The Runners Read online

  So did the crowd that night when Gary Waddock scored for Ireland. He got the ball at the far end of the pitch from Bobby. Just on the edge of the box. Took it down with his thigh and buried it in the bottom left-hand corner. The net rustled and the crowd went mad, shouting ‘Gary, Gary, Gary’ and ‘Come on you boys in green’. The atmosphere was electric. Bobby knew the hairs on the back of your neck were supposed to stand up. He wasn’t old enough to have hairs on his neck, and if they ever grew he would shave them off. He hated standing beside an old man at a match if he had a hairy neck; a hairy neck usually meant a blackhead-infested neck.

  Bobby was good at estimating crowds; every match had an announcement of the official attendance. The unofficial attendance would include the bonker-inners. He reckoned there were at least forty thousand people watching the world champions beat Ireland 2–1 that night.

  ‘And the official attendance for tonight’s game is twenty-five thousand.’

  The announcement made the whole crowd laugh, because they all knew they couldn’t announce that there were fifteen thousand people clever enough to bonk in. It was the biggest crush Bobby had ever experienced, much worse than Croke Park on All-Ireland final day.

  It was an amazing Wednesday night in Dublin, even with the fear that he was going to be crushed. Walking back from Dalyer that night, Bobby wanted to call in to the Sunset House to tell his dad about the game.

  ‘Don’t say anything about the crush, he might not let you go to another match,’ said Anto.

  Bobby ran in on his own, excited out of his mind about the match. The crush wasn’t important; being there was.

  ‘What was the result, son?’

  Bobby noticed the Guinness moustache his dad had.

  ‘Italy won 2–1.’

  ‘Ah,’ he said after a big slug of Guinness, ‘that’s a pity.’

  ‘It was brilliant though. Anto got us onto the side of the pitch. I gave the ball to Paolo Rossi.’

  ‘That’s great. Now run on home. It’s too late for you to be in the pub.’

  Bobby walked outside and could see Anto and Jay chatting in the distance. He sprinted as fast as he could to catch up. Anto walked Bobby home to his house.

  ‘I heard on the radio there was a crush in the stadium where the Ireland match was being played,’ said a worried Laura when she met them at the front door.

  ‘Not in the part of the ground where we were, Mrs Ryan.’

  Anto always had a quick answer to allay her fears. Bobby looked up at Anto, who gave him the smile. The smile that said it all.

  CHAPTER 2

  Bobby wasn’t allowed to drink anything after six o’clock, but he still drank the can of Coke Anto had bought him on the way home from the match. If he was late for his dinner, he would have to have it with no liquid. He hated the rule, but if it stopped him wetting the bed, he would give it a try. He had tried everything else. His mother would wake him before she went to bed, to pee in a potty. His bladder produced world-record amounts of pee.

  Kevin said he was afraid of heights. It wasn’t a very long way down but Kevin constantly reminded Bobby that he was doing him a favour by sleeping on the top bunk.

  ‘Do you want to sleep down here?’

  ‘On your pissy bed? No thanks.’

  ‘I gave the ball to Paolo Rossi.’

  ‘Who the hell is he?’

  ‘The best footballer in the world.’

  Bobby put both his feet on the laths that held Kevin up and pushed as hard as he could.

  ‘Piss off or I’ll kill you.’

  It would drive Kevin insane. He was much stronger than Bobby and could kill him. If he put him in a head lock, Bobby couldn’t do anything about it. He had kicked Bobby twice in the head the previous Christmas and put him in hospital. Bobby couldn’t even remember that he supported Liverpool. That’s when his dad knew there was something seriously wrong with him. He had lost his memory. The doctors called it amnesia. Bobby couldn’t hold a grudge, because he couldn’t remember what had happened. He liked pushing his brother to the point where he would flip. Or the point just before that when he would be raging and on the verge of flipping. Anything could do it. He would say ‘Dire Straits are shit’ or ‘Jimi Hendrix is crap at guitar’ and it would drive him over the edge, to the point of no return.

