The phone rang. Barwise shuddered and let it ring. The last time he’d answered the phone it had been Trish, concretely businesslike, arranging a window to pick up the rest of her stuff. Appropriate really, seeing as he’d defenestrated the bin bag in a pissed rage a couple of nights ago leaving the contents strewn across the back yard.

The phone continued to ring. He sighed and went to answer it.

 
“It’s Micky. Fancy a couple of polite ones?”

           
Barwise thought for a moment. He had work to do, a half finished cartoon strip that, despite his most fiercest avoidance, was resolutely refusing to draw itself. He just didn’t feel inspired. Whenever he sat down at the board he felt a swamping tide of panic well up into his chest like dark water. His pen shook and his vision blurred. He needed to urgently visit the bathroom.

           
“I’ll see you down there,” Barwise heard himself say. At least down the pub he could be more his old self and it certainly helped him go off to sleep.

*          *          *

           
Much later, his upper body a febrile jack-in-the-box on the oafish springs of his legs Barwise allowed himself to be ejected from the pub following a nasty incident with a crippled local.

           
He’d been sitting at the bar with Micky. They’d got looking at the charity boxes and discovered they both had some opinions to explore around the issues highlighted by the plights of others less fortunate than themselves.

           
“Look at that,” says Micky; pointing to the SCOPE box, “do you remember those little crippled statues outside the supermarkets, kids in callipers. Spastics.”

           
Barwise nods, distantly remembering how the little doll-faced girl with the money-box and gammy leg had curiously aroused him as a small boy. She’d had dried bubble gum pushed into one of her eyes and one morning he’d spent some time chipping it out with his fingernails. Like a good deed. He’d gone home and spent a fair part of the rest of the day with the bright, jolly smell of Hubba Bubba on his fingers and a troublesome sensation in his pants.

           
Micky continues, “Now what I want to know is, they change the name to something more politically correct, like SCOPE, then they go and blag a big sticker on the box saying ‘formerly the spastics’ society’. I mean whassa point in that? I mean.”

Barwise grows bored with Micky’s thrust and says, “Don’t you know what it stands for? It’s one of those anachronyms.”

“A what?” goes Micky.

“A nacronism.”

Micky nods.

           
“It stands for,” and this is when Barwise’s luck falters, because some of the chaps from the local hostel for young people with disabilities have come in for a night out with their carers. It is, after all, quiz night.

           
“It stands for,” he says again, having just thought of this in fact and you know when you’ve come up with a classic. His eyes squint with mirth.

           
Micky is still nodding, pint half raised, now not so sure that what is coming will be as educational as he might previously have thought. His eyes dart uneasily over Barwise’s trembling shoulders.

           
“It stands for spastics can’t often propel ‘emselves! Ahh-ha HARR!”

*          *          *

           
Outside, in the steady drizzle, Barwise’s misery was complete. He craned his head back and looked to the dismal cloud cover for some sort of sign. Fine rain rinsed his unshaven face and webbed his tormented eyes. He blinked to clear them and placed his head in his hands like someone gently laying a cold dying animal into a merciful grave.

           
A short while later he composed himself and looked up and across the road at the curry house. Sitting at a table in the window, mellowly uplit in the intimate, brothelish crimson interior sat Trish and Martin, tug-of-warring impishly over a peshwari naan.

           
“Oh,” whispered Barwise, “Not our table.” Bitterly he recalled nearly proposing to Trish at that table, suffused with romance and Kingfisher lager.

           
Unable to tolerate any further pain, Barwise span and bolted up the high street. He skidded to a stop on the corner, his back to the station, panting, feeling sick. He remembered that night coming back from the club. Falling over bags. The pain, the loneliness, the wig.

           
And something else he recalled. The big thundering shape that legged it into the station. He’d forgotten about that. He wheeled around and was surprised to find that the entrance was ungated and that a small light still shone from the newspaper kiosk. The last train came through at about eight forty-five and it was getting on for eleven. Curiosity and a need for distraction led Barwise to venture under the awning and take a peek along the concourse. Twelve yards of black and white tiles and another set of ungated steps leading up onto the windy darkness of the platform. Set into the right hand wall, like a secret door in a role-playing game, was a little booth which sold papers, magazines, fags etcetera. From within Barwise could distinctly make out rustling and a tuneless yet nonetheless elated species of humming.

