The Runners Read online

  the runners

  FIACHRA

  SHERIDAN

  NEW

  ISLAND

  THE RUNNERS

  First published 2009

  by New Island

  2 Brookside

  Dundrum Road

  Dublin 14

  www.newisland.ie

  Copyright © Fiachra Sheridan, 2009

  The author has asserted his moral rights.

  ISBN 978-1-84840-038-2

  All rights reserved. The material in this publication is protected by copyright law. Except as may be permitted by law, no part of the material may be reproduced (including by storage in a retrieval system) or transmitted in any form or by any means; adapted; rented or lent without the written permission of the copyright owner.

  British Library Cataloguing Data. A CIP catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library.

  Book design by Inka Hagen

  Printed by XXX

  New Island received financial assistance from

  The Arts Council (An Chomhairle Ealaíon), Dublin, Ireland.

  10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1

  For Denise

  ‘Keep love in your heart. A life without it is like a

  sunless garden when the flowers are dead.’

  Oscar Wilde

  Acknowledgments

  This book would not have been written were it not for

  the decisions of a few people: Warren Buffet,

  Ronan Ivory and Sean Spillane.

  Deirdre O’Neill, whose support and guidance was vital

  in producing the final manuscript.

  Máire O’Higgins, the believer.

  Deirdre Nolan, the visionary.

  Edwin, and all at New Island.

  Faith O’ Grady, Alison Walsh, Claire Rourke,

  Edwina Forkin and all who read early drafts

  and offered advice.

  Especially my mam and dad, for all

  their love and expertise.

  CHAPTER 1

  Bobby’s house was closer than any other to Croke Park, Ireland’s biggest sports stadium. He would stare out his bedroom window at the Cusack Stand, dreaming of the day eighty thousand people would come to see him playing football for Dublin. His brother, Kevin, slept on the top bunk. Kevin was three years older than Bobby at fifteen. He was in secondary school. Bobby had the summer holidays to go before he started in big school. There would be girls in his class for the first time. Kevin and Bobby were completely different. Kevin played guitar and hung around with his friends in Clontarf, one of the poshest areas of Dublin. Bobby played sport and hung around all over Dublin’s north inner city, one of the poorest parts of Dublin, with his best friend, Jay.

  Bobby’s mam, Laura, was from Clontarf. Bobby’s dad, Matt, was from Ballybough. His father had been called Matt after Matt Busby, the great Manchester United manager. When they got married, money dictated that a house in Ballybough was all they could afford. Laura wasn’t happy living beside the flats. Only a mile away in Clontarf were gorgeous houses by the beach. Most of the houses on Ballybough Road were boarded up. Bobby’s dad said he could make money restoring them, but he never did. The boarded-up windows didn’t keep Bobby and Jay out. They would have hours of fun in a derelict house. They would have tightrope walking competitions on the exposed beams of the upper floor. They would catch pigeons and release them and they would light fires in the old buildings that once housed families of ten and more in each room, with just one outdoor toilet between them. Bobby knew all about the history of the tenement buildings. Jay didn’t care.

  Bobby’s dad was on the social welfare. He collected seventy-five pounds a week because he was an unemployed builder. He would get up every day and look for work, but there was none. Bobby wasn’t sure if he looked at all. Bobby knew that seventy-five pounds a week was ten pounds seventy-one pence a day, with three pence left over. A pint of Guinness was just under a pound. Bobby’s dad loved Guinness. ‘The nicest drink in the world,’ he would say. He always got asked the same question when he got home.

  ‘How many pints did you have?’

  ‘Two or three.’

  How could it be two or three, thought Bobby. It had to be one or the other.

  Jay lived in the flats, and Bobby considered the huge flats complex beside his house his real home. The flats were built so people could move out of the cramped tenement buildings that were now all boarded up. Jay lived on the top floor. His bedroom window looked out over the Royal Canal, the railway tracks and Ballybough Bridge. Bobby’s mam said Jay had a cheeky smile. Jay’s dad was in prison and his mother, Bernie, was a trader on Moore Street in the city centre. She was the youngest of all the fruit sellers. She was tall and thin and attractive. She had straight, blonde hair and never wore any make-up. Bobby fancied her, but had never told Jay. Any men that bought fruit or veg on Moore Street bought it from Bernie. Her good looks drew them in. She was friendly and flirty and they all thought she fancied them.

