‘Right then, that’s for tomorrow. Now, which one of you can make an omelette?’
‘Me,’ Charlie said.
‘Others, collect the eggs. You –’ he pointed in Charlie’s direction – ‘come with me.’
We collected the eggs. There were a lot of eggs, but the hens were moodier second time around; a couple didn’t like us picking up their eggs. One snapped at me and another flew into Johnny J’s face! It wasn’t as cool as I’d first thought, but it was still better than milking a cow.
Earlier that day we were eating ice cream and now we were farm slaves in a place that smelled of every bad thing all at once. Walker sat on the fence, inhaling his inhaler, leaving Johnny J, Sumo and me to do all the hard work. Sumo was happy though – when he took over the egg hunting, he talked to the chickens as he took the eggs from beneath them.
‘Hello, lady, what have we here?’ Once he’d retrieved the egg or eggs he’d thank the chicken. ‘Thanks, lady.’
As we walked back to the caravan, Johnny J spun around, scanning the trees, the green fields, the animals sauntering around, the space and the pink sky. ‘It smells bad, but this is amazing,’ he said.
‘Yeah,’ I said, because it was.
Walker just sniffed and wiped his weeping eyes. ‘It’s all right,’ he said. ‘Dublin’s better though.’
Charlie loved the place too. She didn’t have to say it. There were enough trees to keep her climbing for years. In the short time we’d been there she’d already scaled two and was eyeing up a third.
‘You know what?’ Johnny J said as we walked back to the farmhouse. ‘We always talk about adventure. This is adventure.’
I was hoping for spaceships and superheroes, not a day on the farm! But I had to agree it was an adventure. I was just really scared about how the adventure would end.
37
The Meal
That evening, when all the chores were done, Charlie helped Jimbo cook eggs, I cut the brown bread, Johnny J set the table, Sumo made the largest pot of tea I’d ever seen in my life and Walker sat by the turf fire sneezing and holding on to his inhaler.
‘You all right, Simon?’ I said.
Walker had forgotten his new name was Simon. So had everyone else.
‘Hey, Smarty-pants.’ I walked over and put my hand on his shoulder.
‘What? Oh yeah. What?’
‘Are you all right?’
He settled back in the big old armchair, resting his feet on a large wolfhound that moved so little that if he hadn’t farted every five minutes I’d have thought he was dead. Walker nodded. ‘Having the time of my life, Dave.’ I was worried about his allergies and so was he, but he was pretending everything was fine. I suppose we all were.
The omelette was brilliant. My mam doesn’t like eggs, so we never ate them. Charlie and Jimbo put mushrooms and spinach and ham and cheese in there and every bite melted in my mouth. Charlie was a brilliant cook. I did not see that coming. The brown bread came lashed in fresh butter. The tea was way too strong, but with enough sugar it tasted really good. We all sat around the big old wooden table on long benches and savaged the food in front of us.
The radio was on, and when Jimbo wasn’t shouting at the men talking politics, he was telling us stories about the way things used to be. His stories weren’t boring at all. He was funny, and when he talked about his dead wife, Denise, he’d chuckle to himself.fn1 He’d laugh at his own stories. We all laughed too. Jimbo’s hands and aged appearance didn’t freak me out as much in the dim light. By the end of the meal I realised that Jimbo wasn’t mean or angry – he was kind and funny and I really liked him. He didn’t ask us questions. He said that if we wanted to call our parents, the phone was in the hall. He warned us not to stay on it long though because phone calls to Dublin cost a lot. We said we didn’t need to call anyone. He didn’t push it. He did wonder how long we were planning on staying in Wexford.
‘Two weeks,’ I said.
‘Two weeks here with me?’ he said.
‘If that’s all right, Jimbo,’ Johnny J said.
He nodded to himself. ‘Well, that’s just fine.’
It had been a long day and we were a million miles from home, but we were warm, and fed, and we had jobs and a place to stay, even if it did smell of petrol, burnt toast, a little bit of poo, a lot of wee and lavender.
We ran across the field to our new home, and although it was dark it was still warm out, so we grabbed the fresh linen and we all lay on the grass looking up at the stars.
‘What do you think is happening at home?’ Sumo said.
