Debaser

by Max Frick

the name) will, for a very limited period, be the raison’d’etre of the Jones’s and their infuriatingly imitative neighbours.

  Here, today, Saturday, a substantial percentage of the fifty-thousand-plus ‘profiled population’ – predominantly white, both genders, all age groups, with a mean disposable income considerably lower than the national average and a standardised mortality rate considerably higher (owing, no doubt, to high fat, low food convenience diets, cigarettes and alcohol) – from the twenty-four-thousand-two-hundred-and-forty-three…forty-four…forty-five…households, covering a ‘designated market area’ of some ten square miles and beyond, were, by exhibiting an extensive range of ‘purchase behaviour characteristics’, fulfilling ‘predicted market potential’ and contributing to a success story that will, in the form of statistical data collected and collated, make for pleasant reading back at head office. And as success, like land, must be built upon, databases are surveyed, comparable locations selected ‘off the peg’, geo-demographical analyses made; sites are cleared, foundations laid, great iron frameworks constructed and glazed...

  The dual carriageway bridge was quite a bit behind them and Billy and Tony were walking through one of several car parks that surround the shopping centre in the very heart of the town. Cars, in a variety of colours, were being loaded with the bagged contents of shopping trolleys, while others, cautiously doing laps, awaited more convenient parking spaces than the few currently available. Painted high up on the white wall of the Asda superstore, just below the name itself, bold green block capitals, running almost the entire length of the building, declared ‘OPEN TWENTY-FOUR HOURS’. Lower down, at about head height beside the entrance (and Tony was proudly pointing it out to Billy) a much smaller sign read: ‘On the advice of Lothian and borders police this store will now be closed between the hours of 2am and 5am on Fridays and Saturdays’

  Billy stopped.

  ‘I’m just goin to nip in here and get him some dog food,’ he said.

  ‘What, now?’ said Tony. ‘Can you not get it on the way back?’

  ‘Well, we’re here now, so... I might forget on the way back.’

  ‘Aye, all right, then. Give me him.’

  Billy hesitated.

  ‘Eh, no... No, forget it. I’ll get him somethin later.’

  ‘What? I’m not goin to let him go in a fuckin car park!’

  ‘No, it’s all right. I’ll get him somethin later.’

  ‘Suit yourself, man. Come on, we’ll cut through the centre.’

  ‘We can’t,’ said Billy, indicating the dog again. ‘Not with him.’

  The sliding glass doors, closing behind the people in front of them, obligingly re-parted on their approach. No smoking, no dogs and no cameras slid to their left; no rollerblading, no skateboarding and no cycling to their right and they entered, over a gridiron floor mat and through a welcome blast of cooling air, a preliminary vestibule, before a second pair of sliding glass doors obligingly re-parted, allowing them to pass into the hustle and bustle of the main shopping area.

  Despite the multiform lighting and its manifold reflections in the gleaming surfaces and highly polished fixtures and fittings, as well as the natural light filtering in through the structured glass and steel roof, it was dimmer in here than outside, and while their eyes were taking a second to adjust, the noise immediately encompassed them.

  The sounds, in general, echoed those of the picnic area (less the barking of dogs), but here, owing to the acoustics of the building and the far greater number of people, they were amplified and multiplied and took on a resonant bass quality. The excited cries of those wayward children, as now they ran and slid on the faux-marble floor, were this time countered by the stifled reproofs of harassed mothers, too laden with shopping bags to be any effective deterrent (the volume only of their words was suppressed, not the anger that gave rise to them). Even the music was the same.

  I’ve been up, I’ve been down

  I’ve been a fool, I’ve been a clown

  I’ve done things that other men...

  ‘Not this fuckin song again!’ growled Tony, pained and pointing upwards. ‘Cunt thinks he’s a fuckin rock’n’roll star and they’re playin his stuff in shoppin centres like lift music!’

  An avenue of glass-fronted shops extended straight ahead of them and another to their right. Tony turned right.

  ‘Em, would it not be better,’ said Billy, ‘if we just went straight through?’

  ‘What are you fuckin worryin about? We’ll just take a wee wander round. Nobody’s goin to bother us.’

  They carved a path through the interweaving throng of shoppers. As people passed close by, particles of conversation, like DNA samples from which an expert or even a diligent amateur might construct a life, rose into clarity and faded out again behind them, to rejoin the indistinct thrum of voices. Syncopated dance beats emanated from wide shop doorways beneath names writ large and illuminated. In spot lit window displays similar if not identical mannequins were wearing similar if not identical summer fashions. And in electrical goods stores synchronised televisions, banked high, were all tuned to the same channel.

