Once Upon a Tender Time

by Carl Muller

  But there was no Daddy and certainly no Superman on the day Carloboy ran to ask Uncle Aloy if he would take the boys to the Gamini Theatre to see the ‘Full Serial’ the cinema advertisements were screaming about.

  Uncle Aloy twinkled. ‘Full serial? My goodness, that is three hours, no?’

  Once every while a Full Serial would come along and the queues would be tremendous. This was when one could sit through the entire story, episode by episode. There would be two ten minute and one twenty minute intermission.

  ‘If you ask Daddy is sure to allow.’

  Aloy hummed and looked at the boy. ‘Your mummy knows you came here?’

  Carloboy shook his head breathlessly. ‘I jumped over the wall and came. Uncle, you’ll come and ask? I’ll tell Johnny and Sammy also. Bryce I don’ know. Uncle Victor sure to say can’t go for Bryce.’

  ‘Mmm, but three-hour show. Come, come inside. You standing there if your mummy comes out and sees . . . come inside. You want some Necto?’

  It was the first time Carloboy had been inside Uncle Aloy’s home. He was led to the bedroom where, on a small bedside table, was a bottle of fizzy wine-dark Necto and an upturned tumbler. Aloy poured the boy a drink, sat on the bed and gently, most casually, took the boy by the waist and drew him backwards to stand between his outspread knees. His hand moved caressingly from the boy’s hip, down and around to rest lightly across the pit of the stomach. All the while he talked, smoothly. ‘Full serial no half tickets, no? Have to pay one rupee and another ten cents for entertainment tax also. Even for you. How’s the Necto? You want a little more? Just keep the glass then. Ah . . . will your mummy give one rupee? Other times she only gives fifty cents and twenty cents for the bus, no? How if she says no? And three hours also . . .’ The hand moved down, pressing, thumb and forefinger probing into the trousers to touch the small penis . . . ‘and may even say you have homework to do and bad to sit and see for so long . . .’ The other hand stroked the boy’s thigh, pushing upwards, under the trouser leg. Fingers worked on the trouser strap . . . ‘and then what to do?’

  Carloboy hardly noticed that his trousers had been undone and were slipping off his hips. He was wrestling with the problem of persuading his mother for money, time, permission for this film of films. ‘I can go and ask my granny in Lawrence Road. If I ask she will give me—-Uncle Aloy!’

  ‘Shhh, don’t worry. Just wait like that a little.’ The man was stroking his penis, making it hard. He was breathing hard and Carloboy stood stock still, confused, watching the big fingers moving. Then his trousers fell and Uncle Aloy was pushing them down to his ankles. ‘What? You’re afraid? Don’t be afraid. Turn round, I’ll show you. You want to see? And never mind asking anyone for the money. I’ll buy your ticket and I’ll come and tell your mummy to send you, right?’

  Carloboy nodded. He was turned around, kicking off his trousers and Uncle Aloy was unbuttoning his own trousers and holding him close, drew him to the bed. ‘Don’t worry. Nobody know, no, and don’t tell anybody, you heard?’

  Carloboy nodded.

  ‘You don’t worry about anything. You come here everyday and we will do this and all the pictures I will take you and I will pay for you, right? Here, catch it. What’s the matter? You’re shy? Nobody did like this to you? See, it’s big, no. Catch it nicely. Now shake it like this, ah, that’s the way . . .’

  Carloboy felt a stickiness in his hand and Uncle Aloy shook his own little cock, forcing back the tight foreskin until he felt a short sharp pain. He cried out briefly, struggled, and the man grasped him, wrapped a big leg around him and pushed his organ between his thighs. The bottle of Necto seemed to teeter and the table rocked and Aloy spent himself and rose to hurriedly dab at the boy’s penis with a dirty towel.

  ‘It’s paining?’ he asked.

  Carloboy shook his head. He simply stared at the blood that welled up from beneath the foreskin. ‘Uncle Aloy, why it is bleeding?’

  ‘Don’t worry. Here hold the towel until it stops. It is all right. Nothing to worry, men.’