  Their room wasn’t big enough to have both beds on the floor. There was a wardrobe in the corner beside the window and a dart board on the back of the door. Jay loved playing darts. He had his own board and was much better at darts than Bobby. Jay had never been in Bobby’s bedroom. The reason Bobby gave was that his ma said nobody was allowed in the house. Bobby would imitate her saying, ‘Play on the road, you’re not allowed in the house.’ Bobby knew Jay would smell pee in the room. He knew that’s why his brother hated him too.

  Both beds had orange mattresses. Bobby really wanted to have a non-pissy mattress. His was wrecked because of his world-record bladder. His mam told him there was no way of stopping it. And there was no point in buying a new mattress every few months. Doctors didn’t know why people did it. They could give someone a heart transplant, but they couldn’t fix Bobby’s bladder. He knew there must be a reason why it happened.

  If he was lucky there was one day each month when he didn’t wet the bed. His mattress was now so badly damaged that his sheet had a black bin liner underneath to protect it. It worked. But when he did let loose during the night, a puddle would form in the middle of the bin liner. It was routine for Bobby by now.

  Take the wet sheet off.

  Carefully remove the black sack.

  Take the potty out from under the bed.

  Pour the black sack into the potty.

  Turn the mattress.

  Get back into bed.

  Put the pillow at the opposite end.

  He would try to sleep against the wall, because the sides of the mattress were the only parts that kept dry. It wasn’t always easy to get back to sleep when you were hugging a cold wall. At times anything would have been better than lying in a bed of piss. His skin would be sticky and smelly. He wouldn’t be able to sleep. He sometimes thought death would be better than waking up every morning covered in pee. He didn’t think there were any piss-in-the-beds in heaven.

  Bobby would be the first up every morning. He would go downstairs to the bathroom and run the water for a shallow bath. There was no hot water in the mornings, so it was a cold, shallow puddle he had to sit in. He scrubbed every inch of his body over and over in cold, soapy water with a scourer. He didn’t care if it left red marks all over his skin, he was paranoid about smelling of pee.

  There was no rule about drinking during the day.

  ‘Let’s see who can drink a litre the fastest,’ said Jay.

  They both ripped the top corner of the carton open.

  ‘On your marks, get set, go!’ said Bobby.

  They gulped and gulped and gulped. Orange juice spilled down the sides of both their faces onto their T-shirts. Jay finished first. He was the champion gulper. Bobby never had the opportunity to drink as much orange juice as he wanted before. Normally it was one small glass for breakfast when he was lucky.

  ‘Two down, twenty-two to go.’

  It was their first time breaking into Goodall’s Foods. Goodall’s had premises beside the paper factory, which was on the banks of the Tolka River. A big, green, metal gate stopped people entering, but the gate had a thick plastic flap at the bottom.

  ‘What do you think the flap is for, Jay?’

  ‘I haven’t got a clue.’

  Jay got down on his hands and knees and looked under it.

  ‘The smell is disgusting.’

  ‘What can you see?’

  ‘Metal shelves with all sorts of stuff on them. I can see red sauce, brown sauce and orange juice.’

  By the time Jay got to ‘orange juice’, all Bobby could see were his legs. Bobby held on to his foot.

  ‘You’re not going any further.’

  ‘OK, let go!’
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  Bobby released his grip and Jay disappeared under the gate. Bobby’s heart was pounding. He got down to see what Jay was doing. As he did, a box of orange juice came out the flap, followed by another one.

  ‘Hide them behind the pallets.’

  Bobby hid the cartons of juice behind wooden pallets that were in the yard of the paper factory. They always had a huge stack of pallets. They were brilliant at Hallowe’en for the bonfire. And for leaning up against the trunk of a tree. If Bobby and Jay couldn’t reach the first branch, they borrowed a pallet from the yard. It was a permanent borrow, but when there were hundreds against the wall, one or two wouldn’t be missed.

  Bobby got back to the flap and looked in. Jay was inspecting one of the metal shelves. Bobby could see that the shelves were in an open yard with the indoor part of the factory a little bit further back. Jay reached in to a shelf and lifted out a tray of red sauce. The bottles were red with a yellow label on them. The tray was sealed in plastic. Jay ripped it open and pulled out two bottles. He slid them along the ground to Bobby. Jay pulled out another two and put one in each pocket. He looked at Bobby and put his hands down by his side.

