Chapter One - The Weekly Shop

Mr Wonderful encounters difficulties while completing his weekly food shop.

You know what they say, same s**t different day.

She was shouting out of the car window, but he couldn’t hear what she was saying, just a noise.  He lowered his window and glared at the stationary car.

“Arsehole!  You took my f*****g space!  I was f*****g waiting for that, you dick! Get the f**k out of there.”

He wound his window back up and turned the engine off.  Keys out of the ignition, the snap of the door handle.  The soft thud of the door as it closed behind him.

“I know you can f*****g hear me!”

She revved the engine loudly, as loudly as a 1.4 litre Renault Clio could manage.  He ignored the noise and walked to the boot, opening the catch and fishing out a plastic bag and a claw hammer.  The bag covered the hammer in his grip and he turned towards the irate driver, who was still animated, still shouting.

“People like you make me f*****g sick, you should f*****g…”

The bag fluttered softly to the ground as he drew the hammer back quickly and released a quick backhand punch to her cheekbone.  His aim was slightly too high, and the ball of the hammer caught her low on the temple, just in front of her earlobe.  She jerked back mid-sentence and rested slouched in the seat.  No blood, but the sign of impact was evident from the hollow dent in her face.  He turned her head towards the window, and covered the wound with her long, dark hair.  Another car sounded its horn rudely as it pulled out from behind the stopped car to find another space.  He could hear a heavy drumbeat from the car stereo getting quieter as it moved further down the car park.  He turned back to his boot, put down the hammer and closed the door.  Picking up the crumpled carrier bag, he walked towards the automatic doors of the supermarket.

The doors were no longer automatic and had been prised slightly open to allow access.  He walked past the empty trolley collection point and approached the end of the queue to the cigarette kiosk.  The kiosk no longer sold cigarettes and was the only part of the shop that remained accessible.  Heavy shutters partitioned the main shop floor from the entrance and kiosk, the checkouts closed and emptied long ago.  The staff wore not the distinctive uniform that once carried the branding marketed throughout the UK, but unidentifiable tatters not dissimilar to those worn by their customers.

The queue was a mob, a throng of dissatisfied people jostling and pushing each other.  Any order that had formed was undermined by the loud and aggressive behaviour of those forcing their way to the serving area, a small group of young men of an indeterminate race.  Whatever they were shouting wasn’t English, and the hostility towards them was clearly rising.  The tallest of their number elbowed his way past a heavily pregnant woman, who stumbled and fell, trying to catch his sleeve as she went down.

“Fat b***h”.

He pulled his arm up and kicked her with the toe of his shoe, sending her sprawling on the floor.  People stepped over her to get closer to the front, ignoring her cries for help.  They tried to follow the swathe that the group of foreigners were cutting, but were cut off by sharp elbows, fingernails and feet.  One middle aged man was pulled back by the hair by one hand, eyes gouged by bony fingers as he was sent to the floor.  One of the lucky few customers who had managed to secure a food parcel tried to flee through the exit, before being tackled by a skinhead wearing worn biker’s leathers.  The parcel spilled over the floor and a mass scrabble broke out, tins with Cyrillic writing and unknown characters, long expired and unidentifiable contents rolling into the grasp of the fortunate few.

The man took advantage of the melee and moved closer to the kiosk, stepping over prone bodies and edging out the elderly folk with his large, stocky frame.  As he neared the front of the crowd, the group of young men became aware of his presence and bristled with resentment.

“You,” said the ringleader in a raised voice, “you will wait with others.  You wait.  Men get first, dog get later”.

The man moved closer and stared him down.

“Dogs bite”.

In one movement, the man pulled the gang leaders head towards him and ripped the tip of his nose off with his teeth.  Before he could react beyond the initial pain and astonishment, an elbow was driven into his eye socket, and a final headbutt crunched into his bleeding nose, breaking bone and cartilage and sending him down to the filthy floor.

A smaller member of the gang moved towards him, a distinctive movement toward his back pocket as he pulled out a flick-knife.

Too slow.

The man used the oncoming thugs forward momentum to put all of his force into a downward kick, landing cleanly and with a sickening impact on his kneecap.  The joint briefly held, and then flopped back uselessly as tendons, bone and muscle snapped.  He stood on one leg for a few seconds, and then tried to put weight on the newly broken limb.  He watched in disbelief as it buckled with no resistance and he staggered to the floor, face pale.  The man reached down and picked up the dropped flick knife.

