Fading

He had worked for six years in a college tucked away in a green fold of the earth, in the heartland provinces where the beer is brown and nourishing and snow piles fast and thick over the course of a single winter's night. Mornings the air is taut and dry. Their language was spoken with a round and open mouth, like children carol-singing, and he found there was no other way to force the syllables out from his lungs. Adults twisted the sounds to a guttural monotone. Children spoke with a bell-like clarity. It was by watching their mouths carefully that he too came to speak. And in the afternoons the local greengrocer closes his doors for a two-hour break and leaves his front stall laden with fruit and vegetables, open to all who pass.

That was how Richard might have described the town and tried to explain why he stayed so long at an indifferent job in a place that was just another place to live, albeit a thousand miles from home. He wanted to put some life on his account, felt that he was useful here, and stayed yet another year. He was the foreign dozent who had been there the longest. Each August he took on the role of inducting the new teachers who arrived from Britain and America. He would be there too to wave them off twelve or eighteen months later, to whatever new position they had arranged for themselves. At times he confused their names and faces with those of his ex-students, whom he also waved off every June to start a new life.

In his Business English module he liked to teach by rote little pre-arranged office dialogues, miniature dramas which he carefully constructed to capture and condense as much authentic interaction as possible. He would write the dialogue on the white-board and proceed to wipe out a couple of words at a time, each time getting the students to repeat the whole piece, until there were only a skeleton of words left, a few prepositions and conjunctions, and finally nothing at all, and they could recite it by heart. An out-dated trick of the trade, he knew, but it worked and his students admired his thoroughness.

He had an expert eye for the appointments section of the weekly papers, both English and German. Even in the German papers many of the ads for international positions appeared in English. He would alert particular students to a position that suited them, then help tailor their CV to match. He became an expert at this business of applications and cover letters. In the course of a year he would get to know his students and act as match-maker between the faces in front of him and ads in the newspaper. Set them on the right path and tell them what to say. There was occasional feedback to reassure him; letters of gratitude, telephone surveys by the administration office, sometimes an ex-student dropping by with snippets of information on who was doing what and where.

But it was all a purely academic exercise. He was the architect who never took a brick and trowel in his hands. The idea of writing his own CV was remote, becoming increasingly abstract as the years passed. In secret Richard sat before his word processor and filled the blanks in the familiar template. The one he had designed himself, several years before. Responsible for interviewing prospective students. Coordinator of extra-curricular activities one term. The previous year an advisor on the budget committee. Liaising with industry to design a syllabus.

I'll give that man a job, he told himself. It looked well when printed out on cream paper. But that was as far as it went. The sheet remained on his desk, several variant drafts in fact, slight nuances in emphasis to bring out the administrator, or the teacher, or the academic, or the all-round man of the world.

Maybe that's why my students appreciate me, he thought. I never show impatience at their inability to set down their skills and ambitions on paper. I tell them who they are and where they are going and they're satisfied with that.

Each student left his job-skills programme cherishing the final draft of the final product: a CV on creamy watermarked paper. From a distance the alternate broad and narrow paragraphs made a satisfying pattern. It was something you wanted to fold neatly, exactly to the size of an envelope.

The first continental winter leached the energy out of him and left him with mysterious lumbar pains, lethargic, tired as soon as the sky turned dull around three in the afternoon. The cold was outside of him, outside his well-heated apartment, but still it seeped into him. The sluggishness of early morning and the tiredness of evening pushed in his days from both sides. He understood then the anxious preoccupation with chemist shops, the locals' constant circulation and digestion problems, and the plethora of bottles and pills that appeared on the staff-room table at break. Understood too the attractions of a warm, candle-lit cellar bar, sounds of heavy timber furniture, smells of steaming food, tea laced with rum.

He walked it off instead, the sluggishness, half an hour every evening, later a whole hour and more, until he knew all the paths and nature trails out of the one-street town. His treks extended to as much as three hours a day, winter and summer. That doesn't explain away six whole years, it can't, he knows, but with only sixteen hours of teaching a week it's his only way of understanding where the time went. Because the time had gone, and more still would pass, and it was in need of some milestone to pin it down.

He rings Dean on the phone one night and tells him he's thinking of moving back.

Good man, good man. You would be choosing an opportune moment by all accounts. From what little I hear about the job scene.

