Howard spent a fitful night agonising over how
the wretched photographer had driven Jacintha
away from him. He staggered down the stairs
obsessing and cursing when his eye was drawn
to a weird parcel leaning against the wall.
He examined the black package cursorily and
was surprised to find it was addressed to him.
His eyes lit up at the strange scrawl, which
was intricate yet insectoid. It was the mark
of Granny Grail! He dashed up to his room and
tore away the wrapping to reveal a gnarled wooden
box. Inside was a small, ancient-looking glass
vial of pale turquoise liquid. It came with
instructions.
Herb kills love. Three drops.
Now that Jacintha had dumped him there could
be no more distractions from his pursuit of
Gallie! He would win her! He smiled, slightly
wrinkling his nose as he did so and lifted the
cork stopper from the vial. After a single whiff
of the elixir he pulled away from it sharply.
The liquid bore a peculiar tang, which he could
only deduce to be the stench of evil. He inspected
Granny Grail's note again.
Beware lovers suffer not aches. Aspirin makes
bad the herbs.
Howard had no idea whether Gallie or Dominic
were taking aspirin but he decided to run the
risk. He schemed to ply them with the potion
as soon as he was able.
Gallie and Greg sat in the lounge.
Emmerdale
Farm soaped away on the television. Howard
watched a scene featuring pigs.
'Which are the pigs and which are the actors?'
he said.
There followed a scene with a Norton Motorcycle,
which delighted Greg intensely.
'Lovely machine,' boomed Greg. 'Reminds me of
the time me and my mate went biking in the bleeding
States. Two fingers of bourbon and once around
the block and we got our licences and went cruising
State to State. It all went swimmingly 'til
the gear cog blew on his Thulium 750, slipped
from sixth to first. Ploughed noggin-first into
some farm threshing gear. Found his helmet about
twenty yards from his body. His bleeding head
was still inside, poor bastard. Nasty business.'
'Shit!'
'Still, you're more likely to be done in by
other tossers on the road pulling right out
in front of you.'
'True, true, they don't come worse than Volvox
drivers.'
'Then you've your good weather riders; the moment
the sun shines they jump on their thousand CC'er's
and hit the road in their thousands. They always
crash sooner or later. They're worse than the
kids. And don't mention the know-it-all middle-aged
guys who've never ridden a bike in their lives
and go out and buy the biggest fucker they can
get their hands on. Next thing the bleeding
crows are pecking their eyes out in some ditch.
Those guys give the us
real bikers a
bad rep.'
***
*****
***
Unusually for a Friday night, instead of a disco
the University laid on a gig for a rare performance
by The Io Fangs. The warm-up band,
Doctor
Cruel, did their bit, playing mediocre songs
to make the main act sound good. Howard could
sense that there was potential behind Doctor
Cruel. Their hair was big and their tunes almost
catchy and they had a personal energy that their
songs didn't quite match. Musically they didn't
quite go over the top when they should have,
or counterpoint the anthems with moments of
quietude. They had their pace, they had their
tone and they veered from it with the seldomness
of miracles.
He fingered the vial containing Granny Grail's
potion, which made an unsightly bulge in his
jeans pocket. The warm-up act finished by repeating
their only hummable number. The audience responded
warmly to them out of response to their sense
of exuberance and merriment rather than their
musical flair.
Dominic arrived. Gallie threw her arms around
him with joy. Howard hastily fetched a round
of drinks that were served in transparent plastic
pint cups. He clandestinely carried them to
a stygian cubbyhole, pulled the vial from his
pocket and cursed in extremely ancient Anglo-Saxon.
The stopper of the vial had worked loose, spilling
the potion into the blue denim. His jeans reeked
of some unbearable plant extract. He noticed
that there was still some turquoise liquid in
the bottom of the vessel. He poured six drops
into Gallie's pint of cider and the remainder
of the liquid, a dozen or more drops, into Dominic's
pint of cheap lager.
He found the lovers standing at the edge of
the dance floor looking into each other's eyes.
It was the interval and students bopped to The
Pretenders'
Don't Get Me Wrong.
Handing Gallie and Dominic their drinks, Howard
smiled wickedly.
'Soooo, what are you up to Howie,' said Gallie.
'You look like you're up to some mischief!'
'My dear Gallie, would I ever think of mischief
when with an angel of good like you?'
