New Irish Short Stories

by Joseph O'Connor

  It was a look he remembered from childhood examinations when he stood in shorts and singlet while she catalogued every feature that was not-hers. It was as if there had been a download failure that had robbed her son of the physical advantage that should have been his: the elegant frame of the ectomorph, the fine high cheekbone, the strong straight canines. Larry was a mean trick played by spiteful elves in the womb. And the plainest of babies, even Larry himself could see beyond the chubby smile.

  At fourteen he was besieged by a plague of pimples so ferocious they resisted all medication. Dermatologists peered down at his face while his mother fretted in a Chesterfield. She insisted he max out on Accutane but the spots mutated into pustules that advanced down his neck where they would burst at the slightest touch, leaking gobs of green pus. She took him to a tanning salon and Larry muttered about skin cancer. Oh for Chrissake, she snapped, what would you rather be? Which was a question that seemed vast and unanswerable. That night Larry attacked himself in the bathroom mirror, squeezed and scratched until his face was pocked with blood. From then on it was mostly his mother’s side profile he addressed, she shielded her eyes at the dinner table and then one morning he saw Gloria scuttle past with a breakfast tray.

  *

  Larry boarded a train to Schenectady, the Rebel snug by his side. Birch trees lined the track like spindles, a sunflashed storm raged behind his lids. But back home his daytrip was a paltry thing. The Hudson on screen was wide, brown and empty. A huddle of ducks looked staged, the pampas chaffed with gold was weedy and cheap. Nothing remained of the glory he had witnessed, his homage to nature was in tatters. There are things that happen in your life that feel scripted, a movie that might be made. Larry decided to stick with the human form.

  He found the boy’s number on the noticeboard, a page with feathered strips unevenly cut. His name was Harrison and he knew how to strike a pose. How to handle Larry’s gasp when he slipped off his T-shirt to reveal ‘Necrophilia’ tattooed in blue across his hairless chest. Harrison was vague about why, and it wasn’t clear if he even understood the word, it had been some other, older guy’s idea when he was just fifteen. Which was three years ago in Buffalo where he had an uncle who’d lived there his whole life without ever seeing Niagara Falls. There was some kind of problem with sibilants, so Falls was Fallth and Harrison was Harrithon. But Larry liked the way this plumped his lower lip and he copied it himself later in front of the mirror, whispering ‘lithp, lithp.’

  At that first session Harrison had stood in front of him, fingers toying with the belt of his jeans. But Larry spoke sternly, so there would be no misunderstandings.

  I just need a subject.

  You going to thell the phototh?

  No, said Larry astonished, for why would he sell what he had just found?

  Harrison frowned, sucked on a beer. Larry said he would pay him for modelling, and Harrison seemed comforted by the idea of a transaction.

  The flashgun startled them both. Harrison giggled, cracked another beer and fell asleep on the sofa. Larry stayed up arranging the photos on screen. Gave each jpeg the kind of caption he’d seen on wall tags. Boy, reclining. He lingered over the data, the time of capture, zooming in and out, but all the faults were compositional, the subject himself was blemish-free. Larry built a slideshow, made Harrison float and dissolve, ripple and fade across the screen. He added music, Coleman Hawkins, the kind of stuff his mother used to play at dinner parties where couples gathered round the long table in the state room, as she called it, underneath the chandelier.

  When he woke the sofa was empty and Larry thought fifty bucks was missing from his wallet, but perhaps he was mistaken since the Rebel was still there along with Harrison’s digital self. But it was exhilarating: to be robbed, to be rubbing shoulders with street characters, to have something that Harrison wanted. Really, it occurred to Larry, as he doodled through the month-end presentation, people’s eyes had always seemed to slither over him as if they failed to find any feature worth settling for.

  He braved the exhibition advertised on the noticeboard, black-and-white shots of abandoned workshops in Arkansas, lathes and circular saws, old girlie calendars pinned to the wall. The photographer wore skinny black jeans, caressed a scrawny arm. Boniness was a feature of the arty crowd as if all this creation was burning them up. Harrison had some sort of supporting role, arranging a fan of leaflets on a table, serving drinks on a tray. Larry didn’t usually like to linger but this time he did and eventually Harrison appeared by his side. Walking uptown Larry saw how people just couldn’t stop staring. Harrison sat in a cowhide throne in the Royalton, and there was a parade of people he knew, a woman in red velvet, a man with a grey ponytail.