How are things with you?

Could not be better Richard, his friend asserted, the work situation was a bit hectic here for the last six months but its settled down now. Hey, do you want me to call you back? I can do it from the office phone? Richard is thankful for the consideration, but he's on a call-card, its a cheap rate, not worth the bother of hanging up.

He writes a letter of inquiry to the bank in Dublin about opening an account there. Included in the fat envelope that promptly arrives is his "making the move back" pack. Bemused, he rips off the polythene cover and scans through the issues to be tackled before making the move. There's a handy checklist for the month before, and another for the week before, and then the final bullet points for the day itself. He flits his eyes down the check-boxes; claiming tax back, rent, transferring health insurance, recognition of qualifications. He is cut out and exposed as a specimen, a well-understood case. Each tick he fills in defines him more precisely. What was within is now without. He fills them in one by one to the end, anxious that some don't apply to him, and anxious that the rest do.

The director is stoical about loosing a good worker. He is a believer in home and hearth. He always had a special liking for the foreign teachers and a great tolerance for their constant need for reassurance. Richard prides himself on never having asked for his help unless there was a pressing reason to. He had never demanded special treatment.

We'll miss you here, the director says frankly, I thought you were here for good. But if you've decided to go home, then it can only be your decision. Everyone gets homesick eventually. Perhaps even I would, eh? And they laugh, Richard protesting, It's not homesickness exactly.

So he gives Dean a ring and says in a deadpan voice, The anchor has been lifted but the ship is still in dock. Dean replies immediately, Heeeey, Richard. Good to hear from you. So you're making the move back, is that it? Excellent news. Is there anything you want me to do for you, you know, scout around and sort out some info or post you over The Times? Have you taken a look at the jobs market?

I have you might say wetted my feet. Hmm, but I wouldn't say gone to the extent of wetting my pants with worry.

They have a laugh at the extravagant joke.

I'll be looking forward to seeing you back in these parts. Be sure to keep me informed of when your auf wiedersehen is concrete so we can celebrate this return in the appropriate manner. I can arrange to pick you up at the airport, your bags of stuff, no problem . . .

No no, I'm not going to drag you away from your work. All my heavy stuff is being shipped over a week later. I'll just get a taxi.

But if you need a lift or whatever, just give us a call.

Thanks Dean, he says in a low, earnest voice. It strikes him forcibly that a friend remains a friend though you might see him only two or three times in the course of eight years. Jobs, promotions, wives even, come and go - events heard of after several months time-lag - and at last only the bald facts of address and name are all that you know of each other. Still, you can meet again and pick up the thread, and the bare two years as college kids together counts enough to last a lifetime.

Stefan approaches him in the corridor. So, you are leaving? After so long? Why, you are almost a German now. We'll have to go out one evening before you go. Definitely. Richard agrees and makes to move on, but Stefan is not finished. He asks about what he, Richard, is going to do, how things have changed, what he thinks of Germany, how it compares to his homeland. And Richard answers like a newcomer, like he's just started work nine am that morning.

And so there was his going-away party in the function room of the local hotel. Plates of garlic sausage and cold cutlets, dark dense chunks of smoked ham, salt pickles, light rye bread and pumpernickel, wheat bread and pretzels. This is all totally unexpected, he whispers to Stefan, I don't know how to thank people, they've gone to a lot of expense.

We should have done this more often, says Stefan, the atmosphere at work is too closed all the time. It's good to meet out like this.

And Richard too says he doesn't understand why everyone keeps their private life separate from the work-life, excepting the Christmas party where the staff gathered dutifully for an hour after work and then rushed home to their families.

A pall of blue smoke hung at head-height in the function room. Everyone smoked freely over the loaded platters. His colleagues were eager to see him sample the food, amazed to see him smack his lips at schmalz on bread, offered him their local dry-cure ham for his approval. The director seemed free at last from the constraints of his role. He pulled Richard by the cuffs over to the half-open door and offered him a cigar. The blue smoke drained out in a slip-stream over their heads. The whole summer is still ahead, Richard reminds himself. This wet wind is the beginning not the end.

