Trains?
No. Its the camel. Do you know what a camel is?
It has a hump.
It has more than a hump. It has a nasty, mean disposition and its
teeth are green with gangrene and it bites. Do you know where it bites?
In the Sahara?
No, you omadhaun. It bites your shoulder, rips it right off. Leaves
you standing there tilted in the Sahara. How would you like that, eh?
And what class of a spectacle youd be strolling down the street,lopsided
in Limerick. What girl in her right mind will look at an ex-White
Father with one miserable scrawny shoulder? And look at your eyes.
Theyre bad enough here in Limerick. In the Sahara theyll fester and
rot and fall out of your head. How old are you?
Thirteen.
Go home to your mother.
Its not our house and we dont feel free in it the way we did in Roden
Lane, up in Italy or down in Ireland. When Laman comes home he
wants to read in his bed or sleep and we have to be quiet.We stay in the
streets till after dark and when we come inside theres nothing to do
but go to bed and read a book if we have a candle or paraffin oil for the
lamp.
Mam tells us go to bed, shell be after us in a minute as soon as she
climbs to the loft with Lamans last mug of tea. We often fall asleep
before she goes up but there are nights we hear them talking, grunting,
moaning.There are nights when she never comes down and Michael
and Alphie have the big bed to themselves. Malachy says she stays up
there because its too hard for her to climb down in the dark.
Hes only twelve and he doesnt understand.
Im thirteen and I think theyre at the excitement up there.
I know about the excitement and I know its a sin but how can it be a
sin if it comes to me in a dream where American girls pose in swim-
ming suits on the screen at the Lyric Cinema and I wake up pushing
and pumping? Its a sin when youre wide awake and going at yourself
the way the boys talked about it in Leamys schoolyard after Mr. ODea
roared the Sixth Commandment at us,Thou Shalt Not Commit Adul-
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