Single Text
Leaving Certificate Ordinary Level – Excellence in English Language and Literature
Later, Jack is so tempted by the lollipop that he creeps out of Wardrobe to search for it. Old Nick is still in bed with Ma and when Jack looks at him, Old Nick says, ‘Hey, sonny’. Ma leaps up and screams at Jack to get away. Jack runs back into Wardrobe and Old Nick places his hand over Ma’s mouth. She promises to be quiet if he will leave Jack alone, saying it is all she has ever asked for. Old Nick leaves, but not before reminding her that he is the reason she has Jack in the fi rst place.
Old Nick punishes Jack and Ma for the previous night by turning off the power. T ey have to get into bed during the day to warm up. Ma dozes, and Jack fi nds and eats the lollipop Old Nick brought him. As they cannot cook without electricity, Ma and Jack eat raw food. Ma explains to Jack that turning off the power is Old Nick’s way of making them suff er because she screamed at him. Jack says that Old Nick could have separated them, which would have been far worse.
Room is very cold because the heating is turned off , and Jack has a pain in his stomach, which Ma says is caused by having had to eat raw vegetables the day before. Jack hopes Old Nick never visits Room again but Ma points out that without him they would starve.
Ma decides Jack is old enough to hear the truth about how she came to be imprisoned in Room. She tells him about her parents and her brother, Paul, but Jack cannot take it all in, which upsets Ma.
Jack wants proof that there is a world outside Room. Ma puts the trash can on top of the chair on top of the table so he can see out of the skylight. Jack is furious to discover that he cannot see all of the things, such as ‘ships or trains or horses or girls or skyscrapers’, that Ma promised him existed in the outside world.
As food is running low now, Ma shares the last remaining bagel with Jack, giving him three quarters of it and claiming not to be hungry.
To his amazement, Jack sees an airplane through the skylight that day and now believes that the outside world is real. He is excited at the thought of ‘Outside’ and wants to go there as soon as possible. Talking about their imprisonment makes Ma sad and ‘a bit scared’ and Jack is suddenly frightened that Old Nick might not turn on the power or bring more food.
As night falls, Ma tells Jack the details of her kidnapping. She was a 19-year-old student when Old Nick abducted her from the college parking lot. In her early days in Room, Ma tried hard to escape. Once she smashed the toilet lid down on Old Nick’s head and held a knife to his throat, threatening to kill him if he didn’t give her the code to unlock the door. Old Nick overpowered her, broke her wrist and took the knife. He said that if she ever tried ‘a stunt like that’ again he would leave her to starve to death. Jack fears that the reason Ma is telling him this story is that Old Nick has fi nally abandoned them to die in Room. Just then, the power is switched back on.
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