‘I’m getting on fine. I’m better than anybody realises.’
‘That’s good to know. Shall we stop worrying so?’
‘Yes. Stop worrying.’
‘Will you eat the sandwich I made specially?’
‘Probably not.’
‘Will I give it to Crito then?’
‘No. Leave it. I’ll give it to her myself. Later.’
‘Shall I send her in to you then? Will I tell her she’s wanted in the master’s bedroom?’
He is smiling now and I can’t help it. I smile back and once I start I notice that I feel happy. Happiness makes my body warm, my stomach and all the way down. He laughs and I laugh too.
‘Wait here. I’ll fetch the jam-eating contraption.’
I want to act out my happiness, get to my feet, jump up and down on the spot and clap my hands. I want to get up off the bed and run and go after him and not be ashamed and keep him with me longer, just now, just the way he is now, just us, and with him smiling at me the way he did.
I wait for him. But he doesn’t come back straight away. I won’t go out to the hall and I won’t go to the living room. I take my watch off and wait for the second hand to get to twelve and then I start the countdown to sixty seconds. If he doesn’t come in one minute, I’ll never wait for him again. The second hand reaches the nine and he comes back, with Crito wrapped in a blanket, her black-and-white face sticking out.
‘Special delivery for Master Egan,’ he says. ‘A four-legged friend in need of jam.’
No, my brain says to me, the only thing wrong with us is the worry about you.
‘Thanks, Da.’ And he goes and I keep Crito in her blanket while I eat the blackcurrant sandwich.
At school the next day, I am alone during the break, sitting in the empty classroom reading a book about Harry Houdini and eating chocolate cake, biscuits and a ham sandwich. I like reading about Houdini’s underwater escapes from locked containers while handcuffed and shackled with irons. But I’m disappointed to learn that his escapes were ‘protracted and agonised’ and that the fastest straitjacket escape he performed was 138 seconds. I know from the Guinness Book that this is a long way from the world record broken last year by Jack Gently. On 26th July, 1971, in front of an audience of 600 witnesses, Gently escaped from a standard straitjacket in forty-five seconds.
A few minutes before the end-of-break bell, the mongoloid boy comes in. His name is Osmond and he spends one day a week here and the other days at the special school in Enniscorthy. Every Tuesday he spends break and lunchtime alone, walking around the playing field, talking, and singing off-key. I’ve never been up close to his droopy face and I’ve never spoken to him.
He stands in the doorway with his mouth open and shifts his weight from one leg to the other, smiling at me, humming, waiting for me to speak. I look away but he comes closer and, when I look up, he is standing by my desk, an inch from my arm. He doesn’t speak, but smiles at me, rocking from one foot to the other. I don’t want him near me.
‘Nice book,’ he says.
He smells of vomit. I don’t want to talk to him. If I’m seen talking to him, it will be as though I am his friend, that I’m the same as him: the two of us lonely. ‘Nice book,’ he says. ‘Nice pictures.’
His spit falls out when he speaks and there’s a glob of it shining on my jumper sleeve. I close the book to stop him looking at Harry Houdini. But he is staring at my food.
‘Nice biscuits. Nice cake. Nice sandwich.’
Could he be hungry? I check my watch: only five minutes until the bell for the end of break.
‘Are you hungry? Do you want some cake? You can take it to your class? Take it to room 3G? Wouldn’t that be good?’
He holds out his fat hand and I put the last of my chocolate cake in his palm. He pushes the cake into his mouth, like a tractor shovelling dirt, and then he closes his mouth, moves his closed lips from side to side and, finally, swallows. He has dissolved the cake in his mouth without chewing. I like that I can stare at him; he lets me stare and doesn’t mind.
‘Nice brown cake,’ he says. His voice is not too spastic, but too loud and it sounds strangled, as though somebody is sitting on his neck.
‘Ssssh,’ I say. ‘Please be quiet.’ My leg is jumping up and down and I put my hand on my knee to stop it.
‘Nice biscuit.’
‘Here,’ I say.
He eats the biscuit by the same method — no chewing — and then he says, ‘Nice book.’
‘You can’t eat the book,’ I say.
I’ve made him laugh and he jumps up and down. ‘Cookie monster! Cookie monster!’
He’s not so stupid. He can say what he wants to and he only wants somebody to say things to. That’s all. But I put my finger against my lip to tell him to be quiet. He looks hurt and walks away. I look at my watch: one more minute before the bell.
‘Look,’ I say. I open the book to the page with the photograph of Harry Houdini in a glass cage, his body covered in thick chains. ‘Harry Houdini,’ I say, quietly. ‘He could do magic.’
‘Magic! Magic makes rabbits.’
‘Can you whisper?’
‘Yes,’ he whispers. ‘Magic makes rabbits.’
‘Yes,’ I say.
‘Magic makes hats and ace of diamonds and no rabbits and rabbits.’
‘Yes,’ I say. I didn’t know he had so many words. If he had a normal face I’d probably want to talk to him. I keep whispering and hope he will too. ‘Do you know what an escape is?’
‘Escape.’
‘Yes. Get out of trouble. Escape from boxes and glass cages.’
He points at Houdini. ‘He escapes from glass jar!’
His voice is loud again, but I don’t mind. He’s right. He understands. I smile at him. Even though his face is droopy, he looks better than I thought he did and he looks better when you are closer to him, paying attention. I thought they all looked like identical twins, but now I see that isn’t true. Osmond has his own nose, his own lips, his own eyes, and his own expressions.
The bell rings and, when it finishes ringing, and we can hear the sounds of people coming down the hall, he says, ‘Nice book.’ His voice is even louder than when he first came to me, as though he thinks the bell is still ringing and he needs to shout to be heard.
‘Sssssh,’ I say.
‘Nice book, nice cake, nice biscuit, nice big boy. Nice John.’ He reaches out to touch my eyes.
‘No!’ I say. ‘Don’t touch! Go away.’
I don’t want him to know my name. No, that’s not right. I do. But I don’t want him to say it. He stops smiling and steps away, backwards. There are tears in his eyes.
‘I go,’ he says.
‘Bye, so,’ I say.
‘I go. I escape backwards. I go out of way of John.’
‘All right,’ I say, and then, even though I haven’t planned it, and even though I think I shouldn’t, I smile again and I say, ‘See you next week.’
He smiles back. ‘Giant biscuit escape backwards from cookie jar.’
I laugh and, when Brendan walks to his desk with Kate, they look at me, and they see that I am laughing and seem to wonder what they have missed. I stare at them until they look away and, when they smirk at each other, I don’t think I care.
15
When I go to breakfast, nobody is there. My mother has left a note.
Dear John
I’ve gone to the church hall today to help build a set for the school pageant and your Da has gone into town on the early bus. We’ll both see you tonight for tea. Your lunch is on the dresser. Have a good day at school.
Love, Mammy
I decide not to go to school. When they get home I’ll tell them I wasn’t feeling well. I eat some porridge and fried eggs on toast in the living room in front of the fire while watching TV and then I eat some chocolate and two bananas. Crito sits on my lap and together we watch some of a Carry On film set at the seaside and then, at half eleven, I go to my grandmother’s bedroom.