Richard is now doubly the outsider, no longer an employee and a foreigner as well. He listens with amazement to a confessional monologue from his chief of six years. Education is a thankless task, the director tells him. You put your heart and soul into what in the end is only a public service, or only considered such by the powers, and now even by parents and students themselves. The college was becoming a government instrument for holding down the unemployment rate.

I am forced to raise student numbers and broaden the courses offered, he says. All these job-application courses, my god, after studying how to do a job for four years you spend another two learning how to get a job, does he, Richard, not get heartily sick of it? Does he not notice how the standards of the students has been dropping year by year, these are people who should have been out doing productive work for the economy for the past three years and they're sitting in a classroom and for what? For what? The trouble is the low status given to the Handwerker and the mania for education, education and more education that's the ruin of society, and won't be satisfied until half the population are teachers. But how was the situation in his own country? Would he, Richard, be staying in education?

I'm assessing my options at the moment, he answers. You'll find a niche soon enough, the director tells him.

Touchdown on tarmac on one of those humid spring days, the feet cold but the body clammy under layers of clothing. The sky was low and heavy, the rain only semi-rain, in a pretend-winter in a munchkin land where nobody ever is a baggage handler or a policeman or a teacher, but only works as a baggage handler or policeman or teacher. The air clasped a secret of damp to its smothering breast. In the baggage area the floor was paved with corroded and colourless tiles, while against the end wall stood a glowing row of blue and yellow kiosks. He dragged his bags passed an unmanned customs desk, out into the smell of damp he'd never known was so familiar, so intimate. This is where I am now, he told himself. This is the place I'm in, that's all.

Dean on the phone says, So you finally made it. You'll need a while to settle in and make connections. Listen mein Herr (Dean often threw in a few school-German phrases) well have to hook up some evening and that ASAP. I presume things are pretty hectic at the moment so when the dust settles let's trundle down to some local bar.

This evening perhaps? Richard suggests. Not entirely possible. But tomorrow undoubtedly. A ring some time after lunch and they could make more definite arrangements.

Down at the bank there's a certain delicate pleasure in conforming to type. He can acquiesce and let the female teller guide him through the procedure of opening an account. There's so much that can be said in just a few sentences.

- I also have 3,000 sterling in a British bank account from when I lived over there, can that be transferred without currency exchange commission?

She glances momentarily up from her screen, Just one thing at a time, let's sort out your current account first. She dealt with his savings and life assurance plan, and gave him the run-down on how to transfer his health insurance from abroad, out of pure friendliness or pure professionalism he couldn't tell. The same morning he sorted out a printer for his computer. He needed one for job applications.

By the time he got home with the printer and made himself a sandwich it was almost four. He took out a slim folder containing a half-dozen sheets clipped together. The work of many meticulous hours, he could have used it as a model for his students. Printed on 100gsm paper, perceptibly heavier than the standard, cream bonded paper, wide areas of white space.

This is it, this is where we see if it works.

What's the procedure in registering here, he asks in an employment agency he chose at random. Anything current that would suit me? Of course you have to look through the CV first, I understand.

You must have noticed a lot of changes since you came back, the English girl said. There's a totally different attitude to work now, she went on. There are three or four a day back from abroad looking for work, she said. And that's only in this office. Imagine in the whole city!

He smiles in his job-seeker suit, unmoulded material, able to fit into any role she might suggest and try it on for size. Trying out this agency too, ready to drop it if he finds a better one. You need me just as much as I need you. She looks up suddenly, asks him how many other agencies he has gone to so far.

It's at the cost of a real stomach ache that he can stammer and blurt his way through the aptitude interview down the hallway. Something to suit you will turn up, there's lot of positions coming through our books at the moment, the consultant says.

He rings Dean on the phone and the voice answers him with a poised Hell - lo? that's an invitation to help. The kind of voice a call centre would pay premium money for.

Richard, how the hell are you?

Dean tells him there's a buoyancy in the work market. Dean tells him not to worry. Dean tells him he imagines it's a nightmare having to sort out bank accounts and transfer health insurance. - It's quite easy actually, Richard cuts him short, I handled it all in one morning.

Wow, you're really on the ball. You're really finding your feet, says Dean.

Back then, very first day at college (he'd arrived a few days after registration day) Richard was strolling around the freshman bazaar. Voices appealed and cajoled him, clowns and knaves pleading for his attention, all selling nothing but desperate to have him for their club. There stood another of them, leaning against the Environmental Society stand, sporting a luxuriant moustachio and a thick cotton shirt. The man put a hand to his soft whiskers and smiled in recognition.

