– You’ll soon be the same size as your daddy.
I wanted that, to be the same size as my da. My name was the same as his one. I’d waited till he’d gone to work before I’d shown her that the zip wouldn’t shut properly. He’d have shut it. I hoped she wouldn’t be able to do it. I hated the trousers. They were yellow corduroy. One of my cousins had owned them first. They’d never been mine.
She hitched them up. She tried to hold the two sides together so the zip would go up. I didn’t cheat. I even sucked in my belly.
– No, she said. -No use.
She let go of the trousers.
– They’re finished, she said. -You’re growing too fast, Patrick.
She didn’t mean it.
– We’ll have to use a safety pin, she said.
She saw my face.
– Just for today.
They were checking the B.C.G., that was what everyone said. Henno hadn’t told us anything. He’d just said that we were to queue up and the first two in the queue were always to have their jumpers and shirts and vests off ready when the door opened or there’d be trouble. Only two had gone in and they hadn’t come back out yet. He was supposed to be looking after us but he wasn’t. He’d gone off, upstairs to the teachers’ room for a cup of tea.
– I’ll hear any noise, he said. -Don’t worry.
He stamped his foot on the wooden floor. The noise bounced down the corridor. It took ages to die.
– There, he said. -Whispering is impossible in this school. I’ll hear every little thing.
Then he went.
We heard him at the top of the stairs. He’d stopped.
Ian McEvoy made sure that the wall was guarding him, then he stamped his foot the way Henno had. The laughing was great, waiting to hear Henno coming back down. He didn’t. We all stamped our feet. It must have been his shoes though; we couldn’t get the same noise. But that was all we did; we didn’t shout or mess.
They were checking the B.C.G. marks.
What’ll they do if you don’t have all of them?
You were supposed to have three of them.
– They’ll give you more.
There was a triangle of them up on your left arm. The skin was funny in the little circles.
– It means you have polio.
– It does not!
– It means you can get polio.
– You don’t have to have it.
David Geraghty, the fella in our class with polio, was in the queue behind us.
– Hey Geraghty, I said. -Did you get your B.C.G.?
– Yeah, he said.
– Then how did you get your polio? Fluke Cassidy asked him.
The queue broke a bit and crowded around David Geraghty.
– I don’t know, he said. -I don’t remember.
– Were you born with it?
David Geraghty looked like he was going to start crying. The queue straightened up again; we all tried to get as far away from him as we could. The first two still hadn’t come out.
– You can get polio from drinking water from out of the toilet.
The door opened. The two fellas came out. Brian Sheridan and James O’Keefe. They were dressed again. They didn’t look pale or scared or anything. There were no tear tracks. The two other fellas went in.
– What did they do to yeh?
– Nothing.
They didn’t know what they were to do now. They couldn’t go back to the classroom because there was no one there and Henno would kill them if they went in on their own. I took my jumper off and dropped it on the floor.
– What did they do?
– Nothing, said Brian Sheridan. -They just looked.
He looked different now. His face had gone stiff. He was messing with his shoe. I stopped taking my shirt off. Kevin grabbed Brian Sheridan.
– Lay off!
– What did they do? Tell us!
– They looked at me.
His face was real red now and he wasn’t really trying to get away from Kevin; he was trying not to let Kevin or the rest of us see his face properly. He’d start crying, for definite.
The other fella, James O’Keefe, wasn’t blushing.
– They looked at our mickeys, he said.
I could hear the rubber knobs on the bottom of David Geraghty’s crutches squeaking on the floor. James O’Keefe looked right down the queue. He knew he had power. He knew it wouldn’t last long. I was freezing. James O’Keefe’s face was dead serious. He had us.
– Let go o’ me!
Kevin let go of Brian Sheridan.
– Why?
James O’Keefe didn’t answer that one. It wasn’t good enough.
– Why did they?
– Just look?
– Yeah, said James O’Keefe. -She bent down and only had a look. Me. She touched his.
– She didn’t! said Brian Sheridan. -She didn’t.
He was nearly crying again.
– She did so, said James O’Keefe. -You’re a liar, Sherro.
– She didn’t.
– She used an ice-pop stick, said James O’Keefe.
We were all shouting now. To get James O’Keefe to hurry up.
– Not her fingers!
Brian Sheridan yelled it. It was important; his face told us that.
– Not her fingers! Not her hand.
He calmed down after that but his face was still red and very white. Kevin grabbed James O’Keefe. I got my jumper round his neck to choke him. We had to know what she did with the ice-pop stick. We were nearly next.