           
He pursed his lips. Perhaps he could grab a quick packet of Royals and a mars bar for supper. He had a dig around for some change and as the jangle of coins echoed along the concourse, the rustling and humming stopped abruptly.

           
Barwise froze, suddenly and unaccountably fearful. He slowly removed his hand from his jeans with pick-pocket caution and let out a careful breath. He’d stumbled onto a robbery. Someone was doing over the kiosk and he was about to march up and ask for a fucking light snack.

T
hen a voice came from the concealed recess.

“Can I help you, sir?”

           
Barwise belched a throatful of beer as the tension broke. He took a couple of steps further into the station and peered into the kiosk.

           
Barely tall enough to see over the counter, wearing a dark green sun visor and what actually looked like a butchers apron, stood a little bald man with eyes and grin that hinted at a substantial degree of mental disorder. He reached down, disappearing momentarily, then popped back up with an effortful groan and swung a pile of newspapers onto the counter by their frayed, knotted string. He winked at Barwise and produced a rusty, ivory-handled straight razor which he used to hack at the string and free the papers.

           
He stood back and stared at Barwise with grimy eyes.

           
Suddenly a gust of wind sheeted down from the platform and Barwise turned in time to get a faceful of the stink it carried on it. It was an awful smell, like dead wet dogs and savage wild dung. Like having the bottom of a caged animal held up to your face. He wheeled away from it, choking, and felt the beer rise again. Something heavy thumped along the platform up there, resolute and somehow impatient.

           
“Got something for you,” said the little fellow and he ducked down again and brought up another parcel. He used the razor to cut the string and turned the parcel of papers a hundred and eighty degrees to face Barwise.

           
Barwise frowned and watched the man fan them out. His eyes widened and he said, “No way,” and stepped right up to the counter and leaned over, unmindful that the man had grasped the razor again or that something the size of a garden shed had begun to take the steps down from the platform behind him.

           
Barwise looked up, but the man was busy paring his fingernails and was humming tonelessly again. There was a tremendous oily clatter from behind him. Barwise turned in time to see the diamond hatched gates slam home across the bottom of the platform steps, compressing and springing back like a concertina with the force of their closure. In the darkness beyond he made out the shape of something massive plodding back up the steps.

           
He looked blearily back at the little fellow, feeling confused and suddenly drunk again. His hands gripped the edge of the counter and he narrowed his eyes.

           
“You can’t make a monkey out of Gus,” the proprietor said, grinning even more widely. “Oh, no.” Then he laughed, which Barwise found rather horrid.

           
But Barwise couldn’t stay uneasy for long, because his attention had been drawn back again to what lay splayed out on the counter as if for him alone.

           
“I don’t fucking believe this,” said Barwise and he rummaged about in the pile. He looked up at the proprietor again. “Are these, are these actually new?”

           
The man nodded and grinned more widely. There was a gleam in his eye Barwise struggled to read, but it intimated not only secrecy but an almost gangland complicity.

           
“They mean a lot to you, yes?”

           
Barwise took a step back and ran a hand through his hair. He didn’t know what he felt. “Well, yeah, I guess. I mean, yeah!” He shook his head to dislodge a heavy feeling over his eyes. He wanted to sit down.

           
He reached out a hand suddenly afflicted with a coarse tremor and snatched up the top copy of a comic called Monster Fun. He used both hands to steady it in front of his face.  On the cover a gleeful and mildly unhinged Frankie Stein gawped out at him. Barwise lifted the comic to his face and sniffed it. It smelt of cheap ink and mass produced grainy paper. He looked back at the counter and grabbed for a fistful of the remaining comics: Buster, Shiver and Shake, Jackpot, Whoopee, Whizzer and Chips, Krazy. EVERY MONDAY they blared. Today’s date. Price 8p.

