Free Something Special, Something Rare by Black Inc. Page A

he can’t have been. Simple fact. I mean, it’s hot.
    I mean, this is killing weather. Walk around out there too long – especially wearing your Sunday get-up like he is – and you’re going to die. Simple fact.
    â€“ Drink your water, Mr Collier.
    I’m at the flea-market and the sun is on my head like honey, drizzling into my shoes. I’m wearing shoes and socks. Most boys wear bare feet. My mother says that I am not a ruffian and I will not appear as one. She has said DON’T GET INTO MISCHIEF , as if this is something I occasionally do. She’s given me a handful of pennies. She stands behind the table of the parish cake stall. BE BACK BY LUNCHTIME, KEVIN .
    I take a sip of water. It comes in a paper cup. The gentlemen are watching with proud, doting smiles. The older one should have his thyroid checked.
    At the market the junk stalls face each other with a wide aisle in between. The aisles head north, south, east, west, they are tidy and angular as hedgerows – yet they also tangle like rambling roses, and soon I am lost. Perhaps, in truth, I know where I am, could return to my mother in moments if I chose, but when I stop and look around, I can’t remember the twists and turns I’ve taken to this point, the stalls I’ve passed, the goods I’ve fingered, the people I’ve bumped against. All is commerce. All is noise. Doubtless there are shady deals being sealed in the shadows but, from where I stand, all is good-cheer. Babies howl. Children squabble. Glass is broken. Money rustles.
    â€“ So what did they say about the vehicle?
    â€“ The wife’s car. A station wagon. Green. He took the keys from her handbag, apparently.
    Pennies only buy things that I do not need. I have a room full of trinkets and trash; also other, more costly wares. Spinning tops, wooden toys, a train set, boxed soldiers. A leather ball, rocking horse, a tin engine, a marionette. I have these and countless more. I’m an only child, an only grandchild, an only nephew, inundated. I don’t particularly care for this overflow of goods – but nor do I care to see my toys ill-treated and manhandled. When Mother invites boys over to visit, I am edgy. Too often, my possessions emerge from these visits the worse for wear. I feel the damage is done deliberately, it’s jealousy or revenge or a show of strength. I don’t know whether to be angry or impressed. I am clumsy with friendship, I know. I am shy, I lack conversation, I constantly feel the fool. I squirm, when Mother asks another CAN YOUR BOY COME OVER TO PLAY? Even worse: the boy squirms. I have begged her DON’T SAY THAT ANYMORE.
    WHY, KEVIN? I remember everything about her, her smell, her teeth, her hair, her clothes. I could point her out in the street to you. I remember how her face twisted in pain when I said DON’T.
    THINGS GET BROKEN , I say.
    HE BREAKS MY HEART , she tells my father. HE’S SUCH A LONELY CHILD.
    My father won’t speak of anything emotional. He glances at the stove. Dinner is his emotion. Dessert has his heartfelt sympathy. WHAT DOES IT MATTER , he says, IF THE BOY IS HAPPIEST ALONE.
    BUT HE’S NOT HAPPY. THAT’S THE POINT.
    YOU’RE NOT HAPPY. THAT’S THE POINT. KEVIN SEEMS FINE TO ME.
    And the predicament is that they are both right. I am happy alone. I am also lonely. I think I’ve been born inside a glass box. There’s no place for me beyond its confines. But I am reasonably content inside my home. In privacy, I am almost perfect. It’s the wider world which finds me distasteful. When my mother insists on cracking the walls, inviting the world, dismay and disaster must naturally follow.
    â€“ Did the son know where he was going, in the car?
    â€“ Wasn’t sure. Said he’s always agitating to go home, to the house where he grew up.
    â€“ Oh yeah? Where’s the house?
    â€“ In Dublin.
    The young one sprays laughter. Then gets a