Page 36 of The Elements

I was six years old when I left the island for the first time, when my father and I took the boat to Galway and then a flight from Shannon Airport to England to see his favorite team play.

I’d never been on a plane before, and although the stadium, when we reached it, was impressive, the crowd unsettled me, the noise of the fans so much louder than anything I had ever known.

Only four hundred people lived on the island, but here I was surrounded by forty times that number.

To my alarm, our seats were located in the middle of an enormous stand, where it looked as if there would be no chance of escape if a riot ensued.

All I wanted was to be home again, running around familiar fields with Cormac, my fingers mucky from the earth.

I held tight to Dad’s hand as we approached the stadium, but he released me as soon as we’d gone through the turnstiles.

“You’re too old now for that carry-on,” he said, pushing his way through the throng.

I had to run to keep up with him. When we were finally seated, I looked out onto the pitch.

The grass looked somehow different to the grass at home, as if the green had been painstakingly painted on, blade by blade.

I wondered what the soil beneath it might feel like, whether it had the natural moistness of the island or if it might be tougher to the touch, less giving.

When the teams emerged from the tunnel and ran onto the pitch, they were greeted by deafening cheers, and I pressed myself close to Dad, but he pushed me away in annoyance.

His team was playing The Enemy, and before a ball had even been kicked he let loose a string of obscenities against those players who dared to jog along the sidelines down beneath us.

I’d heard him curse before—he cursed at Mam all the time—but I’d never heard anything like this.

How could he have such hatred in his heart, I wondered, for people he didn’t even know?

One of his targets played for the Irish team and he screamed abuse at him too, even though he’d pinned a picture of him to my bedroom wall in his green-and-white strip and told me how proud the player’s father must be of him.

The game was only twenty minutes in when I needed to use the toilet.

I tried to hold it, knowing Dad would be angry with me if I asked to leave, but eventually it became too much.

I whispered to him that I needed to find a bathroom, and he told me to wait until halftime, that he’d saved up too long to miss even a moment of this.

“But I have to go,” I insisted.

“Tie a knot in it,” he snapped.

“I can go myself,” I told him, looking back toward the staircase that led to what I considered the peaceful Eden outside.

“I’m not letting you go alone,” he said. “Sure, there’s pedophiles and all sorts out there waiting for lads like you. So just sit down, shut up, and watch the fuckin’ game, all right?”

I tried to do as instructed, but it was impossible.

I found myself clutching at my crotch, a horrible pain building inside my kidneys as my small, valuable feet stamped on the concrete beneath me.

I bit my lip and felt blood seeping into my mouth.

And then, as if God had taken pity on me and decided to grant me a reprieve from unendurable discomfort, it magically eased, and I groaned in relief.

It was only as I felt the warm stream of urine pass along my leg that I realized what had happened, and I looked down in horror as it traveled along the stone in the direction of Dad’s shoes.

His mouth fell open in disbelief. The man seated next to him saw the piss coming his way and let out a bark of anger.

“For fuck’s sake,” said Dad, infuriated, dragging me to my feet now and pulling me along the row, my trousers staining dark as he hauled me toward the exit.

Gripping my collar, he threw me down the staircase and flung me inside.

“Get in there and clean yourself up!” he roared, as one of the security guards watched us from a distance but chose not to intervene. “You filthy little animal.”

I went inside and sat in a cubicle for a few minutes, sobbing helplessly, before emerging and doing my best to dry my trousers with hand towels, but there was nothing much that I could do. They were soaked. When I turned around, he was behind me.

“You’re determined to shame me, aren’t you, Evan?

” he asked. “You can’t just be a normal son.

If I could only swap you for Cormac Sweeney.

His parents haven’t a brain cell to share between them, and yet somehow they produced him and his poor dead brother, who would have been a great hurler had he only lived. Look what I got.”

“I’m sorry,” I said, looking down at my runners in distress, and he waited until I dared to look up again before punching me hard in the face.

And so, when my life in London came to its untimely end, when I knew that there was only one way that I could make a living for myself, there was a part of me that wanted to offer myself to The Enemy, just to temper whatever joy he might feel at my capitulation to his plans with fury that I’d chosen the team he hated most in the world.