           
Barwise took a breath in order to say something but let it out through a tight grin. A grin not unlike the gleeful and mildly unhinged grin Frankie Stein was modelling this day in fact, a good twenty years after the comics he had appeared in, comics Barwise had adored as a kid and which had inspired him to create his own strips, had disappeared off the shelves and into hazy oblivion at the cliff edge of his childhood. A small part of him had missed them terribly ever since.

           
Barwise grabbed the entire pile and scavenged for his small change. “I’ll take the lot,” he said, spilling his money onto the counter. In his state of arousal Barwise failed to notice that a small boy had descended the platform steps and was standing amongst the litter and softly stirring leaves gathered at the foot of the drawn gate. Had he turned, Barwise would have glimpsed only a short, fat silhouette, its round hairless head inclined at an angle connoting curiosity. Pale fingers slid through the grating and gripped the cold iron and one might have noticed in the slight shift of posture a more subtle anticipatory attitude, as if the boy was eager for release.

           
Still staring at his comics, Barwise jolted suddenly as a harsh unfolding rattle sounded and he looked up to see that the kiosk shutter was now pulled down. He frowned but was in no mind to question the emphatic closure to their business because he had an armful of his childhood and wanted to get home in order to facilitate its recapture.

*          *          *

           
Barwise peered through a crack in the curtains.

           
On the step, Micky fished in a carrier bag and broke a can of Heineken off its four pack. He thumbed the ring pull and sloshed back a long swallow, wiped his mouth with his wrist and stood staring at the front door with a perplexed expression.

           
Barwise stepped back from the window and peered around the gloomy lounge. He prodded at a pile of empty foil containers with the toe of his left foot and watched with bafflement as they resettled themselves with a hollow silvery rattle, dribbling bits of chicken tikka and aloo gobi onto his sock. He pressed his hands against either side of his face and massaged his temples with his fingertips, feeling the bristles on his cheeks scrape his palms.

           
He went back to the window and took another peek, thinking fuck off, Micky.

           
As requested, Micky had indeed taken his leave, having tired of pressing Barwise’s buzzer for the last ten minutes. Barwise returned to the spicy semi-dark of his living room, stepped over a shoal of lager cans and made for the bedroom, rubbing his hands together. His right foot came down in a foil dish but he didn’t seem to notice and continued through the hall with it stuck there, wearing it like a futuristic slipper. He slouched into the bedroom and to his dismay came upon the small head of Micky peering in over the window sill, his brow furrowed beneath the narrow circumflex of his widow’s peak.

           
Their eyes met and, reflexively, Micky grinned and lifted a hand in relieved greeting, but the wave aborted halfway and all expression emptied from Micky’s face as he saw the state Barwise was in.

           
Barwise skipped nimbly across the room and scooped up the comics scattered over his bed. He clutched them to his chest and stood, breathing in short agitated breaths. Micky stood there watching him with a blank look in his eyes, mortified that he had just caught Barwise having a bit of a wank and thinking how was he going to busk his way out of this one.

           
Barwise decided to be proactive and came around the bed. He gently placed the pile of now dog-eared comics on the counterpane and reached over to unlatch the window. He lifted the sash.

           
“Micky,” he said, “can I be of assistance?”

           
Micky looked at Barwise and saw little he would normally describe as healthy: the greasy hair sticking up at the crown of Barwise’s head, the sallow complexion, the progressing beard, the bloodshot darting eyes and the licks of primary coloured food stains at the corners of his mouth. With a half-hearted gesture towards the bag at his feet, Micky said, “you could assist me with these if you like.”

           
Barwise sighed and stepped back from the window. “Come on, then,” he said and walked off, leaving Micky standing occluded with indecision, actually wondering whether Barwise had meant for him to climb in through the window. He shook his head, gathered his bag of lagers and headed round the front.

           
Micky knew Barwise hadn’t been too clever lately but when he saw the conditions in which he was living, his stunted empathy cranked up a notch and he said, “Fuck sake, look at this shit hole. Are you all right? I haven’t seen you all week.”

           
Barwise sat down on the sofa and disturbed Micky further by smiling quite beatifically. “I’m good, Micky. Very good indeed.” He sat back with a sigh and crossed his legs. He noticed the container stuck to his foot, appeared momentarily at a loss, then idly flicked it across the room. “Why do you ask?”

