Cheating on his wife had become something of a habit to Tommy. He did it practically without thinking now, and almost without guilt.
Why should he feel guilt, he asked himself quite regularly. His wife didn’t love him, that was clear. She disapproved. That was her principle response to everything he did. Disapproval hung over their marriage like a depressing cloud. She disapproved of his comic book collection (‘why on earth would you want to tack a bagged edition of Batman 255 to the bedroom wall, for God’s sake?’); she disapproved of his large collection of videos and DVDs (‘why do you have so many—surely once you’ve seen them the first time you don’t need to bother again’); she disapproved of his books (‘can’t you put them in the attic, they take up too much room’); she disapproved of his art (‘why should I put up with a painting of a naked woman sitting on a tomb in my own conservatory?’). Alright, he’d give her that last one—even if it was a Rick Melton original of the gorgeous Anna Falchi from Soavi’s extraordinary Cemetery Man.
The fact they were still together was a mystery to most people, but it was thumpingly obvious to Tommy. Neither of them could afford to leave. The mortgage was all paid up, but neither of them earned much. Tommy was lucky to clear ten thousand a year and his wife pulled in half that on her small wage as a part time shop assistant. When she nagged at him to get a proper job, he nagged right back that she could always go full time, even though he knew the shop she worked at wasn’t offering full hours. It was an automatic defence to The Nag. She was very good at The Nag, was Tommy’s wife.
And while Tommy had cheated successfully on his wife on a couple of memorable occasions, right now he was getting nowhere fast.
He had found her on an internet dating site—Morefishinthesea.com. Her profile was BlondeVenus. Tommy’s was TommySin. She had replied to a couple of his chatty messages, albeit in a non-committal way. But now she had stopped. He’d sent her five messages in the last week and she’d ignored all of them, although he could see the infuriatingly provocative Online Now status highlighted in green beneath her seductive photograph.
He scrolled down through her profile for the umpteenth time since spotting her, the screen of his Samsung Ace cell phone grubby from the dirt paint Make-Up had supplied him with that morning. BlondeVenus, 35, Single. Body type: curvaceous. Likes reading, trampolining, skydiving and Motorhead. Wtf, he’d first thought when he’d stumbled upon her. Not that he would argue with any of that. Alright, he wasn’t exactly in a hurry to chuck himself out of a plane, and bouncing up and down for fun without sex being involved just wouldn’t have entered his mindset for one second, but the rest he could embrace. And who didn’t love the Lemster? Well, actually quite a lot of people, especially the girls he came into contact with on TV and film sets. Their loss. Love me Like a Reptile was one of the best rock tracks ever written. And don’t let him get started on Stone Dead Forever…
He’d told BlondeVenus that of course, which had earned him a token response, but it also made him think she was bullshitting about her predilection for the Filth Rockers from Stoke, for whatever reason. Maybe she thought it made her sound cool? The rest of her profile didn’t give much away. Her personal statement was bland in the extreme except for the comment: No Married Men, Weirdos, Web Cam pervs or baldies please. That had made him chuckle. And at least he didn’t fit any of those categories… Okay, just the one maybe. Alright: two. He wasn’t going to admit to the third. But at least he had his hair.
“What the fuck you up to? Perving again? For fuck’s sake, man, put it away.”
The exasperated Geordie tones made him jump guiltily. He thumbed the phone off and turned to the tall, ginger-haired man in his early thirties who’d just emerged from the bushes behind Tommy.
“Made me jump, ya bastard.”
Andy “Whay Aye” Hill was dressed identically to Tommy. Both wore purple tunics with a wolf’s head emblazoned on the chest. Their shoulders were clamped with chain mail. Andy’s legs looked particularly skinny in his tights.
“Give it a rest, man. You look at that site any more and your eyes are gonna ping pong out your head. They’re bulgy enough as it is, fella. Anyway, we’re needed for the next shot.”
“I’m trying to keep away from Mark.” Tommy tucked the cell into his thigh-high boot. “Can’t believe he’s on this job as well.”
“Aye, he’s a bit of a knob, man, I’ll give ya that. It’s always the ones ya dinna wanna work with that follow youse around, like. Cheer up, fer fuck’s sake. Could be worse. I might not have been picked.”
“Yeah. That would have been a blow,” Tommy told him as they pushed through the ferns towards the clearing where the TV crew had set up base.
“He’s bangin’ on about that shit movie he’s in again,” mumbled Andy. They joined the collection of extras on one side of the clearing—the opposite side to that occupied by the director, First AD and stars, some of whom were sitting on fold away chairs planted on the lush green grass.
