Six Five Four by John Armstrong (Winner)

It was my big sister Brigid found the first finger tucked away down the back of the couch. I was busy watching the telly and she was there beside me digging between the cushions for money to give the ice cream man and her hand came up and there was a finger in it. Dead and old and curled like a hook around nothing. Finger number one left a faint brown stain on the side of the cushion only ever upturned when the two of us are playing gravediggers. Brigid cupped the finger carefully in her two hands to show me. Looking down at it made me feel sick like it was going in my mouth. The jingle from the ice cream man was fading up the road again but neither of us were thinking about that anymore. On the telly the green puppet and the orange puppet were singing:

Six five four,
Three two one,
Now our counting song is done.

Shouldn't we show Mammy? I asked but even saying it felt in my guts it was the wrong thing and Brigid agreed with my guts by shaking her head. We both knew from experience that Mammy tended to get annoyed if you tried showing her things. Better to save the showing for emergencies. So Brigid pushed the finger back down the side of the couch where it wouldn’t go astray and the two of us tried ignoring it and watching the telly and I counted to six six times because six is the safest number.

The next day it was me thumping down the stairs when I saw finger number two pushing in through the letterbox and dropping down onto the pile of leaflets and old envelopes. I ran to the front window but there was no postman there or anybody else. Finger number two was more recent and had a fat grubby nail and a band of gold squeezed between the knuckles. I picked it up even though it made me feel queasy and held it to me as if it would be taken and counted to six six times because six is the safest number.

I think this one belongs to a man I said to Brigid and she agreed.
We tried to pull the ring off between us but it wouldn’t budge. Brigid even tried her teeth as if the finger was a bottle of fizzy orange.
Tastes like ham she said pretending to bare her fangs and revealing all the gaps.
We agreed the ring was reason enough to show Mammy because maybe we could sell it or return it for a finders fee.
Mammy was rushing out the door with her cleaning bag slung over her shoulder and the two of us stood in front of her and I lifted the finger coaxing the gold to glint the light. I thought for a second that maybe she’d be excited and maybe she’d stay home and maybe we’d get chips but she wasn’t.
Get that dirty thing out of my house was all she said.
Later Brigid said to me she’s only sour because she’s never had one.
A finger? I asked before thinking.
No you ballbag a wedding.
Sometimes we’d argue over which of our daddies Mammy should have married. Our daddies were like big muscley imaginary friends we could make fight. We knew our daddies were different because Brigid’s hair came in waves and mine in curls and because sometimes ladies on the bus would ask me was I anywhere sunny on my holidays when I wasn’t. Mammy says both our daddies are good men and kind and have important jobs over in England that keep them busy twenty four seven. Mammy says she spent most her life feeling lonely for something she couldn’t name but not anymore because now she has me and she has Brigid. On the telly the daddies are always walking in the door with big smiles taking off their hats. A lot of things on telly are fake and that’s how I know.

We decided to hold onto the fingers just in case their owners ever came knocking. Brigid slid her barbie box out from under her bed and bent the doll to sit naked on the dresser and nestled the fingers down inside the box among all the tiny outfits Mammy had made. The two fingers looked so mismatched and lonely down there together that I was almost glad when next morning finger number three slid from the cornflakes box and down into my bowl. My heart jumped because I thought I had won a prize. Finger number three had a nail painted sharp and red and was either a pinky finger or off a smaller hand. As far as I could tell the finger looked clean enough so I set it next to my bowl and continued the pour. As I chewed instead of trying to read the ingredients I gave some thought to the idea of fingers. A finger has to come off a hand and a hand has to come off a person and not without a serious amount of bother. One thing Mammy made sure the two of us understood about the world was that nothing comes out of nowhere. When you want something you have to either make it or earn it or bring it into the world with your own two hands. That’s why Mammy was always out cleaning other people’s houses.

Do you think it hurts? I asked Brigid after I dropped my bowl in the sink. What does? she said
Not having a finger.
Maybe at first said Brigid in a final sort of way.