           
Micky’s attention was on the kitchenette. He said something inexact, something which entirely failed to sum up the enormity of the squalor he saw there. 

“Been busy,” Barwise said, still smiling into the far distance.

“Busy losing the plot?” Micky said with a weak laugh.

“Au contraire, Michael. In fact I have a plan. A plan to regain my lost love.”

Micky was becoming sensationally uneasy. “Trish?” he said.

           
Barwise exploded off the sofa. “That fucking bitch! That toothpick-dicked stain removal merchant! I’ll get her back, Micky, I’ll get Trish back!” Barwise stood in the middle of the room, panting with venom. Then his shoulders slumped and he turned to Micky with a terrible haunted look. “I’ve got friends.” he said in a small, tired voice.

           
Micky had exhausted his coping mechanisms. He backed up to the door and pulled at the handle. Barwise tilted his head to one side. “I’ll get her, Micky.” He said again.

           
“Keep the beers!” Micky said with a bright and terrified shrillness and bundled out into the street.

           
Barwise blinked. He shook his head in four short tight jerks. He smiled and went back into the bedroom to be with his comics.

           
Monday again day after tomorrow. He looked at the pile of small change in an old ash tray by his bed and grinned and skipped gleefully from foot to foot.

*          *          *

           
That night, as Barwise slept, his friends came into the back yard and gathered under his window. Their black outlines and cheap coloration paled down in the moonlight so that they looked like sinister double exposures. They moved across the concrete, past the washing line, through the shrubs, to take their places outside Barwise’s rear window as if summoned.

           
Aroused by their murmuring, Barwise sat up in bed and squinted towards the moonlit window. He slid his bare legs from under his blanket and crept across the room. He smiled through the glass. There were more than ever tonight, and they had brought things with them to help. He waved.

           
One of them gestured and Barwise said “Oh, right,” or thought he had, and opened the window. He was vaguely uneasy, as if he had done this before recently and the result had been unsatisfactory. Nevertheless, he leaned his head out and said, “Hi!” He was so happy to see all his old friends here. There was Martha, Faceache, the guys from Scream Inn. Odd ball sprang about morphing into all manner of hilarious shapes and creatures. All orange. Ray with his specs, Brainy with his monster maker. And his very favourite, Pete with his bottomless pockets. Marvellous. At the back, like a doorman minding the back gate, Frankie lifted a huge green sewn-on hand and waved. Barwise was delighted and was about to clap his hands when one of them stepped forward to speak.     

           
It was Sweet Tooth. His one huge, white prominent tooth stuck out over his top lip. He had his toffee apple, which, for some reason, reassured Barwise enormously. Sweet Tooth opened his mouth. A big white bubble slid out and hung above his head. There were words in it.

           
Barwise read them with a solemn expression. He nodded with great seriousness. Other bubbles popped up above the heads of the crowd. Barwise took the time to read them all, which made him feel very tired. He felt his eyes start to close, so he lifted a hand, bid his friends goodnight and slid the window shut, hoping he wasn’t being too rude. A bit like that chap in the station kiosk really, he thought, closing up business for the night. Not impolite, merely efficient. That reminded Barwise again that it was nearly Monday. Monday was comics day, always had been, always would be. Dad used to bring them home with the newspapers and they’d sit together at breakfast. Dad with the Mirror and the Star, little Barwise with his own stack of colourful tabloids. Each one full of monsters, and kids with the kind of additions to their toy boxes any responsible father would confiscate immediately. Particularly Brainy’s aforementioned Monster Maker which, as the name implies, made things substantially bigger. Barwise’s smile faltered. It wasn’t long after Dad left that the comics stopped coming out, he recalled.

           
He climbed back into bed and lay on his side. He stared at the small pile of coins on the bedside table. He felt a nostalgic longing overwhelm him.

           
As he drifted off to sleep, he murmured, “I’ll get you back.” But behind his eyelids it wasn’t Trish he saw. It was his father.

