The Football Factory

by John King

  We go into a luxury flat on the eighth floor. There’s a view of the surrounding buildings running down to the river. I look out and it’s a nest in the clouds. You don’t imagine this kind of world exists. I mean, I’ve seen the sights from tower blocks, but there’s an atmosphere to this place. It even smells different. This part of Westminster means money. Big money. There’s no rundown cornershops or takeaways. Nothing but luxury flats and Government buildings. The flat’s in the middle of London but it doesn’t belong here. It’s another dimension. A world without people. The place is massive. Three bedrooms, Chrissie tells me. Decked out with paintings that look like they’re worth a bomb. There’s pictures from all over the world and the carpet must be a good inch thick. There’s even a leopard skin on the floor with glass eyes. What a way to end up.

  I feel like James Bond or some other upper-crust playboy as Chrissie starts kissing me again. She has me out within seconds and she’s got a grip like a pro. I can see us in a big wood trimmed mirror and imagine a camera on the other side with M15 agents recording the details. Like I’m important or something. Not just a football hooligan fighting my own kind. But Chrissie’s groaning like mad and I haven’t even got inside her top yet. She’s got me stripped in a couple of minutes and she’s down to her bra and pants. She won’t let me take them off which is getting me wound up. She gets down on her knees and starts in and I have to make do watching her in the mirror. Then she’s on her feet going to a bedroom. I’m told to wait a minute before following. I feel like a right cunt standing in the middle of the room with a hard-on, stark bollock naked.

  I’m summoned by her highness and Chrissie’s on a giant bed with a vibrator wedged up her. She’s still got her bra on but I can’t see her pants. She’s saying she wishes one of my mates was along so we could do her in tandem. I’m smiling but she’s bad news. I’m not that kind of bloke. The very idea makes me feel like throwing up and turns me right off. What’s the point? It’s supposed to be some kind of turn on this line of chat. Breaking down barriers she says. But all I’m interested in is a bit of one on one. I pull the vibrator out and we’re going at it, but when it comes to the business Chrissie starts prick teasing. You can usually tell when a bird gets mouthy they’re not going to deliver. Same with blokes. The ones bragging about how many birds they’ve had are the same ones wanking their lives away.

  I get her worked up and she lets loose. Makes a liar of me. She’s pulling a condom over my knob which I hate but this bird prefers burning rubber to riding bareback and the woman always knows best. I’m banging away for a while but the delay’s blocked me up which isn’t a bad thing I suppose. Means I last a bit longer though I’m not that bothered either way. She starts telling me she wants it from behind so I have to pull out with this fucking robber’s mask over my knob while she gets on all fours. Chrissie assumes the position and raises her arse in the air. She leans over and picks the vibrator up from the floor. She starts sucking on it, groaning like she’s auditioning for a film. I start laughing but she doesn’t hear. I’m glad I’ve got the rubber on now because if this bird wants a threesome then fuck knows what she’s been up to over the last few years. She’s getting well horny and it’s no problem keeping her going. Then I’m giving her the business with just the back of her head for company realising that this isn’t any kind of revenge, just a good one off.

  I shoot my load eventually and roll off. We lean against the pillows with nothing to say. It’s that moment of truth after you’ve done the business with a stranger when you wish there was a button nearby. Hit the switch and the bird disappears. I’m James Bond again. Activate the ejector seat and you’re alone to carry on down the road without the model. In the films the woman always gets killed off so Bond never has to bother about small talk after he’s done the business. I hate the after-shag chat. I want the bird to disappear so I can be on my own. I nod off for a while and Chrissie’s dozing as well. It’s an easy option because you wake up later all refreshed and you’ve got the urge again. There’s no need for idle words.

  I’m drifting, half asleep, feeling I’ve let myself down. It’s alright when you’re going for goal because you’ve got a bit of steel in you and this kind of shag’s about invasion. Instead of sticking the boot in you’re using your knob. An invasion of privacy. But once you’ve delivered you look at what you’ve done with a bit more vision and see it’s shit. You’ve opened yourself up just to exploit someone else. Violence and sex. Sometimes there’s little difference. Not like cutting someone up or torturing them, but it’s all about boosting the ego. At least when you get in a punch-up it’s power pure and simple. You keep your identity. It’s more honest somehow. Not like this set-up where you’re conning each other the whole time. Talking shit just to get your end away.

