Butterfly Wings Raw Eggs And What Ifs

Tracey Iceton comes from Teeside. She has an MA in Creative Writing and tutors Creative Writing, and is about to start a fully funded PHd. 2011 Tracey won the Writers Block NE ‘’Home Tomorrow’’ Short Story Competition 2012 Shortlisted for the Bristol Short Story Competition & joint 3rd phase. She is working on a trilogy of novels set in the Troubles in Ireland, the first of which, ‘’Green Dawn at St Enda’s’’, is due for publication by Cinnamon Press in early 2016, having won the Cinnamon Press Debut Novel, Irish Novel Fair and Chapter One Children’s Novel competitions. Tracey’s website

What if I’d never poisoned my neighbour’s dog when I was ten? What if I’d never found that mutilated seagull on the beach that same summer? What if I hadn’t caught chicken pox off Sinead O’Rahilly so’s I’d have been at school, instead of peeking in through the half-open door, the day my kid brother plopped out, all bloodied and misshapen, like he’d melted a bit and reset in the wrong configuration? What if I’d been born on a Friday, loving and giving, instead of a fucking Wednesday, full of woe? What if I’d eaten all my greens, pulled up my socks, put my best foot forward? What if I’d told Digby I didn’t want to go to the bloody party?

-It’ll be a laugh.
-No, it won’t.
-We’ll get wasted.
-What’s new?
-We’ll get laid.
-Will we, now?
-Sure.
-Fuck off.
-So you’re coming?
-I’m coming.

What if the neighbours had been cat people? What if I’d hated the colour red? What if Mammy had sat me on her knee while I was still small enough and told me all the things I needed to know? What if I had been the listening sort, the sitting still sort, the do-as-you’re-told sort? What if butterflies only came out when it was dark? What if I’d have won the egg and spoon race just once? What if I’d said no just once, and meant it?

-Alright, darling.
-Who are yous?
-Friends of Jimmy’s. You letting us in, or what?
-As long as you brought your own.
-Course we did, didn’t we, Marshall?
-Yeah, Digby, course.
-Alright, but behave yourselves, so.
-Would fine gents the like of us do anything else, darling?
-Probably. In yous come.

What if they’d’ve kept their dog tied up? What if my old man didn’t grow begonias? What if the butterflies didn’t love my old man’s begonias? What if they weren’t such pretty colours, such shimmering yellows, such violent reds? What if that first one hadn’t landed right in my chubby little fingers? What if Mammy had caught me pulling the wings off it? What if I cared, just a little?

-Beer, Marshall?
-Why not?
-Smoke?
-Aye, can do.
-Here, then, you roll.
- Did you bring beers, Digby?
-Do I look daft? There’s plenty here, so why?
-Why indeed. What about all these easy lays you promised.
-They’re here.
-Where?
-What about her at the door?
-Jimmy’s lass?
-Sure.
-Fuck off.
-What?
-I like my balls attached to my body.
-So you wouldn’t?
-Only if I suddenly came over suicidal.

What if dogs didn’t like sardine sandwiches? What if I happened to quite like sardines and the dog had been a dolphin-loving vegan with high-falutin ethics? What if the dodgy swimmer that reached the egg first and made my kid brother come out all melty and warped had drowned in spunk and A.N. other swimmer, not dodgy, had pricked the egg instead? What if the midwife had taken my twisted kid brother and put him out of my misery? What if Mammy had sat me on her knee when I was still small enough and told me she loved me better than him because I was perfect and he was a freak? What if I didn’t go to parties that bored me shitless?

-What time is it?
-How the fuck would I know?
-I just thought…
-And that’s your problem, Marshall, thinking. If people thought less, fucked more and got wasted in between the world’d be a grand enough place.
-Who’s doing the thinking now?
-Have another beer.

What if the world revolved the other way? What if entropy wasn’t the second law of thermodynamics? What if things tended towards order instead of chaos? What if gravity worked in reverse and things fell up? What if begonias were all carnivorous and butterflies were their favourite fare? What if chickens didn’t lay eggs? What if butterflies didn’t have wings? What if butterflies came from chicken’s eggs and chickens were responsible for all the chaos in the world? What if up was down, right was left, stop was go, you was me? What if I hadn’t suddenly come over suicidal?

-This properly blows. Dunno why I let you drag me along.
-’Cos you’re in love with the good times.
-This is the good times?
-Can you remember any better ones, Marshall?
-I remember last Christmas, that piss-up at Monty’s, Iceman taking a hatchet to his sideboard and us falling about laughing.
-I’m talking about proper good times. Times when you felt better than you do right now.
-Better how?
-Emptier? Fuller? I don’t know. What does it matter? Smoke? Drink? Something for the weekend, sir?
-It is the weekend.
-Something for now, sir?
-Jimmy’s lass?
-She was checking you out when she let us in.
-You’re off your fucking head, Digby.
-This music’s shite.
-Musak, you mean.
-Whatever, Marshall. I’m gonna get off my arse and do something, get some hardcore techno banging out.
-Not the sort of banging I was hoping for.
-It doesn’t just walk up to you, you know. You should try getting off your arse, doing something.
-Leave me the weed.

What if I hadn’t worn red the day I poisoned the neighbour’s dog? What if my kid brother’s first word, spoken when he was seven, was my name, not ‘dog’? What if Mammy had bothered to hard boil the egg before she sent me out to race with it balanced precariously on a tablespoon? What if I’d worn my wellies that day? What if schools didn’t make kids run with eggs balanced precariously on tablespoons? What if butterflies ate raw eggs? What if Jimmy’s lass hadn’t just walked up to me?

