Andrea IV – Neighbourhood Threat

Andrea and I meet up on the deck for a change. There’s a few other people around, strolling about or lounging but not many and it’s quite peaceful up here. It’s the first fine weather we’ve had almost since the beginning. First it was freezing cold, then it was blowing rain at us and we’ve been forced to tolerate being stuck down below, with all the windows steamed up. Luckily no B.O. here, but it’s still not pleasant. Now there are craggy wooded islands coming into view and purple mountains in the distance where we’re headed. It’s quite exciting.

‘I wanted to ask you if you ever actually did get in trouble with the law’ she says, leaning on the rail. I'm sitting in a lounger. I take my time, considering how to answer.
‘We all did, sooner or later’ I say – evasively I know. She knows it too.
‘What was it – possession, vagrancy, shop lifting?’
‘Breach of the peace, causing an affray, criminal damage, actual bodily harm...’ I continue to look away.
‘Oh’ she says, clearly somewhat taken aback.
‘...and trespass of course’ I add.
‘Did you ever go to prison?’
‘No. It was all over a very long period, and mostly minor stuff. And I'd been diagnosed as crackers of course so that helped.’
She comes back from the railings and sits beside me, but still looking out to sea.
‘Do you think you were mad?’ she says at last, her hands clasped between her knees.
‘Only in the American sense. I just used to get very angry sometimes.’
She nods but doesn’t look at me. ‘Give me an example’ she says.
I’ve been thinking about this as it happens, so I’m ready. It’s about a woman of course. ‘I was at this party, in Hove I think it was. I’d been invited over by some people I knew from the festies. They were a bunch of space cadets but basically sound...’
‘How old were you at this time?’
‘I don’t know, about thirty I suppose. They were quite a bit younger – twenty something, but the owners of the house were first generation hippies – fifty odd, but I didn’t really know them that well.’
‘Anyway...’
‘Anyway. One of the guys, Carl I think his name was, had brought along his cousin from Bristol, and it was obvious even to me that she was making the effort to talk to me and we stood together and got our drinks and so on, and the music was quite loud so it was hard to hold a conversation, so we went and sat down somewhere quiet.’
‘So did you fancy her?’
‘Mmm... yes.’
‘You don’t sound too sure.’
‘Well I wasn’t, at first. I mean, she wasn’t unattractive – rather sporty, a bit boyish I suppose. Just not really my type. I think a lot of blokes would have found her very desirable. She was definitely interesting – quite intense – lots of eye contact.’
‘So what did you do?’
‘Well, we talked. I think at the time I thought it was going ok considering I was really nervous.’
‘And why was that?’
‘Oh, I’ve never been any good when I’m put on the spot – when a performance is called for. It’s all a bit tense, and it’s hard to be funny when you’re like that, but she stayed with me for most of the evening, so I thought I must be doing something right. I fully expected her to make her excuses and wander off, but no, she didn’t, and then it was getting late and I thought I was definitely in with a chance.’
‘And I bet, by now she probably looked a bit more ‘interesting’ after a few bevvies.’
‘I didn’t used to drink a lot’ I say, defensively.
‘Because of your meds?’
‘What? No. I wasn’t on anything. No it was just that I couldn’t hold my drink, that’s all. And I stayed off the drugs too, as I’m sure you were wondering...’ She throws up her hands, as if to say ‘perish the thought’, but I can tell. Everyone just assumes I must have been a druggie. Sometimes I think I just kept myself clean out of sheer awkwardness (You think you know me? Ha! Think again.)
‘No, my life was out of control enough as it was. I had no need for more chaos. Drugs never made me happy anyway, just paranoid. I would have been on the water by then.’
‘But you had had something to drink.’
I look at her. What is she getting at? Why is she suddenly being judgemental?
‘Some, yes’ I say, guardedly. ‘A few glasses of Bulgarian red probably.’ I look at her but she’s looking away again.
‘Go on’ she says. ‘What happened then?’
‘She just got off with someone else. One of the other guys I came with actually. He was always getting off with someone or other, and she chose him. They went home together as far as I know.’ I wait for her to react. She doesn’t. I decide to press on.
‘So the party was pretty much over by then, except a lot of people were still there, stoned or sitting around having intense discussions and I didn’t know anyone and was not in the mood to make friends, so I just put some music on that I liked and danced on my own.’
‘Can I just interrupt here?’ she says, turning to me, quizzically. I nod and sit back.
‘Go ahead’ I say.
‘Did it occur to you at all in all this that this sort of thing happens to everyone, all the time – being rejected I mean?’
‘I can’t say it did...at the time...’ She goes to interrupt but I hold my hand up. ‘But I know what you mean, in retrospect. The thing is though, you have to understand...’ and I don’t know how to explain this without sounding really pathetic (And then I think, ‘What the heck? She doesn’t think much of me anyhow.’) ‘The thing is, I didn’t even get that far very often, back then. It was quite a big deal. I'd actually been talking to a not unattractive girl, at a party, and, what’s more, she actually seemed not uninterested in me. It was unheard of. I was in a complete panic. You can’t imagine.’
‘I can’t’ she says, genuinely confounded, and I am suddenly furious with her for her lack of imagination.
‘So anyway, I’m there, not dancing any more, just feeling really bad, really angry at myself for being so feeble, going over all the lame things I’d said and how I should have just gone for it somehow – been more assertive, more masculine about it or something. Then there was the self-loathing, and the hating the world and how I didn’t fit into it and how they wouldn’t let me fit in – all the stuff I told you before. Horrible, horrible, all of it. I used to get these terrible black moods, usually late at night, out in the street, crying and swearing and kicking stuff over. I was never actually dangerous. Usually I just hurt myself or maybe wrecked something that didn’t matter too much – a pile of rubbish or something. A couple of times I went playing in the traffic, swearing at everyone, giving the four-by-fours a good old boot as they went by.’
‘Didn’t that hurt?’
‘Steel toecaps. I took my lead from the ostriches – best defence against predators is a well-aimed kick. I have a theory that the primitive hominid was a kick boxer.’
Now she really thinks I’m insane. Oh well.
‘Anyway, they were never used on civilians, rest assured.’ She looks very doubtful but gestures for me to go on.
‘Anyway, on this occasion I’d been planning to crash at the house – I wasn’t going to sleep on the street if I could help it. But I couldn’t sleep and I didn’t want to talk to anybody and I couldn’t go somewhere private and have a rant. I was trapped so I just sat there. I remember it really clearly, sitting in the middle of the floor. I think they tried to ignore me at first. Then someone tried to pull me up to get me to move, and I sat down even more. That’s strange don’t you think – how you can make yourself heavier when you don’t want to be moved? I wonder how that works...’
She turns and smiles at me. That’s better. ‘What happened then?’ she says.
‘A struggle ensued as they say. I found a place over by the wall and I fumed over there instead.’
‘...and?’
‘I don’t really remember the next part. Maybe I made myself really angry, going over things in my head. Maybe it was something someone said. I just felt so frustrated and embarrassed and I just hated everything. I made a lot of noise, broke some things – a lamp I think, and some glasses. Then they were throwing me out and I managed to break someone’s nose. I was just so furious but I didn’t do it on purpose. I had to have five stitches in my face too, spent the night in casualty, then in the police cells while they got hold of my family.’
‘How did they react?’
‘Oh, the usual. More of the same.’
‘How many times had you been arrested before then?’
‘Oh a couple of times, but they’d never been involved before. What I mean is it was just more disgrace, more bother, for them, like they knew I’d end up like this eventually and “didn’t we always say this would happen if you didn’t buck your ideas up” and so on. And they never asked what had happened – just assumed I was guilty.’
‘Well you were.’
‘Yes, but they didn’t know that. That’s the point. They never asked me about it – they just assumed I’d become a criminal now. Even when the previous occasion I’d been in hospital it was me that had been beaten up. But they just assumed there must have been something I’d done to deserve it.’
‘Did you ever think of maybe trying to prove them wrong - saying “I’ll show you”? It must have been fairly humiliating, having to sign on, begging on the streets.’
‘What and get myself a nice respectable job with the council or something? Suck up to some dickless wonk in a tie, day-in, day-out? Talk about humiliation. Oh absolutely, they’d have loved that. “See, I knew you could do it if you put your mind to it.” Shit heads...’

