Getting It in the Head: Stories

by Mike McCormack

Genres: Magical Realism; Short Stories

Synopsis

The acclaimed debut from the author of Booker-listed Solar Bones is a dark, uncanny collection of stunning breadth and audacity.

In this gothic, virtuoso debut collection, Mike McCormack dispenses nightmares both stylish and macabre. “A Is for Ax” offers an alphabetized account of the killing of a parent, while the title story tracks a chilling sibling rivalry. Others tell of a quiz on the road to Calvary, a door-to-door saleswoman trafficking in strange and menacing feats, and a self-mutilating artist pushing himself to the limit. These sly and dangerous stories, balanced on a knife’s edge between life and death, showcase a young writer’s mastery of wicked formal play.

Release date: April 6, 2021

Publisher: Soho Press

Print pages: 272

Sample

“The Gospel of Knives”
 
When I opened the door and saw her standing there like an effigy, draped from head to toe in some fashion paraphrase of a chador, my mind flamed with a single, sordid thought: I wanted to get down on my knees before her in that sweetest of all acts of sexual worship and lick her out good and proper. I could see from her face—the swarthy skin, the too-even set of her teeth, the retroussé nose—that this was a woman of pent-up desires and trammeled passions and I fancied that I was the man to rectify all that. I glowed with confidence. Here was easy meat and it was as much as I could do to stop a predatory grin from spreading over my own teeth. However, when I invited her into my room and she spread out her collection of knives on the table I knew that I had made one of the bigger mistakes of my young and now bitter life.
    “I’m a seller of knives,” she said needlessly, arranging the gleaming pieces on the table, “and I’m here to sell you one of these.”
     I swallowed heavily, eyeing the array of steel which had so quickly covered the table. I would never have guessed that there were so many variations on the single theme of the blade.
     “I’m sorry,” I stammered, “but I’ve got all the knives I need. I’ve got a bread knife and a set of steak knives and a short blade for peeling. I live on my own, so you can see then that I’m not exactly in the market for a new one.”
     “No,” she said quietly, “I think if you look closely at the circumstances of your life you will find that there is ample room in it for one extra blade. No one’s life is so complete that they can afford to do without one of these knives.”
     “I thought you were selling encyclopedias or you were some kind of a Jehovah’s Witness,” I said plaintively.
     “No, I’m a seller of knives. My work is to spread the Gospel of Knives because in the beginning was The Knife. All other versions are fiction. My job is to spread the redemptive word of The Knife. Answer me this, what is the greatest of man’s inventions?”
     “I suppose you’re going to tell me it’s the knife.”
     “Of course, there is no other answer. Taken unawares, most people say it’s the wheel or fire. But they are wrong because the knife is at the source of all. When man picked up his first knife and started cutting and sawing and slicing it was the opening moment of his humanity, the instant of his divinity. Now in all my years in this ministry I’ve never met a man who did not need a knife. I’ve met men who have denied God’s word out of face and I’ve met men who couldn’t sign their name and they’ve all managed without any noticeable handicap. But all these people were bound together by their need for knives. And do you know why? The simple answer is that it is impossible to go through life without cutting or slicing; it wouldn’t be human. If I met a man who didn’t need a knife I’d just pack up my bags and walk away because it would be a sure sign that I had met someone who was less than human and a waste of words. But you’re human, are you not?”
     “Yes, I suppose so.”
     “Well, then it follows that you need one of these knives, it’s unavoidable.”
     “I’ve already told you that I’m full up with knives.”
     “Have you a lover?”
     “Yes,” I lied.
     “Good, because every lover needs a knife. I knew of a man once who woke up beside his beloved and saw for the first time how ugly she was, the scales had finally dropped from his eyes. And even though she was sleeping on his arm he was so panic-stricken he started to chew his own arm off, gnawing and tearing at it like a snared animal. And it took him so long that eventually his beloved awoke and looked at him. He got such a fright that he went into shock and couldn’t move. She couldn’t move him either and he died there in the bed within fifteen minutes. Now if he had one of these”—she held up a short, double blade, smooth and serrated—“he could have had that arm off in two minutes and made good his escape. You wouldn’t want to end up in a situation like that, now would you?”
     “That’s a ridiculous story. Besides, it could never happen; my sweetheart is very beautiful.”
     “All beauty fades but with proper care and attention a good knife will last forever.”
     “I heard a story once of a child philosopher who couldn’t get his penknife sharp enough and he spent all his time honing it until one day the blade disappeared altogether.”
     I will never know why I made up that story.
     “That’s the story of a fanatic,” she said coldly. “The story of a man looking for irreducible truths. It wasn’t the knife which failed him but his imagination. The knife was probably perfectly good within its set application. What he should have done was get another knife. There is no danger of that happening with these knives. Have you ever been to prison?”
     “No, I live a virtuous and God-fearing existence.”
     “And is your life so blameless that you are utterly without fear of reckoning?”
     “The truth is that I have no life. I have no qualifications or work. I have no future and I’m not old enough to have a past. Occasions for sin are severely limited.”
     “Nevertheless, the world is full of treacheries. One day you might find yourself incarcerated, walled up for a crime you didn’t commit, mass concrete and iron bars between you and the blue sky. You might have exhausted all words and petitions and found no succor in prayer. Then these are the knives for you, they are absolute knives. This one can cut through any substance known to man, it has never been known to fail.”
     “That’s ridiculous,” I retorted.
     “Knives are sacred,” she replied. “I would not defile them with lies.”
     “You’re serious about all this?” I said incredulously.
     “Yes,” she replied. “Because these are serious knives.”
 