“The silly fuck reckons it’s gonna be huge.” Andy chuckled. “And it still hasn’t got a title. If they canna even decide on a fookin’ title it doesnae look good as far as makin’ a fookin’ masterpiece, does it? It’s all a load of shite.”
Tommy could only agree. Mark had managed to wind up Andy too, by the sound of it. Mind, that wasn’t difficult; the big Geordie was quick to lash out, and a born scrapper. He saw red quicker than a West End traffic queue at rush hour.
Tommy could see Mark standing in the middle of the clearing, dressed in his poncey knight gear, while the majority of the supporting artists were done up as dodgy villains. Of course he was a knight. That was just another stick to beat Tommy with, wasn’t it?
Andy was on a roll now. Tommy knew better than to interrupt. “I asked him what production company was makin’ it like, and he was all kind’ve evasive, ya know what I mean? In the end he told me. I looked ’em up. Didnae inspire me with much confidence, man.”
The runner who had been standing nearby frantically listening to a stream of orders on his earpiece rounded on Andy. “Quiet please!”
“Alreet, keep yer fookin’ wig on tight, man,” retorted Andy, albeit in a lower voice.
The runner trotted over to them, his young face anxious and stressed. Wasn’t it always? thought Tommy. Who the hell would want to do his job? He didn’t get paid much more than the extras and instead of playing around in the woods with a sword and generally having a laugh, he was always waiting at the shit end of the production company for all the bowel movements to land right on his head at very regular intervals. But to be fair, he remained polite to the bunch of sixteen extras larking around waiting for instructions. Tommy wasn’t so sure he could have stayed so patient.
“Right we need three of you…” The runner had already earmarked Whay Aye and Tommy, and just needed a third victim. He found it in Chris, long-haired, bearded, chubby. And by far the campest-without-actually-being-gay Star Wars fan Tommy had ever met. The runner marched them uphill towards the cave that overlooked the clearing.
“What’ve we got to do like?” asked Whay Aye a tad uncertainly as they were led towards the dark entrance.
Tommy turned to see the director, First AD and all the principle cast were watching them.
“We just want you to hide in here and then come bursting out on ‘Action’,” the runner told them. “D’you think you can do that? Very easy. Just come running out and pull your swords. Look menacing and angry.”
“So what’s the special FX team doing in here then?” Andy continued a little more uncertainly as they ventured into the clammy gloom.
The runner waved away the question and positioned them right at the back of the cave. So Andy asked it again: “Not being funny like, but it looks to me like this guy’s setting up a bomb.”
The FX guy grinned widely as he crouched over the little contraption he’d rigged in one corner of the cave.
A drip of water fell from the low ceiling and trickled down behind the collar of Tommy’s tunic.
“Youse gonna blow us up or what?” The gangly Geordie had gone redder than usual.
“It’s nothing to worry about,” the runner assured him as he began striding quickly towards the exit again. “Just a bit of smoke for atmosphere.” The FX guy winked at them, finished fiddling with the timer and joined the runner in a break for daylight.
“Turning…” came the familiar cry.
“And…action!”
There was a deafening bang and the “bit of smoke” billowed in front of their eyes, filling the small cave in seconds. Tommy could no longer see his hand in front of his face, let alone his two friends as they stumbled blindly in the direction they hoped was the exit, coughing like heavy smokers. Tommy couldn’t see Whay Aye, but he could most definitely hear him. A selection of choice expletives delivered in his aggressive Geordie tones signaled exactly where the gangly northerner was, which helped prevent Tommy crashing into him in the thick smoke, although it didn’t prevent him colliding with the paunchy Chris, who emitted a pronounced and extremely camp squawk as they tumbled through the mouth of the cave together, Tommy landing on top of the bearded extra. Whay Aye joined them a second later, sprawling over their tangled bodies and rolling down the slope towards the crew and the delighted cast, particularly the arrogant tit who played Arthur, who was openly guffawing.
The First AD waved a hand for silence. “Reset. Once more without the swearing.”
As Tommy got to his feet, brushing away the thick flour-like substance that the smoke machine had blasted at them to simulate ash and debris, he saw Mark grinning along with all the others. Of course Mark’s grin was bigger than everyone else’s. “Very menacing.” He chuckled. “And very angry…”
After three more takes, the director was happy and the three dust-caked “villains” joined the rest of their colleagues for a cup of well-earned coffee from the provisions table erected under a canopy in one corner of the clearing. They sprawled on the grass and chatted idly, watching the crew busy themselves preparing for the next shot. The grips hunkered down under tripods and back-breaking cameras, while the cameraman supervised the placing of a dolly track in the ferns not far from the tea table. The First AD chatted to him briefly, tapping the track with his Converse boot cracking a joke that was not smiled at. Cameramen were serious bastards. You didn’t fuck with them or their dollies.
