Foster by Bryan Washington, 2021
The magic trick:
Delivering a sketch of major plot points about the characters’ lives early in the story, and then gradually filing in the details throughout the rest of the story
“Foster” uses a technique that is familiar to me, though I can’t pinpoint a story, author, or even time period in short story history notable for this particular kind of magic.
Maybe Lorrie Moore? Maybe Deborah Eisenberg? Maybe Sherman Alexie?
I don’t know.
Anyway, what it is is this…
Early in the story, the narrator condenses the relationship he has with his brother to mere bullet points.
“We were born four years apart,” we are told. “Hadn’t spoken in six. He’d been in prison for three. He’d killed someone, accidentally, in a hit-and-run. But he’d shot another person before he was caught for that.”
The reader probably is left with some lingering “Wait, what happened?” questions, but the narrator leaves the backstory alone, transitioning right back to the mundane here and now of the cat we were introduced to in the story’s opening paragraph.
The story then repeats this kind of collection of stop-start vignettes. Suddenly, near the end of the text, the narrator further explores one of those previously mentioned biographical notes on his brother. We get the story about the man his brother shot in more detail.
I don’t know exactly what you call that technique. It’s not foreshadowing, because the initial biographical background leaves nothing to implication or suggestion. It’s not setup-and-delivery, because the reader doesn’t exactly ever anticipate or wait on further explanation beyond the initial biography.
It’s almost like giving the reader a sketch at the beginning and then gradually coloring in the picture throughout the story.
Yes, that’s a decent description.
This technique probably has a proper name I’m not aware of.
I like it, though.
It’s an interesting way to create movement in a story.
And that’s quite a trick on Washington’s part.
The selection:
My brother’s instructions were simple: feed the cat twice a day, and give him plenty of water. Keep him away from open doors. The cat could be left on his own for an infinite amount of time. The cat had three siblings, apparently, and they’d been given suitable homes elsewhere, but at the very last minute the fourth home had fallen through. Which made me the cat’s final resort.
If he had thumbs, my brother wrote, we wouldn’t need you.
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