  ‘Here they are, looking for money again. Have a banana instead, son.’

  ‘I hate bananas, Ma. Can I have twenty pence?’

  ‘They’re full of goodness. Eat a banana and I’ll give you twenty pence.’

  Jay didn’t really hate bananas. He just knew his ma would make him eat one in front of all the oul wans. They thought it was hilarious.

  ‘He is so cute, that young fella of yours, Bernie.’

  Bobby would have eaten a banana for twenty pence. That was four games of Mario Brothers.

  They always ate bananas before training. Anto said they were full of carbohydrates. Anto was the most recognisable person in Ballybough. He had a big mop of blond hair. Bobby could see an aura around him. Jay didn’t know what an aura was. Bobby thought most people were miserable. Anto was always happy. He would say hello to every person he met. Bobby and Jay thought it was weird that he would say hello to people he didn’t know. Anto said ‘it always pays to be nice’. Most twenty-nine-year-olds were on the social welfare. Anto didn’t have time to sign on the dole. He was too busy running the boxing club.

  The boxing club was a different world. It had a distinct smell of sweat and leather and the freezing cold gave you goosebumps, even in the middle of summer. The boys had to train hard before they were even allowed in the ring. If you could attain a good level of fitness, which would be assessed by Anto, then you could fight. Bobby and Jay would always fight each other because they were both about the same age and the same weight. The gloves they wore were club gloves. That meant that hundreds of boys had worn them. If you had to put them on after another boy, the inside would be saturated in sweat. If you put them up to your nose, the smell would kill you. Jay and Bobby would jog the two miles to the gym, which was just off Moore Street. Anto would put them through their paces, starting with skipping, followed by sit-ups, press-ups and stretching. He said they had to do it if they wanted to be champions. All the boys trained in pairs. When it came to the punch-bag, it was thirty seconds on, thirty seconds off. If Bobby said he was tired, Jay would slag him.

  ‘I’m going to knock you out when we get in the ring, I feel really strong.’

  Jay would dance around, shadow boxing. He would throw punches at Bobby, stopping the glove a few inches from his face every time. Bobby always concentrated before a fight, even if it was just training. Jay would always act the clown. Sometimes Bobby would pretend he was tired so he could fool Jay into overconfidence.

  ‘There’s no point in saving it for the ring, Jay. I’m going to knock you out.’

  Neither of them had ever managed a knock-out. Anto would only let them box for one minute at a time and he never let them go flat out. They were well-matched, so they hurt each other without ever inflicting real pain.

  �
�I want to remind everyone that we are leaving early next Saturday morning. We have two boxers left who have a chance to qualify for the All-Ireland finals,’ Anto announced.

  The six other young boxers all stared at Bobby and Jay. They looked up to them because they were by far the best young boxers in the club. Anto told them they were two of the best boxers in the country for their age. Bobby had known about the away trip for a while and hadn’t given Anto an excuse as to why he couldn’t go.

  ‘My ma says we don’t have the money.’

  ‘Don’t worry about the money, it’s already taken care of.’

  Maybe he just wouldn’t show up for the bus.

  ‘I’ll be starting the engines at half six in the morning. If you’re late we’re leaving without you,’ added Anto. ‘I’ve arranged for all of you to get a bout. We’re fighting at Mayfield Boxing Club. The Cork lads will be looking forward to boxing the heads off you Dublin boys, so be prepared.’

  The real competition for Bobby and Jay came after they left the gym. They always raced home. There was always a winner in a running race. They would start off at a slow pace, but when they reached the Sunset House pub it was flat out all the way to the bridge over the canal, and the downhill finish that took them to the top of Sackville Avenue. There was never more than a few yards in it, as both of them had good sprint finishes. The two of them would walk the length of the avenue to get their breath back, the winner gloating about being the best, and the loser making up excuses for the defeat.

