he were not openly encouraged, walk away.
Years later, when we lay in beds together, I learned more about him. But here in the dark, in this old school, with many nooks and shadowy spaces and unused rooms, I learned first how slowly I would have to move, how, for example, he would not let me touch him or kiss him until he had abandoned all modesty. This would take time. At first he would touch the light stubble on my face, or the hair on my chest. He would do this as though it were leading nowhere. I could touch his back and open his pants and pull him in against me, and slowly I could put my hands where I liked but only when I sensed from his breathing that he was ready for this.
That night we went silently to a place off the rehearsal room that was once used for storing musical instruments. It had two doors – one connecting it to the rehearsal room, the other giving on to a dark corridor, both of which could be locked. There was no light inside. At first, as we stood facing each other, I moved too fast and Donnacha almost pushed me away. I thought then that he just wanted to play a bit before going to bed. I did not know that he was building up to something and that soon he would be ready for anything.
I wondered that night, as I sneaked across the school to my dormitory and then lay in bed, what Donnacha would do in the morning. I wondered if he would avoid me, if he would pretend that nothing had happened between us, if he would pretend that he had not left marks on my back with his fingernails and made muffled sounds that went on and on as he came all over my chest and stomach, if he would try to make me forget that I had fed his sweet, thick, pungent, lemony sperm into my mouth with my fingers as if it were jam, desperately trying to make sure that none was wasted.
As soon as I caught his eye at breakfast the next morning, however, he smiled at me, the smile cheeky and warm and affectionate. He told me later that I had glanced up at him in wonder, almost in fear, and immediately looked away. As soon as breakfast was over he made his way across and stood behind my chair, waiting for me to finish my cup of tea. He had never done this before. We walked out of the refectory as best friends.
It seems ludicrous now, and it is certainly embarrassing, but it was more or less at the time I began to have sex with Donnacha that I became deeply religious. I still believe that it had nothing to do with him. I believe that I became interested in religion because of a number of poems on the school course that I read and reread with considerable intensity. These were the sonnets of Hopkins and two poems by T. S. Eliot, ‘A Song for Simeon’ and ‘The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock’. If I ever happen to read ‘Prufrock’ now, it is as a comic poem, but then, at the age of sixteen, I took seriously the idea of the ‘overwhelming question’ that Prufrock wished to ask. I believed that there was such a question and that it was up to us, students of the poem, to formulate it. I believed that the question was existential, almost religious, and it concerned how we should live in the world, and how we should relate to God and to each other, and I grew so solemn and earnest on the subject that Mr Mulhern, the English teacher, suggested I go and see a priest who had come back from America and who worked only with the seminarians. He was a theologian. His name was Patrick Moorehouse.
The first day I knocked on his door he was busy, but I was struck by how polite he was. When I told him why I had come to see him, he nodded and said that Mr Mulhern had mentioned me to him, and that he too was an admirer of Hopkins and Eliot. He suggested that I come back another time. I remember that I went up to his room every evening after tea for some weeks but he was never there. One day I saw him on the corridor but he did not notice me.
And then one Sunday, when I had presumed that I was travelling to New Ross for a hurling match, I was told
Years later, when we lay in beds together, I learned more about him. But here in the dark, in this old school, with many nooks and shadowy spaces and unused rooms, I learned first how slowly I would have to move, how, for example, he would not let me touch him or kiss him until he had abandoned all modesty. This would take time. At first he would touch the light stubble on my face, or the hair on my chest. He would do this as though it were leading nowhere. I could touch his back and open his pants and pull him in against me, and slowly I could put my hands where I liked but only when I sensed from his breathing that he was ready for this.
That night we went silently to a place off the rehearsal room that was once used for storing musical instruments. It had two doors – one connecting it to the rehearsal room, the other giving on to a dark corridor, both of which could be locked. There was no light inside. At first, as we stood facing each other, I moved too fast and Donnacha almost pushed me away. I thought then that he just wanted to play a bit before going to bed. I did not know that he was building up to something and that soon he would be ready for anything.
I wondered that night, as I sneaked across the school to my dormitory and then lay in bed, what Donnacha would do in the morning. I wondered if he would avoid me, if he would pretend that nothing had happened between us, if he would pretend that he had not left marks on my back with his fingernails and made muffled sounds that went on and on as he came all over my chest and stomach, if he would try to make me forget that I had fed his sweet, thick, pungent, lemony sperm into my mouth with my fingers as if it were jam, desperately trying to make sure that none was wasted.
As soon as I caught his eye at breakfast the next morning, however, he smiled at me, the smile cheeky and warm and affectionate. He told me later that I had glanced up at him in wonder, almost in fear, and immediately looked away. As soon as breakfast was over he made his way across and stood behind my chair, waiting for me to finish my cup of tea. He had never done this before. We walked out of the refectory as best friends.
It seems ludicrous now, and it is certainly embarrassing, but it was more or less at the time I began to have sex with Donnacha that I became deeply religious. I still believe that it had nothing to do with him. I believe that I became interested in religion because of a number of poems on the school course that I read and reread with considerable intensity. These were the sonnets of Hopkins and two poems by T. S. Eliot, ‘A Song for Simeon’ and ‘The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock’. If I ever happen to read ‘Prufrock’ now, it is as a comic poem, but then, at the age of sixteen, I took seriously the idea of the ‘overwhelming question’ that Prufrock wished to ask. I believed that there was such a question and that it was up to us, students of the poem, to formulate it. I believed that the question was existential, almost religious, and it concerned how we should live in the world, and how we should relate to God and to each other, and I grew so solemn and earnest on the subject that Mr Mulhern, the English teacher, suggested I go and see a priest who had come back from America and who worked only with the seminarians. He was a theologian. His name was Patrick Moorehouse.
The first day I knocked on his door he was busy, but I was struck by how polite he was. When I told him why I had come to see him, he nodded and said that Mr Mulhern had mentioned me to him, and that he too was an admirer of Hopkins and Eliot. He suggested that I come back another time. I remember that I went up to his room every evening after tea for some weeks but he was never there. One day I saw him on the corridor but he did not notice me.
And then one Sunday, when I had presumed that I was travelling to New Ross for a hurling match, I was told
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