 
By now any notion of sexual conquest had fled my mind completely. Her unspeakable beauty dominated the room like a caryatid from some distant, ruined temple and her smile filled me with dread. I could almost hear her mind whirring through a set of instructions, sizing up the options before her face committed itself. It did not help either that my table was now laid out and glittering as if for some terrible, total surgery. I wanted my room emptied now, bare and empty as I had always loved it.
     “I know everything there is to know about knives,” she continued. “Anything I don’t know about knives is a lie. Look at this one.” She took up a short, curved piece and juggled it neatly from hand to hand. “This is a survivalists’ knife, special army issue to the SAS, the US Navy Seals, and other elite antiterrorist units. It’s a tungsten alloy laid over with Teflon. It’s hafted by a brass tang to an ebony handle. It’s the sharpest knife in creation, strictly under-the-counter material and rarer than most gems.”
     Suddenly she hopped forward on one foot and her arm swung down like a scythe. The knife split the air and buried itself in the door at the other end of the room. The walls resonated with the terrific impact. She withdrew the blade cleanly and handed it to me.
     “Now bid for it,” she commanded.
     “I’ve got no money, I’m on the dole. I can’t afford to go throwing away money I don’t have on things I don’t need.”
     “Who said anything about money?”
     “You’re a saleswoman,” I said. “Money is what you deal in.”
     “You’re being presumptuous again. You’ve been that way from the moment you opened the door. I prefer to think of myself as a kind of beneficent society, like the International Gideon Society for instance. I leave people their knives and I walk away. I’ve left knives in hotel rooms and houses all over the world. Sometimes, however, I have to go door to door and get some remuneration, I have to keep body and soul together also.”
     “But I have nothing to give. Look around you, I’ve only these four walls and these four limbs. I have nothing to give.”
     “That is not true. When I opened the door you wanted to possess me, you wanted to get down on your knees and worship. We could settle for that. One knife against one loveless act of sexual possession. A fair exchange is no robbery and since I want you it would be an honorable transaction.”
     I almost squealed in horror. “I can’t,” I said, a dense wave of nausea swelling through my body. “It’s crazy. It’s the craziest thing I’ve ever heard. Why can’t you just leave me the knife and go?” I could feel myself being reduced to a caricature of despair. I was on the verge of wringing my hands.
     “I’m not a charity,” she said coldly. “I want you and you need this knife. I really don’t see any problem.”
     “I told you before I don’t need the knife. Jesus, do I have to go on and on repeating myself?” Tears were beginning to well behind my eyelids.
     “You’ve just told me that you own nothing. Ten minutes of sexual humility and you will own the finest knife in creation. What is there to be afraid of?”
     I was suddenly sobbing, my whole body jerking like a string puppet, tears coursing down my face. Some nacreous light seemed to have spilled in the room and the walls had taken on a tremendous slant. She was now standing before me, sphinxlike and implacable.
     “Are you being willfully ignorant or do I have to spell it out for you? That knife-throwing trick is the least of my talents. I do not think you want to see my full repertoire.”
     I felt my legs collapse beneath me and I was suddenly on the floor, watching my tears spill onto the carpet. When I looked up she was hauling my face up by the hair, standing over me with her legs apart and holding her skirt up with her free hand. She was smiling down on me now without humor, flashing those perfect, too-even teeth.
     “That’s it, boy, on your knees. Be witnessed in the true faith of The Knife.” She pulled my face in closer. “This is going to stay with you for the rest of your life. Like a good sharp knife in fact.”