3. Cora
CHAPTER THREE
cora
I loved two things: photography and watching zombie flicks. Luckily, even though I’d been exiled to Dublin, I could still do both.
I crouched behind a bin, tucking myself out of sight. My fingers lightly grazed the crumbling brick wall as I adjusted my camera, searching for the perfect angle. The narrow alley around me hummed with tension, every noise sharper, every shadow longer. The unmistakable rawness of this part of Dublin kept pulling me back, day after day, like a place out of some hazy memory.
Blanchardstown had its own pulse, a heartbeat that thrummed beneath the grit and graffiti, the boarded-up shopfronts, and chipped paint. It was nothing like the manicured streets where my uncle lived, with their trimmed hedges and clean front lawns, the kind of neighborhood that felt like a lie. Here, everything was laid bare. Life was raw and exposed, painted in harsh strokes that the rain couldn’t wash away. Something in that honesty, even in the danger, made me feel more myself.
Being behind a camera excited me. I loved capturing people’s lives when they weren’t looking.
Their secrets.
Their arguments.
Their passion.
A psychologist would probably have a field day with me — the voyeur. Sneaking around and living vicariously through other people.
I was good at it, though. The sneaking.
My brothers would have a fit if they knew this was my passion project. I was supposed to be safely hidden away in my uncle’s nice suburban house. I’d been here in Dublin for over a decade now since my older brother Conall shipped me off. I’d gone to school, and now … well, now I was just looking for trouble. I wasn’t sure where I belonged anymore.
I steadied my camera and focused on a group of kids at the corner, hands jammed into their pockets as they shared a cigarette. One of them glanced my way, but I ducked before they noticed, letting the wall shield me. I held my breath and waited, the thrill of capturing this city’s edges making my pulse quicken. It was the feeling of being on the brink of something bigger than myself, something I wasn’t sure I understood but couldn’t stay away from.
Blanchardstown had a reputation, one my uncle warned me about whenever I left his house. “Don’t be daft, Cora, it isn’t safe for ye’ out there,” he muttered every time I stepped out, reminding me that I’d be safer staying away from neighborhoods like this. But safety felt like a cage. My life had been about running from things unseen, the stained legacy my father left, and the enemies my brothers said lurked everywhere. With its broken glass and weary eyes, Blanchardstown didn’t pretend to be anything other than what it was. It was a place where people survived, where life pushed through even when the odds were against it. Where fist fights broke out, where men paid for a quick blow job in a back alley, where kids stole a wallet here or there. I took pictures of it all.
I shifted, tightening my grip on the camera, capturing the rawness in every shot. A stray dog sniffed around a pile of trash, scrappy and fearless like it knew how to survive no matter how hard things got. I snapped a picture of it as it moved, hoping to capture the stubborn resilience in its eyes.
A pair of men walked by, hunched over and talking in low voices, heads bent as if shielding secrets from the world around them. I raised my camera, snapping a quick photo before they vanished around the corner. Here, everyone had a story—dark, twisted, or desperate—and I wanted to capture it all, every fleeting moment. This part of Dublin might be rough around the edges, but it was real in a way I couldn’t turn away from.
I leaned against the wall, letting the cold seep into my bones, and wondered if my brothers ever felt the pull of a place like this. I wondered if they’d understand why I’d rather be here, surrounded by Dublin’s harshness, than tucked away in my uncle’s suburban bubble where the most exciting thing that happened was Maude next door arguing with her husband, Fred. I did catch Fred alone one day while Maude was at the market, but it wasn’t that exciting. He was putting on her underwear. I only took a picture of his fingers running over the polyester lace and the expression of longing on his face, but I deleted it. Seemed wrong.
My brother Conall thought he was doing me a favor, keeping me in Dublin. “You’ll be better off with Uncle Tommy,” he’d said. But I knew what he meant: I’d be better off far away from him, from the life he and my brothers had chosen. I’d be out of reach from the secrets and threats woven into our family history. I’d be out of the way. I wouldn’t be a bother.
We used to live in a fancy house with our father in a ritzy neighborhood in New York, but one night, Conall had bundled me up in my coverlet, stuffed my doll in my arm, and walked me out of the house. He’d held my head to his chest and told me not to look, but I had peeked. There had been splashes of red everywhere. Even then, I’d known what they were.
From then on, we’d lived in a crappy walk-up in Jersey with my other brothers. I’d only been four, but I wasn’t stupid. I knew we were all hiding. I just hadn’t been sure from what.
Conall worked like a dog for years to support us. He was the oldest. At the time, my brother Brody was only six, and my brother Paddy was eight. It was years before Conall had any help to put food on the table. Still, I ached for my brothers, even if they were a pain in my ass.
I snapped a shot of two people arguing behind a bar, then a man shoving his finger hard into the other person’s chest, his breath coming out in white puffs. I skipped a few blocks, humming to myself.
My camera’s shutter clicked away, capturing lives that were simple every day. Ordinary. Sometimes, I imagined what it would have been like to be ordinary myself. Instead, I had brothers an ocean away doing Irish mob things, and they’d put me over here like I was an unwanted item. Conall said I’d be brought back when it was safe. I was guessing I would be brought back when it was “necessary.”
I tried to imagine his face the last time we spoke, his steady gaze as he said goodbye, the weight in his eyes. If I was honest, I didn’t know who he was anymore, not in this life he’d chosen. I knew he was out there, wading into things I’d rather forget and business I wasn’t sure I wanted to be part of. For now, I was left here, stranded.
I lingered by the river, watching how the overcast sky made everything softer as if Dublin knew how to keep secrets. This was a stark difference from the sharp edges I remembered America having. Every sound there seemed to pierce the air as if the city demanded to be heard. Here, the noise was a hum, a heartbeat. I lifted my camera and took another gray, endless photo of the quiet water.
Conall had some faulty ideas about the state of things in Dublin. He sent me to live with my mother’s brother, our uncle Tommy, from the McElroy side of the family. Uncle Tommy was decent enough as long as he was sober, but he could be a mean drunk. I’d lived with him since I was twelve, attending school and keeping to myself. Conall visited every few years for a day or so to check that my grades were up to par, but I was twenty-four now and wondering what the rest of my life looked like.
Conall said the O’Kelly name and the grudges our father left behind still lingered in certain corners. He told me to be careful, but honestly, he didn’t understand that there weren’t any “corners” here where I would talk to people who cared, nobody I would whisper secrets to. When I came to Dublin at twelve, I knew nobody and had no friends. Twelve years later, I still knew nobody and had no friends. My uncle was protective and strict when it came to outsiders.
I had been too young to remember the things my dad had been involved in, but I knew that Conall killed our father. There were two theories. One was that it was to take over the businesses that our father had, and the other was that Conall killed him finally in retribution for our mother’s death.
Either way, I was sure my father deserved it.
I headed home. Maybe I would put on Zombieland , order takeout, and edit my pictures from today. It sounded like the perfect evening.
Maybe I would consider getting a job or a boyfriend. I sighed.
Maybe not.