But instead, I took a train to a city several hundred miles from London, where I walked into the reception area of the local football club and asked whether I could meet the manager.

“Mr. Hopworth?” said the middle-aged woman behind the desk, taking off her glasses. “He’s not available today, I’m afraid. Can I help?”

“One of the coaches, then,” I suggested. “Are any of them around?”

“Well, yes,” she replied. “Some are, but they’ll all be busy, my love. Did you make an appointment?”

“No,” I said. “But if one had a few minutes to talk, then I’d really appreciate it.”

“Talk to you about what?”

“A job.”

“Oh, I see,” she said, before opening a drawer and reaching for a folder.

“As it happens, I think we do have a couple of openings at the moment that you could apply for. We’d need a CV, of course.

Did you bring one with you? And references too.

There’s a job going in the canteen, I know that much, on account of a young lad from there going off to America last week—no great loss, if I’m honest—and there might be something going with the groundskeeping staff, only you’d need to—”

“No,” I said, cutting her off. “Sorry. I didn’t mean that type of job.”

“Then what type?” she asked, looking up.

“I’ve decided to become a professional footballer.”

A player walked past, making his way toward a staircase, and turned his head when he heard me say this, before bursting into laughter. I ignored him and kept my attention focused on the receptionist.

“I’m afraid it doesn’t work that way, my love,” she said in a kindly tone, throwing him a look, while speaking to me as if I was a simpleton. “You can’t just walk in off the street and ask to play for us. We’re a professional team, you see. A Championship club with ambitions.”

“I know,” I said. “But, the thing is, I’m quite talented.”

“I’m sure you are, but the answer’s no.”

I frowned. I hadn’t anticipated rejection. In my naivety I had assumed I could just show them what I could do and that would be that.

“Please,” I said. “I’ve come a long way.

” I told her about the island, pretending I’d arrived directly from there.

She heard me out and seemed to soften. Finally, perhaps thinking this would be the quickest way to be rid of me, she picked up a phone, dialed a number, and spoke quietly under her breath.

After a few moments, she nodded and returned it to its cradle.

“You take a seat over there, my love,” she said. “Someone will be down to see you in a few minutes.”

I thanked her, and did as instructed. About ten minutes later a door to my right opened and a man in his late twenties emerged, sporting a man-bun and a tracksuit emblazoned with the club’s colors.

He glanced at the receptionist, and she pointed in my direction.

He turned to me, loosening his hair now and shaking it out.

“I’m told you want to be a professional footballer,” he said, extending his hand, and I stood up, shook it and introduced myself.

“That’s right,” I said.

“You know this isn’t how we do things, right?”

“Yes, I’m sorry about that, but—”

“Where were you before this?”

“London.”

“Which team? I haven’t heard of you.”

“No team,” I said. “I’ve never played professionally.”

“So you weren’t let go from a contract?”

“No.”

“Right.” He looked at me, utterly baffled. “Well, which academy were you at when you were a boy?”

“I’ve never been to an academy,” I told him. “I only played for my school. On the island.”

“What island?”

“The island I grew up on,” I told him, naming it and explaining where it was in relation to the west of Ireland. Then, seeing the blank expression on his face, explaining where the west of Ireland was in relation to Dublin. And then where Dublin was in relation to where we were currently standing.

Unlike the receptionist, the man, whose name was Matt, seemed to be more irritated than sympathetic.

“Look, I’m sorry,” he said, glancing at his watch impatiently. “But you can’t just… All our players have been playing since they were children.”

“I’ve been playing since I was a child,” I told him.

“I mean at grassroots level, in cages, at academies. They’ve been spotted by scouts.

We have files on what their heart rates were when they were five years old, ten, fifteen.

How they’ve grown, how their weight has changed.

How fast they can run. I could practically tell you the date each one’s balls dropped.

Honestly, if you’re not spotted by the age of about eight, you don’t stand a chance.

You can’t just show up at… what are you now, eighteen? ”

“Nineteen.”

“Even worse. Sorry, but you haven’t a hope.”