‘My mam and dad will be doing the war dance,’ I said.
Sumo was deeply sad. ‘My mam will be crying.’
Walker was seriously anxious. ‘Well, I’m a dead man. My mam will have called my three sisters home, and you know what they’re like.’
He was right. His life wouldn’t be worth living.
‘What about you, Charlie?’ Johnny J asked. ‘What do you think is going on?’
‘My brother Louis went missing for a whole day once. My mam, Ben and Sean looked everywhere for him. Mam was terrified, but she kept saying everything would be fine; she knew it would all work out. I’d like to think she knows everything will be all right.’
‘Where did your brother go?’ I asked.
‘A concert in Slane Castle,’ she said.
‘What we did is way worse,’ I said.
‘Oh yeah,’ she said. ‘I’m a dead girl walking.’
We all laughed. Charlie could be really funny. I wondered why I hadn’t noticed that before.
‘What about you, Johnny J?’ Charlie asked.
‘I’m just worried, but I’m always just worried,’ he said, and I knew what he meant. His eyes glistened under the moonlight. Is he going to cry? Nah, Johnny J doesn’t cry. It’s just the light.
‘Goodnight, Dave,’ Johnny J said.
I laughed. ‘Goodnight, Alvin.’
‘Goodnight, chipmunks,’ he said to Sumo, Walker and Charlie.
‘Goodnight, Alvin,’ they said, and giggled.
And that’s where we fell asleep, right there under a million stars.
38
The Work
We woke the next morning to a new day of sun and hard work, and hard work can take your mind off anything – well, pretty much anything. I still thought about prison and my mam’s disappointment all the time, but my stomach felt better and the fresh air helped me cope, and seeing as there was an old rubber tyre shoved into the caravan loo, doing my business outside encouraged me to be quick and efficient. There was no time to sit on a toilet and feel sorry for myself.
Charlie and Walker nominated themselves to clean out the caravan. Betty Bloomers came up the road in a truck with some cleaning products and a bundle of clean sheets and blankets. Johnny J and I spent the morning fixing the fence and Sumo took on all the chicken and cow duties. Jimbo was never far away. The fridge was stacked with lemonade, milk and cheese, and the larder was jam-packed full of brown bread and scones. We could snack when we wanted, which meant that Sumo spent a lot of time in the kitchen.
‘I think these scones are even better than Spam sandwiches,’ he said.
‘Dirt on the ground is better than Spam sandwiches,’ I said.
It was Saturday 23 June 1990, and it was glorious. Normally on a Saturday I’d spend my morning helping my mam with the shopping or reading a book in bed or cycling around the place looking to see if the lads were up and around. Some Saturdays I spent alone in Sumo’s den, playing on the computer or reading his stacks of comics, but on this Saturday I was on a farm in Wexford, fixing a fence with my very best friend in the world. Aside from being wanted criminals, it felt good.
‘Who’s cooler – Indiana Jones or James Bond?’fn1
‘Indiana,’ Johnny J said.
‘Are you sure? Bond’s pretty cool.’
‘Yeah, but he has to wear suits. Indy wears what he likes,’ he said.
It was a very good poi
nt. Technically, suits were not cool, even on James Bond. ‘Yeah, I think you’re right, although Indy is a teacher and Bond is a spy so …’
‘Yeah, but Indy finds treasure and Bond just kills people.’
Excellent point. ‘OK, Indy it is then. How about who would win in a fight?’
‘Bond,’ he said.
‘Yeah, definitely Bond – he’s vicious,’ I said. ‘Although Indy is brilliant at distraction and escape techniques.’
‘True, but no one escapes Bond.’
‘Yeah, but if Indy escapes and stays alive, I think in those circumstances it’s a kind of win.’
He thought about that. ‘Yeah you’re right. They’re even.’
We talked a lot about stuff like that and zombies. ‘Who in our group would be the first to be eaten by zombies?’ I asked.
‘Sumo,’ he said without even thinking. He hammered a nail into wood as he spoke. ‘He’s slow and there’s a lot of eating on him. Also he’d probably refuse to fight back. He’d probably worry that the brain-eating zombies might have feelings.’