Tommy’s attention was diverted by a cell ringtone. The Teddy Bear’s Picnic for God’s sake. The last person Tommy would have expected it to belong to was Mark, but Mark was indeed the offending owner. The First AD, rebuffed and slighted by the cameraman, turned his ire on Mark, which gave Tommy a momentary spurt of satisfaction at least. “Phone to be switched off!” the AD barked. Mark shrugged off the admonition, silenced the phone and carried his tea over to where Tommy and Whay Aye sat brushing at themselves. He was still grinning.
“Loving your work.” He smirked, squatting down next to them.
“Aye?” retorted Whay Aye aggressively. He brushed some dust in Mark’s direction. “Better than standing around like a prick doing nothing.”
“Oh, this is just down time for me,” Mark said smugly. “My real filming job takes place mostly in the evenings.”
“And that would be this low budget slasher you keep boasting about?” Tommy said, and took a sip from his coffee. “I hardly think you’re gonna get much dosh from that—if you get paid at all.”
“It will certainly get me noticed when it comes out, as you will see, my envious friends. And I won’t have to get covered in flour to do it.”
Whay Aye looked murderously at him, his fingers playing on the hilt of his sword in its scabbard as if genuinely tempted to use it. While the supporting artists’ swords were fairly blunt for obvious health and safety reasons you could still do a lot of damage with them.
Mark patted the Geordie’s back patronisingly. “But you did it so well. So very butch. Especially Chris.” He grinned at the bearded extra lying back in the grass enjoying the spring sun on his face. Chris belched demonstratively. Butch as you or anyone here, the belch said. Mark pulled out his phone as someone tried to ring him again, switched it off.
“If you go down to the woods today…” Whay Aye sniggered, “…the only big surprise you’ll get is if anyone ever listens to your bullshit. Was that your Mum checking you took your packed lunch to school and telling you not to mix with the wrong sort, like?”
“It was probably Vicky wanting more sex.” He smirked at Tommy’s expression. “Actually, I haven’t heard from that bimbo for quite a while now. No, the Geordie’s probably right. My Mum. And I’m definitely talking to the wrong sort.” He winked at Tommy, ignoring Whay Aye now, perhaps realizing he risked a punch in the face if he carried on much longer. “I’ve got something for you though, Tommy.” Mark got up and searched for his rucksack which was stacked with all the other extras’ belongings beneath the trees a few feet away.
He came back with a photocopied flyer.
Tommy took it as Mark settled down next to him again. He scanned it curiously. “What’s this?”
“Don’t say I never do anything for you, my friend. It’s a casting call audition.”
“For what?”
“You are one lucky son of a whore. It’s only because I like you that I’m giving you this opportunity.”
“You don’t like me. And you know I don’t like you. And what opportunity?” Tommy was reading the brief lines on the A5 paper but they weren’t really registering.
“Hey, I’m hurt. I thought you were my friend.”
“Is that why you fucked Vicky when you knew full well I fancied her? By the way, whatever happened to her?”
Mark clasped the flyer as if to take it off Tommy. “If you’re not interested…”
Tommy tightened his grip on it. “I didn’t say that.” He read the blurb out loud for Andy’s benefit. “Sinema Extreme Productions announce an open casting for their new movie to be filmed throughout May and June. We are looking for young talent, male and female, ages 20-45. Previous acting experience not necessary but preferred. Applicants must be fit and agile as some aspects of the filming require stamina and action. Auditions to be held at the Factory Studios, Bristol, May 3rd.” He finished reading and glanced up at Mark who was watching him closely. “What’s in it for you?”
“Again, I’m hurt. I’m helping the director out, that’s all. I think you’d fit in admirably.”
“What about me, like?” Whay Aye Andy piped up.
Mark gave him an appraising look, then said, “No. I don’t think you’d fit in at all.”
“Fuck youse then. Wanker.” Andy got to his feet and stormed off into the ferns, deciding it was time to vent his bladder.
Tommy scrutinised the supporting artist he had come to regard as his rival closely for a second or two. “Why me? Is it so you can lord it over me and show off that you’ve got a better part.”
