1978

 

 

IT COULD HAVE been any south coast seaside town, and it could have been any fish and chip shop, and he could have been any youngish man working behind the counter, serving up battered cod and saveloys, dressed in white apron, checked trousers and embarrassing paper hat. It was an absolutely anonymous job in an absolutely anonymous place, and Guy was more than happy with that.

The routine was dull and unchanging, reassuringly so. Clock in every morning at eleven. Clean out the fryers. Set the cooking oil to heat up. Scrub the floor and the melamine tabletops. Dig a fresh catering-size bag of chips out of the freezer. Wait for the first customers to amble in. Work until late. Close up. Go home to bed. Repeat ad infinitum.

His boss was Mr Fernandinho, a Portuguese man who had come over to the UK after the war on a tourist visa and stayed. He was a squat, frog-faced man, bad-tempered but fair. Possibly he had imagined himself doing more with his life than doling out fried food for thirty years in a dilapidated English resort town that only came to life – and then just barely – during the summer months. But, if he felt he was a failure, he was philosophical about it, and when he was sharp with Guy he usually apologised soon after. Guy was a hard worker, conscientious and reliable, and there were far too few of his type around, so Mr Fernandinho couldn’t afford to alienate him.

For Guy, it was all about the safe monotony of the job and the pleasure of never having to think. He lived in a first-floor bedsit a few streets inland from the promenade, and he had bought himself a portable colour telly and a kettle, and there was a second-hand bookshop close by, and this meant he had all that he needed. No one bothered him. No one much cared who he had been or where he had come from. To his neighbours, he was just a drifter who had breezed in last autumn, found himself lodging and employment, and wanted to be left alone.

He had lived in the town for over a year, and it was beginning to seem that he might remain permanently – a victim of inertia like Mr Fernandinho, an accidental fixture, someone who had, in every sense, settled.

Then Petra the Punk walked into his life.

 

 

Strictly speaking, she walked into his workplace.

It was an October evening, midweek, blustery out, a very slow night clientele-wise. The only other customers on the premises were an elderly couple – Mr and Mrs Arbuthnot, or Armstrong, something like that – who dined out at the chip shop once a week and always ordered the same, him haddock with mushy peas, her scampi and about a pint of vinegar on her chips. Both of them winced in disapproval when a girl with glue-spiked hair, Siouxsie Sioux eyeliner, bondage trousers and cherry-red Doc Martens clumped in through the door. News of the punk movement had reached even this bygone backwater, but an actual fully-fledged fan of the music was a rarity. It was a quiet town that didn’t go in much for that sort of thing. The locals would probably have been less shocked by the sight of a Zulu tribesman in full war paint and battle regalia marching down the high street, brandishing his shield and assegai.

The punk girl sidled up to the counter and plonked her elbows on it. Her hands were sheathed in fingerless lace gloves. Metal studs rimmed one ear. The obligatory safety pin speared her nose. She wasn’t tall, but she held herself as though she was, rising on her heels, her head and neck posturally correct. Guy was expecting her to affect an angry nasal drawl, just like Johnny Rotten, and was surprised when the voice that came out of her sounded polite and, well, normal.

“Large chips, please.”

Instantly – and he couldn’t for the life of himself tell why – he was smitten. With those three very mundane words, the punk girl somehow endeared herself to him and stirred the dormant ashes in his heart, kindling a glow.

“Er, yeah. Sure. Coming up.” He poured a scoopful of chips onto a Styrofoam tray, and added a second scoopful. It was a bigger helping than Mr Fernandinho formally prescribed as “large,” but as he wasn’t present at that moment, it didn’t matter. Guy bunged in a wooden chip fork and a sachet of tomato ketchup, then asked her about salt and vinegar.

“Nah,” she said. “I like them au naturel.”

“A chip purist,” he said, parcelling the portion up in newspaper.

“You what?”

“I said... Never mind.”

She frowned at him. Her eyes, amid all that kohl, were hazel with a hint of gold, and dazzlingly huge. Her skin was pale and, to Guy’s reckoning, flawless.

“Are you taking the mick?” she said. “‘Chip purist’?”

“Nope. Not at all. It was just an observation. Comment. Thing to say. Meant nothing by it.”

“Should hope so, too.”

“That’ll be seventy-eight pee.”

She handed over a one-pound note and he gave her change.

“So, erm...” he said as she turned to go.

“Yeah?”

“You new in town?”

“What’s that supposed to mean? Why are you asking?”

“No reason. Just... asking. I haven’t seen you before, that’s all. Here, I mean.” He waved his hands, indicating the shop.

“In your mighty domain,” she said.

“Yes.”

“Well, that’s because I’m normally into gourmet dining. If it hasn’t got a Michelin star, I’m not interested. I just thought this evening I’d see how the other half eat.”

“Oh.”

“You don’t really believe that, do you?” she said with a derisive giggle. “You dolt.”

“So you are new in town.”

“So what if I am?” Her head tipped to one side, almost – almost – coquettishly.

