We drive down there in the van. The Mickey Mouse van. That was hard. Looking at that fucking cartoon mouse on the side was too much like gazing into Tommy’s soul. Why did he love that mouse so much? I wanted to take it off. We should get rid of it, I says to Barney, it just brings up Tommy again and again. Over my dead body, Barney says to me. Tommy’s memory is in that mouse. That’d be sacrilege. Besides, he says, you were the one what said it kept us invisible.

And it was true. Everywhere we went, the presence of this badly drawn Mickey Mouse immediately discounted us from being any kind of threat whatsoever. After that they never gave us a second look.

*

We stayed in a wee caravan park on the estuary. There was a wee social on site with the live music and the chanting and me and Barney got up and did a few numbers, a few Como numbers. Barney was still doing that warbling, mind you. He murdered ‘Tie a Yellow Ribbon’ all over again. There’s a fancy dress ball on the Saturday night with prizes for the best costumes. We’re bollocksed for that, I says to them, if only we knew I’d have fucking rubbed some green dye on myself and ripped my shirt and gone as the Incredible Hulk. I wouldn’t mind shagging the Incredible Hulk, Moira says. You think he’s got a green cock? Sure, he’s green all over, Wee Robin says. You can’t have The Hulk with a green body and this fucking pale fleshy cock between his legs. Right enough, Moira says. You can’t have The Hulk looking weird. This guy is a fucking green giant that mutates through pure rage, she says. His cock could be any colour. A fucking green giant that mutates through pure rage? Barney says. That’s fucking Samuel you’re talking about. Pity his cock couldn’t mutate as well, though, he says. That’s just an angry wee inch, or so I’m told.