Conor's Caveman

by Alan Nolan

  She straightened her cardigan and called the school to attention. ‘Welcome back, boys and girls. I hope you all had a good weekend and are nice and rested and ready for a fun week of work.’

  What’s fun about work?? thought half the school children.

  ‘And I hope you remembered, boys and girls, that tomorrow is Bring Your Parent to School Day. I hope you have organised your mother or your father or your guardian to be ready to come in to the class and tell us all about what wonderful jobs they have – be they air traffic controllers, stockbrokers, landscape gardeners or homemakers. We look forward to hearing from them all.’

  Damian, who was sitting in front of Conor in the hall, turned around to face him. After making sure that Charlie wasn’t within earshot, he said snidely, ‘What are YOU going to do tomorrow, Corcoran? You haven’t GOT a dad, and your mum is never around.’

  The rain was getting heavier on the corrugated roof, and poor Ms. Hennigan was having to speak louder to be heard. Some cold drips started to come down on the heads of the children and teachers through cracks and holes in the roof, and there were small cries of dismay from a couple of the kids. One teacher, who must have been a scout as a child, was prepared enough to bring an umbrella, which he popped open and sat under.

  ‘Really, Ms. Hennigan,’ whispered a small, mousey teacher with big teeth and bigger spectacles, ‘when are we going to get that roof fixed?’

  A drop of icy water splashed off her twitchy nose. This woman really looked like a mouse; all she was missing was a tail.

  ‘As soon as we appoint a new caretaker,’ said Ms. Hennigan. ‘The last one, if you remember, Ms. Sniffles, was chased out of here by certain ruffian pupils.’

  She glared pointedly at Damian and Gulliver, both of whom were snickering (again! Snickering seemed to be their favourite pastime. If there was an All-Ireland snickering team, Damian and Gulliver would be the captain and prop-forward) and picking their noses.

  Chapter Six

  A Dog-gone Dilemma

  After school, Conor and Charlie ran all the way back to Conor’s house. They both had been thinking about Ogg all day and hadn’t been able to concentrate on their school work at all. In art class, the students had to draw pictures of flying saucers to go with a story about aliens attacking Dublin, and Conor had drawn the spaceships as giant fried eggs flying over O’Connell Street!

  They hoped that Ogg had sat there on the sofa, where Conor had left him, being good and watching TV. Some hope.

  When they reached the house, Conor was alarmed to find that the front door was open. He ran inside looking for Ogg. He wasn’t on the sofa in the living room, although the TV was still on.

  ‘I’ll check upstairs,’ said Charlie and took the steps upwards two at a time.

  Conor could hear her stomping about, going from room to room upstairs looking for Ogg while he did exactly the same thing downstairs, but the house was empty. There were no cavemen, frozen, defrosted or slightly chilly, to be seen anywhere.

  Then Conor heard a cry from above. ‘Smoke!’ Charlie shouted. ‘White smoke at the back window!’

  They raced out into the backyard and sure enough, white smoke was billowing across the garden, past the huge old oak tree at the back wall. It seemed to be coming from the side passageway. The kennel!

  As they thought, the smoke was coming from the dog kennel. Conor and Charlie bent down to peek through the doorway, their eyes watering with the thick white smoke. Ogg sat inside, warming his huge hands at a little fire he had built in the middle.

  ‘He sure likes that kennel,’ said Conor. ‘You may as well stay here, Ogg. It doesn’t really belong to anyone any more anyway. When dad left, he took the dog and left me.’

  Ogg smiled. ‘Dog. Gone. Ogg. Here.’

  Charlie nearly jumped out of her socks! ‘He can SPEAK?!’

  ‘He must have picked it up from watching telly,’ said Conor. ‘I always told mum TV was educational.’

  There wasn’t much room for Conor and Charlie inside the kennel, so the two friends brought Ogg back inside the house. Conor looked at his watch. Good. Mum wouldn’t be back until 11pm at the earliest. Plenty of time to spend with their new friend.

