Punk Faction - It's All Done By Mirrors
Marcus Blakeston
Published: 2011
Tag(s): Punk Skinhead Unemployment Dole Ska Hooligan Youth Cult Rock Allen Yob thug British Thatcher Urban Drama Richard Fiction UK82
Punk Faction : It's All Done By Mirrors
Copyright © 2011 by Marcus Blakeston. All rights reserved.
http://sites.google.com/site/marcusblakeston
http://marcusblakeston.wordpress.com
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This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, businesses, places, events, and incidents are the product of the author’s imagination. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events, or places is entirely coincidental.
Special thanks to Mark Astronaut. Without his permission this one wouldn't have been anywhere near as much fun to write.
Chapter 1
Stiggy stared intently at his red canvas trainers, mesmerised by the patterns that were swirling around on them. He lowered his glue bag and looked up at the towering figure of Brian Mathews standing next to him, leaning casually against the outside wall of the Juggler’s Rest. Brian’s head seemed to be so far away that it was almost a small pinprick in the sky. Stiggy had to shout in order to be heard over such a huge distance.
“Look at my shoes! Fucking hell, just look at my shoes! Fucking hell!”
Brian peered down momentarily at Stiggy’s trainers, and then looked away. “Yeah, very nice,” he said, quietly.
Dick!
Stiggy raised the bag to his mouth again, and spoke into it. “Magic shoes, fucking hell!”
Brian sighed to himself and shook his head before reaching into his leather jacket pocket for his cigarettes. He was about to light one when he thought about the solvent fumes coming from Stiggy’s glue and wondered if they were flammable or not. He decided to be cautious, and took several steps away from Stiggy before flipping up the lid of his Zippo lighter and thumbing the wheel. Taking a deep drag, he looked up and down the empty street before turning his attention to a poster in the Juggler’s Rest window advertising the night’s entertainment. The poster was black and white, and looked hand-drawn with a marker pen. It showed a crude, simplistic doodle of what looked like a nun holding a crucifix in a suggestive manner. Below this was the name of a band Brian had never heard of, and an entrance price of fifty pence.
“All right, Bri!”
Brian turned his attention from the poster on hearing the shout, and saw Colin Baxter striding up the street towards him, his leather jacket flapping open to reveal the same Exploited T-shirt he had been wearing yesterday. Brian raised his hand in acknowledgement, and said “About fucking time. We’ve been here ages.”
Colin peered over Brian’s shoulder and glanced at the poster. “Yeah well I’m here now aren’t I?” Brian turned to face him, and a strong scent of something flowery assaulted Colin’s nostrils. The smell was tinged with tobacco smoke and an artificial chemical agent that was so potent he could almost taste it in his mouth. He wafted his hand under his nose in an attempt to disperse it, but the smell lingered, overpowering him.
“Fucking hell, what’s that stink?” Colin took a step backwards.
“Borrowed a dab of me dad’s aftershave, didn’t I?” Brian said, blowing a puff of smoke in Colin’s face as he spoke. “Got to make an effort now and again, haven’t you?”
“Smells like you used the whole fucking bottle.”
Colin glanced over at Stiggy sitting on the ground, a bag of glue held firmly against his mouth, muttering something into it. “I see Stiggy’s already in a party mood.”
Brian didn’t share Colin’s obvious mirth, and didn’t return his smile. “Fuck knows what you invited him for. Talk about fucking gooseberries.”
“Nah, Stiggy’s a right laugh. So where’s the birds then? They already gone in to escape your stink, or what?” He looked around, as if expecting them to be hiding in the shadows.
“They’re not here yet,” said Brian disheartedly.
“You checked inside?”
Brian shook his head. “No, you have to pay to get in tonight. There’s a band on, remember.”
Colin looked closely at the poster in the window. “So I see. Never heard of them, are they any good?”
Brian shrugged his shoulders. “Dunno.”
“Well we can’t go anywhere else, can we? This is where we said we’d meet them, so we can either wait out here and die of thirst or pay up and go in. They’re probably already in there anyway. And if they’re not they’ll do the same when they do get here.”
“Yeah, I guess. It’s only fifty pence anyway. You going to wake Stiggy up then, or shall we just leave him there?”
“Best wake him up. You hold his arms while I get the bag off him. They’ll not let him in with that.”
* * *
Inside the doorway to the Juggler’s Rest, a young man dressed entirely in black from head to toe sat behind a small table littered with pamphlets on animal cruelty, assorted punk fanzines, and a small pile of twelve inch records. The records had a black and red cover design, and Colin noticed that they were produced by the band that was playing there that night.
“Evening, lads,” the man said. He had a faint London twang to his voice, but not the harsh Cockney tones of those from the East End. He looked at Stiggy with slight amusement evident on his face, obviously aware of the strong solvent fumes emanating from his direction as he swayed unsteadily before the table, staring at the pile of records. The man rattled a small, lidless Quality Street tin containing loose change in front of Stiggy to get his attention.
“Fifty pence to get in, mate. Records are three pounds, fanzines are twenty pence. These are free.” He pointed at the animal cruelty leaflets, and Stiggy’s gaze strayed over to them before flicking back to the records.