What's the new in the world of pollution? Richard asked.

I wouldn't know. I'm just waiting here for these guys to turn up, he answered. I'm new here, like yourself. As apparently you are, he added with a self-mocking smile.

He was someone who looked as though he knew all the answers. He didn't, but the reputation clung to him. Someone who wore a sports jacket, went hill-walking, and was not the least concerned what anyone thought of him. This commanded an amount of respect among teenagers still coming to grips with the notion that the schoolyard dynamics have lost their validity here.

At the arts block table there was talk of a weirdo from Sandford who'd walked the railway tracks from Westport to Horseleap for the hell of it. A forty-five mile trip, took him sixteen hours. He lay down on the ground at the station and got the first train back in the morning. Forty-five miles. Did his parents know? What did they think about it? Nothing. They just said to be wary of tunnels, and bring a bottle of water. It's quiet walking along railway tracks, the oddball told them, a good way to see the country. Strictly speaking though, its illegal. Apparently.

Richard leaned across the table, snapped his fingers into a pointer. I know this guy, he said. The whole table turned to him. The moment was his.

Wait till I tell you his name. It suits him perfectly.

He was the first to get to know Dean, the first to know the secret behind the moustache. There wasn't any, except that he smoked dope occasionally, saw nothing wrong with it, and once remarked casually his parents probably wouldn't like it if he smoked every day. And he was curiously calm, abstracted from bitterness and excitement. He liked to talk about other people and who had done what. It wasn't exactly gossip; it was like he wanted to chart out an impartial map of fears and desires and their connections to people. He and Richard became friends, and remained so over the years.

Dean couldn't get out of the office for lunch break next day so they put off meeting until the weekend. But they had a good chat in the evening on the phone. About the strange politics of ex-communist countries.

That Monday Richard moved into a small apartment in the east docks district. Had to plead with the agent to accept the deposit in cash as he did not yet have a credit card. But otherwise they were friendly, and laughed away his suggestion that he could get the stipulated reference from his dorm in Germany. I think we'll have to take you at face value, the woman laughed.

Rows of terraced dockers' houses, some boarded up, some eyeless and decrepit, lined the way to the modern block. A couple of grungy second-hand shops, a corner newsagents, and a little pizzeria. Lines of traffic even at this early hour. The taxi pulled in. Richard hesitated outside the four-story block.

How much would it cost for you to wait here while I bring the bags upstairs?

It'll be alright, said the taximan.

So . . . you'll stay here until I get back for the others?

Yeah, yeah, I'll be here, said the taximan convincingly.

Richard dragged his cases up the bare stairs and left them on the floor. The remaining boxes were due to arrive by freight, could be one week, could be three. The unpacking could wait till then. He took a swift tour of the apartment, checked the taps, the window catches, the shower. It was only six hours since he'd first seen it. He was pleased at being able to make a quick decision. There was something else he'd set out to do. Some small thing that he couldn't bring to mind. He ran his hand through his hair in the mirror.

This is a great area you've moved in to, the young barber told him. The pubs round here have great atmosphere, and you know, great style even compared to city centre pubs. Any of my mates wouldn't bother going into town. It's being discovered though, this place. People are coming here for a night out. Its becoming a second Temple Bar, you know what I mean. You can get to like living round here.

Is this a good business to be in, the haircutting? Richard chatted. The barber circled him with scissors and comb. Looked him in the eye through the mirror as only a barber can, so he felt a bubble of laughter inside him.

I like it. I like it. We open here at ten and that suits me. Finish at six. Its a grand life says you.

I remember the ferocious barbers I had to go to as a kid. The old porridge bowl haircuts.

The barber stopped, mouth hanging open. That's my old man you're talking about. Be careful what you say or I'll bring him down from upstairs to finish off your haircut.

Richard patted his fringe back. He put on his coat and reached in his pockets. His hair felt new and keen. Are you going for a pint when you finish up this evening? he asked.

No. Not directly afterwards. I'm often in the local pubs, sure I'll see you around. Good luck. See you around then. See you . . . Richard is it?