Mark laughed. “You really do have a low opinion of me, don’t you, Thomas?” He watched the runner talking to Arthur for a moment. Arthur was berating the lowly runner for interrupting him while he was texting on his cell. Earlier he had refused to continue acting until a group of curious onlookers and Arthur fans who had gathered on the slope above the TV crew had been moved on by the runners.
“You think I’m like him?” Mark asked, indicating the blond ex-public schoolboy who, at twenty-five, was already one of the higher earning thesps on British TV. “You really think I’m as much of a shit as that?”
Tommy took his time replying. He too was watching Arthur bullying the runner. “I don’t think you’d find it much of a stretch,” he said finally.
Mark got to his feet. “Fine,” he said. “But just for the record, Vicky wasn’t all that in bed. So you really didn’t miss out on much, if that’s what’s bothering you.”
Tommy chuckled wryly. “You mean you didn’t do it for her, more like.” He squinted up through the sunlight at his rival. “You were batting way out of your league there, Markey Mark.”
As Mark turned to go, Tommy added, “What do you really get out of it, Mark? Apart from the ego side of it, I mean. Because I’m sure you’d be expecting me to report back to everyone what a wonderful role you’ve got.”
“Oh, I wouldn’t need you to do that. Everyone will be able to see that for themselves once it’s released. No, I just thought you might like to take part in it. It’s not just a film, Thomas; it’s an event.”
He stopped as he was on the point of pushing through the ferns, presumably to take a leak like Andy before him. “And you can judge for yourself exactly how uncompromising the director’s vision is. Why don’t you look up the Sinema Extreme website? The addy’s on the flyer.” He left Tommy frowning at the piece of paper in his hands and disappeared through the undergrowth.
Andy Hill made sure he was a fair distance away from the clearing before allowing himself to relax. He swore under his breath as he urinated on the thick ferns. He should have been enjoying himself. It was a beautiful location deep in the Welsh national park of Forest Ffawr. The sun was warm and promised a pleasant spring. The birds were comforting him with their melodies, bluebells clustered around the pines. And Andy wanted to hit someone.
Mark would do for a start, the twat. What an arse. What a complete dick. Smug fuck. Thought he was a cut above. Just because he had a big role in a new zero-budgeted Slasher flick. Deluded tit. Laughing at Andy like he was dog shit on his polished shoes. Not good enough to be in his crappy horror nonsense! Well, they would just have to see about that, wouldn’t they? He drew his sword, enjoying the rasp of metal on leather as it pulled free of the scabbard, and swung it in the air. He could imagine burying it in Mark’s guts. He breathed deeply, and sheathed the sword again. He needed something to calm himself, or his diabetes would kick in. He didn’t want a hypo right now, for fuck’s sake.
Andy leaned against the warm trunk of a pine and pulled “something to calm himself” from out of his tall boot where he’d wedged it this morning after costume had finished turning him into an evil Henchman. He popped the spliff between his lips and lit it.
He rested his head against the trunk and closed his eyes. Bliss. Thoughts of Mark, of Arthur, of the First AD and the runner—the whole fucking up-their-own-arse bunch of ’em—slipped from his mind. He listened to the birds, felt the warmth on his cheeks, and enjoyed them for the first time that day. He took another puff. He didn’t hear the ferns rustle slightly as someone passed through them, approaching him. His eyes remained closed as he savoured a third toke.
The birds stopped singing. Andy didn’t notice right away. He was enjoying the patterns behind his closed lids, the sunlight playing his own private cinema show right there in the dappled darkness. Even when he heard the clunk of machinery it didn’t register straightaway. His mind wondered idly what the heavy awkward ratcheting sound might be, and a memory of something associated with it popped into his consciousness—watching Straw Dogs with his buddies back home in Newcastle, scalting back the Old Brown when they shoulda been at school… a second or two before the mechanism swung forward and clamped around his head.
His eyes popped open then alright. And he wasn’t back in his beloved toon watching videos and ogling Susan George’s tits during the rape scene with his randy pals, but screaming like a Geordie hog as the world turned red, so red, and the pain was red, so red and it was more than anyone could bear—bear, bear trap!
The wicked steel teeth of the mechanism bit deep into Andy’s face, into his skull, crushing it like a ginger-haired egg. His guttural screams became mewlings as he tottered away from the tree, hands clawing at the bear trap. The person who had clamped it on him studied his movements for a while. Blood dyed the bluebells red. It daubed the crushed features visible between the massive teeth and cross bars of the antiquated, rusty trap.
