Category: Fiction

“Row, row, row your boat, gently down the stream…” “Merrily, merrily, merrily, merrily, life is but a dream…” We sang this, over and over, bellowing with drunken enthusiasm as we did indeed row a boat – a long wood canoe, rather – down the winding passage of the creek through the valley.

“Seven, red!” the dealer shouts. I am sitting on a padded black stool. My elbows glued to the upholstered edge of the roulette table, with my chin resting against my intertwined fingers. The guy in a black Puma tracksuit, who’s been standing next to me for the last six hours, is punching the air with…

We arrive early at the museum, Jean and me. It’s a special event for patrons but my friend has somehow acquired two free tickets. Two, she has emphasised, in order that I might accompany her. She is wearing her aquamarine scarf; Jean always wears a scarf.

The HiAce van eased to a stop in the train station car park. Ossian’s uncle said nothing. In silence, they emerged into the morning light and slipped behind the van. Ossian took his time, soaking up his surroundings: the row of commuters’ cars, the boarded-up station house, the pinkish sky over the town below, and…

Burls threw water over his face and ruffled the tight curls of his thick hair like pigeons did in the fountain in Washington Square Park. In his first week at NYU, he learned how just being in the city slickens you with a creeping layer of grime. It wasn’t always visible, but the dirt was…

With the euphoria of some chemical released to prepare me for impact, of held-down car horns announcing, with the high-pitched whine of brakes shrieking in distress – the car veering towards a stretch of grassy median before performing an elaborate skidding manoeuvre, as if all grip conceded by the four tyres at once, kicking up…

There’s an issue with one of my friends, Hector. He has a tendency to introduce me to gangsters and dealers. It’s only after the fact that he’ll say: “Here’s the scoop. That guy runs the heroin out of Darndale to the whole of North Dublin.”

My mules needed rest, as did I. In the distance, what seemed like a village. I dismounted and walked about. I was thrilled to find we spoke the same tongue. An elderly man with yellow fingernails led me to his home. His wife and granddaughter sat atop a floor of littered purple flowers. I noticed…