First Love, Last Rites by Ian McEwan

Author:Ian McEwan [McEwan, Ian]
Language: eng
Format: epub, mobi
Tags: cookie429, Kat, Extratorrents
ISBN: 9780795301896
Publisher: RosettaBooks
Published: 1975-01-02T06:00:00+00:00

Conversation

with a Cupboard Man

You ask me what I did when I saw this girl. Well, I’ll tell you. You see that cupboard there, it takes up most of the room. I ran all the way back here, climbed inside and tossed myself off. Don’t think I thought about the girl while I did it. No, I couldn’t bear that. I went back in my mind till I was three feet high. That made it come quicker. I can see you think I’m dirty and bent. Well, I washed my hands afterwards, which is more than some people. And I felt better too. Do you see what I mean, I unwound. The way things have been up here in this room what else is there? It’s all right for you. I bet you live in a clean house and your wife washes the sheets and the government pays you to find out about people. All right, I know you’re a … what is it? … a social worker and you’re trying to help, but you can do me no good except by listening. I won’t change now, I’ve been me too long. But it’s good to talk so I’ll just tell you about myself.

I never saw my father because he died before I was born. I think problems started right there - it was my mother who brought me up and no one else. We lived in a huge house near Staines. She was twisted up, you know, that’s where I got it from. All she wanted was to have children but she wouldn’t think of getting married again so that left only me; I had to be all the children she had ever wanted. She tried to stop me growing up and for a long time she succeeded. Do you know, I didn’t learn to speak properly till I was eighteen. I got no schooling, she kept me home because she said it was a rough area. She had her arms round me day and night. She didn’t like it when I got too big for my cot so she went out and bought a crib bed from a hospital auction. That was the sort of thing she would do. Right up until I left I was still sleeping in that thing. I couldn’t go to sleep in an ordinary bed, I thought I was going to fall out and I could never get to sleep. When I was two inches taller than her she was still trying to tie a bib round my neck. She was insane. She got a hammer and nails and some pieces of wood and tried to make a kind of high chair for me to sit in, and that was when I was fourteen. Well, you can imagine, the thing just fell to bits as soon as I sat in it. But Christ! The mush she used to feed me on. That’s why I get these stomach troubles. She wouldn’t let me do anything for myself, even tried to stop me from being clean.

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