Seán Whelan knew that the laughing was against him. His face was hurt but he tried to join in, but he was too late.
–D’you see him, laughing at himself?
Charles Leavy was next. Henno had to put him in a place. Henno stood up.
–Right.
Two of the boys were sitting by themselves. Liam was one of them. No one had sat beside him when he’d grabbed the seat at the back beside the window, the best desk. He’d looked delighted; he’d expected me or Kevin to charge over to him. He was by himself and so was Fluke Cassidy.
–Right, Mister Leavy. Let’s see what we have for you.
Fluke tried to sneak over to Liam’s desk.
–Stay where you are, Mister Cassidy.
He was going to put Charles Leavy beside Fluke for definite after that.
–Over there, Henno pointed to Liam’s desk.
We laughed. Henno knew why.
–Quietttt.
It was great. Liam was finished now; Kevin and me wouldn’t even talk to him any more. I was delighted. I didn’t know why. I liked Liam. It seemed important though. If you were going to be best friends with anyone—Kevin—you had to hate a lot of other people, the two of you, together. It made you better friends. And now Liam was sitting beside Charles Leavy. There was just me and Kevin now, no one else.
David Geraghty was the fella with the polio. That was why there’d been no one sitting beside him. You had to help him with his school bag and there was a smell of medicine off him. I’d had to sit beside him one week after I’d done well in a spelling test and David Geraghty had done badly. It had been brilliant. I’d sat right at the edge of the desk, nearly off it, one half of my bum hanging over the ground. Then David Geraghty had started talking. And he never shut up. All day, out of the side of his mouth like the other side was paralysed. You could hardly hear it but it wasn’t a whisper. Henno could hear it, I was sure he could, but he never did anything about it, probably because David Geraghty had to go around on crutches and was easily the best in the class.
–You can see the hairs in his nose, you can count them. Five in one hole and seven in the other.
Like that all day. When I realised that David Geraghty was never going to get into any trouble and that I wasn’t going to get into trouble because I was sitting beside him I sat into the desk properly and started to enjoy myself.
–He has seventeen hairs on his arse. Divided by three equals five and two over. His wife combs them for him gach maidin.
All day.
He gave me a go on his crutches. My arms wobbled. I couldn’t hold them straight for very long. They weren’t like the metal crutches you got when you broke your leg. They were old fashioned, wood and leather, like the ones the boy on the polio poorbox had; you couldn’t adjust them. David Geraghty’s arms were as strong as legs. I sometimes hoped that I’d be put beside David Geraghty again but I was always glad when I wasn’t.
Seán Whelan wore glasses. They were in a black case that he put at the top of the desk above the hollow for pens and pencils. Whenever Henno went near the blackboard Seán Whelan would pick up the case and when Henno wrote on the board he took the glasses out and put them on. Every time Henno stopped he took them off, and put them back on when Henno started again. I stopped looking at Henno for a while and just looked at Seán Whelan. I could tell where Henno was by looking at Seán Whelan’s hand. It would creep towards the case, stop and go back to his side; up to the case again, pick up the case, open it and put on the glasses. He took them off and put both his hands to his sides. I waited for him to start moving again. Henno stopped talking. I kept my eyes on Seán Whelan, waiting for a signal. Seán Whelan just kept staring straight at the back of Thomas Bradshaw’s head. He looked slightly towards me. And that was when Henno hit me, a hard slap on the back of the head. Seán Whelan jumped, I saw him just as I ducked and shut my eyes for more.
–Wakey wakey, Mister Clarke!
The class laughed and stopped.
Henno had held his open hand stiff; it was as hard as a plank. I was going to get Seán Whelan back for that. It was his fault. I was going to get his glasses case and do something with it, and the glasses. He had brown crinkly hair. It grew up straight but someone, probably his ma, was trying to make it grow to the side. It looked like half a hill on top of his head. He’d be easy to get. He wouldn’t hit back. I’d get him. He wasn’t rough looking.
Like Charles Leavy.
Charles Leavy wore plastic sandals, blue ones. We laughed at them but we were careful. He brought nothing into school the first day. When Henno asked why not he said nothing, he just looked at his sleeves on the desk. He didn’t squirm. There was nearly a hole in one of his elbows. You could see lots of his shirt through it. His hair was very short, the same all over his head. Now and again he stretched his neck and sort of shot his head out to the side, like he was heading a ball but not bothering to look at it. He looked, and I looked away. I felt hot, scared.
–Irish books. Leabhair Gaeilge.Page—What page would you say, Mister Grimes?
–One, sir.
–Correct.
–A haon, sir.
–Thank you, Mister Grimes.—Sambo san Afraic.There he is in his canoe.
We laughed quietly; the way he’d said Canoe. The picture under the name of the story was black and red on top of the white of the page, a black boy with no shirt on in a red canoe under black trees, the jungle. I looked across. Liam was sharing his book with Charles Leavy. He was pressing his hand up the middle of the book so it would stay open. Charles Leavy waited till Liam was finished, then leaned forward to read the book. The other way: Seán Whelan had his own book, covered in wallpaper. He didn’t wear his glasses for reading.
During little break, the eleven o’clock one, I pushed up against Seán Whelan when we were lining up to go back in.
–Watch it.
Seán Whelan didn’t do anything or say anything. He just looked like he was very determined not to look at me, and I was happy with that. I shoved so I could be beside Kevin.
–I’m going to get Whelan, I told Kevin.
–Sure you are, said Kevin.
I was surprised, nearly upset.
–I am, I said.—For definite. He pushed me.
I’d have to get him now. I looked back at Seán Whelan. He had a way of looking past you, looking ahead but around a corner.
He was dead.
The fight took me by surprise. I was going to wait for a good excuse but Kevin pushed me into Seán Whelan—this was outside the gate, across the road in the field that was being dug up—and Seán Whelan elbowed me or his elbow was just there and I was thumping him and being thumped and that surprised me as well. I swung my fists stiffarmed; I hadn’t the time to ready myself, to remember to punch properly, and it was too late now. Seán Whelan’s head got my chin; my teeth banged. I stepped back out of Seán Whelan’s arms, and kicked. I drew back my left foot and kicked again. Seán Whelan tried to hold onto my foot, to knock me over. I got my foot back away from him and I didn’t fall. Seán Whelan was going backwards, the boys behind him were letting him, because I was going to kick him again. I ran and kicked. I’d got him hard. A good bit over his knee. He skipped back like his legs had gone from under him. He grunted. I had him; I was winning. I was going to get his hair now, and knee his face. I’d never done it before. I’d nearly done it to Sinbad but pulling his head down had been enough; he’d screamed and I couldn’t get my leg to go up hard; I could lift it but not to smash him. Seán Whelan wasn’t Sinbad though. I’d grab a tuft of his stupid hair—
The pain knocked me sideways, buckled me for a second.
I’d just been kicked, just under my left hip and the tips of two fingers. Seán Whelan was in front of me. It took me a while to—