  ‘Don’t move,’ said Jay.

  He pulled the bottle of sauce out of his pocket like it was a gun, opened the cap and squirted it at Bobby. Bobby covered his head with his arm, and when he looked up, he could see a man in blue overalls approaching Jay. He was walking quietly. Bobby could see a smirk on his face.

  ‘What do you think you’re doing?’ he roared, frightening the shit out of Jay. Bobby slid backwards and held the flap up. Jay came out head first with the bottle of sauce still in his hand.

  ‘Leg it,’ shouted Jay.

  Bobby knew what ‘leg it’ meant. They were the words the sketch-keeper or look-out used when they robbed orchards to alert the robber that someone was coming. It should have been Bobby saying it to Jay but he couldn’t get the words out. It required nerves of steel to rob. Jay had them. Bobby was always the sketch-keeper.

  They ran through the yard of the paper factory, up the hill at the back and into the grounds of Holy Cross College. It was a training college for priests. They must have spent all their time inside praying and reading the Bible because Bobby and Jay never saw any of them walking around the amazing grounds. A narrow pathway with huge trees on one side and the back wall of the paper factory on the other led to the Tolka River, which ran all the way along the back of the college.

  Jay had his favourite horse chestnut tree for climbing. When they got to it, Jay flew up, putting his feet in exactly the same spot on each branch that he had done hundreds of times previously. Bobby followed, watching the soles of Jay’s runners getting further and further away, until he dangled from the branch he always sat on. Jay was laughing with excitement. Bobby was laughing nervously, looking behind him to see if they were being chased.

  ‘Come on, slow coach!’

  Bobby had heard that before. No matter how hard he tried, he could never climb as quickly as Jay. Bobby felt something cold hitting his head.

  ‘A bird just shit on your head!’

  Bobby didn’t want to touch it, because he didn’t want bird poo on his hand, and he didn’t want to let go of the branch. He looked up at Jay, who had the red sauce pointing down. He was gently squeezing the bottle, letting one drop out at a time.

  ‘Give it over!’ squealed Bobby.

  ‘You’ll have red hair by the time you get up here if it takes you any longer.’

  The two of them sat on the branch, looking back down the pathway. If anyone came after them, they were safe. They were invisible amongst the branches of the tree.

  ‘Do you want to have a red-sauce fight?’ asked Jay.

  ‘Here?’

  ‘No, beside the waterfall.’

  ‘My mam will kill me if I come home covered in red sauce.’

  ‘You won’t get it on your clothes.’

  ‘Just aiming at the head?’

  ‘No, you dope, we’ll take our clothes off. And then wash ourselves in the Tolka.’

  Bobby loved getting into the Tolka, even though it was freezing. At the top of the waterfall, the water was perfectly calm and clear. Every other part of it looked as filthy as it was. They covered each other in red sauce. Bobby didn’t try to escape from the squirts and neither did Jay. When the sauce ran out, they dived into the water to clean themselves. They ducked themselves under the water and had swimming races, which Jay always won no matter how much of a head start he gave Bobby.

  They had orange-juice drinking competitions every day for the next week, even though the juice became more disgusting the longer it stayed behind the pallets. It made them feel sick, but they had fun feeling sick.

  Bobby couldn’t always swim. He had nearly drowned when he played for the Ballybough United under tens. They were playing a night of indoor matches against the boys from the School for the Blind. All the Ballybough United lads thought this was hilarious. How could they see the ball? See it they did. And they also heard it. The ball they played with had what sounded like bells inside it. Bobby had never played against a team as aggressive as the blind boys. It was like they had something to prove. The minute the whistle went, they kicked lumps out of the Ballybough boys. They won four out of the five games.

  The School for the Blind had a swimming pool as well as an indoor gym. The dressing-rooms were four times as big as the ones in Sean MacDermott Street swimming pool. And they were clean. Sean Mac was verruca city. A killer verruca meant no football. Jay got a disgusting verruca when he was ten. It took over the whole sole of his foot. Jay would pick at the skin and throw it at Bobby.