We sit in silence. We look at the sea and the sea birds. It’s actually a beautiful day. I’m in my shorts and vest and sunglasses and she is in a summer dress that makes her look fabulous. She catches me looking but does not react.
‘Did you get involved in any demos, direct actions, stuff like that? I’d have though that’d have been right up your street.’
‘A bit’ I say, dismissively, ‘I was at Gleneagles for the G8.’
‘But you weren’t all that keen.’
‘Not really. Oh, it was a great party atmosphere and everything but ultimately it’s all mob rule. I couldn’t bring myself to really join in. Unless you’re into fighting with the police... I found it all a bit... impotent I suppose is the word. Perhaps if I could have found myself some simple straightforward evil to fight, a proper villain I could take a stand against. But no, it’s hard being a leftie. You’re always having to think about direct action versus people’s right to make a living, or people’s right to make a living versus the environment, collective responsibility versus individual freedom, chances of actual success versus publicity stunt. And then you have to weigh your own brief allotted time against sacrificing yourself to some cause. If you’ve got half a brain it’s impossible. Being right wing is easy. You just say “I’ve got the bloody money. I’ll do what the hell I want.” You can see why Thatcher was so popular.’
‘Well I don’t think...’
‘You don’t think it’s quite as simple as that. Yeah yeah, whatever. Moving on...’
She gives me her little half laugh, looks at her papers and asks me what else I got into trouble for.
‘That was about it really’ I say. ‘I got done for breaking and entering but that was just looking for somewhere to sleep.’
‘No other violence?’
I look at her. All at once I know what this is about.
‘That’s what you’ve been waiting for isn’t it.’ Now she looks embarrassed. ‘Hitting a woman?’ I suggest. ‘Knifing someone? Rape maybe?’
‘No, of course not. I never thought...’ she says, unconvincingly. ‘I just wanted to know.’ She turns away.
‘You don’t trust me. You assumed.’
She nods and smiles at me a little guiltily and I feel vindicated, for a moment anyway. But I know she’s right really, when I think how furious I was for so much of my life.
‘You are a bit scary sometimes though, you have to admit’ she says, bringing me back. ‘I bet that’s why she chose the other guy. Not because you were pathetic, but because you were a bit too intense.’
‘Maybe’ I say without conviction. It seems plausible. ‘But I can’t help the nagging feeling that if I’d made the right move...’
‘Maybe. But then I think, if she’d been the right girl, what you did would have been the right move naturally. It sounds to me like you didn’t feel very comfortable with her from the start.’
‘But I never did... with anyone.’
She looks at me for a long time. I think we’re done for today. I’m hoping for an epiphany from her. Maybe another time.