  Doors slid open for Larry with Harrison by his side – tables materialised in overbooked restaurants, barmen begged for his order, the service industry was transformed. Everyone looks at you, said Larry, surprising himself with the sting of utterance. Harrison grinned, reached for the pretzels. How can you eat that stuff? said Larry. I mean just think. All those hands dipping in, where they have been. And anyway why did you cut loose from Buffalo? Harrison shrugged. It was hard to explain, longer sentences fatigued him so he relied on a repertoire of gestures. Larry saw a girl mutter something behind her hand to a friend who caught his eye, looked quickly away. The barman smirked knowingly. Larry would like to tell them all that there had been a girl once and that it was not unpleasant but it was not repeated. Melinda had slender wrists and a Labrador who got kicked out of blind-school training for underachievement. The framed certificate of release hung on the wall of her walk-in, and Larry was staring at it when Melinda told him there wasn’t, like, time, you know. But what did that even mean? All these people speaking in unfinished sentences, like the whole world was contained in the gaps.

  *

  Two weeks went by, and Harrison missed ‘Life’. Larry searched but Canal Street was full of transience and Harrison was not there. And then he reappeared outside Larry’s building in the Tuesday dusk, nonchalant, as if this had been previously arranged. Larry showed him the new reflector. A huge white weightless moon that would illuminate his face, the gold on the other side to honey the skin. Hold still, he said, but Harrison kept on playing with the disc, twisting it into a mini circle and letting it spring back like a magic trick.

  Harrison said he was going to Florida in December. Some guy who invited him and maybe a few others – Harrison wasn’t totally sure – to his pad in Key West. A pool with big plants tumbling into it.

  You should theee the phototh!

  And you’re going?

  Dude, I’m there.

  Dude? Larry mouthed while Harrison sprawled on the sofa. And Larry recalled a raucous night in the Keys from his freshman year. A restaurant called Bagatelle and no one to be romantic with, the waitress swaying to the music with the smeared dishes stacked on her arm. An argument about manatees, how they were so impossible – those things, those flippers like stumps. It turned nasty somewhere near the Six Mile Bridge, a gas station where they stopped to piss and someone got left behind who might have been Larry. He can’t remember if what he saw was the disappearing tail lights or the abandoned person receding. Time blurs history and memory spits up treasures and nasties that cannot always be recognised.

  Do you even know this man? he wanted to say. Instead he gave Harrison a house key. A spontaneous offer that took him unawares but it was just a temporary arrangement to help him out between moves from one friend to another. And maybe to show him that Florida was not the only option. It turned out that Harrison could cook the most incredible stir-fry, and Larry adored that fresh feeling of welcome when he turned the key and the door swung open onto music and food. But often it was quiet with signs that he had been – a towel bunched on the floor, a dripping faucet, a shower of crumbs on the countertop. Not on Tuesdays, Larry had said, because Mariella came to clean – Cool, Harrison raised his palm. Larry wished that Harrison would stick to a schedule, this randomness was unnerv
ing but he knew it was all good experience – his last 360 review had highlighted Larry’s problems with empowerment and flexibility. Trust issues, his boss said. Just try to be more accommodating.

  And Larry liked the way Harrison had just giggled about the wallet. Like he understood there was something special between them that could not be undone by a misdemeanour. He had a tripod now, it made him feel they were on safari filming wildlife as Harrison moued and played on the bed, the chair, while Larry documented the history unfolding in front of him.

  The week before he left, Harrison lay on the rug with a sketch pad while Larry circled him with the Rebel. He said he’d always liked drawing, and maybe Larry could see something in the shading of a column.