  I get up and go for a piss. Chrissie’s asleep. It’s a palace of a flat and I help myself to a drink from the fridge. A bottled import. All the nobs drink this kind of lager. I sit on the couch and put my feet up. My flat’s not bad but it doesn’t get near this place. I must have dozed off again because next thing I know it’s dark and Chrissie’s dressed up in red stockings. The TV’s on and there’s a bird on the screen getting serviced by a nigger. It’s a bleary recording but I recognise the body. Chrissie’s smiling for the camera as Dildo Boy does his duty. It’s a rich man’s paradise and she’s telling me nobody does it better than a black man. She’s looking in my face for a reaction probably thinking she’s radical or something. Probably is for her line of thinking. Chrissie can’t compare two different cultures.

  It’s all a bit of a comedy. The faces are so serious that I see the angle. I feel like a vicar because I’m supposed to be impressed and turned on more than usual. Chrissie looks at me again for a reaction. She starts lecturing me on racial equality and sexual freedom in her pinched upper-class voice. I hate the accent. I realise that now. Maybe that’s what does me in, even though she starts sucking my knob again telling me she loves the taste of rubber. Half of me is laughing, the other narked. Suppose I thought I was going to get one back on those miserable cunts in court. Thought I was going to stitch up one of their own. Get the business and turn over a stuck-up slag’s flat next time she’s selling over-priced coffee. It’s no victory. I’m getting a lecture on niggers by a slag in an ivory tower using a black man for her own ends. Arrogant brat’s setting herself up as some kind of expert. Actually thinks she’s dangerous.

  Mind you, I can’t get too upset because she gives a good blow job and I’m happy enough shooting off in her mouth. She chokes a bit and I cheer up because she’s pissed off. Tells me the one thing she doesn’t like is a bloke spunking up in her mouth. At last I’ve got a blow in against the magistrates. She’ll take anything shoved her way but doesn’t like a mouthful. Too fucking bad darling. What’s she’s doing down there in the first place? Chrissie storms off to the bathroom to rinse her mouth out with disinfectant and I go to the fridge for another bottle of lager. I’m sitting on the couch dressed when she comes back, wondering what the fuck I’m doing here. It’s raining outside and it’s a long way home. The day hasn’t really worked out. That’s what happens when you get involved with the law. They come at you from every direction. They pull all the strings and have their way every time. The cunts are everywhere.

  I watch Chrissie walk in with her cockiness and set ideas. She goes on about niggers but how many mates has she got who are black? Shafting a black man doesn’t prove anything. She uses her sex like a hammer and it’s me that’s being used here. At least I got a shot off in her mouth, though, so something good’s come of the day. That and six inches of Chelsea aggro. Expensive though. Two hundred and five quid for something I should be getting for free.

  BOMBER COMMAND

  The picture flickered for a fraction of a second, causing Matt Jennings to lift his head from the newspaper he was reading, a plastic mug of steaming tomato soup frozen halfway to his lips. He concentrated on the screen that had attracted his attention, eyes trying to make out
a vague object in the darkness. It was nearly two in the morning and the conditions outside were fair for the time of year. It hadn’t rained for three days and the wind had calmed after its earlier rage. There was something in the shadows on the far side of the car park, though he couldn’t see more than a faint quiver on the rolling film. Jennings put his mug down and was tempted to pour the soup back into his flask, but kept his gaze on the dark corner, automatically switching the angle of camera 6.