  But Carloboy was horrified. He sat silent, holding the soiled orange towel, watching the blobs of blood spread on the cloth. Aloy poured him the last of the Necto. It took a long time for the bleeding to stop. Only a long time later did the boy understand what had happened. Aloy had pulled back his foreskin so forcibly that the little flesh thread that held it at the end of his prepuce had snapped. So now he could pull back his foreskin all the way. It was yet another discovery.

  ‘Now it’s all right, no? See, no more bleeding. Here, put your trousers, and come again, right? You’ll come?’

  Carloboy nodded.

  ‘Good boy. And don’t tell anyone. I’ll come and tell about the picture. I’ll come in the evening. You want some water?’

  ‘No, Uncle.’

  ‘Come tomorrow if you like. You can come?’

  Carloboy nodded.

  ‘Good boy. Then you go now. If you come tomorrow about this time is good. I’ll be at home.’

  It was a most definite end of innocence.

  *

  The world becomes a different place to a child who has been abused by an adult. To Carloboy it was a welter of emotional ladles, whirling, swirling in a sort of sexual mulligatawny. At six, he had thought Uncle Dunnyboy quite funny. Uncle Dunnyboy, his father’s eldest brother was considered extremely strange by all and sundry and was regarded most cautiously by Beryl von Bloss.

  ‘Poddi,’ she would shout, ‘see who door is knocking.’

  ‘Nona, Dunny master have come.’

  Beryl would groan, then say: “Nother damn curse. Not enough the work in the morning, have to watch him now.’

  Dunnyboy had a strange alto-husky voice. Slightly whining.

  ‘What for you came?’ Beryl would demand.

  ‘Where Sonnaboy?’

  ‘Gone to work. You go an’ come some other time.’

  ‘Walked and came, no? Tired also.’

  That was another thing about Dunnyboy. He walked. Buses, rickshaws never held any charms. Nor did trains. He was, say, in Maradana. It seemed a good idea to go to Wellawatte six miles away. He walked.

  Beryl shrugged. ‘So sit a little. You want some tea?’

  ‘Eh?’

  ‘Tea! Tea! You want?’ Dunnyboy was deaf too.

  ‘Can make some tea?’ he asks hopefully.

  ‘That’s what I asked, no?’

  ‘Eh?’

  ‘Oh, you old bugger. I’ll bring some tea!’

  ‘Little water also never mind.’

  And the man would range around the house and go to the kitchen and the bathroom and ask for more water from the earthenware goblet and pick his nose and leer at Poddi and stare at the chintz curtain at the bedroom door.

  Carloboy was greatly taken up with this oddball uncle who looked quite old, shrunken even, and quite harmless, and who was quite deaf and made queer, clipped remarks and had no conversation whatsoever. A shabby uncle, who never had any clothes of his own. He wore Sonnaboy’s shirts and Totoboy’s trousers and an old coat Viva had given him and a lot of junk which Terry had dumped on him. Anna, too, would give him Colontota’s old shirts and vests and Elsie let down the hems of Eric’s old trousers for him.

  Elsie was most annoyed, which was not surprising. She lived in a state of permanent annoyance. She would snarl: ‘What men, every Christmas giving new shirt for him. Where all the shirts? God alone knows. And the ties and socks he has. Damn shame for me, no, going about and asking other people’s clothes. What is new won’t wear. Locking in the almirah and keeping. Keeping for what? For rats to take and eat? And won’t stay in the house. Suddenly telling I’m going out and going. Going to where I’m asking but won’t tell. Just putting on some old torn thing and somebody’s big trousers and going.’

  Anna would give a gusty sigh. ‘Coming home sometimes. When see the state I feel sorry, men. Las’ time I gave three old shirts of Mister Colon’s and two rupees. Told to go by bus.’

  ‘Bus? D
on’t give, men. Walking everywhere. And just coming and putting in the almirah. Madness, no?’

  Anna would sigh again, Dunnyboy was a trial. Beryl would snort. Her husband had regaled her with some pretty weird things about Dunnyboy. Carloboy found this uncle quite intriguing . . . until the day Dunnyboy had slyly reached for him and squeezed his penis. ‘Let see,’ he had said, and raised the boy’s trouser leg.

  It was a most fleeting encounter. Beryl had stormed in, slapped her son and dragged him into the kitchen where, having administered another slap, had gritted: ‘Don’t you go near him again, you heard! Nex’ time he comes you go to the garden and play. Damn cad, he is! If I see you going near him again you’ll get with the firewood stick!’

