The Mark Addy

When Manchester floods I think of The Mark Addy, an Irwell riverside bar that flooded twice and never reopened.

There was a pixelated sunset printed canvas that sat proudly on the walls there, still wrapped in the shrink wrap it arrived in. Plastic wrinkles at the side of the sky where the horizon ends and the weathered walls begin. As if the sunset knew the rain was coming, maintaining its homespun artistic integrity through from the before to the after.

We are sat as a three on a table set for four waiting, waiting patiently, for the arrival, for the second coming, the second undoing. The table we are sat by has pale blue, tattered napkins folded and neatly shoved under each leg because in fact, all four of them are wobbly, would you believe it? Never in my life had I seen such a dark type of wood, chopped and varnished for my liking and then destroyed for my undoing. It’s not mine, no, but then why do my feet feel damp and why have the napkins turned to pulp? Wobbly table legs don’t matter when the wall mounted TV, still showing yesterdays highlights, is wading through water, along with everything else. The undoing is here yes, but it is also still incoming.

When Manchester floods again, I’ll be the first to reopen The Mark Addy.