“Then hello. Welcome. It’s funny, nobody’s ever called me a dolt before. Plenty of other things, but never a dolt.”

“I was going to say something worse, but then, you know...” She clicked her mouth towards Mr and Mrs Arkwright, or whatever their surname was. “Didn’t want to offend the pensioners.”

“A punk who’s scared of offending.”

“That such a surprise? We’re not all like the stereotyped idiots you see on TV, effing and blinding and gobbing.”

“And pogoing,” Guy added.

“Oh no, I pogo. If the guitars are thrashing and some skinny bloke is jumping up and down onstage snarling into a mike, I can’t help myself. It’s a thrill, when the music’s loud and the crowd are going mental. But that doesn’t make us all evil drooling monsters. It’s like Sid says, ‘We’re really quite nice and friendly, but everyone has a beastly side to them, don’t they?’”

“Ah, yes. Mr Vicious, the great sage of our times.”

“He damn well is and all. He’s wiser than you’ll ever be. You ever listened to any of the Pistols’ lyrics? Properly? No, you’re too middle-of-the-road and boring, aren’t you? Bet you like the Eagles and that Dire Straits. Maybe a bit of ABBA...”

“Hey!”

“Sorry. That was a low blow.”

Before Guy could reply, Mr Fernandinho emerged from the back room.

“Why are you standing there gassing with the customers, Guy?” he snapped. “There’s work to be done.”

There patently wasn’t. The restaurant was near empty. But Guy knew better than to argue with his boss. He grabbed a J-cloth and a can of Ajax powder. “I suppose the bins out back could do with a scrub.”

“That’s more like it.”

The punk girl smiled and popped a chip into her mouth. “I’ll let you get on with it, Guy.” Calling him Guy seemed to amuse her, or maybe it was just that she now knew his name, while he still had no idea what hers was, and this gave her some obscure advantage over him.

As she left, Mrs Allbright (or whatever) loudly and openly tutted.

“Oh, what?” the girl said to her.

“Such a shame,” the elderly woman said. “To see a pretty thing like you go to such lengths to make herself look so ugly.”

“Better that than looking like a shrivelled-up old testicle like you.”

The response was a sharp intake of breath and an aghast glare.

Guy hid a smile.

The girl turned on her heel and sashayed out of the shop.

She disappeared along the pavement. Then she backtracked to throw a glance in through the window. Catching Guy’s gaze, she stuck her tongue all the way out like a kabuki performer, flicked him a cheery ‘V,’ then was gone again.

“We can do without her type,” Mr Fernandinho muttered.

Guy felt quite the opposite.

 

 

ON HIS ONE day off a week, Guy liked to go for a stroll along the seafront, if the weather wasn’t too foul. Today, it was only drizzling, and with the collar of his bomber jacket turned up, the chill was bearable.

He was passing one of the shelters that dotted the promenade at intervals when someone called out to him.

“Oi. Chip shop.”

The punk girl was huddled on the bench inside the shelter, smoking.

“You,” Guy said.

“Yeah, me. Fancy a fag?” She offered him a cigarette from a pack of Silk Cut.

“No, thanks. Bad for your health.” Guy made to move on.

The girl rolled her eyes. “I’m asking you to come and sit next to me. It’s called a cue. You can either pretend you do smoke, or you can say no, but come back with some kind of line like ‘But I’ll watch you finish yours.’ Either way, you can at least be polite and give me five minutes of your time.”

Guy thought for a moment. “But I’ll watch you finish yours.”

“That’s my boy. It’s Petra, by the way. In case you were wondering.”

“What’s Petra?” Guy said, lowering himself onto the bench’s unforgiving wooden slats.

“My name, you twat.”

“Petra as in the Blue Peter dog?”

“No, as in the ancient city in Jordan. Petra ‘the rose-red city half as old as time.’ Which is from a poem.”

“I know. By John William Burgon. It’s about the only thing he’s famous for.”

“Not just a pretty face,” Petra said, and then kicked his shin with her steel-toecapped Doc Marten.

“Ouch! What did you do that for?”

“Petra the fucking Blue Peter dog,” she snorted. “Arsehole.”

Together, side by side, they watched the waves hurling themselves onto the shingle beach and shattering against the groynes. Seagulls stomped by, hunched and aggravated, the wind ruffling their feathers. The pain in Guy’s shin slowly subsided.

“If you’re such a smartypants,” Petra said, puffing out a plume of smoke, “how come you’re stuck here in the arse end of nowhere, working in a chippie? How come you’re not making a mint as a merchant banker or a stockbroker or writing the world’s greatest novel or something?”

“Long story.”

“I look like I’ve got somewhere else to be?”

“Is that another cue?”

“He’s learning.”

“Well, you could say this is the right place for me,” Guy told her. “Or you could say I’m here because it’s about as far away from all the bullshit as I can get.”

“What bullshit?”

“The bullshit of my life so far.”

“You’re running away from something. Hiding from something.”

