A Reading Life Special Event
Irish Short Story Month Year III
March 1 to March 31
Eddie Stack
Dublin
"It Couldn't Happen to a Nicer Man"
In an act of supreme generosity Eddie Stack has sent me 22 short stories to post for Irish Short Story Month. I offer him my great thanks for this. I intend to share all of these short stories with my readers. He is a master story teller with a deep understanding of Ireland.
Press comments on his work
Press comments on his work
Praise for Eddie Stack’s writing
"Mr. Stack's fiction is versatile and engaging...a vivid, compassionate, authentic voice...securing (him) a place in the celebrated tradition of his country's storytelling.” -
“This second collection of short stories by Eddie Stack has a wonderful sense of unreality, of weirdness among Irish characters and of downright fun.”
“Eddie Stack’s stories jet back and forth across the Atlantic, contrasting small town Ireland and big city US. Every time they land, the author seems to test the borderline of what might and might not be possible in downtown bars, crumbling dance halls and drizzly farms. The result is a remarkably consistent collection of short stories.
"It Couldn’t Have Happened to a Nicer Man"
by
Eddie Stack
Sergeant Malone’s eyelids
closed into nutshells and he exhaled like a punctured tire when he heard a car
pull into the barracks yard. Kitty
Kelly, the new constable. No sooner had he conjured up her name than she
was standing before him, right hand raised in salute.
“Kitty Kelly, skipper,” she announced. Malone looked at her
with weary eyes. She was a big woman, six foot four and almost two hundred
pounds weight, he reckoned. They shook hands.
“Sit down Kitty,” he said, “welcome to Bearnagweithe.”
“Glad to be here,” she replied, looking around for a chair, “Who’s
that fella in the red ski suit I saw downtown?”
“Red ski suit? Oh, that’s Spoke Whelan, he’s harmless.”
“What’s his game?” Kitty quizzed, taking off her cap.
“Resident genius,” said the sergeant, looking at her hair,
bottle blonde and cropped nearly to the bone. Oh Jesus, he thought, they’ve
sent me the Gestapo. Sergeant Malone opened a manila folder and yawned, “I’ve
booked you into the Imperial Hotel until you find a place of your own…”
“Fine. What kind of a patch have you here?”
“It’s quiet, as a rule…”
Constable Kitty Kelly
drove slowly to the Imperial Hotel, checking out the town. She saw the oddball
in the red ski suit again and stared at him until he hurried down a laneway.
She wondered about the nun-like waif with the quick walk, and circled the
square to get a better glimpse of her face. “This place is full of weirdoes,”
Kitty thought, nosing into a parking spot in front of the hotel.
She was just about satisfied with her room, which had a view of
the town square and a wrought iron balcony. The bed was large with a good
mattress and the wardrobe had plenty space for all her luggage and boxes of
baggage.
Kitty
looked out the window and scanned the town. It was no great shakes: hodge-podge
shops and houses, badly parked cars and no people to be seen apart from the
lady stepping out of the bank across the square. The policewoman watched her, a
redhead with a confident walk. Good legs, thought Kitty, stepping back from the
window as the lady approached the hotel.
When Constable Kelly entered the dining room,
the redhead was sitting alone at a table by the window. Engrossed in her
newspaper, she was startled when the policewoman asked,
“Mind if I join you?”
“No, no. Please do,” she replied to the woman in blue uniform.
“Thanks. Kitty Kelly, latest addition to the forces of law and
order here.”
“Oh! I’m Joan Long, I work at the bank.”
They
made small talk. Kitty quizzed Joan about the town social life, flats, and
such. She smiled into the bank teller’s innocent brown eyes, gazed at her neck
and looked lovingly at her slender hands. A virgin, she thought, noticing no
rings on the fingers, no sorrow in the soul.
Kitty’ was enjoying her
main course until a man came to the table in a whirlwind of greetings.
“Hello, hello, hello!” announced Malcolm Finn, pulling out a
chair and joining them. Joan greeted him and Kitty stared at the intruder.
“It’s good manners to ask if you may sit,” she said coldly.
“I beg your pardon?” stammered Malcolm, ruddy as a beetroot, “this
is my table, and I always dine here.”
