Rickie O’Neill is a 35 year old writer, actor, director and musician originally from Claremorris, Mayo, currently residing in Galway. For the past 13 years, Rickie has been a session musician and full-time drummer for the Irish band The Saw Doctors. In 2015 he changed his course slightly and began writing, starting off with short film scripts and poetry (which he still enjoys writing very much to this day). In 2017 he took a keen interest in the short story form and was particularly impacted by how powerful a short story can be as opposed to a long-drawn-out novel. Plus, you finish them quicker. Rickie’s writing influences include Anton Checkov, Roald Dahl, George Saunders, Lafcadio Hearn, Chuck Palahniuk, Anthony Bourdain, Mike McCormack & Donal Ryan. Last December, Rickie released his first self published novella called Little Sickos, under the pseudonym Fionnain J McKeon, and in March 2026 he released his first anthology under the same name titled ALIVE ALL NIGHT, which can be purchased from Rickie/Fionnain directly by emailing saltedstrings@gmail.com.

THE FIXER

By Rickie O’Neill

   At 6:38pm the big hot sun finally went down over the last building in the town. Around that time and deep in the backstreets, small birds were fighting one another over a few meagre crumbs like starved orphans at a neglected home. In dark puddles and dripping drains, here they all were fighting for their lives. Twenty of them at least. Throwing beaks around like they were small daggers.

  And drawing blood.

  All that cawing and all that squealing, all that dirty fuss, just to die a dull death a day or two later than they might have done in the first place.

  “Damn furry devils.” said one homeless tramp to another. “They’re like Barbarians the way they go on. Little fuckers.”

  The two tramps laughed.

  “They’re just like us actually, you know.” said the woman tramp, picking gum chunks out of her hair. “The only difference being,” she said. “is that we don’t have wings and cannot fly away when the getting gets good.”

  “A shame indeed.” said the scraggly man, swirling drink around in his bottle. “A shame indeed we have to endure all these minutes together.”

  “Yeah.”

  “In this life.”

  “And the next.”

  “No doubt.”

  “Hmmm. . .”

  “Until we don’t anymore.”

  The woman, unable to contain herself, scoffed at the remark, spat a big thing onto the ground and swiped the bottle out of the man’s hand like a child eager for sweets.

  “Don’t be so fucking dramatic.” she said. “You’d swear with the ways you’re talking you’d spent your entire life reading books.”

  “I don’t think I ever read a book in my life.” said the man. “Ha!”

  “I know that.” she said. “All I’m saying is that I’d love a set of wings for myself, like those birds there. That way I could maybe fly away from you one day. I’d fuck off to a beach someplace, like a free and careless soul, or get as close as I could to a fresh flowing river. That’s all it is. That’s all I’m saying.”

  “Sounds simple enough.” said the man, half laughing to himself. “I wish you luck with it, I suppose. I really do.”

  “Also, I’m much smarter than you. You do know that right?”

  “Yes.” he replied. “You are indeed full to the brim with brains. But having wings like that, along with your level of intelligence, could be a real bad thing for someone like you. For someone so, ya know, tough.” Then he said, “Hang on. Give me a sec.”

  The man paused a moment then to flick a ‘not so small’ bug off his sleeve and a’course the force of the crack killed it instantly.

  “All I’m saying is, I’d be careful if I were you.” he said, grabbing the roach and tossing it. “Don’t dream too big coz, well, you know how you do get.”

  Leaning over, and almost growling, the pale woman laughed hard into the man’s face. Whispering threats into his ear, she’d make big plans to kill him one day and reckoned she could do it all “reeeaaal easy” when he wasn’t looking.

  “You be careful what you say to me.” she said, bringing the bottle up to her lips. “Once you’re gone from this world, I’ll have no problem finding another husband. After all, I am beautiful and you are not.” Checking the dregs of the bottle, she then said: “We’re going to need more of this. Fuck. How much money do we have left in the bucket?”

  “Zero.”

  “Well.” she said. “Figure it the fuck out. GO. Isn’t that your job?”

  The tramp man sighed up into the city’s abyss, got up, dusted off his frayed Levi’s and said “Yes, darling. Right away.” And when he left, the woman didn’t say anything. There were no long goodbyes. No reassurances of love. No nothing. Instead, she sat there in silence watching the birds go about their business.

  “The little fuckers!” she said, biting into her thick, black nails. “They actually do have it better than us.” And then she shouted down the street: “And hurry back.”