A piano in a derelict pub begins to play itself
on All Saints’ Eve. The notes are familiar—old
reels and ballads from a vanished folk band. A
woman named Eileen, known only as "The
Lark" in
her youth, hears it from her flat above the
River Liffey. She hasn’t touched an instrument
since 1974, when her brother vanished during the
Troubles. The melody stops when she steps
outside.
The pub is abandoned, but the piano remains. A
local priest warns her not to return. The walls
hum with a low, steady pulse. Eileen finds a
faded photograph in the floorboards—a boy with
her eyes, standing beside a man in a green coat.
The same man who once played the piano.
She visits the village of Dún Laoghaire, now a
shell of its former self. The locals speak in
hushed tones of the "song that haunts the
streets." A fisherman shows her a cave beneath
the cliffs, where the dead are said to gather on
certain nights. Inside, she finds a second piano,
covered in dust and bloodstains. The keys are
warm.
Eileen plays. The walls tremble. A voice speaks
through the wood: "You were meant to stay.
" She
realises the curse is tied to the 1916 Rising—
the same year her brother disappeared. The music
is a conduit, a way for the past to bleed into
the present. The villagers have been hiding the
truth: the piano was built from the timbers of a
rebel hideout.
On the night of the GAA final, the city falls
silent. Eileen stands at the edge of the Liffey,
the piano behind her. The crowd watches as the
river turns black. The music swells. She plays
the last note of the reel her brother once
performed. The water recedes. The piano
collapses. The voice fades.
The next morning, the pub is empty. No one
remembers the song. Eileen walks away, her hands
still stained with ink from the sheet music
she’d copied. The city moves on. But in the
shadows of the docks, the piano’s echo lingers.