  Conor and Charlie spent the afternoon showing Ogg all the wonders of modern technology. They showed him the toaster and how it toasted bread (although, for Ogg, bread itself was modern technology); they showed him the computer (Ogg tried to eat the mouse, but it was an ancient one with a lead attached, so they were able to pull it out of his mouth); and they showed him the gas fire, with the little switch to turn on the instant flame. Ogg was fascinated by this – his people had only just discovered fire themselves, and to have a wondrous device like this that produced a beautiful blue frame without all the fuss of dry twigs and bits of flint stone seemed like pure magic.

  Just then the microwave oven that Charlie had been messing around with PINGGGed loudly and Ogg, deep in his gas-fire reverie, jumped up and ran out of the room. Not AGAIN, thought Conor as they looked for him in the living room, the bathroom and the little room under the stairs. How could a caveman the size of Ogg go missing twice in one day?

  They eventually found him upstairs in Conor’s bedroom, hiding on top of one of the wardrobes. ‘I don’t even want to know how he got up there,’ said Charlie as Conor coaxed Ogg down.

  Charlie checked the time on Conor’s alarm clock; she had to go. She had to catch her dad before he went out to play Monday five-a-side at the leisure centre and remind him that tomorrow was Bring Your Parent to School Day.

  Conor and Ogg saw her out. ‘Seeya, Conor! Bye, Ogg!’ Charlie chirped happily as she trotted down the path and up Clobberstown Crescent to her own house.

  ‘Yep, seeya,’ said Conor. He was still wondering what to do about Bring Your Parent to School Day. His mum was so busy working her four jobs that he didn’t dare ask her to take time off to do it. And he couldn’t ask her boyfriend, Frank Delaney, because, 1. He was a cop, and he would put the frighteners up half the class and most of the other parents who turned up – everybody has their guilty secrets, especially in Clobberstown, and 2. He was the most booooooring person that Conor had ever met. He even made being a police sergeant sound boring, with long, slow car chases pursuing some old lady on a walking frame who dropped litter in the street. The only time Frank’s face lit up was when he talked about the mounds of paperwork that he and the other guards in the station had to do on a daily basis. Boy, did Frank like paperwork.

  So, no, Frank wouldn’t do either.

  Conor rubbed his chin and looked at Ogg, standing in the hallway in his furs, with his long hair and big stone spear. A smile grew on Conor’s face. He had an idea – it was a risky one, but it might just be crazy enough to actually work!

  Chapter Seven

  The Caveman from Uncle

  The next day was just as wet and windy. Conor got up early again and hustled Ogg in from the ex-dog’s kennel where he insisted on sleeping.

  ‘Right, Ogg, today is Bring Your Parent to School Day, and I’ll be jiggered if I’m going to school without some kind of relation. So. Here’s the plan. You’re it.’

  Conor fished around in his mum’s wardrobe until he found what he was looking for: Frank’s dungarees. Frank had worn them during the summer when he was painting the living room for Clarissa, and they were covered in paint splashes and globs of dried plaster. Perfect, thought Conor.

  ‘I’m going to stick these on you, Ogg, and we’ll see what you look like.’

  This was easier said than done – Ogg had never worn clothes before, aside from his furs – but eventually, after much grunting and oof-ing from both parties, Conor managed to get the dungarees onto the oversized caveman, as well as a white tee shirt to cover his furs. Ogg looked almost human. Well, he was human. Mostly. He just looked more like a modern human.

  ‘Stand up and let me see you,’ said Conor.

  Ogg stood up. The dungarees were big – Frank, like most law-enforcement officers, was a tall
man – but they were nowhere near big enough for Ogg. The legs of the trouser part stopped just below Ogg’s knees, leaving a length of hairy leg and two big, hairy feet on show. ‘Hmm. We’ll have to do something about that.’

  Ten minutes later, Conor had cut the toes out of a pair of Frank’s size-twelve runners that he found under the bed and jammed them onto Ogg’s feet. He gave Ogg’s hair a quick comb – well, a slow comb actually, it was quite matted – and HEY PRESTO! an instant relative. Ogg was still quite unshaven, and his hairy toes were sticking out of the front of each of the runners, but, Conor thought, he would have to do.

  On the way out the front door, Conor had to send Ogg back inside with the flat-screen television set that he was trying to bring with him, tucked under his hairy arm. ‘Ogg. Watch. Mammoth. Show.’