“Sort of.”

“What?”

In reply, Guy said, “What about you? How come you’ve made here your home and you’re not up in London, going to the 100 Club by night and hanging out at Sex on the King’s Road by day?”

“Ooh, hark at you, professor of punk. Who says this is my home? Maybe I’m just passing through. And don’t think I haven’t noticed you avoiding my question.”

“My answer is I’m not prepared to talk about it.” He added, “Yet.”

“Mr Mystery. Well, my answer is I’ve sort of run away too. From a bloke I was seeing. Right bastard. His idea of fun was getting off his face and kicking the shit out of me.”

“A punk too?”

“Yeah, but a drunk and a druggie first and foremost. I loved him so much, which is why I stuck it out as long as I did. But when he nearly broke my arm one night, that was when the penny finally dropped. I knew I had to get out, otherwise next time he might kill me. And don’t make that face.”

“What face?”

“That sad goo-goo face. That feeling-sorry face. I don’t want your pity. He was a cunt, and I was a twat for letting him be such a cunt to me. I betrayed my own principles.” She shrugged. “You live and learn. You move on.”

“You want to go to the cinema?” Guy said abruptly, surprising himself.

“No, ta.”

“Okay.”

She grunted in frustration. “Don’t give up so easily, Guy. Never take no for a first answer when you ask a girl out. If she refuses three times in a row, then perhaps you should accept that she doesn’t fancy you. But otherwise, keep trying.”

“All right, so if I ask you a second time, you might say yes?”

“Give it a whirl.”

“You want to go to the cinema?”

“No.”

He was crestfallen.

Petra laughed. “Just teasing. Your expression! Priceless. Yes, let’s go to the cinema. There’s fuck all else to do in this dump, is there?”

 

 

THE TOWN’S CINEMA was old and musty-smelling, with a leaking roof and seats whose stuffing crunched when you sat down. They went to a matinee showing of Midnight Express, which was all that was on, and afterwards Petra said, “Well, this clearly isn’t a date, because you just took me to the most gruelling, depressing film ever and now I want to slash my wrists,” but with a smile, because it clearly was a date. Then they went to the amusement arcade and shovelled ten-pence pieces into the Space Invaders machine. Petra was pretty good at the game, whereas Guy struggled to clear even a single screen.

As the sky darkened, they moved on to a pub, The Anchor, where Petra drew stares and the occasional snarky aside.

“Oy-oy, freak show’s in town,” someone muttered, while someone else said, “Why don’t you get in your spaceship and go back to the planet Zarg?”

“Doesn’t it bother you?” Guy asked her as they carried their drinks to a quiet corner table. “People making snide comments all the time?”

“If it did, would I dress like this?” she replied. “It’s just the look they object to, not me. And that’s because they’re cowardly conformist wankers.” She raised her voice loud enough so that everyone in the pub would know they were being referred to. Lowering it again, she said, “I hate sheep. People who follow unthinkingly, like this lot, with their jeans and their conservative attitudes and their complete lack of imagination.”

“Aren’t you a follower yourself? I mean of punk.”

“Ah, punk’s just a fashion statement. It’ll have its day and then something else will come along. Already there’s people in London dressing like the opposite of punk: frills and flounces and buccaneer boots. They all gather at the Blitz Club and Billy’s and dance to glam rock records. That’ll probably be the next wave, with bands writing songs that sound like glam but different, just like punk’s like rock-and-roll but different, and then there’ll be something else, and something else after that. I choose to be a punk but I won’t be one forever. I pick whatever suits my mindset at the time. People who follow trends slavishly, unthinkingly, just because it’s cool – they despise themselves. They have no self-worth. They get their identity from something outside themselves. Not me. Whatever I wear, I’m still me inside and that’ll never change.”

“Petra. From the Greek for ‘rock.’”

“Look, we already know you’re educated. No need to show off.”

“I think it suits you. You’re stable. Grounded. Solid. Like a rock, you won’t be worn down.”

“Are you using flattery to try and get into my knickers?” She peered at him over the rim of her lager glass.

“I don’t know,” he said cagily. “Is it working?”

“You might be better off telling me I’m pretty, not comparing me to a fucking bit of stone.”

“You are pretty. And the ‘rock’ thing really was meant as a compliment. I’ve known some flaky girls in my time.”

“Some rocks can be flaky.”

“Not the type you are.” Guy was beginning to wonder if anything he ever said to Petra would go unchallenged. Her personality was as spiky as her hair. For all that, he was enjoying the cut-and-thrust of the conversation. He didn’t even mind that she always seemed to win. “You’re... you’re granite.”

“I’ll jot that one down in my diary. ‘Dear diary, today a boy said I was granite. I really want to shag him now.’”

“Do you?”

“Buy me another pint and we’ll see.”

 

 

THEY STAGGERED TO his bedsit. Petra mocked the state of the room, the mess of unlaundered clothes, the narrowness of the single bed. Then they kissed, they fumbled each other to nakedness, they fell onto the bed, they fucked as ardently and urgently as any two people ever had.