“We going in then or what?” Brian said, pushing roughly past Stiggy and dropping a fifty pence coin onto the table. The man picked up the coin, put it in his tin, and looked up expectantly at Colin as Stiggy followed Brian into the pub without paying. Colin unzipped his jacket pocket, took a pound note from his wallet, and gave it to the man.
* * *
Trog nudged Don when he saw the three punks enter the pub. Two of them headed straight for the bar, while the other made for the toilets. He pointed at the two standing by the bar.
“That’s that gobby cunt I were telling you about, and his mate.”
Don followed his gaze, and stared at the band names painted on the backs of their leather jackets. He was amused to see Cockney Upstarts and Blitz, both of whom he considered to be true skinhead bands, jumbled in with the names of lefty punk bands like Vice Squad and Anti Pasti.
“You think it were them that did Ian over?”
Trog laughed. “Nah, they’re both weak as piss. That cunt there–” he pointed at Colin. “–he only went and fucking pissed his pants as soon as he saw me.”
Don smiled, and shook his head. “No fucking way.”
“No, straight up. He turned round, saw me, then pissed his pants.”
Don shook his head again and reached for his beer. “Mate, I wish I’d been there to see that. Fucking hell, what a useless cunt.” Putting the glass back down again, he looked around the room, his gaze lingering momentarily on each of the punks who were there. “So if it weren’t them, how are we going to find out who it was?”
Trog followed his gaze, and thought for a while before replying. “I’ve been thinking about that. You saw the state of Ian’s face, all them bandages and shit. Must’ve been pretty fucking mashed up underneath them.”
Don nodded in agreement, his face stern as he
thought about his friend lying unconscious in a hospital bed. All those tubes, and that fucking machine breathing for him. When he had first heard about Ian’s beating he hadn’t expected it to be as severe as that. The nurse had said Ian was lucky to be alive, but they still didn’t know if he would ever recover.
“Well,” Trog continued, “you couldn’t mash someone up that bad without doing any damage to your fists.”
“Yeah,” Don said excitedly, as realisation dawned on him. “So we just need to find someone with bruised knuckles.”
“Got it in one, Don. Got it in one.”
* * *
Pint of bitter in hand, Colin looked around the crowded pub while he waited for Brian to be served. There were a few faces he recognised, and he nodded to them when he caught their eye. Colin’s heart sank when he saw the skinhead from the Queen’s Head staring intently at him over the rim of his lager glass, and he turned his gaze quickly away to face the small stage in the corner near the gents’ toilet. A tall, thin man with long hair was busily threading cables along the stage between two small amplifiers at either side of it. A microphone stand stood at the right hand side of the stage, and a small drum kit was in the centre. He was obviously a roadie getting everything ready for the band.
Colin turned around and leant his elbows on the bar next to Brian as he took a sip from his bitter.
“That fucking skinhead’s here with a mate,” he said.
Brian looked around and located the two skinheads before turning his attention back to the barman. “Pint of bitter please,” he said, and then turned his head to face Colin. “They’ll not do anything, not with this many punks here. They might be skinheads but they’re not fucking daft.”
Colin grunted in agreement, but he wasn’t entirely sure about that.
“Them birds here yet?” asked Brian, looking around expectantly.
“Not seen them,” said Colin. “Best get some seats anyway though, the place is getting quite full.”
Walking towards the stage, Colin heard the two skinheads laugh as he passed them, but he chose to ignore it. He had better things to think about because he had seen Becky sitting at a small round table, beckoning him over with her fingers. Kaz was with her, and this fact was not lost on Brian, who quickened his step when he saw her.
“All right. Been here long?” Colin asked, putting his pint down on the table and looking around him for a spare seat.
“No, not really,” said Becky, smiling, looking up at him.
Colin spied an empty stool at the next table and retrieved it before setting it down opposite Becky. Brian put down his pint and went in search of a seat for himself while Kaz watched him, taking a short sip from her Pernod and blackcurrant. She absentmindedly pulled down her pink mohair jumper to smooth out invisible creases.
Colin sat down and stared at Becky’s green fishnet stockings, followed the line of her legs up to a fake-fur tiger skin mini-skirt. Her legs seemed to part slightly to give him a better view, though he wasn’t sure if he was just imagining that.
“Here, what you been doing then?” Becky said, shattering Colin’s concentration.
He looked up, bemused. “What?”
Becky smiled, a row of white teeth contrasting perfectly with her black lips. “Your face. It looks funny.”
Colin raised a hand to his bruised face self-consciously, and grinned at the deathly white face before him, with its black lipstick and heavily applied black eyeshadow and liner. “You can talk,” he said, his gaze drifting back down to her legs.
Becky’s smile got even wider, and she beamed at him. “You like it? Kaz did it for me.”
“Yeah, it looks … interesting.”
Kaz pouted and gave Colin a sharp look. “Interesting? It’s a masterpiece.”
Colin looked up, registering Kaz’s presence for the first time, and looked again at Becky’s makeup. “Yeah, I guess,” he said. Becky beamed again.
Brian arrived, pulling an empty chair behind him by its backrest, the two legs in contact with the wooden flooring making a faint scraping sound.
