How I Became A Nun Read Free

of my two burdens. He looked for somewhere to throw them.
     But he wasn’t really looking because he hadn’t taken his eyes off me. Then
     he did something surprising.
    He put the spoon into the cone, dipped it into the remains of the pink ice cream,
     half-melted now but still solid enough to scoop up, and lifted it to his mouth. I shall
     not slight the memory of my father by suggesting that he couldn’t let an ice cream
     go to waste when he had paid good money for it. I’m sure that’s not what it
     was. Sometimes he had miserly reflexes, as we all do, but not in a situation like that.
     He had always been a straightforward, small-town sort of guy. I’m sure he
     didn’t even imagine the possibility of complicating the tragedy. I like to think
     that he did it simply to relish a spoonful, just one spoonful of delicious, genuine
     strawberry ice cream. Like an ultimate, secret, sublime confirmation.
    But then the situation turned around. He screwed up his face in a grimace of disgust and
     spat emphatically. It was revolting! I was staring at him pop-eyed (I was pop-eyed
     already from the retching), seeing double or triple. I should have been exulting in the
     triumph of the weak, a sentiment I knew so well, the triumph of those for whom
     vindication always comes too late. And perhaps there was an element of that, since the
     habit was deeply ingrained. But I didn’t feel exultant. In fact I didn’t
     really understand what was going on. Instead of accepting the obvious explanation, as
     any person in their right mind would have done, I was so caught up in the disaster that
     I was looking for something more baroque, another turn of the screw that would
not
cancel out what had gone before.
    He lifted the cone to his nose and gave it a good sniff. His expression of disgust
     intensified. There was that stalling of imperceptible movements that precedes the swing
     into action. He wasn’t a man of action; in that respect he was normal. But
     sometimes action has to be taken. He didn’t look at me. Throughout the rest of
     that ill-fated afternoon, he didn’t look at me again. Although I must have been
     quite a sight to behold. Not once did he look in my direction. Looking would have been a
     kind of explaining, and it was already too late for explanation to bridge the gap
     between us. He got up and headed for the ice-cream store, leaving me alone on the
     sidewalk bench, all in a mess and crying. But I followed him.
    “Mister …”
    The ice cream vendor looked up from his comic book. He tried to compose his features,
     because he sensed there was a problem, but he couldn’t imagine what it might
     be.
    “This lousy ice cream you sold me is off.”
    “No.”
    “What do you mean, No, for Christ’s sake!”
    “No sir, all the ice cream I sell is fresh.”
    “Well, this one is rotten.”
    “What flavor is it? Strawberry? It was delivered this morning.”
    “What the hell do I care? It’s rotten.”
    “Doesn’t come any fresher,” insisted the vendor. He looked along the
     row of drums with aluminum lids lined up under the counter and opened one. “Here
     it is. Brand new; I opened it for you.”
    “Don’t try it out on me.”
    “Is it my fault if the boy didn’t like it?”
    Dad had gone red with fury. He held out the cone.
    “Try it!”
    “I don’t have to try anything.”
    “No … you’re going to try it and you’re going to tell me if
     …”
    “Don’t shout at me.”
    In spite of this reasonable suggestion, both of them were shouting.
    “I’m going to report you.”
    “Don’t make me laugh.”
    “Who do you think you are?”
    “Who do you think
you
are?”
    By this stage it had become a battle of wills. It was too late for the problem to be
     solved in a rational fashion. My father must have known that if he had tried the
     strawberry ice cream at the start, things wouldn’t have degenerated to this point.
     But he hadn’t, and now he was being paid back in kind, although