  And yet, Dunnyboy went through the family with a kind of insane doggedness. He had carnal knowledge of his younger brothers and sisters when they were children together. He had opportunity to also abuse his nephews and nieces. Before he died, mercifully enough, he had demonstrated to an ever-widening family circle that he had some sort of avuncular right to meddle with their private parts, put his cock between their legs, masturbate the boys and push a big finger into the girls’ vaginas until they cried and struggled against him. It was the unspoken, unsung family sin. Everyone knew, but no one dared acknowledge it to the other. Parents strove to keep their children away from the old man, yet they accepted him in their homes. As Beryl said, ‘Need five pairs of eyes when that Dunnyboy comes.’

  The old man was sly. He would loll around, pretend to doze, let his lower lip sag, and although as deaf as the psalmist’s adder, would stir in a most predatory manner when Poddi minced in to dust the furniture.

  Carloboy worried himself to a frazzle about his sore foreskin, but it healed quickly enough and he was soon quite taken up by his ability to push it back and expose his glans. The skin would roll back to stay around the rim of his glans, curling thinly. The pink tip would suffuse redly as he grew hard and in his child mind he would feel some panic too. What if it became as big and as thick as Uncle Aloy’s? How would he wear his short trousers? All manner of small-boy fears assailed him and yet, he discovered that arousal came with the seeing, the showing, the hasty flick of Jamis’ sarong, the raising of Poddi’s jacket . . .

  That evening he ran across the garden to St Lawrence’s Road and, scaling a wall, shinned up an adolescent mango tree which grew in Mr Bakelman’s garden. Straddling a low branch which overshot the wall, he saw Mrs Joachim’s servant walking a toddler. The woman was in her twenties, swathed in a flowered cloth and with a tight jacket that accentuated her pointed breasts. Carloboy adjusted the end of his short trousers, allowing his penis to show, and pretended to be totally oblivious of the young woman now strolling slowly below.

  He knew that she had stopped. Even as he sensed that she was staring up at him, seeing his nakedness, he felt his organ swell. Casually he pushed back his foreskin.

  ‘Eesssssch.’

  It was the woman. She made a sucking hiss, trying to draw his attention. His eyes flicked towards her, saw her tight smile, and he looked hastily away.

  ‘Esssssh!’

  He looked down. ‘What?’ he asked.

  The woman smiled archly. ‘Baby from the tree can come?’

  ‘What for?’

  The woman nodded to him to climb down. She pressed the toddler’s hand into her crotch. ‘Baby come, will you. Our house no one at home. For a little while come.’

  Carloboy clambered down. ‘Joachim house, no?’ he said.

  The woman nodded. ‘Wait, I first will go. I inside after going and calling, baby come.’

  ‘What for?’

  ‘Baby come, will you. One rupee I’ll give,’ and the woman walked away.

  Carloboy stood, uncertain. ‘Uncle’ Joachim did not like him. Not since the day of the mangoes and the milkman.

  The Joachims had a very tempting mango tree. Grafted mangoes, old Joachim would boast. In season, the tree would be laden with fruit and, being grafted, each mango was a luscious globe of purple-red and honey yellow. Old Joachim’s pride and joy, irresistible to the boys of the neighbourhood.

  One long afternoon, when all Wellawatte seemed in a stupor, Carloboy had crept in to raid the tree. He had reached a branch, fifteen feet up, and perching there, began to devour as many mangoes as he could. No use taking any home. The distinctive fruit were unmistakably Joachim’s and Joachim’s only. He would be branded for the pillage.

  It was a pity that the Joachims preferred cows’ milk in their tea. The milkman would come at dawn. He had a canvas carrier strapped to his bicycle bar, and in this he carried his bottles of milk for delivery. It was pity, also, that the milkman returned at two p.m. each day for the empty bottles.

  Carloboy with his mouth full of the forbidden fruit, was unnerved when the milkman suddenly bicycled into the garden, dismounted and leaned his machine against the mango tree. What was more, the milkman also coveted those mangoes. He gazed longingly up at the bunches of colourful fruit which hung in such tempting profusion, and saw a large-eyed boy, mouth smeared with orange pulp.