  The flats were all three storeys high. Each landing had seven flats. Twenty-one flats in each building. Sixty-three flats on Sackville Avenue. The ground-floor flats were single storey. They were designed for old people. A round stairwell led you to the upper floors. Anto lived on the top floor of the middle block with his granny. Bobby and Jay never asked why he didn’t live with his mam and dad, or ma and da, as Jay would say. Bobby would say ma and da too, but if his mother heard him she would correct him.

  ‘It’s mother and father.’

  Bobby would drive her crazy with his inner-city accent. She spoke properly, according to herself.

  The people in the inner city were poor. Bobby and Jay felt rich. They always had money and went to places none of their friends did. Anto had taken them to see Barry McGuigan fight. The tickets were fifty pounds each. They had been to see Ireland beat Malta 8–0. Bobby could remember Liam Brady’s goals clearer than any of the others. When he got the ball at his feet, he was a magician; he was the master, he was the best Irish football player ever. Bobby loved the ease with which he strolled around the pitch. He walked with his shoulders hunched forward and he looked lazy, but nobody could get the ball from him.

  Bobby loved Italy the most. He had been excited for weeks about going to see them play Ireland in Dalymount Park. He still copied Marco Tardelli’s celebration from the World Cup final in 1982. He scored in the second half to win the World Cup for Italy. After the ball hit the back of the net, Tardelli jumped off the ground and ran around like a lunatic, shaking his arms down by his side. He had veins the size of small rivers running down his arms. Bobby tried shaking his arms like Tardelli, but no veins ever appeared.

  Anto had really bad scarring from burns he got in the Stardust disco in 1981. Forty-eight young people died at the disco. Anto never talked about it, but everyone in Ballybough knew his arms had been burned when he was trying to save people. Jay’s mam said he ran back into the burning building to pull people out of the fire, and that he had saved many lives. The scars didn’t take away any of his strength.

  They always stood in the same spot in Dalymount Park. And they always got in the same way. Anto wasn’t scabby, he just refused to pay into Dalymount. He saw it as his mission to bonk in, with Bobby and Jay always in tow. There were always a few hundred people who tried to bonk in. Anto was the master bonker inner. He could get them over the wall in seconds. The plan, if a security guard saw them, was to scarper in separate directions and meet at their spot behind the goal.

  When they arrived at Dalymount, there were thousands of people all trying to get in through three small turnstiles. There were also thousands of people trying to get down the bonker inner lane.

  ‘There’s no way we’ll get in there, there’s too many people,’ said Anto.

  Anto spotted a few people climbing over a gate that led into a truck yard behind the stand.

  ‘Why don’t we follow them over the gate?’ said Jay seriously.

  ‘It’s too dangerous,’ said Anto.

  ‘We could climb over that easily,’ said Bobby.

  ‘Are you sure?’ said Anto, staring at them to see if there was any fear in their eyes.

  ‘You’ll be the one struggling to get over it,’ laughed Jay.

  Climbing gates was easy for them. If your foot was small enough you could wedge it between the side of the gate and the wall. Bobby took a size three. Jay took a four. Anto’s foot was much bigger, but he was able to use his strength to get up the gate quicker than any of the others. Bobby loved the excitement of bonking in; it was the same adrenalin rush that boxing and running gave him. When Bobby got to the top of the wall, he couldn’t believe how many people were in the ground. The terrace was jam-packed. He held on to the top of the wall with his hands and let go. He hit the ground with a thump.

  ‘We’ll make it down to the front lads, follow me. It’s too dangerous to try and get our normal spot.’

  Anto led the way, followed by Jay and Bobby. There was an Ireland flag on a big pole directly in front of them. About halfway down, there was a sudden surge from behind. Bobby felt himself being lifted off the ground. He looked down at his feet dangling and when he looked up, he had lost Anto and Jay. He had no control over where he was moving. He started shouting as loud as he could for Anto and Jay. Bobby couldn’t see anything. All he could see was the parka jacket of the person in front of him. His face was right up against it. There was no room for him to move. He had to turn his head sideways as it was getting more and more difficult to catch a breath. He thought about trying to get down onto the ground, but then it occurred to him that he might get trampled on. He tried to scream Anto’s name as loud as he could, but he felt like he was wasting valuable energy. He thought he was going to die. It started to hurt his chest to try and take a breath. Then he spotted one of the crush barriers that people leaned against.

