Nightmare

At the corner outside the ward. Du An followed Kenny Dalglish. When Dalglish stopped, Du An stood facing him. “You might not know me, but I know you. Bishop John Catholic School—always fighting, in school and out. The school authorities came to me several times, and I spoke up for you. I said children's quarrels ought to be settled by the children themselves. Besides, it was always the others who started it, wasn't it?” Du An looked up at Dalglish. He had always known that the school had quietly buried those incidents for him. So it had been Dalglish behind it all along. Dalglish smiled and looked him over. “I also watched you go from losing out again and again to training yourself until no one could get near you so easily. Your running, your Sanda practice—I know about all of it.” Du An reached up and scratched the back of his head, his ears growing warm. “How do you know all that?” Dalglish smiled, his gaze drifting to the stretch of old Liverpool rooftops beyond the window. “Because of Liverpool. Because of Anfield.” Then he sighed. “Your grandfather, Old John, was a die-hard Reds fan. Years ago, he and I had our picture taken together.” Du An shook his head slowly. “I've never seen a photo of him.” “It may be that Mrs. Mason threw them all away. On April 15, 1989, during the Hillsborough disaster, I was there. I lived through that dark moment from beginning to end, and I saw everyone's hearts torn apart.” Du An went still. “Marina and I, along with the club, have been helping the families of the victims, hoping they could walk out of their grief. Everyone else used football to soothe their scars. Only Mrs. Mason shut herself away, refused every bit of help, and burned everything connected with football. She has been trapped in that tragedy her whole life. So I have kept watching over how your family is doing, and naturally I know everything about you.” Du An pressed his lips together and bowed to Dalglish. “Thank you!” “Hey, child, what are you doing? You know this is what we do willingly. I think of Liverpool as my home, and all of you are my family.” Dalglish helped him up. He went on, “You're a good boy… But football isn't what Mrs. Mason says it is. It doesn't only bring people pain.” Du An straightened and nodded slightly. He understood this city's madness for football. And he understood his grandmother's hatred of it. And himself? Now it was his turn to think the question through seriously. How did he see football? Dalglish looked at Du An and saw a maturity in his eyes that did not belong to his age. He sighed and began to speak of a past he himself did not want to face. “I don't know whether you clearly understand what happened at Hillsborough, or how you see football, but what I want to tell you is that I will never forget the sights of that day as long as I live.” “Countless ordinary people who loved football only wanted to go to the stadium and watch a match, and in the end they stayed there forever.” “Everyone suffered. Every family of the victims was broken. Mrs. Mason's pain is real, and so is her shutting herself away and hating football, because the Leppings Lane terrace became a nightmare she will never be able to walk out of.” “After the disaster back then, half of Liverpool collapsed. Grief, rage, despair—they hung over everyone. Many families, like Mrs. Mason, lost their closest kin and were left with nothing but an empty house and a lifetime of scars.” “That day I saw so many people and heard so many heartbreaking stories. One father, Trevor Hicks, wept and wept, unable to decide—should he get into the ambulance with one injured daughter, or stay with the other daughter, who would rest there forever?” “Because the police wouldn't let them take the bodies away, all of the dead were laid out in a row in the stadium's gym. Do you know what that kind of despair is like?” “At the Sheffield hospital I also saw a boy named Lee Nicol. He was only fourteen. There wasn't a mark on him, but the doctors had already declared him dead. I didn't understand. They told me it was lack of oxygen—his brain had stopped working. When they pulled him out, he was unconscious but still alive. In the end, though, he became the ninety-fifth victim.” At that point, Dalglish could barely go on. Perhaps, as he himself had said, those sights he could never forget in his life were also haunting him like a nightmare, every hour of every day. Du An said nothing. Dalglish sighed and patted Du An's shoulder. “But you have to know, football was never the pain itself.” “Later people held memorials at Anfield. Anfield became a place of comfort for the victims' families, because here there were people who cared about them, understood them, even felt what they felt.” “They could talk, they could pour out their grief. They were all strong. They took their lost loved ones' love for Liverpool and turned it into grim jokes. Someone said, ‘Hey, the poor bastard, but now he can watch Liverpool play in heaven for free—that must make him happy,’ and so on.” “What held this city up and slowly brought it back to its feet was football, of all things.” “The fans never gave up on the stadium, the club never gave up its faith, and countless Liverpudlians hid their grief in their hearts and folded their longing into every cheer, every match. Other people think football only brings wins and losses. Only we know that it is holding our regrets for us, and smoothing over our wounds.” “That is the power of football. It does not create suffering. It takes suffering onto itself.” “Back in 1966, Bill Shankly kept inviting me south from Scotland to Liverpool, but it wasn't until 1977 that Bob Paisley signed me. I never played under Bill, but that line of his makes a lot of sense: ‘Some people believe football is a matter of life and death. I am very disappointed with that attitude. I can assure you it is much, much more important than that.’” At that moment, Du An lifted his head. The confusion in his eyes thinned a little, and he looked at Dalglish. No one had ever told him these things before. From childhood, everything he knew about football was his grandmother's tears, her trembling, her fear. He had always believed football was a disaster, a curse. It was everything forbidden in this family. But Ethan's excited face every time told him otherwise. The way those people at school looked when they talked about Gerrard's goals told him otherwise. And now Dalglish was telling him otherwise! Kenny looked at him and went on quietly, “Mrs. Mason has been trapped by the nightmare her whole life. She chose to keep away from football, to protect herself and her family in her own way. I don't blame her. No one has the right to blame a woman who has suffered pain like that.” “But you are different.” “You have to carry this family now. You have to earn money, protect your grandmother and Ethan. The road ahead of you is hard—a hundred times harder than for an ordinary boy.” “The most practical question is this: how do you plan to pay the money back?” Du An was silent. Talking about earning money was cruel for a thirteen-year-old boy. Dalglish gave him the answer. “A couple of days ago I saw David Coleman. He's a good scout, and his father is a good friend of mine. I know the boy's eye. I once invited him to Liverpool, but he's an Everton fan. He told me about you—said you have good football talent, but if you don't practice football, that talent will disappear.” David Coleman? Du An answered instinctively, “I've never played football.” “Then go and play.” “I trust that David Coleman wouldn't lie to me. He has a good eye. He says you can do it, and I think you can too.” “Liverpool's children are never crushed by hardship. We could stand up out of the ruins back then, and you can too. If life collapses, if there's no money, no one to lean on, no way back—it doesn't matter.” “If fate insists on making you suffer, then use football to cut yourself a road out.” “Football was never your shackle. It can be the ground you stand on.”