  ‘Ho! Mango hora!5 Here, mangoes breaking!’ he bawled.

  Carloboy froze. His first urge was to shin down, leap the bicycle and flee, but the man stood threateningly at the foot of the tree and was in second wind. ‘Here! Tree on top! Mangoes all eating!’

  There was no help for it. The man had to be silenced, better yet driven away from where he stood. Also he was rousing the neighbourhood. Ammunition, too, was freely available. A hard, unripe mango shafted down to take the man on the head. Then another, and another. Carloboy began to enjoy himself. Also, he had a good throwing arm and the big man with his big mouth was an easy target.

  The man yelped as several mangoes made contact. He roared: ‘Here! Mango fruit to me hitting! Mango hora! All breaking and throwing!’ But he rushed away to thump on the door and Carloboy streaked down, upset the bicycle in his desperation to get away, fell, rose and bolted to more anguished howls of: ‘There going! my bottles broke and running!’

  Mrs Joachim, emerging with a headful of curlers, gaped. But she caught a glimpse of the fleeing boy and fumed. ‘That little devil! You wait,’ she screeched, ‘you wait, I’ll come and tell your father!’

  That evening, for Carloboy, had been most painful. Sonnaboy did not like old ‘Monkey’ Joachim. He particularly resented entertaining complaints from the man. He took a leather slipper and went after his son, who had paled and fled to the kitchen when Joachim stood at the door.

  And now here he was, hesitant at the gate with its peeling yellow pillars, as the nanny, carrying the toddler, went around the house. She was soon at the hall window, crooking a hand, urging him to come. He went.

  Inside the small living room, the toddler sat on a mat. Some stuffed toys had been tossed down. The infant sucked happily on a teddy bear’s head. Carloboy looked around nervously. The woman took his hand. ‘He will stay,’ she said of the infant, and led him into the maw of the house. He wanted to break free and run, but he also looked interestedly at the frayed curtains that hid beat-up beds, striped pillow slips, the piles of clothes slung across the tops of doors and the long kitchen table with its red-checked plastic. She led him to a bedroom with a hideous dressing table on which talcum had been liberally spilt. His knuckles felt warm and he jerked his head when he realized that his hand was pressed against a furry vagina, pushed through the folds of her cloth. Slowly, she rubbed the back of his hand against her crotch. Carloboy stood stock still. He watched her drop her cloth and his penis stiffened. She pulled him to her. ‘Baby trouser take out,’ she breathed. Her fingers slipped the buttons. With a hiss, she raised the tail of his shirt, hitching it in a crude knot around the bottom of his chest, arched herself and bent to rub her vagina against him.

  Carloboy dumbly sank to the bed with her. ‘Baby on top come,’ and she gripped him to her and her fat brown legs cradled him and he breathe the garlicy smell of her breasts as her fingers held his penis, rubbing, rubbin
g, in a stickiness that daubed over his small testicles and across the pit of his stomach. She was breathing heavily, jerkily, and her mouth was open and a near-whistling sound came from her throat, ‘Hard, hard, you hold me,’ she croaked and Carloboy buried his face in her cleavage, felt the impress of a safety pin on his cheek and her hips plunged and he was suddenly bouncing, riding her and felt as though something was bursting inside him. And then she lay still, gasping as a hand fell away from his buttocks and the other slowly unclasped his cock which was steeped in her tumescence.

  Carloboy was sweating. What had happened, he thought wildly. He thought he was going to die or something. And that marvellous, awful delirium that had flooded him. His penis was a little, shrivelled thing now, but an instant before it had been rock hard and something had caused a starburst within him. He had squirmed, wriggled, his knees trembling. It was a feeling he had never known before—something like pain and ecstasy, like holding an ice cube to a flame.

  The woman told him to get up. He did so, looking at her outspread thighs, her cleft with its dark hair. She giggled. ‘Baby like?’

  He nodded.

  She reached out and he came close to her. Gently she stroked him and told him to sit. ‘Finger you put inside,’ she said, placing his hand on the inside of her thighs.

  Carloboy spoke for the first time. ‘Where?’

  ‘Here. I’ll show.’