– Tell us!
I choked James O’Keefe a bit.
– O’Keefe, tell us! Go on.
I loosened the jumper. There was a burn mark on his neck. We weren’t messing.
– She lifted his mickey up with an ice-pop stick.
He turned to me.
– I’m going to get you, he said.
He didn’t say it to Kevin, only to me.
– Why? said Ian McEvoy.
– To see the back of it, said James O’Keefe.
– Why?
– Don’t know.
– To make sure it was normal, maybe.
– Is it? I asked Brian Sheridan.
– Yeah!
– Prove it.
The door opened. The two others came out.
– Did she touch yeh with the ice-pop stick? Did she?
– No. She only looked. Didn’t she?
– Yeah.
– How come you? Kevin asked Brian Sheridan.
Brian Sheridan was crying again.
– She only looked, he said.
We left him alone. I took my shirt off, and my vest. We were next. Then I wondered.
– Why are we to take our stuff off?
James O’Keefe answered.
– They do other things as well.
– What other things?
The two in front of us were very slow. The nurse had to put her hands on their elbows to get them into the room. She closed the door.
– Is that the one? I asked James O’Keefe.
– Yeah, he said.
She was the one with the ice-pop stick. The one down on her knees staring at our mickeys. She didn’t look that way. She looked nice. She’d been smiling when she grabbed the two in front of us. Her hair was up in a big bun with some down the side between her eyes and her ears. She wasn’t wearing a cap. She was young.
– Dirty wagon, said David Geraghty.
We broke ourselves laughing, because it was funny and because David Geraghty had said it.
– Does your mickey have polio? Kevin asked him.
Kevin didn’t get what he’d expected.
– Yeah, said David Geraghty. -She won’t touch it.
Then we remembered.
– What other things?
Brian Sheridan told us. The blotches were gone off his face. He looked normal.
– He listens to your back with a stethoscope, he said. -And your front.
– It’s freezing, said James O’Keefe.
– Yeah, said Brian Sheridan.
– Yeah, said one of the others that had just come out. -It’s the worst bit.
– Did he check your B.C.G.?
– Yeah.
– Told yeh.
I checked mine again. All the marks were there, the three of them. They were very clear, like the top of a coconut. I looked at Kevin’s. His were there as well.
– Any needles? someone asked.
– No, said Brian Sheridan.
– Not us anyway, said James O’Keefe. -Maybe some of youse.
– Shut up, O’Keefe.
David Geraghty spoke again.
– Did they do anything with your bum?
The laughs exploded. I laughed louder than I had to. We all did. We were scared and we’d made David Geraghty nearly cry. It was the first time David Geraghty had been funny out loud, in front of everybody. I liked him.
The two came out. They were smiling. The door was open for us. It was our turn, me and Kevin. I went first. I had to. I was pushed.
– Ask her for a choc-ice, said David Geraghty.
I laughed later. Not then though.
She was waiting. I stopped looking when she looked at me. -Trousers and underpants, lads, she said.
I only remembered the safety pin on the top of my zip, only now. My ma had put it there. My face burned. I turned a bit, away from Kevin. I got it into my pocket. I turned back and I whistled to get rid of the heat in my face. Kevin’s underpants were dirty. Down the middle, a straight brown line that got lighter on the outside. I didn’t look at my own. I just let them fall. I didn’t look anywhere. Not down. Not at Kevin. Not at the doctor at the desk. I waited. I waited for the feel of the stick. She was in front of me. I could tell. I didn’t look. I couldn’t feel my mickey there. There was no feeling there at all. When the ice-pop stick went under I’d scream. And dirty myself. She was still there. Bent down looking at it. Staring. Maybe rubbing her chin. Making her mind up. There was a cobweb in the corner over the doctor, a big dry one. There was a thread of it swinging. There was a breeze up there. She was making her mind up. If it was bad enough to lift to see the other side. If I didn’t look she wouldn’t do it. I was looking for the spider. If she did it I’d be finished forever. The most amazing thing about spiders was the way they made their webs. I’d never be normal again -
– Righto, she said. -Off you go, over to Doctor McKenna.
No touch. No stick. I nearly forgot to pull up my underpants and trousers. I took the first step. I pulled them up. Between my bum was wet. It didn’t matter now. No stick. Three B.C.G. marks.
– Did she touch yours? Kevin asked me.
At the door, going out. He whispered.
– No, I said.
It felt brilliant.
– Me neither, he said.
I didn’t tell him about his underpants.