*          *          *

There was a little pot of cream and a matchbox on his window ledge in the morning.  It had rained in the night; Barwise could smell the creosote on the damp fence. He looked out across the yard. The gate was shut, the gap between the bottom of the gate and the concrete clogged with fallen leaves. Some of Trish’s belongings were still strewn in the flower bed.

           
Barwise picked up the items on his window ledge. He unscrewed the lid of the cream jar and sniffed. Memories went off in his head like fireworks; this was the smell of Trish at night. The cream smelt just like her moisturiser. Amazing, because it was far from being moisturiser. He pushed open the matchbox with a thumb and nearly fell over when out popped a little pink sponge. It was highly porous and about the size of his thumbnail. It smelt faintly metallic.

           
Delighted, he took these through to the lounge and sank down onto the sofa. He would spend the day planning. And tonight he would get Trish back. Delicately he placed the matchbox containing the Iron Eater on his bare right knee and Martha’s pot of Monster Make-up on his left knee. He sat back with a contented sigh and contemplated his plan.

*          *          *

           
Barwise stood looking up at the fire escape at the back of Martin’s building. He checked his watch. They wouldn’t be back from her mother’s for a good hour, plenty of time to lay his traps. Another thing he didn’t miss were those trips round to see the old girl every Sunday afternoon. Not that she was a cow or anything, it was just the stifling gas fire-cooked smell of cheap tabloids, beetroot salads and the dismal war-torn honk of continually renewed farts that oppressed him. It made him want to clamber out of the scullery window biting back screams. Those visits would stop when he got Trish back. He chortled throatily and patted his pockets. Lovely. He glanced up and down the alley, stepped over a haul of bin bags and began to climb.

           
He reached the fourth floor, his footsteps like dull chimes on the wet ironwork of the fire escape. He ducked beneath the small kitchen window and sidled up to the back door. His foot slipped on the metal and kicked one of Martin’s pot plants into space. Barwise swore and peered over the railing. He watched the plant plummet into the alley, spiralling leaves, and detonate with a splintering thud at the bottom of the fire escape. As he looked down, Barwise could make out the furtive withdrawal of indistinct shapes into the shadows of bins and gateways all along the alley. He smiled and raised a hand but they remained hidden.

           
Barwise turned back to the door. He took the matchbox out of his pocket and slid it open. He tipped the Iron Eater onto his palm. It felt slightly oily when he picked it up between his thumb and forefinger. He placed it against the mortise lock.

           
There was a brief glugging sound, like water going down a plug hole, and the lock was gone. All that was left was a ragged hole in the wood. Barwise was astounded. He plucked the Iron Eater out of the hole (it was now the size of a snooker ball), and held it up to his face. “You were hungry, weren’t you fella,” he said. He stepped forward and pushed against the door. To his delight it swung open. He stepped over the threshold and began tearing little bits off the engorged Iron Eater until he had a handful of little pink pieces each about the size of a pea. He lobbed the tiny Iron Eaters out onto the fire escape, scattering them.

           
Barwise went into the kitchen and pulled a small Mag-lite out of his back pocket. He trembled with excitement as he shone the narrow beam around the room. He went through to the living room. When he saw Martin’s shelf full of Laurel and Hardy figurines he felt a sudden and vicious urge to smash everything up, massive as a heart attack. He stood breathing hard, a tremendous, thick pounding at his temples.

           
Barwise steadied himself. Stick to the plan, he told himself. He dug in his pocket for the Monster Make-up and pulled the little jar out. Living with Trish had taught him one thing: she was a woman to whom routine meant everything. He looked around, located the bedroom and went through.

           
He had braced himself for the rush of unpleasant feelings he had anticipated on seeing their intimate little boudoir. He let out a harsh, involuntary bleat of laughter when he shone the torch on two single beds. Marvellous. No shagging, Martin. I need time. He spoilt me, Martin. Barwise rejoiced.

           
He went over to the bedside cabinet. There it was: Trish’s night cream. Every night before lights out, she plastered herself with that shit. Barwise unscrewed the pot and scooped the cream out with his fingertips. He looked around, shrugged, lifted the rug up with his foot and wiped the goop off on the carpet.

