Counterparts, I says to Kathy. Do you think that everybody has their counterparts out there? Not like their double exactly, but like their opposite number?

That’s what Davy says, Kathy says to me. That’s what Davy says but only he calls it his alter ego. My fucking alter ego is out there, he says, and then he brings up the story of Ms Marvel, which was this comic book that he always went on about. I says to him, what the fuck does your favourite comic book have to do with a sleeping fox? and he says to me, shut up and listen, shut up and wait till I tell you, he says:

*

Carol Danvers is investigating her own alter ego. She is trying to track down Ms Marvel and find out her true identity. But Ms Marvel’s true identity, her alter ego, is Carol Danvers. Only she’s forgotten or suppressed it somehow. She starts to having these blackouts. There are gaps in her story. Ms Marvel does not know her true identity. Ms Marvel is trapped in a place of no memories. Carol Danvers’s shrink puts her under and while she is hypnotised she recalls memories of Ms Marvel and her superpowers. But her shrink dismisses them as ludicrous or as shadow fantasies personified. It’s just a complex, he says. Think about it, Davy says.

What if your complexes are not in here but out there?

What if you could come face to face with your own alter ego?

What if your alter ego has forgotten it’s your own invention?

I says to him, I’m not indulging any stupid comics-fanboy superhero nonsense, she says. You do not want to get mixed up with these people, I says to him. These people are dangerous, I says to him, but he’s obsessing over it. You’ve been reading these comic books for too long, I says to him. I’m not mental, he says to me, I’m not mad. It’s a projection, I says to him. You’re projecting onto this fantasy figure, I says to him, but he just laughs at that. Imagine the power of projection, he says to me. That’s what you call art.

*

I start to notice changes with Davy and it’s like this supposed meeting with Special Branch has inspired him, she says. Can psychological warfare be as subtle as that? Could they have somehow hypnotised him by planting the seed of this idea and then the seed somehow grows under its own power or under the power of Davy’s fantasy? Thing is, he stops wearing his sloppy T-shirts and his training shoes and his baggy jeans and he starts to buying smart shirts and dress shoes. He starts to wearing a blazer into work and he even starts to wearing the cologne. Sorry, the aftershave, he starts to wearing the aftershave. I think to myself, okay, it’s good to aspire. It’s good to want to better yourself, if that’s all it is, then fine. Then good. He’s looking better than ever, I’ll be honest with you. He’s making an effort. I’m all for it. Then you lot go and kidnap me. Then he kicks the shite out your friend at the comic shop.