Jack and Djinn
Amber Sweetapple
Miriam's life is a hot mess. Her boyfriend Ben is no longer the man she fell in love with, and he won't stop knocking her around. And Jack? He's kind, handsome, and sweet: everything she could ever want and more. As her passion for Jack ignites, so does the rest of her body...
Amber Sweetapple: Hi, Mr. Byrne. I'm so glad you could join us today. I was wondering if you could start off by telling us a bit about how you met your wife, Jack's grandmother. It sounds like you've had a pretty romantic life.
Sean Byrne: Och, call me Sean. You'd like to know about how I met Gracie? It is quite a romantic story, if I do say so m'self. It goes back to just after the war--that'd be the Second World War, just so we're clear. I'd spent the war shovin' shells up the arse-end of an ack-ack. That's those anti-aircraft cannons you know. I was stationed in Dunkirk, and I spent just about all the war there. Wasn't too bad, really. Got to knock some of those bastard Krauts out of the sky, I did. I s'pose I shouldn't say that now, though, should I? It ain't...whatcha call it...politically proper or what have you.
Anyway. I met my darlin' Gracie on the ferry to Dublin. She was the prettiest lass I'd seen in four years, and believe me, I'd seen plenty. Ahem, but that's a different story, and not one I'd think is proper, if you take my meanin'. She had the longest, blondest hair I ever did see. It was...oh lord, it was like sunlight spun into gold and braided down her back. It shone and gleamed, and it fairly begged me to touch it. So I did, and got a good whack across the jaw for my troubles. More than a whack, if you'd like the truth. She was aboard the ferry with a right ugly bastard, a bloke named Hamish. He was a Scot, and had a terrible accent. Couldn't understand one word in five the man said, and this is comin' from an Irishman with a fairly thick brogue m'self. Well, ugly old Hamish--and lord, he was ugly, had a face like a bulldog and the temper'ment to suit--he didn't take too well to me havin' a touch of his girl's hair. He reached around and walloped me a good one.
"Dinna be toochin' my garl" he said. And of course, not understandin' a damn word he'd said, I thought it best it give him like for like. Of course, if he'd known he was fixin' to tangle with Sean Byrne, I'm fairly sure he'd've kept his grubby paw to his self. But he didn't and so we went a few rounds all up and down the ferry. I think we might've scared a few people along the train, what with the flyin' punches and all.
Well, needless to say, old Hamish couldn't chew what he'd bitten off, which is to say, I threw the mug straight off the ferry. Oh, don't look so horrified, it wasn't like we was goin' fast, was we? He could swim, and we wasn't more than half a mile off shore. I'm sure he was fine.
Of course, it took me the rest of the trip to Dublin to get Gracie to so much as look at me, and when I did manage that much, the look came with a nice ringin' slap across the face. I'd've lost her then, except I knew she was in love with me. I just had to convince her of that fact. I spent the rest of that summer doin' just that. I courted her, helped her father around the farm, cut peat--if you don't know what cuttin' peat is, you should know it's the most dreadful hard work a man can do--and I took her for nights on the town. Eventually, she came to see things my way, and we was married in a little white church in Tipperary. I dunno why Tipperary, except that's what Gracie wanted. I didn't have no family of my own, so it was just her folks and my best mate from Dunkirk, a lad named John, who's been dead these twenty years, God rest him.
AS: When did you first know you had the "The Sight"?
SB: I knew I had The Sight from the time I was five years old, or nigh about that. I learned of it from my mum, God rest her. She had The Sight, as did my grandmum and her mum, all the way back to time out of mind. We've always had The Sight, only I was the first male in our family to have it.
AS: What's your favorite Irish beer?
SB:Oh, we're talkin' booze now? If it's beer we're drinkin' I'll have a Smithwicks, which ain't pronounced "Smith-wicks" by the way. It's properly said "Smitticks". But I'm a whiskey man, for the most part, and I don't ever drink nothin' but Jameson. Ain't no other whiskey for my money.
AS: Have you and Jack gotten into any trouble lately?
SB: Trouble? Me? Certainly not. Although there was that little incident in the grocery store. Jackie is always tellin' me to keep my seeings to my self, you know, and I do, most of the time. Only this one I just couldn't keep in. There was this sassy little girl, pretty as you please and carryin' a babe in her arms and another runnin' crazy through the store. I happened to bump into her, by accident-like--and don't you be thinkin' it was anythin' but an accident, however lovely she may been--and I happened to get a Sight. Her husband was steppin' out on her, you see, and she didn't have a clue. He was fixin' to steal their savin's and pull a runner on the poor lass, and I just couldn't let it pass. So, I tell her what I seen. How was I s'posed to know her husband was in the store with her? He gets lippy with me, and I teach him a lesson with my good left hand, and that led to Jack steppin' in, and of course the coppers got called in and...well...we had to do our shoppin' elsewhere.
AS: Read any good books, lately?
SB: Well, now. My Jackie, he got me one o'them electronic readin' machines, a Kindle, for the last Christmas, and he's been showin' me how to buy the electronic books on it. The last book I read on it was Aurora by Ryk Brown.
AS: I hear you make an appearance in Djinn and Tonic which releases this week. Will you be in Djinn and Juice as well?
SB: I do indeed make a brief appearance in Djinn and Tonic, as does my Jackie. As for the next book? Well, you'll have to find out for yourself won't you,? You never know what could happen.
AS:Thank you very much for your time, Mr. Byrne.
SB: Oh, the pleasure is mine, to be sure. And I told you, call me Sean.
About the Author
Amber Sweetapple is a
sassy mama to 5 wild and wonderful kids. She enjoys long evening walks in her
suburban Detroit neighborhood with her writer husband Jack Sheppard. Her other
favorite things are singing, chocolate, good wine, and writing her hunky husband
into her stories. She also likes belly dancing, watching Real Housewives (don't
judge!) and cooking dinner for her family in her crockpot. Oh, and cupcakes.