  Larry ambushed himself with a tattoo while Harrison was gone. He fussed over word size and position. The woman – underfed with tarry hair – yawned and pointed to his hip. He wrote down the word in careful capitals so there would be no misspellings. Her needle bit, like a determined insect or maybe a scorpion. It was almost more than he could bear, and Larry wondered if he needed to become accustomed to pain. You want it or no? The woman held out a little white pill. Normally Larry would never take anything from hands that could have been anywhere – but these were uncertain times, so he swallowed. You know, she paused to stretch, I did this guy yesterday, he told me in Bangladesh the kids don’t get named till they reach their first birthday because the parents don’t think they’re going to survive.

  Sad, he murmured, clenching against the pain.

  She sighed, picked at a cuticle.

  Harrison lost his curls in Florida, came back with a buzz cut that clung to his skull like a pelt. And there was something different in his performance. He pouted so close to the lens you could see pores. Larry did not like this, he did not like the way that Harrison touched the tripod with lewd suggestion, dry humping and mincing – yes mincing – around the room with his shirt off. There were purple bruises glowering beneath the golden skin but Larry was making the big leap from auto to manual and this took all his concentration. He muttered about f-stops. He wanted to do a long exposure using the dying light so Harrison had to remain absolutely still. He explained the problem with aperture and shutter speed but something kept Harrison in perpetual motion. The images on screen revealed a restlessness that suggested someone on his way somewhere. Larry thought of the souls in the dark wood, the crayoned picture he drew for his mother of the Seventh Circle of Hell when he was eight and still believed in the possibility of being adored. But Harrison was not a suicide, he was a beautiful boy with a speech impediment.

  Since the Florida assignment Larry has been feeling brittle, the sound of twigs snapping. He keeps a noise simulator by his bedside so he can be soothed by a heartbeat or waves crashing on the shore. He drifts, remembers Nantucket summers, pootling mopeds and a hermit crab sinking into the sand, his mother stalking off towards the marina, the teetering marriage and a divorce narrowly averted when his father obliged with a heart attack. And suddenly, miraculously, Larry’s acne beat a hasty retreat, leaving behind a minefield of scars and the hunched posture of the afflicted. As he trailed the casket out onto the street Larry wondered if this was his father’s gift from the grave. But there was a trade-off: growth ceased and Larry stalled for ever at five foot seven, which rendered him invisible in the world of men. Excuse me, battling forward at bars and concerts and nightclubs. Girls looking over his head into the eyes of another.

  *

  Larry trudges through January slush to an exhibition on Washington Street.

  Hey, check out the stripes. A girl with a silver wig points from Larry’s sweater to a long rectangular canvas and then back again.

  Wow, says another. An almost perfect match.

  My God, where did you even get that? A twitter of girl laughter, like wind chimes.

  If you lay down, says Silvergirl to Larry, you could be like part of the painting.

  Cool, Harrison grabs Larry’s elbow. A cluster gathers with a craning of heads and the artist himself turns to look.

  Can he? Silvergirl spins round and pouts at the artist who nods grandly.

  Lay down, Larry, Harrison nudges him.

  Yeah Larry, lay down.

  Larry takes a step backwards. Oh come on, it’ll be fun, Silvergirl tugs his sleeve. A guy with a yellow bandana holds up a video camera and Harrison shoves Larry forward.

  You need to be right here, says Silvergirl-choreographer, yep, yeh, right – okay now bend down, she prods him expertly the way the swimming teacher used to line them up for the high dive. There you go now.

  And Larry is flat on his back on the floor blinking at the spotlights that twinkle high overhead and everyone peering down at him like the dermatologist chair again.

  Shuffle up, up, right to the baseboard. Hands by your side, Silvergirl barks and the camera whirrs and people press closer, flip open their cells.

  Oh it’s so funny, and they’re laughing, the faces looming over him, hair flopping forwards. Everyone knows him now, all these strangers calling Larry’s name and taking his picture because he is part of it now. Harrison like a ringmaster corralling the crowd. Larry turns his head sideways and sees Silvergirl is wearing silver platforms and her toenails are navy velvet with little stars. There is a frigid rush of air down here and he closes his eyes.

