Thomo sat down and tasted his coffee. ‘Everything okay?’ Like he cared. He was our Nick replacement, but he was no Nick, or teacher, or anything, really. He’d told us he was on a contract and would be out on his arse come December, so I suppose the incentive wasn’t there.

‘Devil’s real, eh, Curtis?’ I asked.

‘Too right,’ he replied. ‘While I was with the spirits who dwell suspense, a lady summoned me.’ He put his lips to her neck, and pecked her white skin.

‘That’s disgusting,’ one of the other girls said.

Thomo looked up from his paper. ‘What?’

‘Tracey kissed Curtis.’

Thomo shrugged. As long as no one got pregnant on his time. ‘Give it a rest, Colin.’

‘I’m Curtis.’

Tracey said to me, ‘You live next to Curtis?’

‘Yes.’ I continued copying my devil: red leotard with a big arse and ball pouch. Loaded and ready to fire thunderbolts. Like Curtis probably, as he took her hand and stroked it.

She returned to her boy lover. ‘That’d be nice, bein’ that close, eh?’

‘We hang out,’ Curtis said.

I examined her dress, undone to the third button. Black bra. That was all it came down to, surely? Curtis was determined to conquer his personal wilderness, desolate for seventeen years.

‘Me and Clem have grown up together, haven’t we, Clem?’

‘I guess.’

‘Got up to a lot of trouble, haven’t we?’

‘Some.’

‘Like what?’ Tracey said, smiling.

‘Can’t tell you. I’d have to eat you afterwards.’

‘Gross,’ the same girl said.

Thomo: ‘Come on, it’s not a coffee shop, I want results. Full face, quality stuff. No bullshit.’

‘We used to go in the substation, didn’t we, Clem?’

‘Yeah.’

‘And throw sticks at the high voltage lines.’

‘That’s really intelligent,’ someone said.

‘Coulda killed yerself,’ Tracey added.

‘Not if you know what yer doin’.’ He whispered in her ear, ‘To do thy bidding pleases me so well.’

It was becoming obvious. He loved his tight pants, but they probably weren’t the best choice, considering. He moved about awkwardly. Tracey’s head was still an oval, with a sort of pig nose and elephant ears. She said, ‘That doesn’t look like me.’

‘I can’t draw.’

‘Why’d you do art?’

‘Either that or Home Economics.’

Curtis crossed his legs, but that made it more obvious, so he adjusted his jumper to cover it. The Devil called: big, flaky horns with sharp tips. And red wings, spread to display their venation, and some sort of sword for lopping heads. ‘Yep, me and Clem, we were the neighbourhood terrors, weren’t we, mate?’

‘Yeah.’

‘Even got picked up by the coppers, once.’

‘Did you?’ She seemed to like this idea. She held his arm, he crossed his legs again.

‘We got locked up for the night but they didn’t have any evidence. Reckoned we’d stolen some grog but, you know …’

She added lines to his portrait, and now it looked like a donkey. Then she studied my devil and said, ‘You read them cards?’