Joan got flustered, wiped her mouth with a napkin and
apologized that the confusion was her fault; she should have informed Constable
Kelly that it was Malcolm’s regular table. Kitty grunted and stabbed a roast
potato with her fork, speckling gravy on the tablecloth. Malcolm bit his lip,
put on his spectacles and stared blankly at the menu. He felt uncomfortable,
face boiling, mist of sweat on his brow. Kitty eyed him sullenly: a soft man in
late mid-life, dressed impeccably in country tweed jacket, checked shirt and
bow tie. Gentry, she thought, chewing a lump of steak.
Malcolm ordered a schooner of sherry to start with, baked
haddock to follow, easy on the white sauce, plenty broccoli and hold the
carrots. Joan asked how his orchids were coming along and he sipped his sherry
and said,
“Very
well actually. Last week’s sun did them a barrel of good so they’re just on the
verge of opening...that’s the most exciting time...just when...”
“So where would you advice me to start looking for a flat?”
Kitty cut in, addressing herself to Joan.
“Ah…well I got mine through the local newspaper, The
Independent.”
“How big is your place?”
“Just a studio really, bedroom off a living-room cum kitchen.
But tiny all the same...I’ve been trying to persuade Malcolm here to rent me
part of his place but he won’t budge. “ Malcolm smiled uneasily.
“The old servants quarters, you know...disused and in a
terrible state...not rentable in it’s present right now...”
“I wasn’t asking.” Kitty stopped.
“I’m sorry, please excuse me ladies.” Malcolm said and drained
his sherry. He rose from the table and left the dining room with a proud walk.
“Who’s that weirdo?” asked Kitty.
“Malcolm Finn,” sighed the bank teller as she rooted in her
handbag for anxiety pills, “A gentleman farmer who lives a mile or so outside
the town. He’s very well off but a little eccentric...a bachelor who won’t ever
marry.”
“Who’d want to marry a sponge like him?”
“Ah he’s a nice man though, it just takes a while to get to
know him. He hasn’t much else apart from the flowers...anyway I’d better get
back to work. It was nice meeting you Kitty, and welcome to town.”
“Thanks. And listen, I’ll see you around. We might meet for a
drink or something. I’m staying here in the hotel.”
It rained on and off for
the next week and Kitty prowled around the town, shoulders back, eyes
searching, intense as a spotlight. One day she cautioned two town deadbeats for
loitering around the public toilets in the Square. Another time she asked Jake
Sloecome if he had permission to display a sandwich sign on the footpath
outside his bookshop. On market day, she followed Spoke Whelan for two hours,
as he slowly walked every street, alley and lane in the town, eyes to the
ground, looking for a diamond he had seen in a dream. She knocked off the surveillance when he
bowed into St. Colman’s church for inspiration.
Off duty, Kitty took to the bed and fantasized about Joan
Lyons. But she didn’t join her for lunch again, sat alone instead at a round
table in the dining room and brooded while Joan and Malcolm Finn joked at his
spot by the window.
One evening, just as dusk
fell and rain pelted in squalls, Kitty snared Joan as she left the bank. They
walked briskly to the teller’s flat and Kitty whispered, “Would there be any
chance of a cup of tea? I’m perished with the cold.”
“Sure,” said Joan, opening the door, “come in. Sorry that the
place is in a mess...”
“It’s fine,” Kitty replied.
The first thing the policewoman noticed was the underwear
drying on the back of a chair by the fireplace and her blood heated up. Joan
brought tea and biscuits on a tray and whipped the undies away in
embarrassment.
“They shouldn’t be there,” she said in a half-laugh.
“What’s natural is wonderful,” Kitty chuckled.
They sipped tea and complained about the weather and the lack
of life in the town. Kitty smiled and said, “We should go away some weekend—hit
the hot spots in Dublin...”
“Yeah,” Joan said dreamily, “actually I haven’t been in Dublin
for ages...”
“What about going there some weekend?” Kitty pressed.
“Yeah, maybe. It’s a thought. Would you like more tea or
another biscuit?”
“Yes please. And by the way, I love your hair. Beautiful cut.”
“Really? Do you think so Kitty?”
After that evening, Kitty
regularly called on Joan for late afternoon tea and biscuits. She subtly tried
to woo the banker away from Malcolm Finn’s table and was surprised when Joan
said,
“Actually Kitty, in an odd sort of a way I feel that Malcolm
needs me. He likes the company and loves discussing girly things...you know...like
he loves talking about perfume and make-up...He’s odd I suppose but the poor
man is harmless.”
