The God Squad (18 page)

‘Why?’ he asked.

I hesitated for a moment before telling him I was afraid of operations.

‘You don’t worry about operations, you won’t have to have one.’

I felt so happy that day that I decided to write to my
uncle, telling him I was in hospital and asking him to come and see me or to send something I could play with. If he wasn’t able to get a game, I asked him to send some money, saying that I would buy something myself. No sooner had I given the letter to a nurse to post than I was sorry for writing it. My uncle had not been a part of my life since I last saw him on the day he left me back to the school from my aunt’s. I worried about him writing to the nuns to tell them I was begging.

I had become particularly friendly with a fat round-faced boy from Kilkenny, whom some of the others called ‘Fatso’, a name he hated and which caused him to issue the fiercest of threats to those guilty.

‘I’ll break your fucking neck,’ he used to say, ‘as soon as I can get out of this plaster.’

He was older than most of the other boys by about two years and was in hospital to have his leg straightened at the knee. He had had surgery and was in plaster of Paris. He liked to read and chew sweets or gum, if he could get it without the nurses knowing. He was an avid radio listener and, with his guitar, used to mimic Cliff Richard or Elvis Presley. Occasionally he tried to play some of the instrumentals which the Shadows had made popular at that time. ‘Apache’ was his favourite. He hated anyone to touch the instrument, anyone who did was warned that they would end up with their necks in plaster. Somehow, I looked on him as the one person who would take my side when all the others were jeering me, and though he was immobile I was satisfied that he would one day carry out the threats he was issuing from his bed.

‘You leave him alone, you little bastard,’ he’d say and anyone who was teasing me stopped immediately out of fear of him. I was afraid of him too, and because of that, I never did anything to turn him against me.

I was careful to agree with him when he said that Cliff Richard was better than Elvis Presley, though I hardly knew the difference between the two. He used to buy chewing gum with pictures of various stars in the packet and keep them in his locker in a scrap book. He spent a good deal of time doing his hair to look like Cliff. He had his own large jar of Brylcreem which he applied liberally and with the aid of a double-sided mirror he combed it back with a coiff at the front.

‘What’s that like?’ he’d ask.

‘Grand,’ I’d reply.

‘Is it like that?’ he’d say, holding up Cliff’s picture.

‘Yeah, very like it.’

Then he would pick up his guitar and play the first few chords of ‘Travellin’ Light’ or ‘Livin’ Doll’ before beginning to sing, doing his utmost to sound like his idol.

‘When I get out of here,’ he said, ‘I am going to start a band.’

At night after I had been given my tablets, John Gorman and I used to pull our beds as close together as we could. He had a cage in his bed to keep the weight of the bedcovers off his plastered leg and from the bars of this he’d hang a small transistor radio tuned to Radio Luxembourg. He also had a torch which he hung beside the radio so he could read when the lights had been put off. He was curious to know why I never had visitors. Because I wanted him as a friend I didn’t hesitate to answer anything he asked. As I was not exactly sure of how my parents had died, I told him they were killed in a car crash and that I was in the back at the time. It seemed the easiest thing to say and avoided the necessity for further awkward questions. He wanted to know where I lived and who looked after me.

‘A school, with a whole lot of other boys. Nuns look after us.’

‘I hate nuns,’ he said.

I repeated what he said, and then realized that for the first time I was expressing how I really felt about Mother Paul and Mother Michael, finally admitting my real hatred of them to somebody. I was about to ask him what it was like to have parents when we heard a nurse approaching. He turned off the radio and the torch and pretended to be asleep.

Everything was quiet for a while then he whispered to me that his mother and father slept in the same bed. I said I didn’t believe him and repeated what my aunt had told me about men being naked in front of women.

‘Cross my heart,’ he said making the sign of the cross over the pocket of his pyjamas’ top.

‘Do you know the difference between men and women?’ he asked.

‘No,’ I said.

He made me swear on the bible that if he told me I would not tell anyone else, ever. I promised.

He said that one Sunday morning he had rushed into his parents’ bedroom without knocking and his mother was standing on the floor with no clothes on her. He described her breasts as ‘diddies’ and said that she had no ‘mickey’ like a man, just a big bunch of hair with a slit in it. His father had roared at him to get out and never to enter the room again without knocking. Then he asked if I knew how babies were made.

‘No,’ I answered, sensing that there was something wrong with the conversation taking place, and yet wanting to know. Again I had to swear never to tell before he would continue. He said it was a bit dirty and wondered if I really wanted to hear it.

‘Yes,’ I said.

‘You know sometimes,’ he said, with a tremble in his
voice and hesitated, ‘when your mickey gets hard and stands up?’

‘Yes.’

‘Well the man puts his mickey up into the woman’s bum and pisses into her.’

‘How do you know?’ I asked.

‘I just do,’ he replied, before saying that another boy had told him. I was gripped by a strange, inexplicable sensation that made me want to hear more, even though I was feeling guilty as if doing something wrong.

‘You can only do it at night,’ he said, ‘because that’s when your mickey gets hardest and that’s when you have the most piss saved up inside you.’

He kept silent for a short while and then asked, ‘Did you not know that?’

‘No,’ I replied.

I was becoming sleepy as John Gorman asked me again to keep what he said a secret. I agreed and said I was going to sleep. Without thinking, I put my hands under the covers and was surprised and a little frightened by the pleasure I was getting from feeling my own erect penis.

‘There’s a letter for you,’ a nurse said as she tossed an envelope onto my bed next morning. I was surprised that the envelope was white and knew immediately that it had not come from St Michael’s. I opened it and unfolded a single sheet of notepaper, out of which a £10 note fluttered down onto my bedcovers. In my excitement I grabbed the money in case anyone saw it and stuffed it under the mattress before reading the letter from my uncle. He didn’t say much except that he was enclosing money and hoped that I would be able to buy whatever I wanted. He signed the letter, ‘Uncle Con’.