  Conor sighed and held up the plug. It was only six feet long; the TV wouldn’t even make it down the garden path, let alone all the way to school.

  After pausing at the garden gate to make sure the coast was clear, Conor took Ogg’s massive hand and led him down Clobberstown Crescent, before turning right onto Clobberstown View and down onto Clobberstown Main Street, past the bus stop, past the express supermarket and the post office, past the heavily graffitied children’s playground and up the suitably named School Road, towards St. Gobnet’s School. The rain was becoming heavy again, and the wind was howling through the trees, but Conor and Ogg walked on, hand in hand. Anyone who looked at them would have thought that the much bigger figure of Ogg was bringing his little boy for a walk, and not the other way around.

  As they reached the school, Conor noticed all the different cars parked on the roads outside the gates. Must be the parents, he thought to himself. There was quite an array of automotive excellence on show, from sporty, expensive, two-door soft-tops to rusty old bangers with four doors but only one that actually opened.

  With a deep breath, Conor led Ogg through the gates and into the school. They were both glad to get out of the storm. Here we go, Conor thought.

  At his classroom door, the school principal, Ms. Hennigan, stood with a clipboard, ticking off each parent’s name as they filed in. ‘Ah,’ she said as Conor approached, ‘Conor Corcoran. And who is this, aheh, strapping young man you have brought along today?’ She was giving Ogg a serious sideways glance.

  ‘This is Ogg,’ began Conor, ‘I mean, this is my Ogg.’ He gulped. ‘I mean my, em, uncle … Ogg. Uncle Ogg!’

  ‘Such an unusual name,’ said Ms. Hennigan. She put out her hand, seemingly to touch Ogg’s chest, but diverted at the last second and fixed the button on the strap of his dungarees instead.

  ‘It’s, em, short for Jim,’ said Conor.

  ‘Jim,’ said Ms. Hennigan. She tried to write on the clipboard, but she hadn’t clicked the button on her ballpoint pen. She looked up helplessly and gave a nervous laugh. Ogg smiled and Ms. Hennigan gulped audibly and staggered a little. Grownups, thought Conor.

  At that moment Charlie stuck her head around the classroom door. ‘Hiya, Conor, my dad’s …’ She stopped dead when she saw Ogg standing there with Ms. Hennigan.

  ‘Ah, Charlie,’ said Conor in a quiet voice, ‘you know my Uncle Ogg … er, Jim?’

  ‘Yes, of course, Uncle Jim. Come on in, Uncle Jim …’ She led Conor and Ogg into the classroom. Ms. Hennigan stood staring after them, leaning slightly against the wall.

  There was an audible GASP! in the packed classroom from kids and adults alike as Conor walked in with Ogg. Nobody had ever seen someone that tall. Or wide. Or, well, hairy.

  Conor gave Charlie a small smile and went to his desk. ‘What are you doing?’ she whispered.

  ‘I didn’t want to arrive with no relation,’ answered Conor. ‘It’ll be fine.’

  Charlie snorted, ‘Oh yeah, it’ll be fine until Ogg has to speak!’

  Now it was Conor’s turn to gulp. He hadn’t thought of that. Every parent or relation had to give a short speech on what they did for their job! What was Ogg going to say for HIS job? That he hunted woolly mammoths across the vast icy tundra of North Wicklow?? He couldn’t even speak properly! This is a disaster, thought Conor. He sat down at his desk with his head in his hands. Ogg, standing by the wall with the other parents and relations, gave him a little wave.

  One by one, the parents of the other children got up to speak. There were no air traffic controllers among them, but there were plenty of people who worked in supermarkets and in office jobs. There was even a lollipop lady called Sheila who brought in her giant lollipop to show the kids. (Her daughter Rebecca turned bright red.)

  Then it was Dennis Deegan’s turn to speak. As I mentioned earlier, Damian’s father, as well as being a scout leader, was a high-flying, high-earning stockbroker, and he wanted everyone to know it. He smoothed down his orange hair, adjusted his gold cufflinks and smirked at the other parents as he took his place at the top of the class, as if to say ‘all your jobs are rubbish compared to mine’.

