The Marble Collector

33

I’m lying on the floor of Aunty Sheila’s living room. Around me, Hamish, Angus and Duncan are in sleeping bags, fast asleep. My hand throbs from where Father Murphy walloped me today and I can’t help it, I start to cry. I miss Daddy, I miss the farm in Scotland, I miss my friend Freddy, I miss the way Mammy used to be, I don’t like these new smells, I don’t like sleeping on the floor, I don’t like Aunty Sheila’s food, I don’t like school, and I particularly don’t like Father Fuckface. My right hand is so swollen I can barely close it and every time I close my eyes I see the cold dark room he locked me in today and I feel panic, like I can’t breathe.

‘Hey!’ I hear someone whisper and I freeze and stop crying immediately, afraid that one of my brothers has heard and will tease me.

‘Psst!’

I look around and see Hamish sitting up.

‘Are you crying?’ he whispers.

‘No,’ I sniffle, but it’s obvious.

He shuffles over on his bum, moving his sleeping bag closer to mine so that we are side by side. He gives Angus’s head a kick and Angus groans and rolls over to make room for his feet. At eleven years old Hamish always gets what he wants from us and he always does it so easily. He’s my hero and when I grow up I want to be just like him.

He puts his finger on my cheek and wipes my skin. Then he tastes his finger. ‘You are fuckin’ crying.’

‘Sorry,’ I whimper.

‘You miss Da?’ he asks, lying down beside me.

I nod. That’s not all of the reason, but it’s part of it.

‘Me too.’

He’s quiet for a while and I don’t know if he’s fallen back asleep.

‘Remember the way he used to do the longest burp?’ he whispers suddenly.

I smile. ‘Yeah.’

‘And he belched the entire happy birthday song on Duncan’s birthday?’

I laugh this time.

‘See? That’s better. We can’t forget things like that, Fergus, okay?’ he says, full of intensity like he really means it, and I nod, very serious indeed. ‘We have to remember Da the way he was, when he was happy, the good things he did, and not… not anything else.’

Hamish was the one who found Da hanging from a beam in our barn. He wouldn’t tell us exactly what he saw, none of the gory details, and when Angus tried to make him, he punched him in the face and almost broke his nose, so none of us asked again.

‘Me and you, we’ll remind each other of stuff like that. I don’t sleep either most nights, so you and me can talk.’

I like the sound of that, just me and Hamish, having him all to myself.

‘It’s a deal,’ he says. ‘Shake on it.’ He grabs my hand, my sore one, and I whine and cry out like Aunty Sheila’s dog when you step on its paw. ‘What the fuck happened?’

I tell him about Father Murphy and the dark room and I cry again. He’s angry about it and puts his arm around my shoulders. I know I won’t tell the others this, he would flush my head down the bog if I did that and I like him holding me this way. I don’t tell him about me pissing myself though. When I came home, I didn’t tell anyone about what Father Murphy had done to me. I would have, but Aunty Sheila noticed it and helped clean my hand and bandage it up, and she said not to bother Mammy with it because she’s upset enough. Everyone’s upset, so I didn’t tell anyone else.

‘What have you got there?’ he asks, as my marbles clink in my other hand.

‘They’re bloodies,’ I say proudly, showing him. I sleep with them that night because I like the feel of them in my hand. ‘A nice priest gave them to me when I was in the dark room.’

‘For keeps?’ Hamish asks, studying them.

‘I think so.’

‘Bloodies?’ he asks.

‘Yeah, they’re red, like blood,’ I explain. I don’t know much more about them, but I want to.

‘Like you and me,’ he says, clinking them around in his hand. ‘Blood brothers, bloodies.’

‘Yeah.’ I grin in the dark.

‘You bring them into school with you tomorrow,’ he says, giving them back to me and settling down in his sleeping bag again.

Angus tells us to shut the fuck up and Hamish kicks him in the head, but we’re silent until his breathing tells us he’s fallen asleep again.

Hamish whispers in my ear: ‘Put them bloodies in your pocket tomorrow. Keep them there, don’t tell anyone else, none of the lads, or the Brothers will hear and they’ll take them from you. And if he locks you in that room again, you’ll have them. While everyone’s working and getting their heads slapped off them, you’ll be in there, playing. Do you hear?’

I nod.

‘That thought will help me tomorrow, thinking you’re in there having a blast, pulling the wool over their eyes. You can’t cross a Boggs,’ he says.

I smile.

‘And the more they put you in there, the greater you’ll be. Fergus Boggs, the best marble player in Ireland, maybe even the whole world. And I’ll be your agent. The Boggs Brothers, partners in marble crime.’

I giggle. He does too.

‘Sounds good, doesn’t it?’

I can tell even he’s excited by it.

‘Yeah.’

‘It’ll just be our secret, okay?’

‘Okay.’

‘Every night you can tell me what you learned.’

‘Okay.’

‘Promise?’

‘I promise, Hamish.’

‘Good lad.’ He ruffles my hair. ‘We’ll be okay here,’ he says to me. ‘Won’t we?’

‘Yeah, Hamish,’ I reply.

He holds my sore hand, gentler this time, and we fall asleep together.

Partners in marble crime. Bloodies forever.