  He punched the correct buttons and achieved the desired view. A jolt of recognition identified a human form. Jennings zoomed in, wondering what he would find in the recesses of the car park, up against the wall, fearing the worst as a reel of psychopath blockbusters hovered. Day followed day, weeks turned into months and years, and now he was cruising down a tunnel into God knows what. Cushioned by warm air and surrounded by high-tech surveillance gear, he didn’t really want to know what went on in the depths of night, the endless repetition of empty car parks and sidewalks, metal gates and driveways suddenly appealing in the face of murder and mutilation. Despite himself, he felt the anticipation of puberty, a twinge of excitement penetrating thirty-five-year-old bones, adrenalin flowing as a ghost began to form. He felt exposed as the camera hit its target and a face looked straight back.

  A drunk glanced over his shoulder, the stream of hot liquid running back between his legs across the patterned concrete, harmless dregs, a million miles from the torrent of thick jugular blood Jennings had feared. Disappointment gave way to joy, embarrassment replaced by a sense of the absurd as the drunk walked back towards a small side gate dedicated to those who had fallen in the Falklands, out of the company car park, off along a side road towards the train station. The figure swayed gently from side to side and Jennings imagined him singing a song, a happy song of dancing and love, on his way to the all-night kebab house for a large donner with chilli peppers and chilli sauce. That would sober him up quick enough.

  Jennings clicked into the various cameras and enlarged images flashed across the bank of screens surrounding his desk. He was safe and sound, a politician in his nuclear bunker immune to the outside world, removed and cut-off with a one-way view of life that strayed across his line of fire. But he could do nothing other than pick up the phone and call the police station. He was a peaceful man. Violence scared him and, despite the repetitive nature of the buildings he had watched over for the last three years, he was content with the safety of his hideaway, the consistency of the work, the chance to read newspapers and travel magazines, and dunk the sandwiches Pat made him each evening into a mug of soup while planning for the future. Tomato was his favourite flavour and he had this on Tuesdays, Thursdays and Saturdays, while chicken filled in the gaps on Wednesdays and Fridays.

  Jennings was thorough in everything he did and had great pride in the knowledge that nothing would ever get past his command post. But there were no bitter winds blowing across his face and no searchlight with which to examine the surrounding jungle. He tried to picture himself with his finger on the trigger of a machine gun, smiled, glad that he wasn’t hoisted up as a sitting target for Iraqi commando raids or South American peasant rebellion. He was happy with the warehouses and concrete walkways, the passing cars and drunks emptying their bladders when they thought they were safely hidden from prying eyes, the prowling cats and stray dogs.

  Once his shift was finished, Jennings exchanged brief pleasantries with Noel Bailey and was straight out of the door. His replacement would go through the formality of checking the cameras and have an excellent view of his colleague crossing the car park. It was six in the morning and still dark, but Jennings was conscious of the lenses. He didn’t like being watched. He got into his car and was soon home, the journey taking ten minutes, the roads practically empty of traffic. He walked through the small front garden and was safely behind the front door, bolt in place and chain hooked. His sigh of relief was audible in the silence of the hall. He was king of the castle once more, back in total control.

  He went into the kitchen, took a carton of grapefruit juice from the fridge and filled a tumbler. He drank slowly balancing calories with vitamin content, rinsing the glass when he had finished, leaving it to dry in the empty rack, changing his mind and wiping it with a cloth before putting it back in the cupboard; then tiptoeing upstairs to the bedroom he shared with his wife. He could see the outline of Pat’s body under the duvet, the friendly smell of sleep and perfume, earrings and bracelets on the bedside table. The door clicked when it was closed and he listened for the sounds that would show he had woken her, but there was nothing. He went directly to the boxroom at the end of the landing which had been converted into a small office. This was his workshop and the nerve centre of their future success. Jennings plugged in his Macintosh and switched on, a crack of light burning through the screen, the mouse tight in his right hand, finger on the button.

  The man from the surveillance unit was soon surfing the Internet, information setting wires alight, ridding him of the need for conversation and puerile social skills, the warehouses and empty car parks blasted into the void, technology maximised. It was so easy on the superhighway, the world at his fingertips waiting to be explored, and all for the price of a local call. The only light came from the screen and he was all-powerful, sitting back in the dark, a white knight in the London metropolis, the figure lurking in the shadows serving humanity. His fingers pounded the keyboard, eyes flitting up and down, left and right.