The remaining members of the gang visibly backed off, giving him a clear route to the kiosk.  Several onlookers had paused to watch the commotion, while fights continued deep in the crowd for the remaining food that had been dropped.

“Mr Wonderful.  A pleasure to see you as always”, said the girl behind the counter with more than a hint of sarcasm.

“Just give me the f*****g parcel, Scarlett.  You can suck me off later”.

“Only if you wine and dine me.  And you’re not going to find anything I’m eating or drinking in this poverty package.”

She thrust the bags of food at him and turned away.  It was clear by this point that he wasn’t an easy target, and the massed crowd separated slightly as he walked towards the exit.  One of the gang members started to follow him, his hand behind his back, walking cautiously.  In a flash, Mr Wonderful picked out a plain tin from the top of the bag and threw it straight and hard at the would-be assailant.  He saw it too late, and it struck him just below the eye, fracturing his cheekbone instantly.  The edge of the can was sharp, and it quickly opened up a raw wound.  As he fell to one knee, clutching his face, blood began to drip and pool on the ground beneath him.

“Keep the peaches you f*****g nonce.  Don’t say I never give you nothing”.

Mr Wonderful turned and carried his food parcel beyond the reach of his awaiting masses, back to relative safety, back to his car and back to his family.  The Renault Clio was no longer there, but the driver was.  She had been pulled from the car and stripped of clothes and valuables and left to lie dead on shards of broken glass and cracked concrete flagstones.  She was a victim, but no longer exclusively his victim.  At some point her body would be removed, but birds would be picking at her carcass for the next three days if she wasn’t harvested for fuel or food by the shoppers.  And that was assuming the necrophiles didn’t take an interest first.

He started the car, and gently eased away from the space.  All doors sealed tightly, just like the borders of Brexit Britain.

*

Much can happen in five years.  Democracy works, but not always for the better.  Tired clichés, but true in their own way.  The 23^rd June 2016 was a momentous day for the United Kingdom, as over 50% of its voting population opted to leave the European Union.  Few would be aware of the cataclysmic events that would begin to shape the island nation, destroying the moral and financial fabric of its society.

After triggering Article 50, it took almost four years to unilaterally approve the UK’s final exit plan.  Border problems emerged throughout this period, but the explosion of violence following the official exit was swift and brutal.  Passports for UK residents were withdrawn, and European owned aviation companies refused them access to transport.  Attacks on airport staff were common, with groups of holidaymakers and ex-patriates routinely beating and stabbing those responsible for denying them access.  Over 200 murders were reported in airports across Europe, and before long international airports also removed passport privileges.

The prisoners were detained, beaten and held in makeshift camps as nations refused to meet the expense of flying them home.  The UK government turned their back, and rather than being political prisoners, they became slaves, denied rights and an identity.  Children were separated from parents and sold into sex slavery, their shipping costs paid by wealthy businessmen in the middle and far-east.

And at home, they were missed.

Not by the government, who oversaw the destruction of the National Health Service, which had received no funding since Article 50 ensured a separation from the European Union.  Not by the financial industry, whose banking masses had deserted the bonus-free wasteland of the UK.  Not by the manufacturers and engineering firms, whose departure from the UK had led to mass unemployment and plummeting share prices. 

They were missed by the 70 million who were left behind, beyond the closed borders.

*

And behind the closed doors of 57 River View, Mr Wonderful slowly unpacked his food parcel and quietly missed his wife and son. 

A mobile phone buzzed into life from the kitchen work surface, a power surge from the charger as the electricity came back on.  Power cuts were common, the intermittent service more off than on.  Mobile networks operated on a severely limited basis, with only a couple of hundred thousand of the wealthiest inhabitants able to afford the charges set by secure, militarised service providers.  The phone’s more basic functions were used now; photographs taken that would never be shared, music stored that reminded people of happier times.  The most common use was the torch, which was convenient for the many power-outs.

The mobile phone’s screen lit up, the background a picture of Lana and Sam from 2018.  Lana was smiling at the camera ruefully, with Sam looking up slightly as if intending to ask a question.  The photograph wasn’t particularly flattering for either, but it was the best that he could find.

Lana was 35 in the photograph, and Sam was five years younger.  Both had a light tan from the sun that summer, and the same green eyes.  Sam was yet to develop his father’s rugged looks and was almost a carbon copy of his mother.  The same generous smile, the same cheeks prone to plumpness and the same cheerful disposition that lifted the mood of everyone around them. 

Until they became missing persons in a society of missing people, they were his favourite people in the world.