  But why exactly are they laughing, is it the sweater or maybe it is him, maybe they are laughing at Larry’s cratered face? And then Harrison crouches down and straddles him and a rapturous roar goes up from the crowd. With one hand flung above his head like a cowboy Harrison grabs Larry’s belt with the other and the girls are screeching Oooh and the shutters are clicking and the guy with the yellow bandana is circling like a buzzard.

  Harrison’s thighs lock Larry in a vice grip. Silvergirl tucks in snug behind Harrison, wraps her long white arms around him and the crowd urges them on. Harrison is bucking and thrusting now, Yippee-yie-yay, his shirt is open, the crowd is whooping and Larry is straining against all this friction, and he tries, he really does try to join in the fun of being ridden but his spine is banging against the floorboards, and he hisses, Harrison no, baring his teeth. But this is the bucking bronco performance of Harrison’s life. Silvergirl pulls off his shirt from behind so he is bare-chested and gleaming when Larry screams GET OFF and jerks his hips upwards with a force he does not know he possesses. Harrison’s head whips backwards, cracks into Silvergirl’s face. The crowd gasps, then rushes forwards. Omygod, she is moaning behind covered hands, and Larry can see blood streaming from her mouth or her nose, he can’t tell which. Harrison helps her up, her long legs splayed like a foal, then other arms encircle her and shepherd her away.

  And all those who remain turn to stare down at Larry, crinkle their disgusted lips as if he was a turd on the floor.

  ATH-HOLE, says Harrison and kicks Larry’s thigh, hard enough to hurt.

  Fucking creep, spits a girl with a red mouth and kicks him in the arm.

  Larry groans, rolls onto his side, bends his knees and closes his eyes, tries to zoom out and away, wills his spirit to exit his body but it clings on, his Larryness, and he can see the photo, how it would be, Man on floor, as the footsteps recede and clatter away down the stairs.

  Visiting Hours

  Emma Donoghue

  SHE SAYS SHE CAN’T, BUT that’s what they all say. It’s not that they’re lying, they just don’t know their own strength. It’s a sort of humility, they bow down before the hugeness of the pain, they all say it at some point: ‘I caaaaaan’t.’

  ‘You’re doing great,’ I tell her. ‘You’re marvellous. Big breath now.’

  It’s the visiting hours I find most interesting, actually. Not as exciting as the birth, of course, but they give me more to think about afterwards. The mum and the baby, well, that doesn’t vary much (thank God, or nature I suppose). In nearly every case I’ve had – seventeen and freaked out, or forty-five and worn out – she stares down as if she’s been looking all her life for t
his one face. As if she’s scared by how much she loves these miniature fingernails, this chamois-soft skin, these purple heels already.

  But the rest of them, you never know how it’s going to go. Grannies who get proprietorial before the cord’s been cut; I had one who wanted to catch the baby herself, but I told her that was my job. Other grannies who just ring in from the golf course. Aunts tight with jealousy, or dragging in five of their own (noses running). An uncle with the reek of whiskey off him, and lots of hearty granddads trying not to hear the gory details, and one who couldn’t stop crying. (‘It makes me feel so fecking old,’ he said in my ear.) A toddler in an ‘I’M A BIG BROTHER’ T-shirt who had no idea what was going on; a twelve-year-old who looked like she would put a pillow over the newborn’s head the minute they got home. And the dads – don’t get me started. The tight-jawed and the high-as-a-kite, and some who check in with the office while waiting for the epidural to kick in. In my experience they don’t faint like in films, but they bang into IV lines and knock the monitor belt off and yelp at the sight of blood. Or a trace of meconium, even more so; one of them ran to the nurse’s station, roaring, ‘She’s shat all over the birthing ball!’ I had one fella doubled up with what he swore were ‘sympathetic contractions’. Most of them aren’t in physical pain but would gladly lie down in front of a train rather than watch her go through any more of this. They make protests as if they’re at some customer-service desk: ‘Surely you can do something’ or ‘This is ridiculous.’ Some of them are convinced that ‘midwife’ is a euphemism for ‘student nurse’, and they keep demanding to see the doctor. A couple of times I’ve had to send them out in the corridor, just to give the woman a breathing space.