Page 17
Oskar's desire to wreak revenge on his tormentors and to impress Eli overcomes his fear of taking on three boys at once. He swings his rod with all his might and hits Conny on the ear. Conny screams and is rushed to the hospital. Now that Oskar has triumphed over the class bully, the other kids start to treat him with respect, and he finds with some of them the same friendship he originally sought from Eli. But by now his relationship with Eli has progressed beyond mere friendship.
That night, he takes Eli into the basement of the apartment building and boasts to her about his triumph. "Bravo!" she says. Some time later, he proposes a ritual to seal their relationship: he cuts his hand with his knife and asks her to do the same thing so that they can mix their blood. To his horror, she instead licks up from the floor all the blood that has been dripping from his hand and then screams at him to leave. Confused, he doesn't respond. She runs away.