  While Billy anxiously kept his eyes peeled for any sign of possible confrontation ahead, Dooly was attracting puzzled stares from people sure that dogs weren’t allowed in here, and this or that audacious child or inquisitive toddler would occasionally allow the palm of an outstretched hand to plane along his sleek back, or the tips of their little fingers to undulate over his ribcage.

  ‘Every song this cunt ever does gets to number one!’ said Tony, still pained and again pointing upwards. ‘How?’

  Billy allowed himself to be drawn.

  ‘Because people buy them?’ he said.

  ‘Aye. But why do they fuckin buy them?’

  ‘Em...because they like them?’

  ‘Because they like them? No, not because they fuckin like them! It’s because they’re fuckin stupid!’

  The forcefulness with which Tony spoke these words undoubtedly captured the strength of his feelings, but he seemed to be completely unaware that the words themselves were a less than accurate translation of those feelings. Billy tried hard not to look bemused.

  ‘How the fuck would they know what they fuckin like?’ continued Tony.

  Billy tried harder not to look bemused.

  ‘Every cunt’s doin everythin these days just because every cunt else is doin it!’

  Billy tried harder not to look bemuseder.

  ‘Eh, right,’ he said. ‘But I still don’t get why people would buy the records if they don’t really like them.’

  ‘Neither do I, man,’ said Tony. ‘Neither do I. But, sadly, they do.’

  They turned left into another avenue of shops.

  ‘What was your first record?’ asked Tony.

  ‘Why?’

  ‘What why? I’m just fuckin askin.’

  ‘It was either “Promises” by the Buzzcocks, or Queen “Don’t Stop Me Now”. I can never remember, so it depends who I’m talkin to.’

  ‘You’re talkin to me.’

  ‘Buzzcocks.’

  ‘Poofs!’

  ‘All right, Quee... Forget it.’

  They strode on in silence.Tony, initially self-satisfied, grew impatient to be asked the same question. Billy, sensing his impatience, didn’t ask it. On they strode, rash vanity snapping at the heels of Tony’s proud restraint. Billy redoubled his resolve. They turned left again then right into a final avenue of shops and by now Tony’s pent up resentment was desperately seeking a release.

  ‘All people do in this fuckin town is shop!’ he snapped.

  ‘Em’, said Billy, ‘maybe it just seems like that because we’re in a shopping centre.’

  ‘Em, no,’ mocked Tony. ‘It fuckin is like that. There’s fuck all else to do here. The place is like a ghost town after all the shops’ve shut. The only cunts on the streets are gangs of young guys bored out of their minds and pissed up on Bucky. It’s a fuckin disgrace that a town this
size doesn’t even have a town centre!’

  ‘Em,’ said Billy again, ‘we’re in the town centre.’

  ‘Exactly, man! Fuckin shops! I mean a proper town centre. Somewhere you can go for a bit of fuckin nightlife. There’s one fuckin disco in this whole town! Does that not strike you as ridiculous?’

  He seemed to be awaiting an answer.

  ‘Are you askin me?’ asked Billy.

  ‘Aye, I’m fuckin askin you.’

  ‘Well, I suppose it...’

  ‘And they had the perfect opportunity to build us a proper town centre, a proper main street, when they were doin this place up. They even built the fuckin street! That fuckin “Boulevard” out there, or there, or wherever the fuck it is.’ He gesticulated wildly in several different directions. ‘A big long wide street bang in the middle of town. But do they build pubs or clubs on it? Do they fuck! A couple of fuckin banks and insurance companies, a load of fuckin offices, the arse end of Safeways and a petrol station! And a new fuckin multi-storey car park! It’s fuckin shameful, man. That’s all cunts think about these days! Fuckin business!’

  The splashings of a decorative fountain could be said to mimic those of the river, and Dooly, possibly fooled into thinking he was still outside, stopped to cock his leg against the thin trunk of a ficus, planted beside it in a bed of small pebbles (its dark green waxen leaves had caught the glare of the lighting and taken on the artificial look of their surroundings).

  ‘My fuckin sentiments exactly, big man,’ said Tony.

  Billy tugged Dooly sharply onwards, towards the