listening when the beer was this good and the company so agreeable. His gaze drifted toward the door just as it creaked open.
The man who entered looked out of place. He wasn’t particularly tall, nor was he broad-shouldered and young. There was something furtive about him, like a rat skittering through an alley. He wore a faded brown overcoat, its collar turned up against the chill, the hem of his pants slightly ruined. His face was unremarkable, save for the faint twitch in his jaw—like something restless was itching beneath his skin.
Ciaran watched as the man stepped inside and cast a quick glance around the pub. He lingered for only a moment just long enough to drop a brown parcel onto the floor near the bar. The package landed with a muted thud, like something weighty but fragile had been set down. Then, just as swiftly as he had come, the man turned on his heel and slipped through the door back into the night.
“Who was that?” Ciaran muttered.
Seamus paused mid-sentence; eyebrows raised. “Who?”
“That fella with the coat,” Ciaran said, gesturing toward the door. “Did you see him?”
Seamus shook his head, his attention already drifting back to the froth in his glass and said: “Probably some lost fool.”
Ciaran frowned and turned his gaze back to the parcel. It sat there, unassuming, a brown paper bundle tied with twine. Perhaps it was nothing. A forgotten package, a misplaced parcel of groceries, maybe even a gift left behind by some absent-minded old man. But the way that stranger had moved, quick and deliberate—it gnawed at the edges of Ciaran’s thoughts. He distractively took another cigarette from his pocket. Outside the window, the Belfast streets were dark and indifferent. Across the room, the parcel remained untouched, unnoticed.
Minutes passed, and Ciaran’s unease only deepened. Something was wrong. He knew it in his gut, the way animals sensed an oncoming storm.
The sound was not the sharp crack of a gunshot or the metallic clang of a dropped glass. It was deeper, crueler, a roaring detonation that seemed to come from everywhere at once. The air turned into fire and the light to a candid white. The walls groaned, the floor bucked beneath Ciaran’s boots, and then came the fire—blinding, ravenous, unstoppable.
Pint glasses shattered, splinters of wood and glass flying like shrapnel through the smoky haze. The Hog and Declan was thrown back. Their weightless bodies, for one terrible second, before colliding with something hard and unyielding. A pressure built in his ears and then silence swallowed everything. Patty, once warm and jubilant, was reduced to ash.
When his vision swam back, it was of a different world. Black smoke coiled through the air; the ceiling sagged where the beams had splintered. Seamus felt the force hit him before he heard the sound, his body thrown backward as if a giant had swatted him aside. Moments ago, he had been speaking of the future, was slumped over the table, his face unrecognizable. The laud, cheerful chatter was now reduced to an atrocious silent.
Outside, the rain began to fall.