Journey IV – Fuddy-Duddy

As time went on I was further disappointed to discover that the conversations I’d been so intrigued by simply revolved around what the people they knew had been getting up to. As I got to know more of them, so I was included in the conversations more. Maureen and Jo had apparently been sleeping together at first but then Jo got off with a guy called Graham at one of the parties and brought him back. Maureen seemed to be interested in Ian for a while after that (the guy with the shaved head) but he wasn’t all that keen and she disappeared soon afterwards.
To be fair, Darren’s contribution could be very entertaining but it was all incredibly trivial. Occasionally there’d be a long discussion about the music we were listening to or, among the girls, something daring or unflattering that had been worn at the last party. Very occasionally someone would start talking about something philosophical or spiritual but it was all very woolly and pretentious. There was vague talk of missed lectures and overdue assignments, and a suggestion that I enrol in something but I never came across anything even remotely resembling a college or university. Other times there’d be a brief but pointless argument over some trivial matter, usually started by Chloe – the short haired girl whose bottom I’d seen that first morning. Nobody really paid her much attention and she usually stomped back to her room and slammed the door, which was at least a refreshing display of genuine feeling.
Early on I had tried to talk a bit about the meaning of all this and why we were here, as we had on the boat, but it was impossible. They didn’t exactly avoid the subject, and sometimes some anecdotes and vague hypotheses were put forward but nobody seemed to want to pursue the subject. Sometimes I persisted but I got the impression that they thought I was being a bit too “intense” or “paranoid”. They thought I analysed things too much, as if thinking was the cause of the problem rather than vice-versa. I came across a similar argument when I was alive, as if my trying to work out what was wrong with my life was the cause of my problems.

And, as time went on I got used to the inconsequential exchanges, the shifting, superficial relationships, the unmemorable conversations. Most of the people were friendly, many were indifferent, few were hostile but there was no sense of any developing connection with anyone in particular. This made life casual and relaxed on one level but made me feel horribly vulnerable on another. If anything happened would anyone come to help me? Would I even be missed? Would any of us?
And there was a feeling of menace about the place, although I couldn’t begin to say what or who the menace was exactly. To me it was palpable in every empty doorway, in every darkened window, in the night time itself – not hostile or predatory exactly. I couldn’t imagine their motives, whoever, or whatever they were, living in the shadows. Sport perhaps? Fun?