I began to wonder did the fingers come off our neighbours. They were tenants like us because we all lived in narrow houses leaning tight together. Next to mine and Brigid’s room were the Murphys. The Murphys had no children of their own and most nights they fought like we couldn’t hear. Throwing things and banging. I suppose I’d be annoyed too if someone took a finger off me.
Sometimes at night Brigid would pretend to be Mrs Murphy and I’d pretend to be Mr Murphy and I’d stamp the floor while Brigid called me names.

You ballbag Brigid would say. You bag of misery.
And I’d say something like you’re not lovely anymore and you never were.
At the end there’d be one final big scream crash and then silence and we’d both go to sleep. I liked this pretend fighting because I was always at least a little bit pissed off with Brigid anyway. Mammy told me it’s good having a big sister because it means you’ll always have someone in your corner. That’s why when finger number four dropped from the tap and plunked into Brigid’s bath to give her a fright I decided right then and there that I wanted them to stop.
Brigid came down the sitting room in her pink dressing gown specifically to show me. Her hair was wet against her neck and shivering. I asked her did it float.
Obviously it didn’t float she said like I was so stupid for asking.
Finger number four was stuck out straight and its nail ragged with chewing and its cuticle peeled all the way back. As Brigid was showing me I looked up and saw that the man with the sunglasses was back. I nudged Brigid and she hid the finger in the sleeve of her dressing gown. The man with the sunglasses gave us both a little wave through the window before sliding an envelope in the letterbox and returning to his car. The envelope came to rest at the very top of the pile.
I made sure to give finger number four a good dry with a fresh towel before placing it down in the barbie box with the others. Four three two and one. Counting the fingers was like scratching an itch because I could know for certain they were all there and I counted them a few more times just to be safe before shutting the box and sliding it back beneath the bed.

After that the fingers seemed only interested in annoying Brigid. The next night finger number five turned up right in the middle of her dinner.
Eat your beans like a good girl said Mammy. She had laid the table nicely with serviettes and a candle. I shovelled the beans into my mouth faster and faster though I knew she wasn’t bothered about me.

There’s a finger said Brigid and Mammy said where? and Brigid said in my fucking beans! and fist slam down to rattle the cutlery.
Show me said Mammy and Brigid passed the plate across to her. I had six beans left on my plate and half a slice of toast. Finger number five was the most normal looking so far even though it was probably a thumb. Mammy plucked it from the plate and set it on the table and then I don’t know why but she started digging in Brigid’s beans with her own fingers. Pinching the beans and swirling and crushing them and lifting them and letting them plop back down onto the plate. The candlelight played across her face.

Now said Mammy. No more fingers in your beans.
Then I don’t know why but she was singing it.
No more fingers no more fingers no more fingers in your beans.
By now I had eaten the last six of my beans one at a time leaving only a slimy trail across the flower patterns on my plate. I wanted Mammy to look but she didn’t. Instead she was staring at Brigid who was staring at the ceiling with her arms folded breathing through her nose. So Mammy snatched up her plate and slammed the whole thing down into the bin.
No more beans no more beans no more fingers in your fucking beans.
After that I decided it was my responsibility to be the first in the house to find the fingers. I hoped for a sixth and no more because six is the safest number.
The next day while Mammy was at work we discovered the man with the sunglasses down on his knees in our back garden. At first I thought he must be praying but then I saw he was only planting flowers. I decided that the man couldn’t be a real gardener in his white buttoned shirt and black leather boots as if the sudden need to garden had caught him by surprise. His sunglasses perched backwards on the back of his big thumb head like he had eyes there to watch us. I thought his trowel would be good for playing gravediggers. Brigid was mesmerised by all the flowers and I tried telling her not to go any closer but she did anyway. Hello kitten said the man with the sunglasses.

Whatcha doing with all them? Brigid asked. The man patted the soil with his palms.
Don’t mind me he said. I’m only making things nice for my new tenants.
Later after the man had left the two of us set wordlessly to pulling up all his flowers and fucking them against the back fence clumps of soil and all until they made a pile.
He doesn’t even live here Brigid said through her teeth. How can it be his house if he doesn’t even live here?
Beneath the upturned roots I discovered finger number six. I rinsed off the clinging soil in the garden tap's glinting stream and wondered was the rest of its owner buried down there too. This finger was the freshest so far and I thought I could still feel a small shudder running through it. As I followed Brigid back inside I noticed that the man with the sunglasses had left behind his garden shears. They rested leaning up against the house.
After that Brigid invented a new game where there were never any fingers to begin with and fingers didn’t even really exist. We curled our hands into fists with our thumbs tucked down the middle and together we watched the puppets wave their big shapeless fabric hands like oven gloves. Some part of me knew that inside a puppet is made of all fingers but I buried that knowledge as best I could.
Are you both not a bit old for these lads? said Mammy holding a basket of washing to her hip.
We watched the green puppet and the orange puppet stretch the hinges of their jaws and sing:

Six five four,
Three two one,
Now our counting song is done.