Afterwards, while Petra enjoyed a postcoital cigarette, Guy examined her body in detail. He hadn’t had a chance to in the throes of passion. She had small pert breasts, a smooth flat belly, wide generous hips, a tidy pubic thatch, and there on the inside of her left thigh...

Guy recoiled as if stung by a scorpion.

“Oh, fuck. Oh, Jesus,” he breathed. “What – what the hell is that?”

Petra looked down. “What? Oh, my tattoo, you mean.”

“Yes. Your fucking tattoo.” He sprang off the bed, backing away from her. He was trembling. His balls had clenched up to the size of broad beans.

“Guy, what’s got into you?”

“That!” He pointed agitatedly at her leg. The tattoo was small, no larger than a two-pence piece. From a distance you could have mistaken it for a mole or some other sort of blemish. “That thing. Christ in heaven, what are you doing with that on you?”

Petra peered at him, puzzled by his reaction. “It’s not what you think.”

“Isn’t it? Because what I think...” Guy was aware that he had begun to hyperventilate. He fought to steady his breathing. “What I think is that you’ve got a fucking inverted pentagram on your skin.”

All at once he was back in the ruined chapel. He was being anointed with goat’s blood. He was being made the butt of Alastor Wylie’s extravagant practical joke. The terror, the humiliation, the indignity, the seething rage – all the emotions that the incident had aroused, and which he had fought to put behind him, came flooding back. He could feel the priest’s finger inscribing the warm wet pattern on his chest, feel it as thought it was happening right now, again. He was sweating all over. He could barely bring himself to look at the pentagram on Petra’s thigh – barely bring himself to look at her.

Petra stubbed out her cigarette. “Calm down,” she said. “Come here.”

He couldn’t move.

“Come here,” she insisted.

Reluctantly he walked over.

“Sit. Relax.”

He perched on the edge of the bed, still trembling. “How could I have missed it?” he murmured. “You’re – you’re one of his minions. Must be. You’ve finally come for me.”

“One, I’m nobody’s minion,” Petra corrected him flatly. “And two, I haven’t ‘come for you,’ whatever that’s supposed to mean. Stop babbling and look at me, Guy. Look me in the eye.”

He did.

“What’s scared you?” She tapped the tattoo. “What does this represent for you?”

“Bad things. Very bad things.”

“You’ve some kind of history with it?”

“Yeah. Stuff that’s happened throughout my life.”

“Want to tell me about it?”

“No.”

“You can, you know.”

“No. You tell me.”

“Tell you what? Why I have the tattoo?”

“Yes.”

“All right,” she said. “If it’ll help.”

“But I warn you. I’m this close to kicking you out.”

She was unimpressed by the threat. “I’d like to see you try. I’ve never left anywhere against my will.” She lit a fresh cigarette from the tip of the one still in her mouth. “So, you reckon I’m a Devil worshipper? Is that what the pentagram says to you?”

He nodded.

“Well, you’re wrong,” Petra said. “Robes, virgin sacrifices, all that Dennis Wheatley guff – that’s Satanism, right? But only if you believe that Satan is an actual being. You know, the Fallen Angel, God’s shadow, ruler of Hell, the personification of evil, all that malarkey. That kind of Satanism is called theistic, and it is, not to put too fine a point on it, a load of old bollocks. Satan the ultimate bad guy is a fabrication of the Church. He’s a propaganda tool, a bogeyman used to frighten people into having faith and going to Sunday services and donating to the collection and being good little robots.”

“He’s not,” said Guy. “I’ve...”

“You’ve...?” she prompted. “You’ve met him? Is that it? Have you? Really?”

He was going to say yes, but settled for, “I may have.”

Petra eyed him speculatively. “Maybe you think you have. Maybe all you did was come face to face with yourself.”

“Eh?”

“The other kind of Satanism, you see, is atheistic Satanism. It says there’s no such thing as Satan, no supernatural deity with that name. There are no gods at all. There’s just us. To follow God or any other supposedly divine entity is to deny life. It’s surrendering your humanity, and everything that makes you interesting and useful as an individual. It’s abdicating responsibility for your actions and offloading it onto someone else.”

“It’s bad, then.”

“It’s not constructive, put it that way. Atheistic Satanism says bugger to all that. Be yourself. Be here on Earth. Enjoy yourself. Don’t cower in fear of divine judgement, either here or in some mythical afterlife which doesn’t exist. Listen to your heart, indulge your desires, have fun, live. It’s a philosophy, not a religion, and you can boil its message down to a single sentence.”

“Which is?”

“‘Do unto others as they do unto you.’ If someone loves you, love them back. If someone despises you, ignore them unless they’re actively trying to harm you, in which case neutralise them.”

“Well, it’s certainly shorter and pithier than the Ten Commandments,” said Guy.