Eventually though I found myself going with the flow. I shut up about my worries and my thoughts and found myself surprisingly content. It was a weird situation in that I looked and felt about thirty but still had all the memories of an old man. I was amazed every morning to see my flat, hard belly back again. I wandered about in just a pair of worn army surplus shorts, vest and para boots and looked, I thought, pretty good. It was exactly like life in fact, except without the worry of where the next meal was coming from and whether I was going to die of cold next winter. And thirty had been a good age for me, relatively speaking. I’d been to raves and festies and gigs and parties, I’d danced all night and hugged scores of strangers. This place was a bit like that, and it made me wonder just how old all these others (average age about twenty-two on the face of it) really were. Or maybe they’d all died young, having too much fun and this was their idea of heaven. In which case, what was I doing there?

And for a while it even came to seem quite interesting – or at least – it came to seem that it might get interesting. I enjoyed the music and no longer felt too old to get up and bop about. Also I no longer felt I was old enough to do without sex. I gave up on meeting anyone at a party and I stopped going to a lot of them (it was just too frustrating) but some of the girls at the house were pretty and seemed approachable and available, so I remained quietly optimistic on that front.
The menacing atmosphere of the town at night too, secluded as we were in our little island of music and warmth, provided an interesting backdrop. Sometimes, when the conversation drifted off and I was bored I would think about our isolation and vulnerability there in that little kitchen and when the evening became too sleepy and giggly I’d go and stand behind the sofa at the window, drawing the curtains behind me and look out at the street and the darkness, feeling the draught on my body, and I’d be sure I saw strange beings moving about out there. I accepted that I was probably just being paranoid but I couldn’t be sure. I felt fairly safe moving about during the day, and to some extent in a noisy group at night, but nothing would have made me go out there alone after dark. Nobody did. Even my route past the entrance to take the steps up to my room was something I preferred not to do alone and I always made sure the lights were on. My room I kept locked, and once I was up there I didn’t go out again until it was light.
I’m not sure how much the others felt the same way. I noticed they didn’t tell me there was nothing happening, only that they didn’t seem to think it was worth talking about.

Eventually though I had to accept the fact that I was trapped and furthermore that I probably wasn’t going to find a girl who was interested in me at any time in the near future. This was particularly frustrating since many of the girls went around the house only slightly dressed, casually falling out of their tops on a regular basis. Quite often we would be sitting around in the kitchen, in the afternoon or late into the night and the conversation would get a little more charged and there’d be maybe a game with forfeits leading to some playful exhibitionism or the girls would dance erotically together and pretend it wasn’t for our titillation. Sometimes a rather intense flirtation would develop between people who were otherwise ‘just good friends’ and we’d be sitting right next to them on the sofa as they embarked on some fairly advanced foreplay. Next day they’d be slightly flushed, but still ‘just friends’, as before. Sometimes the heavy fumes of sex were all but unbreathable. I never got used to it. In some ways I didn’t want to – I wanted more than casual sex, certainly, but I wouldn’t have turned it down. I thought about Andrea’s advice but it didn’t seem to apply. They were just girls after all, and as she had warned me, they just wanted to have fun. In retrospect I realise my age – even looking just thirty, didn’t help but I wasn’t like them. There were the guys who looked even older than I did but I wasn’t like them either. It wasn’t that I was rejected so much as that no one saw me that way. The girls seemed to like to think of me as friendly and nice but perhaps a bit too serious. Some of them took to calling me Mr Giles who I understood to be some sort of fuddy-duddy librarian character on the telly. Once or twice I tried a flirtatious comment but was made to understand that I was embarrassing them so instead I went for displacement activity – dancing until I fell over.

So as autumn became winter I spent more and more time in my room or wandering the streets, looking for a way to move on. I found a storeroom with a lot of old magazines and books in it and that kept me occupied for a while. I can’t say my room was a particularly attractive place to spend time in, what with the mushy pea paint job, but I kept it warm, and I cleaned the window and washed the bedding so it wasn’t too bad. A girl called Kim came and joined me sometimes saying she just wanted to relax away from the others and liked me because I didn’t see her as a sex object. I didn’t have the heart to correct her on that. She was a pretty girl who liked to wear low cut tops and short skirts and I found her company rather unrelaxing, but it was good to have company. Alone, I fantasised about her mercilessly.
I did also notice that there were other quiet, sexless souls about the place that rarely or never came down to the kitchen, keeping themselves to themselves. Something about them though discouraged conversation.

