Trevor started speaking in a grander voice, a couple of old guys looking up from the corner. ‘Till tree from tree, tree among trees, tree over tree become stone to stone, stone between stones, stone under stone forever.’

It was hard to know how to follow that. ‘Nice.’

He grinned. ‘I like your vibe.’ Large elbows on the table, a little closer. His voice more intimate. ‘The thing you got going on.’ Vibe. Hadn’t been called that before. But he got it, Matty thought, and imagined his cock, pushed tight against the leather at his crotch. He was gazing over, amused. ‘Quiet type, huh?’

Move it on, then. ‘Got a room?’ Matty drained the glass, put it down and stared back. Didn’t blink.

That changed the mood. Trevor looked startled. ‘Yeah. Uh, yeah, sure.’ He sat up straighter. ‘Great. OK. Awesome.’

The pub’s room had a view of the car park. Shifty was out there, getting rained on. At least the mud on the wheel arches would get cleaned off.

‘And you’ve got Swift,’ Trevor was saying, taking his leather jacket off, releasing the smell of sweat. ‘Telling people to eat their own babies to stop the famine. Talk about black humour.’

Matty nodded from the window.

‘The guy was a genius. People thought Gulliver’s Travels was a book for kids, they didn’t see what he was doing, holding the mirror right back at everyone, English society, the works.’ He paused, only for the shortest breath. ‘I really wanna fuck your mouth.’

A charge of electricity, from stomach downwards. Matty turned round and looked at him. Knelt down.

‘The human body, you know? Oh fuck. OK. So he was looking at the ugliness of the human – wow. The human – holy shit, you’re good at this.’

Tongue. Mouth. Hand. Hands. Bit of everything.

He was hefty, bigger than he looked, the leather having kept it all in. He stood with his hands on his hips, broad girth matted with ginger hair. ‘Because, yeah, Gulliver’s miniature in this part, or at least he’s among giants, so he can see all the blemishes in – oh, man. All right, come on, let’s do this.’ A hand came down. ‘Hey.’

Matty hummed a no.

‘No? Well, if you’re cool to – shit that’s – OK. Great.’

Fourteen, on a school trip. Having to bunk up with the girls and listen to them crying over how cute Jules and Guillaume were but how they’d gone off with Rachel and Ciara obviously because they were slags.