“Oh, there are other rules,” said Petra. “I’m just giving you the Readers’ Digest version. Hopefully this is helping you calm down so you can stop having this big girly hissy fit.”

“I don’t know.”

“I just don’t want you getting the impression that I’m some boggle-eyed lunatic who bites the heads off bats and has lots of strange leather-bound books at home. I’m not. I’m completely sane, and I dare say better adjusted than ninety-nine per cent of Christians. I mean, holy wars. What’s that all about? Christians seem to spend half their time killing other Christians, or failing that people from different religions, all in the name of a supposedly loving God. It’s like Pascal said: ‘Men never commit evil so fully and joyfully as when they do it for religious convictions.’ Look at the Irish situation – Catholics versus Protestants. It’s all so pointless, and it could end tomorrow if everyone stopped blowing each other up because they think God wants them to and started being true to their own natures instead.”

“That’s a pretty simplistic view of the problem. There’s politics, history, territorialism...”

“But when you get down to it,” she said, overriding him, “almost every conflict is a clash of ideologies. And if you dispense with all forms of orthodoxy – politics, nationalism, and especially religion – then what you’re left with is just people, human beings, and human beings by and large want to coexist in peace. They don’t want endless death and mayhem. It’s common sense.”

“And that’s what your pentagram represents?” Guy said. “All of what you’ve just said?”

“And more, but in essence, yes. It’s a reminder, a secret token of commitment. Believe me?”

Guy found it hard to look at the tattoo. This was not helped by the fact that it was in such distractingly close proximity to Petra’s pussy. He made a conscious effort to focus on the pentagram and not the erotic, enticing pink-lipped slit just a few inches away.

The tattoo was tiny and innocent, just lines etched in ink. Merely a symbol.

“Can I touch it?” he asked.

Amused, Petra popped the stub of her second cigarette in the empty Skol can she was using as an ashtray. “Go on, then. If it’ll make you feel better.”

Guy placed a forefinger on her skin. Ludicrously, he anticipated some kind of reaction within himself, revulsion, nausea, something like that, or perhaps a sudden burning sensation in his fingertip, as though the tattoo was magically empowered and liable to scorch those who were intimidated by it. But there was nothing, just the soft warmth of a woman’s inner thigh.

“You know what would make me feel better?” Petra said.

“No.”

“If you slide your finger up a bit. Go on. And a bit further.”

“Like that?” said Guy, obliging.

“Yes,” she purred. “Just like that. A bit further still. Oh, yes.”

 

 

LITTLE BY LITTLE over the next few weeks, Petra explained her form of Satanism to Guy. She never lectured or hectored. She simply answered when he asked, laying out the fundamentals and leaving him to digest them.

She told him she had started out as a student of the writings of Anton LaVey, the American occultist who ran his own Church of Satan in California and had published two key books, The Satanic Bible and The Satanic Rituals, neither of which Guy had heard of. Somehow the eccentric and inconsistent Mr Ingram had not seen fit to stock them at Shamballa (...And Other Dreams). She told Guy about LaVey’s notion that Satan was the “Black Flame” that burned inside every person, the embodiment of will, a source of great inner power if you knew how to tap it. She talked about the Nine Satanic Statements, a kind of secular Apostles’ Creed, and the Eleven Satanic Rules of the Earth, a repudiation of the Ten Commandments. There was also a list of Nine Satanic Sins, among them Stupidity, Pretentiousness, Self-Deceit, Herd Conformity, Lack of Aesthetics – things to be avoided if you wished to lead a productive, fulfilling life.

Petra had eventually drifted away from LaVey’s ideas. There was an undercurrent of selfishness there, a peculiarly American brand of fuck you which didn’t sit well with her. Plus, given that the whole point of LaVeyan Satanism was to foster self-reliance and individuality, then it was necessary, even obligatory, to turn your back on your teacher and find your own way. LaVey had provided her with a template to work from, at least. The rest was down to her.

She was a rational, pragmatic person, so LaVey’s penchant for magical rites also held little appeal. She acknowledged that they served a function as psychodramas, enabling one to work through frustrations and mental blocks and emerge the other side with a clearer head and a healthier outlook. She felt, however, that enlightenment could come simply from approaching a problem carefully and with an open mind, confident in your own ability to resolve it.

“The universe is amoral,” she said. “It doesn’t care how we behave or what we do. The only truths are inner truths. Answers don’t come from outside, from other people or some nebulous supreme being. They come from within.”

Guy, for his part, began revealing his past to her, particularly his repeated encounters with what he thought must be the Devil. In each instance Petra was able to offer a plausible rationale, showing him that he hadn’t in fact bumped into Beelzebub but had instead misinterpreted the experience and seen demonic influence where there was none. Molly Rosenkrantz, for example, had obviously been unhinged, quite conceivably schizophrenic, or at the very least so obsessive and insecure that she had faked being possessed by an evil spirit in order to tighten her hold over Guy. When that had had the opposite outcome, scaring him off, she had got desperate and resorted to the razor blade. And as for his vision of Alastor Wylie on the beach in Thailand, what drug was it he had taken? LSD? Ahem! That was a great big clue right there. Wylie had been busy elbowing his way into Guy’s life. Guy had had no wish for him to usurp the role of his late father. So his subconscious mind, liberated by the acid, had recast Wylie as the Devil. His id had been communicating its feelings to his ego in the way it knew best: through symbolism. There was nothing more to it than that.