I laughed. ‘Yeah.’
‘What about Charlie?’ I asked, and he stopped hammering.
‘I think she’d do fine. She’d probably live in the trees, and she’s fast. And I think if she had to, she’d kill as many as she could.’
‘You like her,’ I said.
‘I don’t know. She’s different. I just like hanging out with her. You know.’
A week earlier I wouldn’t have known, but having spent time with her, I was starting to understand.
‘But do you like her?’ I said, and he just gave me a look.
‘Why?’
‘No reason, just asking,’ I said.
‘Well, don’t.’
‘So you do.’
‘Shut up and hammer,’ he said.
We both shut up for a while, and I was steaming because I knew deep down he liked her and she definitely liked him and I wondered why it bothered me so much. Who cares? I thought to myself. Who really cares?
I did.
After a while he asked who would win in a fight between a vampire and the Terminator. Now that was a really good question. A vampire against a machine! We talked about that for a really long time and didn’t come up with a definitive answer.
By lunchtime the fence was fixed. When we got back to the caravan, the smell of petrol, burnt toast, a little bit of poo, a lot of wee and lavender had been replaced by a mix of bleach and lemon. In the sheds and fields, the cows were milked, the chickens cleaned out and fed and the eggs collected. Jimbo was so happy he treated us to a large lunch of cold meats, brown bread and chips that he fried in a pan with oil on his huge stove. I thought blind men shouldn’t mess with fire, but he told me he was only ninety per cent blind, and anyway he’d been making chips that way since he was a boy. The radio was on and the commentators were talking about the Cameroon v Colombia and Czechoslovakia v Costa Rica matches later that evening.
‘I played football myself back in the day, boys,’ Jimbo said.
‘No way, Jimbo! Were you deadly at it?’ Sumo said. I’d gotten used to seeing him wear the Wookie mask and it didn’t even seem to bother him in the sun.
‘God, no, I was terrible. My Denise was a better player than I was.’
‘Oh. Sorry to hear that, Jimbo,’ Sumo said.
‘Don’t be sorry – I was brilliant at everything else,’ he said, and he laughed to himself and we all laughed because his laugh was very funny to listen to. Charlie described it as a mix between a sneeze and a dirty chuckle.
When we were all stuffed, Jimbo went to the loo. ‘Excuse me, boys,’ he said. ‘The throne awaits.’
‘The throne,’ I said.
‘Yeah, he means the loo. That’s what my dad calls it too,’ Walker said. ‘My mam always calls him a thick when he says it.’
We were finishing cleaning the dishes when the news came on. We weren’t listening, not really. I was busy washing, Johnny J was drying, Charlie was cleaning the floor, Sumo was wiping down the table, Walker was pretending his allergies were at him and sitting by the fire. We were all making lots of noise, but in the background I heard them mention a manhunt for the ‘Fearless Five’, but as soon as it was mentioned, Jimbo came in and turned off the radio.
‘Now, boys, you’ve done a fine morning’s work, so follow me.’
We followed him outside, and he pointed his stick due south.
‘The beach is that way, boys,’ he said. ‘Follow the smell of the sea and enjoy yourselves. Be back at five for the cows and chickens and don’t drown.’ We were so excited at the prospect of swimming at the beach that it never occurred to me that Johnny J, Sumo, Walker, Charlie and I were the Fearless Five!
39
The Beach
We ran toward the sea and didn’t stop until we got there.
We didn’t have swimming togs. All we had was the clothes on our backs and our coats. It had been so nice sleeping outside and the coats made for good pillows. We had nothing to wash ourselves with either, and because it was so hot we were a little bit smelly. Now, if Charlie hadn’t been there we would have taken off our jeans and T-shirts and run straight into the water in our pants, but because she was there we stopped at the glistening water’s edge and we all looked at one another. What to do? What to do?
‘Let’s just go for it,’ Johnny J said.
‘Fully clothed?’ I said.
‘At least it might clean our clothes,’ Walker said.
Sumo smelled himself. ‘Yeah, I could do with that, lads – not going to lie to you.’
‘I’m in,’ Charlie said, and before she’d uttered the word ‘in’, she was already waist-deep in the glistening water and then she disappeared under it head first and I held my breath until she burst back out with her arms spread wide.