'Yeeeah,' said Gallie. 'You would. You blokes
are always up to... Yuk! This cider tastes off!'
Gallie and Dominic frowned awkwardly.
'My word, so does mine!' said Dominic. 'It tastes
for all the world like deuced poison!'
Howard shrugged.
'It
is poison! What do you expect from
Student Union catering? Fucking Chateau Lafitte
'74?'
He gazed at the ceiling, seemingly captivated
by the rotating disco lights rocking on their
frames like luminous parrots. Gallie kissed
Dominic on the cheek with unfettered affection
and took another sip from the pint of contaminated
cider she clasped in her two small hands.
Howard smiled as Dominic took another sip, shrugged
and took a hearty gulp.
The disco music faded out as an excited voice
over the tannoy, with the hyperbole that typified
the band, announced
The Io Fangs. All
the lights deadened. The dancing students rushed
to the front of the stage to join the ones who
had been standing there all night.
A drum roll broke the silence. It began as if
incidental to some circus trapeze acrobatics.
But gradually, in the darkness, the roll became
syncopated by the odd beat until the syncopations
became the rule. Before long an unfathomable
drum solo was in full force. Crescendo usurped
rapid crescendo of dexterous skin thrashing.
Then it stopped. Coloured spotlights lit up
the stage to reveal
The Io Fangs.
The
Io Fangs were responsible for a minor fashion
amongst students for purple hair and flares
and their appearance did nothing to suggest
that their taste for their particular brand
of attire had changed one iota. The vocalist
of the band was a self-publicising extrovert
of immense charisma who coined himself
The
Shark. The Shark's black leather jacket
was unfastened to reveal a lithe chest that
caused screams and paroxysms amongst the female
students, and possibly a few subscribers to
the gay-soc club too.
'Good crack in
Redater!' muttered The
Shark.
Male cheers and a collective from-the-top-of-the-lungs
female howl reflected his greeting.
The band launched into their first song, the
hit single
Anthem From The Box of Pandora
with blistering verve. The Shark's long purple
hair flopped over his face as his surprisingly
deep voice tore at the audience like thunder.
The fans at the front danced wildly, headbanging
with a stroke-inducing fit of intensity. Out
of desire not to be struck by flailing limbs
the surrounding crowd made space for the thrashing
dancers.
The band's two guitarists took turns to hammer
out distortion-twisted solos. One was tall,
square jawed and sported thick black-framed
spectacles and wore a corporate suit. The other
looked more stereotypical: skinny and clad in
scruffy jeans and T-shirt and wore his curly
hair long and unkempt. As the gig progressed
the guitarists exchanged their solos like salvos
in a duel. The besuited guitarist produced music
fashioned of a quirky style with subtlety and
varied expression whereas his colleague concentrated
on speed and sensationalism. The guitarists
who knew what they were talking about rated
the slower musician more highly. As it happened
the complementary styles worked extremely well
together, generating counterpoints of raw energy
and refined nuance.
While the guitarists provided sport for the
men The Shark meanwhile targeted the female
contingent of the bobbing fans. A man of boundless
energy he made women watch him with the absorption
of a starving predator stalking prey that was
too dangerous to kill. During the slower songs,
as close to ballads as The Io Fangs got, The
Shark wielded his curious talent for deluding
women into feeling as if they were somehow being
serenaded personally. During the more typically
fast-tempoed Io Fang songs he created in the
fairer sex a breathless thrill that was nothing
short of sexual. His bass voice seemed to affect
the women as if their vibrating eardrums were
erogenous zones.
Howard noticed that Gallie was deeply attentive
to The Shark's performance. Whereas she usually
stole admiring looks at Dominic, now she seemed
oblivious to his presence to the point of being
impolite. Not that Dominic seemed aware of her
inattentiveness to him. Dominic seemed distracted
but not by the band. When Howard followed his
glances he saw Dominic's ex, Sue. Sue looked
stunning with her fair hair tied back and her
desired figure tastefully showcased in a white
woollen dress. Surrounded with her gorgeous
friends, Sue was giggling and waving her arms
in the air, struggling, like Gallie, to catch
the eye of The Shark.
Howard smiled. Granny Grail's potion was obviously
working its magic very nicely.
 | | | | |
| From: |
JGR | Subject: | 2002-05-25 09:36:38 |
| | | | |
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