  The downloaded image of a red-headed woman filled Jennings with great expectation, the transparent negligee and welcoming smile a subtle turn-on, the red painted nails long and exotic, text running ragged around partially concealed breasts. He felt guilty and turned to look towards the door, fearful Pat would wake and find him examining other women. It wasn’t right, but he was curious all the same and there could be no real harm in looking. He knew there were harder services available, that he was a child in the world of international pornography, a naive boy scout in a web of middle-aged perverts.

  With a burst of decision Jennings cancelled his last command and dragged the image to the dustbin, then confirmed the option. He switched off and sat in the dark, thinking and plotting the future. He was ambitious. A winner. He was a clean-living man with morals and a beautiful wife, a woman he loved dearly, someone to cherish and respect. He didn’t urinate on private property and hated the thought of having his soul caught inside a surveillance camera. He let his mind race, living the future, then started dozing, dreams setting foundations, jumping awake and going to the bathroom, ripping the woman’s memory into tiny pieces and flushing her away. He looked at his watch, mouth watering as he realised it was almost time for breakfast.

  Jennings waited for the bacon to crackle and the tomatoes to melt, the smell of fresh Colombian coffee filling the kitchen. He had always wanted to visit South America. Brazil, Colombia, Peru, Bolivia. The names were magical, but a fear of disease, filth, macho violence meant he would make do with glossy magazines and the Sunday papers. Pat was still asleep and he would eat his breakfast and watch twenty minutes of morning TV, wash the dishes and take his wife a cup of coffee in bed. She wasn’t working today, but rarely slept in. She was at her best in the morning whereas he was the kind that enjoyed the evenings. The night-shift suited him and it gave them both the space they needed, which in turn helped to keep their marriage fresh. He was a lucky man.

  Jennings had plans. Big plans. He was working for the future, clicking into the modern age, his computer a lifeline, a connection with the rest of humanity. Technology was making world travel redundant. Everyone wanted to watch satellite TV these days. The planet’s population was tuning into the same news broadcasts, while personal computers would soon be as essential as electricity. Virtual reality was the new reality and Jennings was smart enough to adjust his thinking and move with the times. He was progressive.

  —Are you awake, dear?

  He saw Pat’s bare back in the half-light of the curtained room. He slipp
ed into bed next to her and she turned around, healthy breasts pressing against his sweater. A wedding photograph on the wall showed family and friends, a country church, flowers and confetti, smiling faces.

  —I didn’t hear you come in, Pat said.

  —I’ve had my breakfast already. It’s only half-seven though.

  Pat sat up and took the mug of coffee, shifted over a little so that her husband would be more comfortable. The coffee quickly had its effect and Jennings felt his wife’s hand moving across the inside of his thigh tugging down his zip. He took the mug of coffee, careful not to spill it on the bedspread as Pat moved nearer, placing it on the bedside table, mildly irritated he had forgotten to bring one of the Windsor Castle coasters to protect the pine. Jennings watched the motion of the bed clothes and noticed the freckles on Pat’s face and shoulders. He loved his wife. She was everything a man could wish for in a woman.

  —Come here and kiss me, he said gently.

  Husband and wife kissed with the solid romance of companionship and ten minutes later he was moving softly, timing his run, high above the clouds riding on pure oxygen, bringing her to climax with his precision performance. When he had finished he timed the withdrawal perfectly, simultaneously positioning his discarded briefs below his wife’s buttocks, thereby avoiding stains on the sheet. They lay in each other’s arms and rested. Soon Pat was quietly snoring and Jennings began drifting, musing over the wonders of his invention, Smart Bomb Parade, and the deal he was about to sign with a major video games manufacturer. Youngsters would love Smart Bomb Parade. It would satisfy their natural instincts and make him a rich man. He would move out of London and enjoy some clean Gloucestershire air. Perhaps they would try for a child once they were financially secure. He knew Pat was proud of his inventiveness and technological know-how. They were going to be rich one day.