Journey III – Teenage Kicks

It must have been about midday when I awoke again. I went back down to the kitchen and slumped on the sofa in my shorts. I had toast and peanut butter with a cup of instant coffee for breakfast, then thought I might do some washing up but on closer inspection thought better of it. As the morning progressed I saw most of the people from the night before come in and get something to eat. Some took their food back where they’d come from, others sat blearily in the kitchen to eat and flick through a magazine. As the afternoon wore on, the booze and the dope came out (it never seemed to quite run out) and I was content to sit about in a warm aromatic haze.
That was my first day, and pretty much indistinguishable from every other day for the next few weeks. I stopped keeping track. There always seemed to be something to eat in the fridge – not necessarily something appetising, but something nevertheless. As for the washing up – like everyone else, I just rinsed off the utensils I needed and left the rest. There was conversation but generally I couldn’t hear what they were talking about because they tended to mumble among themselves and the music was always on quite loud in the background. They didn’t so much ignore me as not notice me. It was intriguing but there didn’t seem to be any malice to it so I had to accept it.


Eventually the monotony was broken with news of a party that weekend. (I had no idea what day of the week it was.) I asked the buxom girl, whose name was Maureen and who had been the most approachable of them, where it was and how we were going to get there. She shrugged and laughed and said something I couldn’t make out. ‘I’ll follow you then’ I said loudly in her ear and she gave me a look that suggested I’d finally realised something important but I couldn’t imagine what that might be. She wasn’t terribly pretty and looked a bit too young for me but I certainly wouldn’t have said ‘no’ at that stage. Maureen’s hardly a young girl’s name after all. She might have been even older than I was when she died for all I knew.
Anyway, Saturday night came and they put on some loud music and smoked and drank quite a bit before leaving and we were quite raucous by the time we set out. I hung back a little to watch and see what would happen - fully expecting to see the group whittled down as we wandered the streets aimlessly all night. I was apprehensive to say the least.

The streets were empty as before as we noisily made our way. Somewhere a dog barked. Somewhere I could hear the unmistakeable sound of partying, but all the houses we passed were silent and dark as before. We lost a couple of our group at some point but had gained three others by the time we arrived. Nobody seemed much concerned about it.
When we got there I was surprised to find there really was a party going on. It was in a tall Victorian house with high ceilings and huge windows and a basement lit with red bulbs. That seemed to be where most of the action was. The whole place had much the same neglected charm as our place, but much more spacious and with no furniture to speak of. We came in the front door and looked in on the lounge. It was dark and nobody was in there, despite the fact that the windows were wide open and dance music was spilling out into the front garden and across the street. We went down a narrow staircase to the basement to find something more melodic playing and everyone sitting around on cushions on the floor or leaning against the walls. We settled in amongst them, squeezing into the gaps and taking our turns on the ever-circulating joints and wine bottles. I felt warm and oddly at peace despite the fact that I still couldn’t hear a word of what was being said, even when the bloke with dreads next to me talked directly into my ear. I just smiled and nodded, which seemed to be the right thing to do. Later on I went for a wander and found a bunch of lads had congregated in the back room to look at torture porn on the TV. A naked girl was strapped to a chair and apparently having her face cut away. I quickly went through to the lounge and had a look at the record collection, then stood in the bay window looking out at the night and took some deep breaths. It was all so familiar – this noise, this light, this smell. What was that smell? There was a couple just along the wall near the stereo. They were mostly in shadow but I could see enough to know she was down to her underwear and he was working hard on her breasts with his mouth and on her crotch with his fingers. I decided to go downstairs again and give them some privacy but found that now a few more people were up dancing and that at least one of them – a small dark girl, had taken all her clothes off and was moving about among the others, apparently oblivious of the fact that she couldn’t dance. I couldn’t help but watch her nonetheless. I found myself an unopened can and settled down on a beanbag by the stereo to observe the fun.
It occurred to me that I’d never really understood what this ‘having fun’ business was all about. I understood pleasure and excitement, beauty and awe, humour and fascination, but not ‘fun’. Everyone here was laughing but nobody was doing anything particularly funny. People moved on the dance floor but none of them danced well. A few people seemed to be getting off with each other but there was nothing very erotic about it or even particularly illicit. Every record sounded the same. I longed for punk and techno and psychedelia. Even a bit of rock ’n’ roll or jazz wouldn’t have gone amiss. I felt somewhat superior and hugely inadequate at the same time. They knew no better and they were happy. Envy and contempt – how typical!
I leaned back and watched the girl stumble about.