           
Barwise took the lid off the Monster Make-up and decanted the contents into Trish’s now empty cream jar. Barwise wasn’t surprised to see that it was the same consistency and colour. It had the same smell. He span the lid back on and replaced it on the cabinet. Very carefully, he did the same with Martha’s pot; he didn’t want any of that stuff on him. He put it back in his pocket and stood up. He took one last look around, smoothed the bedding and returned to the living room.

           
He looked at his watch. If the past was anything to go by - and with Trish it was as reliable as a seeing-eye dog - they would be home within ten or fifteen minutes. He went to the front door and let himself out into the hallway.

           
There was a little boy with short spiky black hair standing there. He was wearing a black blazer, stripy tee-shirt, shorts and shiny shoes. He had a little pot belly and wavy lines were emanating from the side of his head with words between them. SHOCK HORROR, they said, and IMMINENT FEELINGS OF DREAD.

           
Barwise looked at Faceache and was about to say something, when he heard footsteps in the stairwell below. He heard Martin say something.

           
“Fuck!” Barwise said and ducked back into the flat. He looked frantically around, spotted the broom cupboard adjacent to the front door and pulled it open. He shoved the vacuum cleaner aside and got in, clattering the ironing board with his knees. “Shit!” He pulled the door shut and squatted  in the dark, panting.

           
Seconds later the front door opened and Barwise heard Trish and Martin come in. He held his breath.

           
“That was a very pleasant afternoon,” Barwise heard Martin say.    

           
From the living room: “I think she liked you, Martin. Especially when you found her pads.”

           
“I haven’t had beetroot for goodness knows how long,” Martin said, and in the darkness, Barwise choked.

           
Trish said, “I think I’ll turn in early.” Regular as fucking clockwork.

           
Martin said something else and then Barwise heard the bathroom light ping on. He stood in the cupboard, knees bent and beginning to threaten cramp. He straightened up and felt his head connect with the low ceiling. He hoped Martin was keen to hit the hay too, maybe try for a bit of topside. Don’t even think about it, tosspot, thought Barwise, it just ain’t worth the pain.

           
Eventually, Trish emerged from the bathroom. She said, “See you in a minute, then.” Martin made a hideous kind of appreciative grunt and then the TV went off.

           
Barwise jigged from foot to foot as quietly as he could. When he heard the bathroom light again, he decided to get the hell out of there. He bent over the Hoover, trying to avoid clanking the ironing board again, and opened the door a crack. He put his eye to the gap and saw that the living room was all quiet. From the bathroom he could hear Martin’s electric toothbrush humming. Satisfied, Barwise stepped out into the lounge, heart thumping and reached out a hand for the front door handle.

           
Trish screamed. Barwise froze, his hand halfway to the handle. There was a crash then another scream, this time louder and lungfully sustained. Barwise turned and saw Martin step out of the bathroom with a dumb look of uncertainty on his face. He made for the bedroom, saw Barwise cringing in the doorway, stopped, looked back at the bedroom and was only galvanised into action when Trish screamed a third time.

           
He reached the door just as she emerged.

           
Her head was the size of a horse’s. Pupilless eyes blazed from a wart-studded forehead. Teeth like sugar cubes gnashed behind meaty, rippling gums and ropes of filthy saliva flew in thick, grey clots. She lowered her head and bellowed.

           
Martin staggered away from her, eyes wild and horrified. He seemed to see Barwise for the first time, and came towards him, arms raised. “What have you done to her?” he said in a shrill, accusing voice, but didn’t reach Barwise, because Trish reached Martin first and sank her claws into the flesh beneath his chubby arms. She wrenched her wrists and Martin’s face crumpled in shock as she lifted him off his feet by his armpit hair. There was a brief tearing sound and Martin shrieked. He sank to the floor, red-faced, arms crossed with his hands pressed beneath his armpits. He twisted his body away and looked up at Trish. Huge boils had broken out across her cheeks and chin. She no longer had a left eye but a long splintered horn curved from the socket, dirty-looking and slathered with fluid.

           
Barwise gaped as Trish bent forward and hauled Martin to his feet. He beat at her arms, but she was too powerful. She dragged him through the lounge and into the kitchen. Martin went down on his knees, weeping now, and saying “Don’t, don’t.” over and over. His knees squeaked on the linoleum.