  Conor had heard this all before. Dennis regaled the scout troop regularly on how hard but how rewarding the world of stockbroking could be. So Conor looked out the window at the storm – it really was getting bad now, with lashing rain and winds that were making the weathervane on top of the school hall spin uncontrollably – then he put his head down on the desk and promptly fell asleep.

  He only woke up when he heard the WOWs and JANEY MACKs from the kids around him as Dennis finished talking and handed them each a crisp fiver from his over-stuffed wallet. Charlie threw her eyes up in disgust but took the fiver anyway. Naturally, Dennis somehow ‘forgot’ to give Conor a fiver.

  ‘Don’t worry,’ whispered Charlie, ‘I’ll split my money with you. Flash eejit – he doesn’t know the value of it.’

  Ms. Hennigan coughed. ‘Alright, settle down. Thank you, Mr. Deegan, for your most, eh, generous talk.’

  Dennis smirked and flashed his too-white teeth to the class.

  ‘And now, we’ll hear from Conor Corcoran’s Uncle Ogg, I mean, Uncle Jim.’

  All eyes turned to the massive, long-haired figure standing against the wall in too-short dungarees and shoes with the toes cut out of them. He looked back at them and blinked.

  Conor sprang to his feet, thinking quickly. ‘I’m afraid my uncle can’t speak today because, well, he can’t speak.’ That much was true. ‘He can’t speak because he has, em, larry … um, larring … eh …’

  ‘Laryngitis?’ said Ms. Hennigan helpfully. ‘He’s lost his voice? Ah, poor pet.’ She shook her head and gazed at Ogg adoringly.

  ‘That’s it!’ cried Conor. ‘What SHE said! He’s got larry-vitus, and he can’t speak, so I’m going to speak for him.’

  ‘This’ll be a first,’ muttered Damian Deegan to Gulliver. ‘Corcoran never usually speaks either.’

  Charlie turned around in her seat and glared at Damian, who shut up sharpish.

  ‘You see, my uncle is a handyman. Which explains the handyman’s clothes. Handily.’ Conor took a deep breath and continued. ‘He’s great with his hands. He can fix anything – doors, windows, walls, toys, bikes, rocking horses, gutters, trampolines, garden sheds – you name it, he can fix it. He’s Mister Fix It. Except his name is Ogg. I mean, Jim.’ Conor gulped. ‘And that’s it. Thank you.’ He sat down again and turned around to look at Ogg, who gave him another little wave.

  There was a small clap from the class, who were slightly in bewilderment that Conor had spoken at all. But the applause, small as it was, was drowned out by a huge tearing, wrenching sound from down the corridor. Ms. Sniffles appeared in the doorway. ‘Ms. Hennigan,’ she shrieked above the noise, ‘the school-hall roof, it’s lifting off!’

  Ms. Hennigan bustled down the corridor, followed by most of the parents and children. The double doors to the hall were wide open and through them they could see broad daylight as the corrugated-iron roof was raised, bent up at an angle by the high wind. Rain spattered down into the hall, covering the wooden floor.

  ‘Oh, my!’ cried Ms. Hennigan. �
��Can anybody help?’

  ‘Mr. Deegan is a scout leader,’ shouted Charlie. ‘I’m sure he can help!’

  ‘Well, I …’ stuttered Dennis Deegan, edging his way back though the crowd.

  Suddenly the massive figure of Ogg made his way through the throng of people in the doorway. He walked over to the PE bars at the side of the hall and nimbly climbed up them, swinging off a rope attached to a ceiling cross-beam and flipping himself through the driving rain, up onto the roof. Ms. Hennigan gasped and clutched her chest.

  Ogg took the loose panels of the rusty corrugated roof in his massive bare hands and, with brute strength, bent them back into place over the gaping hole. Hanging on despite the gale force wind, he produced a big wooden caveman club from under his dungarees and battered and bashed the iron roof back into place.

  The clanging and kronching sound inside the hall was very loud, but at least the rain wasn’t coming in any more. The crowd cheered, Conor and Charlie cheering loudest.

  Eventually Ogg, satisfied with his work, climbed back through a window high up in the wall of the hall and dropped down to the wooden floor. He was wet through.

  The crowd of parents, relations and children gathered around him and clapped him on the back. They might have taken him up on their shoulders in celebration, but he looked much too heavy.