The following Friday, twelve days after his arrival, Dean says, Good to hear from you man. How are getting on so far with this major life event? The worst of the stress must be over by now, eh? Dean reassures him he'll soon settle in and make contacts. They say changing job and country are two of the most stressful things in life. You seem to be handling things pretty well, mein Herr.

When he puts the phone down Richard frowns. That voice, so utterly concerned, so familiar and solicitous. Yet blankly indifferent. Quick with wit, and as depleted as the porous clinker piled around a lead smelter. It was a voice you wanted to put all your trust in. The voice of a talk-show host on public TV, before the contestants spill their guts out to him.

At the corner of Earl street someone asked him the route of the feeder bus. It was a woman, a lady rather, in a tight red jacket. He said, Sorry? understanding neither her accent nor the content. She repeated herself slowly. I don't know what a feeder bus is, he replied, I've been away. I see, she said, well, you'll find out soon enough, and stood where she was as though the conversation might continue from there. English was still unfamiliar in his mouth, he realised, and looked at her, and studied the timetable.

Dean says, there's this guy over from the Southend branch, he's a great laugh. They're taking him out once things are under control in the office. You can meet up with us if you like. There won't be too much of the shop talk. These are easy-going fellows. Of course I don't want to drag you out of your way, I know the Merchants Inn is a bit inconvenient from your ehh . . . neck of the woods.

No problem Dean. I'd be delighted. I'll hook up with you there let's say around 9 pm?

That sounds perfect. Well definitely be there by then. Hey! looking forward to running into you, mein Herr. We didn't actually manage to meet face to face as it were, last week.

A colleague in Germany said to him once, You Irish, it's in the blood. To which he'd replied, I wish you could see me back home in my own city. You wouldn't think I was such a sociable person then. Its just being in a foreign city makes you more open. You don't give a damn.

He remembers the pub as soon as he sees it, he must have been in it years ago. It is not the street names he remembers, but cityscapes, corners, which way to turn next. In this pub too, he knows the lounge door. Through the bulbous windowpane he sees them. Four tall figures, and when they laugh they throw back their heads and then stoop over gasping, but the pints in their hands remain upright. The pub is dark with an oily light inside, low gleams from brass and thick varnish. He looks at the group and then Dean sees him and draws a finger on him.

Put it there, says Dean reaching out a big hand and pulling him in amongst them. He is introduced all round. John, Neal, Colm.

Dave's the name. So you're the guy who's just finding his feet in the new economy? says one with a grin.

That's me indeed, he answers. A pint is handed over the counter to him. One character puts a finger under his nose and gives a Hitler salute. No offence taken. Nothing is serious, they let out huge anarchic laughs, drink deeply. As though they are laughing at the sight of themselves in suits and ties; as though someone would accuse them of taking themselves too seriously. They curse with relish. What do I do in my job? You don't wanna know. Even the boss doesn't want to know. How did I get into this line of business? By default. Never studied any kind of course for this job. I used to be a historian - an historian, but I'm all right now. Do you hear that professor Quaid? No he doesn't. Germany you were in? What's the stroodlebugs like? What?

So you have some skills in writing. That's marketable, says Dave. There's a lot of documentation associated with the promotions end of things. I can put you in touch with someone who might know what they're talking about, unlike me.

That would be fucking appreciated, Richard says.

He means it, man, says Dean, putting a hand on Dave's shoulder, he's seriously looking to get fixed up.

No no, straight up, I'll root out his number and you can give me a buzz tomorrow. Any time. Give us a ring after lunch and Ill put you through to him in person.

We're liaising - I say liaaaising until four don't forget, says Dean, stretching out the word in some running joke. He turns to Richard. So man, you might be falling on your feet if things pan out right. Hey! Its good to see you! You're looking well. In the peak of health. The food over there must be doing you good. You haven't changed a bit, not since we were college kids. Hey, how was the flight back? How are the women over there treating you?

Richard looks from one to the other and they are all grinning, welcoming him in now that he speaks their common language, Dean smiling approvingly. He can speak it well, he's an expert, he's taught it for six years in a green fold in the earth, in a land where children form their words like carol-singers. He's taught it from books and cassettes and sent six cohorts out as adepts in the world, and now its his turn and the words come to him easily, like its all a big joke, just the way it should be.