Lauren Foley’s writing is experimental, at times diary-like, scientific and explicit. There are no sexual euphemisms to be found here. It’s pure.

‘Polluted Sex’ is a story about an Irish girl, her English lover and her friend (who is also her lover). Raw in detail and language, it is fearless in depicting women, their sexuality and their bodies, in deeply realistic way.

Órla, the protagonist, is waiting for her period to start:

‘There’s a certain kind of sanctity surrounding your menstrual flow, a hangover of old ilk connecting you to the tides and their transgenerational fears of moons and banshees.’

First published in Polluted Sex, Influx Press, 2020. You can read it here