  ‘If I can get to that…’ thought Bobby.

  He wriggled and wriggled until he felt his feet touch the ground. He reached out and grabbed at the bottom of the metal barrier. He forced himself through a sea of legs to a tiny spot directly underneath, where nobody could stand. He waited until he got his breath back and then screamed Anto’s name as loud as he could over and over again. He knew there was no way Anto was going to hear his name through the sea of bodies. He could feel the tears welling up in his eyes. The legs around him seemed to be getting closer and closer. He was beginning to feel uncomfortable and he needed to pee. Then the urge took over and he peed in his pants. He couldn’t stop it.

  He closed his eyes and thought about Jay. Where was Jay? What if he hadn’t made it to safety? He had just resigned himself to being in that tiny spot sitting in his own pee for the next two hours when he heard his name. It got louder and louder over the hum of the crowd. He looked around at all the shoes. Then he spotted a new pair of Nike runners moving against the tide of old shoes. Anto always had new Nike runners and kept them spotless. Bobby screamed his name. He could see the runners getting closer. Anto was weaving around bodies quicker than Bobby dribbled around cones at training. Bobby reached out and grabbed Anto’s ankle. Anto reached down and grabbed Bobby’s hand. Bobby felt like Anto was going to break it he was gripping it so tight.

  ‘Are you OK?’

  ‘Yeah,’ Bobby said, holding the tears in.

  He had felt closer to death in the crush than he ever had before. There was a panic and a sick feeling inside him. There was no eerie calm.

  ‘Where is Jay?’


  Anto lifted Bobby up by the armpits.

  ‘Can you see him? He should be straight ahead.’

  Bobby spotted Jay, clinging to the railings behind the goal. He was holding on with one arm, while looking back up the terrace.

  ‘Jay! Jay!’ he shouted, waving both hands in the air.

  Jay saw him and waved back. He was shouting, but Bobby couldn’t hear what he was saying. Anto had to force his way down the terrace. Bobby knew that when he had kids, he would be taking them to Dalymount and to Tolka Park to see Ireland play, crush or no crush. His dad preferred the pub to football matches, even though he loved football. Bobby would never choose the pub over a football match.

  ‘Make sure you don’t let go,’ Anto ordered.

  Bobby held on tighter than he had ever held on to anyone’s hand in his life. Anto said ‘excuse me’ hundreds of times as he pushed by the people on the terrace. Bobby knew he would be safe. Anto lifted Jay down and moved them to the corner of the pitch.

  ‘What happened your trousers?’

  ‘Someone spilt a can on me in the crush,’ Bobby lied

  Anto was charming enough to the man on the gate for him to let them get onto the side of the pitch. It was much safer there. Eventually the man had to let hundreds of other people onto the pitch to avoid the crush. Bobby and Jay were delighted. They were standing on the sideline, within touching distance of the players. Just before Paolo Rossi scored the first goal, the ball came out of play and Anto picked it up. Rossi ran over to take the throwin. Anto handed Bobby the ball.

  ‘You give it to him.’

  Bobby threw Rossi the ball. He caught it and said something in Italian to Bobby, but Bobby couldn’t understand.

  ‘No problemo,’ Bobby said back to him.

  Rossi was the top scorer in the 1982 World Cup. Bobby couldn’t believe he had just thrown him a football. He was much smaller in real life than he looked on television. From Uruguay in 1930, to Italy in 1982, Bobby knew all the winners and the score in each World Cup final. His favourite was the 1978 final in Argentina. Mario Kempes, with his long flowing locks, scored in the final when the pitch was covered in confetti. There was more white confetti than green grass to be seen. The Argentinians won the World Cup for the first time and Holland had lost the final for a second time in a row. That final was in Buenos Aires. The attendance was eighty thousand. The Argentinians went mad.