Angelo was out on his feet, almost, from fatigue. He’d endured one hell of a day and, up to now, a long and tortuous night of hassle and grief. How long and how tortuous it would turn out to be, he was reluctant even to contemplate. He’d barely finished the gripe with Doofer on his cell when some guy knuckled the window with a key, loud enough to wake the street and maybe point the filth his way, and gestured for Angelo to open up.
Angelo sighed, partly out of boredom, and hauled himself upright in his seat. He scrutinised the dark, well-dressed figure in his wing mirror and shook his head almost imperceptibly from side to side: Simon Middleton, that poor-little-rich-boy, looking for an eighth and a spliff or two for the weekend and maybe a few Mandy’s for his college-type acolytes. These small-time users and twice-a-week thrill seekers filled Angelo with contempt, although he couldn’t say why exactly. Maybe he owed his resentment, partly at least, to the fact that Middleton, and others of his kind had so much going for them already in terms of the wealth and affluence to which he himself aspired.