Kitty felt like savaging Malcolm, decrying him as a fruit, an
impotent wimp. But she felt that might have an undesirable effect. Instead she
philosophized about sexuality and deviance in a most compassionate way.
“Different strokes for different folks,” she said softly, “it
takes all types to make the world.
On a late-night prowl
around town, Kitty spotted Malcolm Finn driving down Clare Street and wondered
where he was going. She gazed after the car as it wound slowly down the street
and turned up Briar Hill. At least he’s not going to see my honey, Kitty
thought, fondling the undies in her pocket that she had earlier nicked out of
Joan’s laundry basket in the bathroom.
Undies were also on Malcolm Finn’s mind that night. He parked
in the shadows outside St. Mary’s Church and sat in his car, listened to the
wind whip the black leafless trees and frowned at wisps of cloud gliding past a
crescent moon. Malcolm left the car quietly and melding with the shadows; he
walked by the high churchyard wall and crossed through the cemetery, shutting
out the whispers of his dead ancestors. At the end of the burial ground he
stooped by an iron gate and fiddled with the lock keep. Gently he coaxed the
heavy barrier open and slipped into the convent grounds.
Malcolm made his way through the high-hedged garden, which he
often visited with Mother Superior. At the tall monument of the Crucifixion he
veered left and turned into the drying-yard by the laundry. His mouth watered:
lazily swaying in dim the moonlight, dozens of schoolgirls’ underwear boggled
his mind. “Ahhh!” he gasped and rushed
across the cobblestone yard.
Just as Malcolm reached for a pair of black tights, he was
dazzled by a blaze of lights. He shielded his eyes in fright. A bell rang
somewhere and the convent wolfhound barked. Panic stricken, Malcolm ran but
couldn’t find a way out of the yard. He heard voices, dozens of voices and he
covered his head with his jacket. The hands of ten nuns grabbed him, and he
fell to the ground weeping, clutching a pair of black tights.
Mother Superior was kind to Malcolm and gave him hot cocoa with
a good shot of brandy. Sitting in her office, he confessed his mission and told
her about his closet life. She pursed her lips and stared at her desk while
wondering if the same rules of sin applied to non-Catholics like him. He was
always different, she thought, remembering their excursions to garden shows
around the country. How could a man who was so passionately in love with
flowers be a sinner as well? No, she concluded, Malcolm was not a sinner, he
was just ill.
“Malcolm,” she said quietly, “I think you should see Doctor
Maura. I’ll make an appointment for you and we’ll forget all about this
incident.”
Doctor Maura knew Malcolm
well; they often played bridge together, he attended her New Year’s Eve party
and she never missed his annual birthday bash in the manse. A kind faced woman
with grey hair in a bun, she sat at her surgery desk and opened his medical
file. Malcolm nervously fingered his tweed hat.
“I’m not gay,” he muttered, “I just like wearing women’s
clothes...”
Dr. Maura nodded. “It’s nothing to be ashamed of,” she
consoled, “you’re a cross-dresser.”
He made a whimpering sound and checked himself promptly, sat
erect in the chair. Dr. Maura trotted out case histories and informed him that
there were other closet cross-dressers in the area and he was not alone. She
took off her spectacles and said,
“Once you have the clothes, you’ll be fine.”
It took him a couple of
days to raise the subject with Joan Long. She was supping her soup when he
whispered that he was a cross-dresser. Her eyes widened and the spoon halted
before her mouth. Malcolm waited for the news to settle and was heartened when
she said,
“I’m still your friend, your private life is your own business.”
He clasped her hand and muttered.
“Thank you Joan, thank you.”
At desert he wondered if she might do him a huge favor: help
him buy a couple of feminine outfits. Without hesitation Joan agreed and
Malcolm closed his eyes with a sweet smile.
Kitty Kelly called on Joan
that evening and they had tea and biscuits in front of the fire. The
policewoman again suggested going away for the weekend; Willie Nelson was
playing in Dublin and she could get tickets. Joan winced and said that she had
a prior arrangement with Malcolm. Kitty’s head jerked backwards. “Joan,” she
sighed, “I don’t know for the life of me, what you see in him.”
On Saturday morning Malcolm collected Joan and they drove to
Galway. A cheerful drive over the mountains, opera on the radio, she explaining
the qualities of different fabric and cloth, Malcolm confiding fantasies. And
you’ll probably want make-up, she said, looking at his face and wondering what
would suit.