‘What are you waiting for, boys?’ she said, and that was it. I was in. I ran until it was deep enough to dive, and suddenly I was under the cold water, my body tingling from head to toe. I could hear and feel the thunder of the sea and it was exhilarating. When I opened my eyes, I was facing Johnny J. He gave me the thumbs up and for one second the world seemed to stand completely still. Walker hid his spectacles behind a rock and he inched in slowly, holding on to himself, shivering and talking about how cold it was.
‘Oh, it’s seriously cold … Oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh no. Oh no …’
Sumo walked straight in and up to his chest. Then he just stood there, in his Wookie mask, rubbing at his clothes, turning around every now and then and jumping to avoid waves. He also counselled Walker from his standing position.
‘Doing great, Walker. Keep coming, keep coming, keep coming.’
‘Oh, shut up, Sumo,’ Walker would say every few minutes.
‘Any minute now you’ll be up to your knees.’
I loved swimming in the canal in Dublin, but the sea was just bliss. Johnny J, Charlie and I splashed around for a bit, until Walker had finally made it to his waist, but by then our clothes were really heavy.
‘I’m getting rid of my clothes,’ Johnny J said.
‘Me too,’ Charlie said.
I didn’t know what to think. I definitely wasn’t going nude. Charlie was there! Not to mention the beach was packed with people of all ages.
They both ran out of the water, past Sumo and Walker, and they stripped off on the beach. Johnny J stripped off to his boxer shorts and she stripped down too. She was wearing A BRA! They ran back into the water, past Walker and Sumo again, who didn’t seem to notice she was wearing a bra. They were too busy talking about the problem of Sumo’s purple face.
‘Maybe if I wash it in the salt water.’
‘Won’t work,’ Walker said.
‘Why not.’
‘The whole point is you can’t wash it off.’
‘So I’m stuck wearing a Wookie mask for the rest of my life?’ Sumo didn’t even sound that upset.fn1
‘Nah, your skin will regenerate in twenty-seven days.’
&nbs
p; ‘How do you know?’
‘I’m a genius.’
‘If you were a genius, you would have known about the dye pack and I wouldn’t be standing here wearing a Wookie mask,’ Sumo said, and Walker laughed.
‘I suppose that is a fact,’ he said.
Johnny J and Charlie both dived and started swimming for the horizon. It looked really fun and my clothes were weighing me down, so after I’d really thought about it I waded past the two boys.
‘All right, Dave,’ Sumo said as I passed him.
‘You can call me Jeremy when Jimbo’s not around.’
‘Nah, it’s too confusing,’ he said.
‘You stripping as well?’ Walker said, and there was a hint of alarm in his voice.
‘It’s the only way,’ I said.
Back on the beach I stripped off, but it was only when my trousers were around my ankles that I remembered I was wearing Papa Smurf jocks. Oh no.
Walker noticed them straight away, pointed and laughed. ‘Hey, Sumo, would you look at Smurfette over there.’ Sumo laughed. It was too late to try to peel on my soaking jeans, so I put my T-shirt back on because it was just about long enough to cover Papa Smurf. Then I just ignored the lads and returned to the sea as quickly as my skinny white freckled legs would take me.
Walker was finally up to his chest and washing himself and his clothes, much like Sumo. As I ran past them, Walker started to sing the Smurf song and Sumo joined in. Walker took off Papa Smurf’s voice and he kept repeating the phrase ‘Smurf along with me’. It was really annoying.
In my head I angrily told my mam what I thought about all of this. I’m not six years old, Mam. Why do you insist on buying me jocks with Smurfs on them? Yes, I liked them for a really long time, but I’m thirteen years old! I need jocks like Johnny J’s – just black or white or even blue. Another thing, Mam, where do you even get jocks for thirteen-years-olds with Smurfs on them?
I swam out to Johnny J and Charlie; they were just treading water together in what felt like the middle of the ocean. They were too far out to sea to notice that I had Papa Smurf’s face on my jocks. I made a mental note to stay in the water until they had dressed and gone. I wasn’t going to let Johnny J or Charlie see that.
The Fearless Five Page 14