-What’s that you’re smoking in my kitchen?
-Weed.
-Is it, now.
-Aye.
-Well, you gonna give us a drag, or what?
-Here.
-Yous aren’t really friends of Jimmy’s.
-Nope, not me. Digby, maybe.
-Why’d they call you Marshall?
-’S my name.
-Why?
-Dunno.
-You get a badge to go with a name like that?
-Nope. Least I got a name.
-Fiona.
-I don’t like it.
-Fuck you, then.
-If you insist.

What if Digby’s mammy had kept him away from me on account of her bad feeling about me? What if Digby’s mammy hadn’t forgotten to resist the night Digby’s da came home wasted and climbed on top of her? What if the little swimmer that reached the egg that made up one half of Digby long before Digby was Digby had been X instead of Y? What if he’d come out a minute past midnight instead of a minute before and been a year younger, a year lower? What if he’d beaten me in the egg and spoon race? What if I’d beaten him in the egg and spoon race? What if our eggs had been hard boiled by our mammies? What if the neighbour’s dog had turned up his snout at my poisoned sardine sandwich? What if the tide had been high enough to cover up the dead seagull the day we went to the beach that same summer? What if Jimmy’s lass hadn’t just slipped her hand in mine and led me up the stairs? What if I wasn’t so horny and easily led?

-Are you drunk, Marshall?
-I don’t think so.
-High, then?
-Maybe. A bit. Not too much.
-What’s too much?
-When your cock goes numb.
-Not numb now, is it?
-Why don’t you check for me?
-Like this?
-Yeah, just like that.
-You got any tattoos, Marshall?
-Nope.
-I do. Wanna see?
-Do I?
-You might. It’s on my hip.
-What is it?
-Guess.
-A butterfly?
-Aye, how’d you know?
-Had to be, always is. Let’s see it then. Before my cock goes numb.

What if butterflies were never red? What if eggs were never raw? What if dogs were never greedy? What if kid brothers were never twisted freaks? What if mammies were never stupid enough to leave ten year olds in charge of seven year olds? What if begonias never got black-fly, green-fly, white-fly, and were never needing to be sprayed with weed killer? What if weed killer never came in bonny red spray-gun bottles? What if tattooed red butterflies never came out at night to land right in my nicotine stained fingers? What if friends never dragged friends along to parties with shite musak where they sat around getting stoned, drinking other people’s beer and leching after their lasses? What if friends never absented themselves from said parties to shag the backs out of said other people’s lasses while said friends were trying to swap said shite musak for hardcore techno? What said other people never came back suddenly from booze runs to be told some cunt was upstairs shagging the back out of said other person’s lass?

-How’s your cock now? Numb yet?
-Nope, just pleasantly tingly. What about you?
-I don’t have a cock.
-’S that why you helped yourself to mine, there?
-Dunno. Think it was the name.
-What?
-Marshall. How many chances am I gonna get to fuck a Marshall?
-As many as you want.
What if doors didn’t fly open and enraged boyfriends didn’t charge through them while horny, easily led boyos were getting sucked off by lasses with butterfly tattoos and strong tongues? -What the fuck?
-Jimmy!
-Ah, Jesus Christ.
-I’m gonna fucking kill you.
-Jimmy, stop it, don’t. Jimmy, you’ll kill him. Jimmy!
-Get your arse up. Get dressed. You and me are taking a wee drive.
-Hey, c’mon, there’s no need…
-I’ve just fucking decorated this room, so I ain’t blowing your brains out all over it.
-Jimmy, please, don’t!
-Don’t worry yourself, Fi, you’ll be getting a good hiding when I’ve done with this cunt.

What if I’d never pulled the wings off that butterfly: life destroyed? What if I hadn’t dropped my egg and spattered yellow snotty goo all over my sandals, my toes: life destroyed? What if I hadn’t found that half-dead seagull and started in on it like it was a game of ‘Operation’: life destroyed? What if I hadn’t been in the back garden, out of earshot, watching that son-of-a-bitch dog wolf down sardines avec weed killer, while my mutant kid brother was falling down the stairs, breaking his neck, dying in a pool of beautiful red: life destroyed? What if I hadn’t done more than enough to deserve having my brains blown out by Jimmy Mac-something who was bigger than me in every fucking way possible? Life destroyed.
What if Digby hadn’t come out of the living room, hardcore techno blazing behind him, just as Jimmy was driving me down the stairs with his gun up my arse? What if Digby really had been a friend of Jimmy’s? What if Digby really hadn’t been a friend of mine? Life destroyed.

-What the fuck? Fuck’s sake, Marshall.
-You know this piece of shit?
-I do, aye, Jimmy.
-Do I fucking know you?
-Don’t you remember me, Jimmy? That job we did together.
-I ain’t done any jobs with you. Don’t even know your fucking name.
-Oh, sure, now I’m hurt. How can you be forgetting a name like Digby?
-Whatever your name is, this’s got nothing to do with you. So stay outta it and we’ll be on our way.
-Sure, sure. And where would you be taking him, now?
-Never you fucking mind.
-Marshall?
-It’s alright, Digby. We’re just going for a wee drive.
-Aye. Like fuck yous are.

What if Digby had been me and I had been Digby? Simple - Digby still would’ve ended up dead, a metal slug barrelling through his skull, dropping him like he was rolling off a tablespoon, mashing his brains raw-egg style. And I still would’ve walked away untouched, leaving a trail of footprints, each a wing ripped off a beautiful red butterfly.