“But Clive Milward?” Guy said. “He died in a fire. It was as if...”

“As if Satan was punishing him?”

“Well, yes.”

Petra snorted. “No, that was just what it was, a teenager disposing of a fag butt carelessly and setting the place alight by accident. I’ll tell you what’s instructive about that whole incident at school. You got those three boys expelled. You, Guy Lucas, were the agent of their downfall. Nobody else had anything to do with it, and that includes Satan. You triumphed. You did exactly what had to be done. They got their just deserts. That was the Satan here” – she jabbed Guy’s chest – “the Black Flame inside you, doing its job. Your stepdad seems to know a thing or two about that.”

“Don’t call him that. Stepdad. Ugh.”

“Your mother’s husband, then. Wylie. That whole sham ritual he put together – he got you back, good and proper. That’s how it works. Someone fucks with you, you fuck with them in return, at an appropriate level, to ensure they never do it again. No wonder he’s such a big cheese in the government. From what you’ve said about him, Wylie’s got Satanism down pat, even if he’d never call it that himself. He’s manipulative and shrewd, and I’m sure he never has a moment of self-doubt. He gets what he goes for. He makes the most of his life. He succeeds.”

“You sound like you admire him.”

“Subjectively, because of what he did to you, I think he’s a big fat turd,” Petra said. “But objectively, I have to say there’s a lot to like about the way he operates. If only he had more of a conscience, Alastor Wylie is the sort of man who could change the world for the better.

 

 

AUTUMN GREYED INTO winter, and Guy fell ever more deeply under Petra’s spell. She seemed to be the person he had been waiting for all his adult life, the one who came along and made everything clearer, the one who spoke sense and put the world into perspective. He began to be unable to imagine himself without her. His dead-end job in a dead-end town became immaterial. Life was infinitely rich with Petra around.

As Christmas approached, Guy grew convinced that he had found his soulmate. He started to do something he had long since given up doing: making plans for the future. In all of them, Petra featured centrally.

Then, one gusty Saturday afternoon, the Mods rolled into town.

They came in a swarm of buzzing Vespas and Lambrettas, each scooter adorned with a plethora of rearview mirrors like elaborate chrome antlers. There had been fights all along the south coast that year, in places like Brighton and Hastings, gangs of Mods and Rockers coming down from London to clash on the beaches, a revival of a noble tradition going back to the ’sixties and the antagonism between the original Young Moderns and their mortal enemies the Teddy Boys. This particular group were out for a scuffle, but had apparently got lost on their way to the venue. Either that or they were simply enjoying a weekend jaunt to the seaside, although it seemed unlikely. The way they meandered up and down the seafront road on their scooters in close formation, now and then one of them veering across the white lines into the opposite lane, carried unmistakable menace. They were troublemakers, no doubt about it. Whatever they had in mind would be fun for them, but not for anyone else.

Soon enough they got bored of parading around. Hunger drove them to seek food. Mr Fernandinho’s chippie was the place they chose to find sustenance.

They entered, all nine of them, with their crash helmets tucked under their arms, bumping tables ‘accidentally’ with their hips, kicking chair legs. Mr Fernandinho treated them diplomatically, which was out of character for him. He addressed them as ‘gentlemen’ and enquired politely how he might help.

“Cod and chips all round,” said the tallest, skinniest Mod, whose parka bore Union Jack patches, a large RAF roundel on the back, and The Jam’s logo, drawn on the sleeve painstakingly in marker pen. His short centre-parted haircut was an almost exact replica of Paul Weller’s.

“Guy, you heard the gentlemen,” said Mr Fernandinho. “Look lively.”

While Guy fried the fish, there was more laddish rowdiness from the Mods. A sugar dispenser crashed to the floor, shattering to pieces. Mr Fernandinho hurried over with brush and dustpan, saying it was nothing, these things happened, never mind, no harm done. Guy just counted down the seconds until the meals were ready and the Mods were gone. The young men had brought an ugly mood with them into the chip shop – along with the smells of unwashed parka and diesel fumes – and he couldn’t wait for them to take it away again.

“What are you looking at, twat?” one of them demanded, scowling.

“Nothing,” said Guy. “Food’s almost ready. That’ll be eleven pounds twenty, all in.”

“Eleven quid twenty,” the Mod said to his friends. “Who’s got cash? Anyone?”

Heads were shaken. There were smirking, insolent looks all round. The Mods had never had any intention of paying.

“Tell you what, gents,” said Mr Fernandinho. “First-time customers get a free meal.”

