Paddy Clarke Ha Ha Ha by Roddy Doyle

was the year after—so he didn’t know me.
    —You mind yourself, sonny, he said.
    —SHE’S A LONG-HONG GOH-HON -
    I couldn’t do it; I didn’t even know what Hank Williams was singing.
    Da hit me.
    On the shoulder; I was looking at him, about to tell him that I didn’t want to sing this one; it was too hard. It was funny; I knew he was going to wallop me from the look on his face a few seconds before he did it. Then he looked as if he’d changed his mind, like he’d controlled himself, and then I heard the thump and felt it, as if he’d forgotten to tell his hand not to keep going towards me.
    He hadn’t lifted the needle.
    —A MAN NEEDS A WOMAN THAT HE CAN LEAN
ON—
BUT MY LEANING POST IS DONE LE-HEFT AND
GONE
    I rubbed my shoulder through my jumper and shirt and vest; it was like it was expanding and shrinking, filling and shrinking. It wasn’t that sore.
    I didn’t cry.
    —Come on, said Da.
    He lifted the needle this time, and we started again.
    —I WENT DOWN TO THE RIVER
TO WATCH THE FISH SWIM BY-YY—
    He put his hand on my shoulder, the other one. I wanted to squirm it away but after a while I didn’t mind.
     
    The record player was a red box. He’d carried it home from work one day. You could pile six records in it, over the turntable. We only had three; The Black and White Minstrels, South Pacific and Hank Williams The King of Country Music. When he brought the record player home we only had one, South Pacific. He played it all Friday night and all the weekend. He tried to make me learn I’m Gonna Wash That Man Right Out of My Hair but my ma stopped him. She said if I ever sang that in school or outside they’d have to sell the house and move somewhere else.
    It played 33s and 45s and 78s. 33s were L.P.s like the three we had. Kevin smuggled his brother’s record, I’m A Believer by The Monkees, out of his house. It was a 45. But my da wouldn’t let us play it. He said there was a scratch on it; he didn’t even look at it. He wasn’t even using the record player. It was his. It was in the same room as the television. When he was playing it the television stayed off. He once put on the Black and White Minstrels at the same time they were on the television and he turned the television sound down but it didn’t work. The singer’s mouth, the black fella that sang the serious songs, was opening and shutting when the record was over and the needle was about to go up, but it didn’t. It kept going over the scratch. Da had to lift it.
    —Were you messing with this? he said to me.
    —No.
    —You then; were you?
    —No, said Sinbad.
    —Somebody was, he said.
    —They didn’t touch it, said my ma.
    My face burned when I was waiting for something else to happen, for him to say something back to her.
    Once, he put on Hank Williams during The News. It was brilliant; it was like Charles Mitchell was singing NOW YOU’RE LOOKING AT A MAN THAT’S GETTING KIND O’ MAD, I’VE HAD A LOT O’ LUCK BUT IT’S ALL BEEN BAD. We all roared. Me and Sinbad were let stay up half an hour later.
     
    When we got the car, a Cortina like Henno‘s, a black one, Da drove it up and down the road, learning how to drive it, teaching himself. He wouldn’t let us into it.
    —Not yet, he said.
    He went up to the seafront. We followed him; we could keep up with him. He couldn’t turn it to go back down to the house. He saw us looking and called us over. I thought he was going to kill us. There were seven of us. We all baled in the back and we reversed all the way back to the house. Da sang the Batman music; he was mad sometimes, brilliant mad. Aidan had a bleeding nose when we got out. He was whinging. Da got down on his knees and held Aidan’s shoulders. He wiped his nose with his hankie and got him to blow into it, and told him he’d have great crack picking the dried blood out of his nose when he went to bed later and Aidan started laughing.
    They all went down to the field behind the shops to find the big