I’m not sure when we got back to our place. It was getting light but I was still half expecting never to find it again. We sat in the kitchen having toast and coffee (I found some real coffee and a coffee pot, which I was fairly sure hadn’t been there before) and then we retreated to our rooms to sleep for a few hours. Later it stopped raining and I went out for a walk through the willows, down to the stream, and along the path to where the road crossed it at the far end. I still didn’t entirely trust that I could find my way back or that I wouldn’t be snatched by something as I passed but I got back ok, and just in time for the start of the evening session.

And that was more-or-less how things were. The weather got somewhat colder and damper and the days shorter, and an increasingly stale humid brown fug hung over the kitchen. People came and went and nobody seemed to wonder where or why. There was music on most of the time and either a spliff or a pipe doing the rounds to accompany it. There was a TV lounge further up the hall but it was not really comfortable and I didn’t go in there often. Mostly it was the boy’s room where they played computer games or watched horror movies on video. I found the violence in both seriously disturbing. The only relief was the parties. I liked to pretend I was above it all but I always went along hoping things would get interesting, and sometimes they did. Sometimes one or two of the girls would begin dancing close together, ‘inadvertently’ showing their knickers to us ‘boys’ sitting on the floor. Or there would be a game of dares – an obvious excuse for people to take their clothes off – usually the girls. (Why was it usually the girls? Not that I was complaining.) Later on there might be someone streaking through the house and out onto the street. That was more of a mixed event.

I wish I could say I knew how to handle the situation, with all my maturity and wisdom. I was at once disappointed in myself for not being able to just let go and join in, and disgusted with myself for not being able to tear myself away. It was not even especially sexy for much of the time. The girls were silly and giggly and ungainly on the dance floor. Very few of them would have turned my head under any other circumstances and the real exhibitionists were often the least attractive. I’m sure that wasn’t a coincidence.
The boy’s reactions (our reactions) were invariably crass and laddish or mumblingly self-conscious and we very seldom joined in with what the girls began. The most we’d do was take off our shirts and jig about ineffectually in the girl’s general vicinity, trying not to look too keen and in fact looking totally inept. As a result, much of the sexual activity, faked or otherwise, was among the girls. The only regular exceptions to this were when a few mean looking dudes with crew-cuts, tattoos and scars turned up. They’d be all but stripped and on the dance floor the moment any of the girls looked like they might try some of their routines. The men’s grimy or tanned arms seized the girl’s soft white bodies like a gang of snakes setting about a pet shop. We could do nothing but watch as they moved in on them, puppies and kittens, bunnies and chicks – powerless to save themselves.

Those occasions were unusual though. Generally the action was altogether less hard-core and I told myself that I was a voyeur – Lautrec at the Folies Bergere or some such. I even took to carrying a small sketch pad with me. (Quelle poseur!) But in truth, no matter how arrhythmic their routines, no matter how artless and staged the amateur lesbo porn – breasts nonetheless wobbled in low-cut tops and bottoms jiggled under short skirts. Tongues still writhed together and fingers explored and I throbbed fit to burst. You couldn’t fake that. I was at once sardonic and detached and hugely turned on. Disgusted as I would have been with myself, the fact is that I would have stripped off too and made any of those girls submit to me, if I could have, using nothing but raw self-confidence. And I’d have done it right there, shameless, in front of everyone (but perhaps with a little more dexterity.) Superficially I looked a lot like the mean dudes – mature and somewhat swarthy and grizzled from the streets. I was not an awkward youth any more, not like these numpties I hung around with most of the time. Was I a snake or was I a puppy? The truth is I was neither. I was a tortoise or an axolotl perhaps – peering out at them from my tank at the back of the menagerie.

One night two girls, one topless and hugely over-endowed, the other more slender in her bra and knickers, fell on top of me on the sofa. They’d been slow dancing and snogging in front of me for a while and now they were lying all over me, kissing and writhing, using my face as a pillow and my legs to rub themselves against. I suppose they were aware that someone was underneath them and perhaps found using a human being as a couch more interesting than just lying on an inanimate piece of furniture. It should have been a fantasy come true but I couldn’t see anything or hear what they whispered to each other. My hands could only reach their backs and they didn’t seem to want my lips to join theirs so there I was, squashed. Not wanting to poop on their party, I waited for them to finish. When they finally got off me one of them gave me a very lascivious smile. I suppose she thought they’d given me a very big treat but in fact by then I was as limp as a used condom. I found a book and went and sat on the stairs and waited for morning.