“What you saying, you little brown shrimp?” snarled the tall Mod, whom Guy had to assume was the leader of the pack. “You think we can’t afford your crappy grub? You think we’re a bunch of tramps or something?”

“Not at all,” said Mr Fernandinho, retreating back behind the serving counter. “It’s my usual offer. Open to everyone.”

“Here,” said Guy, placing the last of nine newspaper-wrapped parcels on the countertop. “All ready. Bon appétit.”

“Ooh-la-la!” said the Mods’ leader archly. “‘Bon appy-tee.’ Very sophisticated they are in this town.”

“Why’s it such a fucking shithole then?” one of the gang remarked. “Nobody around. Rubbish little beach. Hasn’t even got a fucking pier. Whoever heard of a seaside town doesn’t have a fucking pier?”

“Come on, let’s go,” said another of them. “I’m ruddy starving.”

The Mods gathered up their meals and, to the great relief of Guy and Mr Fernandinho, made for the door.

By terrible coincidence, that was when Petra arrived.

She often dropped by, usually during Guy’s break hour, so the two of them could go and get a bite to eat or else just sit and chat while she had a cigarette. Mr Fernandinho still didn’t approve of her, but knew he had to put up with her. He was loath to ban her from the chip shop in case his best and only employee took umbrage and resigned.

Guy spotted Petra through the window, saw how the Mods reacted to the sight of her, and knew instantly how things were going to pan out. It had the crushing inevitability of a traffic accident, a juggernaut on a collision course with a car, nothing anyone could do to prevent it happening.

“Hello, what’s this?” said the Mods’ leader, looming over Petra. “A fucking human hedgehog.”

The others cackled.

Petra ducked her head and skirted round the gang. Guy sent up a small prayer of thanks that for once she had elected to keep her mouth shut.

Then one of the Mods grabbed her arm.

“Here, darling,” he said and made smoochy noises. “How about a snog? I don’t normally fancy your sort, but for you I’ll make an exception.”

Guy began to move around the counter, picking up a mop as he went, the first weapon that came to hand. Mr Fernandinho waylaid him. “No. Not wise.”

“Sod that,” Guy said, brushing his boss aside. “I have to help her.”

Petra looked up at the Mod gripping tightly on her forearm. “Let go of me,” she said, coming across as remarkably calm.

“Snog first.”

“I’d rather kiss a dog’s arse, you tosser.”

A couple of the Mods chortled. “That’s funny,” one said. “The last thing Graham kissed was a dog’s arse.”

Graham rounded on his colleague. “Shut it, you nob.” He turned back to Petra. “In that case, how about a fuck? I’ve heard about you punk birds. You’re slags. Gagging for it all the time. I’ll do you, only it’ll have to be from behind so’s I don’t have to look at all them safety pins and whatnot, ’cause they’re right off-putting.”

“How are you going to manage that with nuts the size of a football?” Petra asked.

“I’m sorry, you what?”

“I said...”

And she kneed him in the groin.

Graham the Mod let out a wheezing gasp and sank to the ground, clutching himself between the legs.

Petra spun round and headed for the chip shop doorway. Guy was nearly there, the mop brandished like a quarterstaff.

“Get inside! Quick!” he urged her. As soon as she was across the threshold he would lock and bolt the door, then phone the police.

She almost made it.

The gang leader got in her way and brought her down with a punch to the face. As Petra fell, she made a sound halfway between a shriek and a groan. Guy propelled himself through the doorway, not caring what might happen next, not even thinking about his own safety. He rammed the mop at the Mod like a lance, only to find that in all the excitement he was holding it with the head forwards. The clump of thick cotton strings had almost no effect on the Mod, other than pissing him off.

“Seriously?” he said, glancing down at the mop then back up at Guy. “You arsehole.”

He snatched the mop out of Guy’s grasp, snapped the handle in two across his thigh, and tossed both halves aside. Then he loosed off a roundhouse that laid Guy flat.

Guy had never been hit so hard before, not even when the three bullies had beaten him up at Scarsworth Hall. He rolled on the pavement, unmanned by the impact and the searing pain. He couldn’t get up. He just wanted to curl into a foetal ball and never be hit again.

Sadly, the Mods felt differently. They started raining down kicks and stamps on him. Guy’s flailing hands seized hold of a foot and he tried to flip its owner over, but another of the Mods booted his elbow and his arm went numb and he had to let go. He could dimly hear Petra screaming, telling the Mods to stop, leave her boyfriend alone. Through the forest of kicking legs he saw her snatch up a discarded crash helmet and swing it at the gang leader’s head. The man was hardly fazed; he evidently had a pretty thick skull. He swivelled round and belted Petra in the belly.

The blow bent her double. As she sank to her knees, heaving for breath, the Mod grabbed a handful of her hair spikes and began dragging her. Petra scrabbled for purchase with her heels as he hauled her round the side of the chip shop, into the narrow alleyway that ran between it and the seaside souvenirs emporium next door. Guy scrambled frantically after her on all fours, but a toecap came up under into his midriff and he was sent flying over onto his side. He sprawled in the gutter, winded, paralysed with agony, while the Mods hurried off laughing to join their leader in the alleyway.