“Budge up,” he said to Kaz, putting the chair down next to hers and reaching for his pint.
Kaz shuffled her stool a few inches to one side to make room for him, and turned to face Colin. “So what happened to your face, then?” she said.
Colin decided to use the same story he had given his grandmother. “Caught a few elbows while I were dancing.”
Brian smirked at Colin, but didn’t contradict him. Kaz laughed, throwing her head back and glancing at the ceiling. Her long brown hair hung limply behind her. “You did all that from dancing?”
Colin’s face reddened, and he looked over at the two skinheads sitting across the room. The one that had attacked him a few nights ago was staring directly at him, and when Colin’s eyes locked with his he made a gun out of his fingers and pointed it directly at Colin. He cocked his thumb to form the gun’s hammer, and then raised the two fingers of the gun to his mouth before blowing on them. The meaning was not lost on Colin.
* * *
“You see that?” Trog said. “Fucking cunt just gave me a right look.”
Don flicked the ash from his cigarette onto the discoloured table, ignoring the ashtray at its centre completely. “Mate, you’re getting obsessed. I thought you were looking at that Bride of Frankenstein that’s with him.”
“Bride of fucking Pissenstein, you mean.”
Don laughed, and took another drag of his cigarette, leaning back in his chair. He left the cigarette in his mouth and stretched out his arms at the side, rolling his shouders before putting his hands behind his head. “I’d do her. With a bag over her head, of course. You can have the fat one in pink.”
Trog smiled and shook his head. “You’d bang any cunt, you. Bag or no bag.”
Don removed the cigarette from his mouth and blew smoke rings at Trog. “Aye, fair enough. So what’s it like banging Mandy then? Is it true what they say about older birds?”
Trog coughed and wafted the smoke away from his face with his hand, dispersing it. “All true, mate,” he said with an enigmatic grin.
“Jammy bastard.”
Don caught a movement in his peripheral vision and looked around to see a tall, thin man walking from table to table with a large Sainsburys carrier bag in one hand and what looked like a twelve inch record in the other. He had long, unruly hair which he flicked away from his face when he leant over to speak to people sitting at the tables. When money changed hands at one of the tables, the man pulled a fresh twelve inch record from the carrier bag and handed it over before moving on to the next table. When he arrived at Don and Trog’s table he looked in their direction but walked past without approaching them.
“You see that?” Don said. “He just fucking blanked us completely.”
Trog looked over at the man, and heard him ask the people at the next table if they wanted to buy a record. “What, did you want to buy one of his fucking hippy records or something?”
“Nah, do I fuck. That’s not the point though is it? It’s fucking discrimination, that’s what it is.”
Trog laughed. “Yeah, Don. We’re a fucking persecuted minority, we are. Should be a law against it.”
* * *
“You want to buy an album?” the man said, thrusting a dog-eared LP in front of Colin’s face. Colin looked up, and recognised the man as the roadie he had seen on the stage earlier. He took the album from him and flipped it over, knowing instantly from its flexibility that it was devoid of an actual record. He recognised it as the same one that had been offered for sale at the entrance to the Juggler’s Rest.
“Any good?” he asked, reading the song titles printed on the back. They didn’t sound very punk, and the long-haired man selling it didn’t really improve his impression of what type of music was etched onto the record itself.
The man rubbed his chin thoughtfully while Colin inspected the album sleeve. “Oh man,” he said. “You’re asking the wrong guy there. We’re pl
aying here later tonight, so you’ll find out for yourself.”
“How much are they?” Becky asked, leaning over to inspect the record sleeve.
“Three pounds.”
“Giz a look then,” Brian said, snatching it from Colin’s hand.
The man watched patiently while Brian and Kaz looked at the album cover, before asking if they wanted to buy a copy.
“Nah mate, you’re all right,” said Brian, putting it down on top of the ashtray in the centre of the table. The man picked it up and started moving away to try his luck at the next table.
At that moment, Stiggy returned from the toilet. He seemed to be attracted to the record in the man’s hand, and stared at it intently.
“Oh wow, is that my prize?”
The man held it out in front of him in both hands for Stiggy to get a better look. “Yours for only three pounds.”
“Wow, look at them dancing.” He waved at the twin figures split diagonally across the front of the album sleeve. “Hello,” he said to them.
The man smiled at Stiggy. “Do you want to buy one?”
Stiggy looked up at the man, seeing him for the first time. “Aaaaaaaahhh!” Stiggy cried out in alarm, and took a step backwards away from him, his eyes widening.
The man looked across at Brian, confused. Brian held out his hands and shrugged his shoulders, a faint smile at the corner of his mouth. The man nodded, and with a final “Catch you later, guys,” took his sales pitch to the next table. Stiggy watched him nervously before pulling up a chair and looking bleary eyed around the table. His mouth opened when he saw the two girls, and he gaped at them.
“This is Stiggy,” Brian explained with a sigh.
* * *
Trog watched the punk rise from his seat and head toward the toilets alone. He nudged Don and pointed. “That gobby cunt’s on his own in the bogs. What do you reckon about paying him a visit, see if he knows anything about Ian?”
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