  Most of the lads were already on a huge floating tube when Bobby took his two tiptoe steps through the cloudy, shallow, disgusting, disinfected pool. He hated it touching his feet. He tried to jump over it one day and wrecked himself. He ran and jumped straight on top of the tube, knocking Jay off as he landed. Jay swam to the side and climbed out of the pool. He launched himself at the tube, landing in the middle. Bobby got splashed in the face but managed to cling on. One of the strong lads from the Blind team was next to launch. He was twice the size of Bobby. As Bobby thought he was going to get squashed, he let go, thinking his feet were inches from the bottom. He was in the deep end. He sank straight to the bottom. He could see four pairs of legs dangling from the tube. He pushed himself off the bottom and when his head hit the air, he took a deep breath and sank again. Bobby hadn’t even learned how to tread water. From the bottom, he could see someone crash onto the tube. He pushed himself up again, this time slightly sideways. He took another big breath in, sank again, and repeated the sideways push up six more times before he made it to the side of the pool. He clung on there for what seemed like an eternity before making his way to the empty shallow end. It was the first time he realised what could happen if you couldn’t swim. He had never been in the deep end in Sean Mac when he was ten. He had been in the Irish Sea a few times when he was younger, but just to paddle. He stayed in the shallow end looking at all the swimmers having the best time of their lives. Jay hadn’t even noticed. Bobby was determined to learn how to swim. He told Jay on the way home what had happened.

  ‘I’ll teach you how to swim.’

  ‘Do you think I’ll be able?’

  ‘It’s easy, you won’t drown in the shallow end of Sean Mac.’

  Over the next few weeks, Jay taught Bobby how to swim. He wasn’t as good as Jay, but he could swim. That was all he needed. He knew he would never be afraid of drowning again.

  Bobby thought about death a lot. He knew what suicide was. He had heard about people hanging themselves and sticking their heads in gas ovens. The thought entered his head sometimes as to what would happen if he walked in front of the number 23 bus. He knew he would die, but what happened next is what he thought about. Some people had thrown themselves into the River Liffey and drowned. He never thought about doing that. He didn’t want to die when he was on the bottom of the deep end, but an eerie cal
m had come over him. He knew everything was going to be all right. He didn’t know if Jay thought about death like he did. He was afraid to ask. It was a secret he had to keep to himself. So was wetting the bed. If he didn’t wet the bed, maybe he wouldn’t think about death any more.

  CHAPTER 3

  Bobby was surrounded by old people. His neighbours on one side were a couple in their seventies called Eileen and Ned. They had a dog called Smartie who made it his mission in life to jump over the back wall into Croke Park. The wall was seven feet high. He would jump up continuously for five minutes and then take a break, panting at a hundred miles an hour while he lay on the ground. When his breathing became slower and his tongue went back in his mouth, he would start jumping again. Then he would do it again, and again, all day long. Bobby had seen him cling to the top of the wall twice. He barely managed to glance at the freedom on offer before he slid back down into his small yard. Eileen said Smartie had bad hips. It didn’t matter what you said back to her as she was stone deaf.

  His other neighbour was Michael Dunne. He was ninety-six. He drank a naggin of whiskey every day, except Sundays when he drank two. Bobby couldn’t understand why he didn’t buy a large bottle as it would save him a fortune. Bobby would be sent to the Vine Tree off-licence on Ballybough Road to make the purchase. He was allowed keep the two pence change, out of which he would buy two penny golfball chewing gums.

  The Vine Tree’s busiest day was when the Dubs played in Croke Park. Dublin’s Gaelic football fans were either normal people or skinheads. The skinheads drank flagons of cider before matches. They hung around on the street outside Bobby’s house, smoking cigarettes, singing songs and pissing up against the walls of the houses. Nobody said anything to them because they were skinheads; you didn’t mess with skinheads. Some of them had the word ‘skinhead’ tattooed on their lips. Others had spiders’ webs tattooed on their heads. One really fat skinhead had a shrine for every year Dublin won the All-Ireland tattooed on his back. 1891, 1892 … all the way to 1983. Bobby knew he would be getting 1985 on his back in a few months’ time. Barney Rock was on fire and Dublin would get their revenge on Kerry for defeat in the 1984 semi-final.