The sounds Guy heard then – the tearing of clothes, Petra’s rasping screeches of protest, the Mods’ inane chuckling – would haunt him for many days to come. He peered up and down the street. It was deserted. Where was everyone? Why wasn’t anyone doing anything? Where were the fucking police? Surely someone must have called them by now.

With a Herculean effort, he raised himself to his knees. He spied one half of the broken mop handle nearby. He reached for it, at the same time pushing himself fully upright. The world teetered. The road seemed to rise and fall beneath him. He walked. Every step was a battle, as though he were aboard a ship pitching up and down in a storm. Yet he staggered on.

In the alleyway, most of the Mods were gathered in a knot, shoulder to shoulder, looking on. Beyond them, the gang leader was crouched over Petra, his jeans down, pumping away at her from the rear. Petra lay prone on the sordid brick floor of the alleyway. Her battered, bloodied face wore a look of numb resignation, her mouth hanging loose with disgust. Her whole body jerked each time the Mod thrust into her.

The other Mods were agog, mesmerised by the act of rape, so much so that they barely registered as Guy elbowed his way through. It was only when he reached the front that they realised he wasn’t one of their own kind, and by then it was too late.

Guy raised the mop handle above his head with the splintered end pointing downwards. He drove it, hard as he could, into the gang leader’s back, using the roundel on his parka as a target.

Bullseye.

The Mod spasmed as though electrified. He tumbled away from Petra, his erect, shit-stained cock flapping wildly. He tried reaching for the mop handle spearing him from behind, but couldn’t pull it out. Eventually he collapsed against a dustbin, choking and mewling.

The nee-naw, nee-naw of a panda car siren skirled above the rooftops, growing louder. One of the Mods yelled, “Fuck, it’s the fuzz!” and they all fled, haring to their scooters.

Guy didn’t give a toss about them any more. He crawled over to Petra. There was blood leaking from between her buttocks. He took off his jacket and draped it over her, and he stayed there, hugging her to him, sobbing, until a police officer found them.

 

 

AT THE HOSPITAL, Petra lay unconscious, sedated. She had had to have surgery, five stitches, but the prognosis was good. There was no reason why she shouldn’t make a full physical recovery.

Guy’s injuries were seen to, too. He sported some atrocious contusions and abrasions but, aside from pain and stiffness, he was fine. Nothing broken or ruptured.

The Mod he had stabbed was also there, in the intensive care ward. The doctors were unsure if the man would walk again. The mop handle had partly severed his spinal nerve. “Frankly, if he’s left a cripple,” a consultant confided to Guy, “it’s no more than the bastard deserves.”

When Guy had finished giving his statement to a detective sergeant, he was allowed to go free. He stayed by Petra’s bedside through the night until dawn. He didn’t sleep a wink.

It would be fair to say that that long, lonely vigil was a pivotal moment in Guy’s life. He thought again and again about the Mods’ vicious, mindless assault. He thought about tribes and factions, confrontation and hatred. He thought about his father, dead now for over a decade, victim of the worst kind of irony, murdered while on a mission to broker peace. He thought about the bigger picture, the blocs the world was divided into, the ever-present threat of nuclear obliteration, the insanity of the superpowers’ doctrine of mutually assured destruction. He thought about individuals, who only wanted peace, and collectives, who seemed hell bent on war, a seemingly intractable paradox.

Come the morning, he had arrived at a turning point. A decisive moment.

He went in search of a pay phone.

He didn’t have a great deal of change on him, but that didn’t matter. He dialled 100.

“Operator. How may I help?”

“Yes, I’d like to make a reverse charge call please,” Guy said.

“What number to?”

“It’s an oh-one London number.” He reeled off seven digits.

“And who shall I say is calling?”

“Guy Lucas.”

The distant burr of a phone ringing. Finally, a click of connection.

“Hello? This is the operator. I have a call for you from a Guy Lucas. Will you accept the charge?”

Silence. Then a grumbled, “Very well.”

“Putting you through now, sir,” the operator said chirpily to Guy.

“Alastor?” Guy said into the receiver. “It’s your stepson. I’d like to talk.”

“Guy,” said Wylie. “I’m not sure you and I have much to say to one another.”

“Please, hear me out.”

“Do you know what time it is? I happen to have been up half the night trying to sort out this bloody public sector pay chaos. We’re in for a wretched bloody winter if this nonsense carries on much longer.”

“It is early, and I apologise for that.”

“Hmm. Well, that’s something, I suppose,” said Wylie, partly mollified. “An apology. Are you after your mother? She’s still asleep upstairs.”

“No, it’s you I want,” Guy said.

“Curiouser and curiouser. Well? What is it you’d like to talk about?”

“Me. Us. The future. My future.”

A pause, then Wylie said, “Interesting. Do go on.”