           
Barwise followed, trying not to miss anything, and saw Trish reach out and threw open the back door. It flew open and hit the worktop so hard the frame split. Barwise stood at the entrance to the kitchen and watched as Trish lifted the gibbering Martin to his feet, snorted hot yellow steam into his running eyes, tensed and tossed him out into the night.

           
Barwise shrieked. Trish turned her monstrous face away from the darkness outside and made a foul-tempered rattle at the back of her throat. Barwise took a step back, shaking his head. Trish tilted her head and returned her attention to the door overlooking the alley.

           
From below, Barwise could now hear a familiar murmuring sound. He wanted to see so badly that he actually came across the kitchen and stood directly behind Trish. His eyes widened with surprise and wonderment, for there was no longer a fire escape. He looked over Trish’s slumped shoulders. There were a few denuded stanchions still bolted to the wall, but little else. In the alley, pink spongy medicine balls sat gleaming amongst the rubbish.  There was a great crowd gathered in the alley, gradually taking on substance. A hundred familiar faces looked up at him, imploring him to make them live again, make them real. Beside him, Trish shuddered and let out a soft cry. She glanced up and Barwise saw blue eyes.

           
He looked down again and saw bubbles popping up above the heads of the crowd. They drifted up towards him. Trish was crying, one manicured hand holding onto the door frame for support. Barwise rubbed his chin with his fingers. He frowned and stepped back into the kitchen.

           
“You can’t make a monkey out of me!” He crowed, laughing like a loon, and shoved Trish out, too.

*          *          *

           
The police found him the next day. He had somehow broken into the concourse of the disused station and was pounding on the rusty, screwed down shutter which concealed the old newspaper kiosk. He was shouting. When the policemen put locks on his arms he howled, a terribly empty, let-down sound that reverberated the length of the concourse and could be heard quite a way down the weed-ridden tracks in either direction. They took him away and charged him with the double murder of his ex-partner and her new lover. A certain Micky Mitre had informed the law in his statement that he thought Barwise might be planning a drunken revenge. “He kept saying he was going to get her back,” Micky could be heard saying down the pub. “He got her back, all right. Chucked em both off the fucking fire escape. I mean! Yeah, I’ll have a pint, mate. Cheers.”

*          *          *

           
Barwise sat on his bunk with his head in his hands.

           
They had been found at the foot of the fire escape, dead from the fall. His prints were all over the flat, his bootsoles matched the muddy tread marks on the back door from where he had kicked it in. It wasn’t meant to be like this. What had he been doing this last week? Nothing seemed to add up. He looked around his cell, broken-hearted. “Trish,” he said in a bewildered voice. No way out of this, they had told him. He curled up on his bunk and stared at the graffiti on the wall a foot away from his nose. No way out. He shuddered.

           
There was a noise in the corner of his cell. He sat up quickly, eyes adjusting to the gloom.

           
A small boy stood in the corner by the door. He grinned a mouthful of tombstone teeth and put a finger to his lips. He had close-cropped hair and fat, pale cheeks. He put a hand in his trouser pocket and Barwise watched with amazement, as the smiling boy pulled a parrot in a cage from it. The boy frowned in a comical, exaggerated way, and put both hands in his pockets. Out came a step ladder and a set of golf clubs. Barwise clapped. A tear trickled down the side of his nose.

           
After a few minutes, the boy was almost totally obscured by junk. The cell was getting full and Barwise was becoming uneasy. What if someone came to check on him? At last the boy pulled something from his pocket, showed all his teeth in a mad crescent of satisfaction, and chucked the object on the cell’s only table. Barwise looked at it. He was aware of a dimming in his periphery and he looked up to see that he was alone again in his empty cell. All the junk was gone. Well, all but this one thing. For a while, Barwise remained sitting on his bunk, dimly aware of how hard his heart was beating.

           
He got up and went over to the table.

           
Barwise stood looking at the rusty straight razor for a long time. There were tiny strands of coarse string caught where the blade was hinged to the ivory handle.

           
Smiling, Barwise picked it up.

*          *          *