I couldn’t wait to tell John Gorman but before I did, I made him swear not to tell anyone. He suggested that if he
said anything about the money I could tell what he told me about babies and the difference between men and women. Slowly and with great caution, I took the money from under my mattress and showed it to him. He gasped and asked who sent it to me.

‘My uncle,’ I said.

‘Jesus,’ he responded, ‘he must be awful rich.’

‘He is,’ I said, jumping at the chance to give him a better impression of me. I said that my uncle was living in the house my parents used to live in, that it was a big house and there was a farm with it.

‘When I’m twenty-one,’ I said, ‘I’ll be getting it all as well as the money my mother and father left me.’

I don’t know how I came out with that tale but it was obvious that John was impressed and, from that day, his attitude to me changed. I even somehow managed to convince myself that there was a house, a farm and money waiting for me. One day, I would be rich.

‘Jesus!’ Gorman exclaimed again. ‘Ten pounds is an awful lot of money, you could buy loads of things with it. All you have to do is hide it until your new boots and splint come, then you can go to the shop and get ice cream and lemonade and sweets and cigarettes.’

‘What would we do with cigarettes?’ I asked.

‘Smoke them of course.’

It was a hospital rule that patients couldn’t keep money, it had to be handed up to the sister in charge of the ward. Gorman got annoyed when I told him so, and said that I would be mad to give it up because the most I would get at any one time would be sixpence or a shilling, which he described as being ‘fuck all use’.

‘Hide it,’ he urged.

‘What happens if I’m caught?’ I asked nervously.

‘Nobody is going to know you have it as long as the
two of us keep our mouths shut,’ he said.

‘Suppose,’ I said, ‘that someone asks where I got the money when I go to the shop?’

‘All you have to do is say you’re getting messages for a patient in the men’s ward.’

Later, when a nurse came around asking if anyone had money to be ‘handed up’, I remained silent.

When my splint and boots arrived a nurse fitted them on me. She tied the shining leather boots tightly and then fixed the iron splint firmly to my leg. Before being allowed to stand out of bed, I had to sit for a time with my legs hanging over the edge. As I did, I noticed the tightness of the boots on my feet and in particular the pulling effect of the splint on my foot. Before I stood up, I mentioned that the leather strap just below my left knee was hurting me, and she loosened it slightly. Even though it was extremely uncomfortable I said nothing, fearing I would not be allowed up. I had spent long enough in bed, now I was anxious to be walking again. I looked forward to the freedom. There would be the opportunity to play table tennis and walk around the hospital grounds. But it was the shop I was most excited about. Having money of my own, and being able to spend it was a new experience, one I was determined to enjoy.

I felt desperately weak when I stood up and was certain that I would faint. The blood seemed to drain from me and I could almost feel my face turn white. The nurse looked at me and could see I was in difficulty.

‘Are you all right?’ she asked.

‘Just a bit dizzy,’ I answered.

She held my arm as I took a few steps and enquired how I was feeling. I felt less weak, and said so. After two or three minutes walking she suggested that I sit on the bed and only take short walks with long rests in between until I got used
to being up. She warned that under no circumstances was I to leave the ward.

‘Never?’ I asked incredulously.

‘Well not today anyway.’

Later that day as I was walking along the corridor with the nurse, the consultant approached and recognized me. He gestured to her that he wanted me to keep walking and, having watched, said that he would like to see me the following week, ‘after he has had some time in the caliper.’

As I became stronger my walking improved and I was free to move around the ward and the grounds outside as I wished. John Gorman watched my progress and eventually suggested that I go to the shop. The £10 note which had been hidden for almost three weeks was withdrawn from under the mattress.

‘What will I get?’ I asked.

‘Lucozade, biscuits, twenty “Players” and a box of matches.’

‘How am I going to get cigarettes?’ I asked.

‘Just ask for them.’

‘What if I get caught?’

‘Say they’re for one of the men.’

Nervously, I left the ward and walked up the long corridor to the shop which was situated in a room adjacent to the men’s ward. A small group of men had gathered outside it, all in dressing gowns. As they chatted among themselves I stood at the end of the queue and rehearsed over and over in my head what I was going to ask for when my turn came to be served. I wanted to sound confident.

‘Are you new here?’ one of them asked.

‘No. It’s just that I was in bed until I got this,’ I said, pointing to the splint.

‘Now that you’re up and around, it won’t be too long before you’ll be heading home.’

‘I don’t know,’ I answered.

I never expected to find a nun serving in the shop, and if John Gorman knew, he said nothing. She looked to me and asked what I wanted.

I drew a deep breath and quickly told her. I was going to add that they were for one of the men but decided against it. To my surprise she put everything into a brown paper bag, took the money and asked me to wait a minute for the change. I took it, and without checking stuffed it into my trousers’ pocket and walked as quickly as I could back to the ward.

Just as I left the bag on John Gorman’s bed the sister in charge of the ward appeared, demanding to know what was in the bag and who gave me permission to leave the ward. ‘I don’t know,’ Gorman said, ‘Pat Doyle bought them and he was leaving them on my bed because he was tired.’

I glared at him and felt cheated.

She emptied the bag and held the cigarettes aloft. ‘I don’t suppose,’ she said, ‘either of you had the slightest notion of smoking these.’

‘No, Sister,’ I said, and John agreed.

I had thought of telling her they were for one of the men and that I was going to bring them to him later, but I realized she wouldn’t believe me. I admitted having bought them for myself and John Gorman. He was furious and denied any knowledge of the cigarettes.