I mumbled along under my breath because six is the safest number.
That night it wasn’t the key in the door that woke me but the boots on the stairs. I hid my face inside the quilt and tried to make myself as small as possible in the bed. Across the room I could hear Brigid’s shudder breath but didn’t peek to see if she was awake because if she was awake then we’d both be awake. The boots thumped towards our room then stopped and creaked Mammy’s door open. I counted to six and then I counted to six times six and then I counted to six times six six times because I was safe in the counting because while I was counting there wasn’t any room in my brain for anything else. There was no talking that I could make out from Mammy's room and no arguing. After I don’t know how long I heard the boots again thumping down the stairs like an enormous heartbeat in the middle of the house and the front door latching shut. I lay there for a long time full of bad electricity before our bedroom door peeped open and I saw the soft shadow of Mammy looking in at us. I pretended I was asleep. Brigid did the same.
All the next day I gripped finger number six down inside my pocket. The skin felt warm in my fist and the bone brittle like it might snap. I knew finger number seven must be hiding somewhere in the house but I tried my best to not find it even though it was my responsibility.
That night while Mammy was at work Brigid decided we had no choice but to open the most recent letter from the man with the sunglasses. All this time it hadn’t moved from the top of the pile. I asked her why?

Ballbag she said under her breath.
Brigid pushed a thumbnail into the envelope and drew it across while I watched. The paper was folded in three and lined and covered front to back in his piggy handwriting. Brigid squinted and began slowly to read with her mouth moving to follow the words. While I waited I kept an ear out for a key in the door.
What does it say? I asked her before she was finished the first side.
It says we have to leave the house said Brigid before scrunching up the paper in her two hands and clutching it like she could squeeze it out of the world. It says we have to leave the house and also that sin is a wound on the face of Jesus Christ.
So with nothing else left to do the two of us went upstairs to pack. When I turned on the big light in our room I found that the bulb had been replaced by finger number seven hanging limp out of the socket. The glow from beneath finger number seven’s skin bathed the bedroom in deep red twisting sharp shadows out from every corner and crevice and hiding place. I did a bit of crying then in the red because if six is the safest number then seven is jagged like broken glass. Finger number seven was too high up for either of us to reach so Brigid put her two hands clumsily down onto my shoulders like she was trying to stop me from floating up through the ceiling.
Our school bags weren’t big enough to fit all our toys and clothes and bits and pieces and seashells and army men and loose buttons so instead we filled a black bin bag each. As we were trooping down the stairs with the bags held out in front of us Mammy was just in the door kicking off her shoes.
Am I being robbed? she asked us tired and smiling.
Brigid tried explaining the situation and then I tried but Mammy seemed certain that we had gotten something completely backwards.
Go back upstairs and get ready for beddy she said. I didn’t need any more telling than that.

So we really don’t have to leave? Brigid asked later sitting up in her bed. Finger number seven had gone back to being a lightbulb with its pure clean light and I was already feeling my eyes drifting shut because six is the safest number.
Not in a million years said Mammy. This house belongs to us.

Later in the night when I crept downstairs to the kitchen Mammy had lit a candle and was reading the letter Brigid had earlier scrunched up. When Mammy looked up she didn’t seem at all surprised to see me. The garden shears lay across the table. The candlelight played across her face.

Suddenly finally I felt I was beginning to understand all the ways the world was joined up. Not because it was fair or right or made any sense even. But maybe because exactly the opposite.
Which one are you going to do? I asked her. Down inside the pocket of my pyjamas I gripped finger number six like it would be taken. Mammy smiled at me.

I haven’t decided yet my love she said. But I could see by her face that she already had.