“Just give me a chance, that’s all I ask.”

“There’s no point.”

“You don’t know that until you see me play.”

“Sorry,” he repeated, shaking his head, trying to walk away. “And no offense, but I’m too busy for this. There’s the door.”

“You don’t understand,” I told him. “I’m good.”

“If you’re so good,” he asked, “then why are you only getting into the game now?”

“Because I don’t really like football,” I said, and he rolled his eyes.

“Great,” he said. “Exactly what we’re looking for. A nineteen-year-old with no experience and no medical records who doesn’t even like the game.”

“Just because I’m good at it doesn’t mean I have to enjoy it,” I said.

“No, but it helps.”

And it was at that moment that the door opened again and a young man emerged, making his way toward the receptionist and handing some forms to her.

“Thanks, Robbie, my love,” she said. “You’ve filled everything in, yes? I don’t need to double-check them?”

“I think I have,” he said, flashing her that smile that would soon be my undoing. “But you know what I’m like, Doris. It might be worth giving them the once-over to be sure.”

She slapped his arm playfully, charmed by him, as everyone always was, and he turned to look in my direction. He was taller than me, and good-looking. I stared at him.

“Hey,” he said, looking from Matt to me and back again.

“Just dealing with something,” said Matt.

“Who’s this, then?”

“Evan Keogh,” I told him. “I’ve decided to become a professional footballer.”

Robbie was the first person not to react to this statement in a derisive way. In fact, he looked as if the only thing that he might find strange would be for someone not to hold that ambition.

“Are you any good?” he asked.

“Yes.”

“Robbie’s just breaking into our first team,” Matt told me. “He’s been with us since he was a boy.”

“Just let me kick a ball around with some of the players for five minutes,” I said, turning back to the coach. “That’s all I ask. You can time me. Blow a whistle when the five minutes are up. If, after that, you don’t think I’ve got what it takes, then I’ll leave, and I won’t bother you again.”

Matt frowned, then turned to look at Robbie. “Is this a windup?” he asked, and Robbie shrugged.

“Nothing to do with me if it is,” he said. “But I can give him a kickabout if you like? I’ll grab a few of the lads.”

Matt shrugged, then shook his head as if he’d decided that, at worst, this would make a good story for his friends in the pub later.

“Five minutes,” he said, pointing a finger at me. “Not a second more. Agreed?”

“Agreed,” I said. “And thank you.”

Robbie led me back to the changing rooms and handed me a football strip, sitting on a bench and watching me as I changed.

At first, I wondered why he was paying such close attention, but then understood from his expression that he was simply studying my body to assess whether I had the right physique for the game.

“What’s your BMI?” he asked, and I shrugged.

“Haven’t a clue?”

“Your body-fat percentage?”

“Don’t know.”

“Your resting heart rate?”

“I’m not going to know the answer to any of these questions,” I said. “I can tell you my height and weight, but that’s about all.”

“Go on, then.”

“A hundred and seventy centimeters, seventy-three kilos.”

He nodded, and a few minutes later we were out on a training pitch with half a dozen other boys. They looked at me suspiciously, as if worried that I might be there to steal one of their places in the squad. On the sidelines, Matt appeared and held out a stopwatch. He’d tied up the man-bun again.

“Five minutes!” he shouted. “Starting now.”

I nodded, and another coach, acting as referee, blew a whistle.

Robbie lifted the ball with the toe of his right foot and began to make his way down the pitch, preparing to pass it to one of the others.

He didn’t get that far, though, because I took it off him effortlessly, slipped in and out of two midfielders, past a defender, and, in that moment, my career as a professional footballer began.

When it was over, I walked slowly toward Matt, feeling I’d done all right but not certain that I’d played quite as well as I could.

I was talented, yes, but these boys were a lot better than any I’d ever competed against before.

I could play alongside them, but it wasn’t a foregone conclusion that I could beat them.

Still, he stared at me for a long time before narrowing his eyes, then looking me up and down, holding his gaze on my calves for a few moments. I flexed them, to emphasize the muscles, and he nodded. That’s when I knew I was in.

“Tell me your name again?” he said.