Then the watcher grew bored of the agony and hefted the spear. It was a very rudimentary spear, bound at one end with thick animal furs, like a caveman’s atavistic weapon. The killer held it a moment, enjoying the feel of the wooden haft, then lunged forward, goring deep into Andy’s stomach. The killer leaned on it, slamming Andy against the tree. The spear was withdrawn, festooned with a clutch of entrails, then slammed back in, twisted, the killer’s huge raw gloves, also fashioned from animal strips of fur, soon red from the pulse and squirt of blood. The killer turned to smile at the Red One camera nosing out of the ferns, clutched by a kneeling operative. The lens focussed on the wound, on the blood on the spear, and on Andy’s Bear Trap face.
The killer released the spear—still embedded in Andy’s stomach and impaling him against the tree—a little reluctantly. Then, as if the impulse was just too strong, grasped it again and gave it one last twist. If Andy had still been capable of coherent thought—if in fact, Andy had still been alive come to that—he might have pondered on the choice of the primitive spear as a killing tool, which he certainly wouldn’t have remembered as an item of Dustin Hoffman’s arsenal in Straw Dogs. He might then have gone on to ponder if these particular weapons were actually not inspired by Peckinpah at all, but rather by something else—something, shall we say, a little less revered. But of course, Andy didn’t have the luxury of any of these musings. The fog on the Tyne was all his alright, thick and dark and all-embracing.
The hands in the animal gloves let go, and reached for something else instead. The killer placed it amongst the gory bluebells, right next to the still-burning spliff in the grass. Then both killer and cameraman slipped back into the trees and ferns. After a while the birds returned. A robin chided Andy for the interruption, flitted in the branches above his bleeding head, alighted on the object placed upright on the grass at his feet. When it toppled over the robin took flight. The spliff glowed faintly red and finally went out.
Tommy must have fallen asleep in the warm sunlight. At first he thought it was Whay Aye shaking him awake and was about to swear at the gangly Geordie when he realized it was Alex the runner.
“You’re on.”
“Hmmm?”
“Wake up, Tommy. If the First AD catches you sleeping you’ll never work on Arthur again.”
“Yeah. Sorry, mate.” He stood up sleepily, straightening his tunic, blinking around him.
“Where’s Andy?”
Alex was looking frazzled again. The production was behind schedule—weren’t they always?—and they still had three scenes to shoot before wrap. Tommy glanced around. The Geordie was nowhere to be seen.
“Probably having a piss.”
“That’s all he’s good for.” This was Mark’s contribution. “He must have a bladder the size of a pea.”
Alex ignored this. “Can you both go search for him,” he told them. “And hurry.”
“Why me?” Mark was outraged. “He’s not my mate.”
“I don’t care. Now, please.”
Mark held up his hands. “I need to be checked by costume, I believe.” He glanced over at Emma, the pretty wardrobe girl who was busy adjusting Arthur’s costume.
Alex’s patience was slipping fast. “That can wait. We need Andy now.”
“Why’s he so important?” Mark wanted to know, but he grudgingly began to follow Tommy as he traipsed through the ferns in the direction Andy had disappeared.
It didn’t take them long to find him.
Tommy spotted him first. He stopped and Mark was about to tell him to move on when he saw what his colleague was transfixed by.
Tommy said nothing. Mark stepped past him, as if fascinated.
“Is…is that real?” he said after a while.
Tommy continued to say nothing. Mark stepped even closer. They heard the greedy drone of flies.
“I mean…is this a special effects scene?”
Mark must have realized how ridiculous he sounded because he stopped talking. He had one hand out as if to check the blood was Karo syrup and his boot knocked an object lying in the grass. He stared down at it. Tommy ripped his gaze away from Whay Aye’s ruined face and looked at it too.
Mark was reaching to touch it, when a voice stopped him.
It was Alex, who had decided he needed to hurry the search along.
“Don’t!” was all he said. But it worked. Mark’s fingers stopped inches away from touching the object, and slowly withdrew.
Tommy said nothing. He was looking at the video box too. For that’s what it was: a big old clunky VHS box, plastic sleeve all shiny in the sunlight. He could see the cover image, a girl wearing sunglasses and screaming in close up. Woods fringing the background, a crudely drawn log cabin, some other details. He could read the title too: Don’t Go in the Woods…Alone.
“Don’t,” said Alex again, his thin face callow and scared. Then he added, “Oh fuck,” and backed away through the ferns before turning and running.
Mark turned to face Tommy. “This is bad.” His expression was blank.
Tommy said nothing.