Joan suggested they shop at Brown Thomas and she led him
through the various departments. Malcolm was in ecstasy and admired lingerie,
negligees, underwear. He swooned at mannequins and realized he needed a wig as
well, brunette he thought; blonde would suit better, Joan advised. When he’d
picked out what he wanted, she took the items to the counter and they carried
four huge bags of goodies back to the car.
“This truly has been one of the happiest days in my life,” he
said as they drove home, “Thank you Joan, thank you.”
Malcolm shaved his legs
that night and pulled on panties and tights. Stuffed the cups of his black bra
with tissues and tied it over his chest. He selected a pale satin blouse from
the three he’d got and stood in front of the full-length mirror, tied the
buttons, settled the collar. Then he took a brown tweed skirt from the hanger,
opened the zip and stepped into it. Sat at the dressing table in his bedroom
and carefully applied make-up to his face. Finally he donned the blonde wig and
settled the crown on his head. Malcolm looked at his transformed reflection in
the mirror and gasped, “Oohh la-la...”
He had a rapturous evening in the manse, lounged in the sitting
room under paintings of his ancestors, played Mozart on the hi-fi and got tipsy
on champagne. At bedtime he slowly undressed, put his clothes away neatly and
pulled on a crimson negligee with black trim. Washed off the make-up, applied
moisturizing cream to his face and went to bed with his blonde wig on.
“At last I’m myself,” he muttered to the pillow.
At lunch the following
Monday, he told Joan about his nights at home. I’d love to have seen you, she
giggled and Malcolm broke into uncontrollable laughter that turned the heads of
other diners. Kitty Kelly shot him a caustic look and he blushed and dabbed
sweat from his forehead with a napkin.
“God Malcolm,” Joan said quietly, “I have never seen you
happier.”
“I know,” he chuckled, “I know.”
Some nights later as
Malcolm sipped sherry in a tight black velvet dress, he decided to pay a
surprise visit on Joan. Maybe pick up the back issues of Cosmopolitan that she’d
promised him. He examined his make-up, settled the wig, and sprayed a little
Estee Lauder on his neck. Perfect, he smiled, posing this way and that in front
of the mirror. What a surprise she’ll get, he chuckled. First time ever outside
the manse in woman’s dress, he felt overwhelmed by freedom, looked at the
cloudy sky with outstretched hands and said, “Thank
you God, thank you for being good to Malcolm.”
He was unprepared for the
difficulties of driving with high heels and the car growled painfully as he
changed gears. It took all the concentration he had to control the vehicle and
a couple of times he thought he heard his mother’s voice pleading with him to
turn around and go back home. “It’s the sherry,” he chuckled. “Mother loved
sherry.”
On
the outskirts of the town a figure emerged from the darkness. Malcolm saw the
luminous belt and the blue uniform commanding him to stop.
“Good grief!” he muttered and halted.
Kitty Kelly peered at the vehicle registration number and then
looked at the driver. Malcolm Finn in black velvet dress, blonde wig and
scarlet lipstick. Her chest expanded and she towered over the car.
“Kitty,” he stammered, “us ladies have to stick together.”
“Get out of the car, you pervert,” the policewoman ordered,
fingers squeezing her black truncheon.
End of Guest Post
Eddie Stack has received several accolades for his fiction, including an American Small Press of the Year Award, and a Top 100 Irish American Award. Recognized as an outstanding short story writer, he is the author of four books —The West; Out of the Blue; HEADS and Simple Twist of Fate.
A natural storyteller, Eddie has recorded spoken word versions of his work, with music by Martin Hayes and Dennis Cahill. In 2010, he integrated spoken word and printed work with art, music and song to produce an iPhone app of The West; this was the first iPhone app of Irish fiction.
His work has appeared in literary reviews and anthologies worldwide, including Fiction, Confrontation, Whispers & Shouts, Southwords and Criterion; State of the Art: Stories from New Irish Writers; Irish Christmas Stories, The Clare Anthology and Fiction in the Classroom.
A natural storyteller, Eddie has recorded spoken word versions of his work, with music by Martin Hayes and Dennis Cahill. In 2010, he integrated spoken word and printed work with art, music and song to produce an iPhone app of The West; this was the first iPhone app of Irish fiction.
My great thanks to Eddie Stack for allowing me to post this story.
This story is the sole property of Eddie Stack and is protected under international copyright laws and cannot be published or posted online without his permission.
Mel u
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