Wednesday evening in The Spread Eagle.
“Same again?” I point to my companion’s empty glass.
“Yeah.”
As the barmaid pulls two more pints, I glance around. It’s pretty quiet tonight. Two young women I’ve not seen before start laughing at a nearby table. They’re fashionable; too fashionable and pretty to avoid drawing attention to themselves. I notice a couple of the regulars staring - weather-beaten, wiry men with musty leather jackets and too much blue denim.
Bob’s sat at the bar as usual. No matter what day you go in, he’s always there, hunched over his pint of mild like a morose panda, his dyed, slicked back hair shining in the spotlights. He never says a word, never even has to ask for another drink: the barmaid has one ready whenever he finishes. I know he’s married, and I wonder what his wife does during those long, frequent evenings he’s here. Bingo with friends? Watching TV? Or sat stony-faced staring out of the bedroom window? Maybe that’s just what happens to a marriage when you both hit your 50s.
A shout makes me turn.
One of the young women is standing up, holding a packet of crisps over her face and making a muffled screech. What the hell? Then I realise she’s not holding it in place, she’s trying to pull it off.
The packet is attacking her.
Her friend jumps up and tries to help. Woman no.1’s screech turns into a bona fide scream as she tugs at the packet, her friend pulling too. They struggle for a few moments, the people in the pub staring in bewilderment, until abruptly the packet does come off, and the woman’s scream doubles in intensity. Her face is a glossy, deep red and for a split second I wonder why she’s painted herself with lipstick.
It’s blood, you idiot.
I glance at the packet still in her hand. It’s writhing and struggling to escape from her shock-fuelled grip, and I notice something stuck to the side of it. Something red and floppy, like a dripping cloth. I stare back at the woman’s face and realise what it is. Not a cloth.
Skin.
The packet of crisps pulled half her face off.
Her friend vomits over the table then collapses in a faint.
The sound of smashing glass from the bar makes me turn away from the horror. The vision that greets me is less gruesome than the faceless woman but is enough to make my insides condense into a lump of ice.
The display of crisps and nuts has come away from the wall, and packets are leaping onto the counter. More spring up from the boxes underneath. Lots more.
The barmaid is overwhelmed in seconds, dragged down out of view, her screams cut short with shocking speed.
A packet of Nobby’s Nuts flops down and begins firing out chilli-flavoured pellets so fast they’re just a blur. An old couple are hit in the forehead and drop like marionettes with their strings cut.
A different packet flops down on the counter and swivels to face me. The end rips open and a flat disc shoots out towards my head. Instinctively, I put my hand up and feel a sharp tugging sensation. When I look, I see that the top half of my forefinger is missing. Blood is pumping out in a small, steady jet.
Oh. My. God.
There’s a whitish powder round the stump. I can’t help but brush it with the forefinger on my other hand and taste it. Salt and vinegar. Very strong salt and vinegar. My finger was severed by a Salt and Vinegar Disco - the most harshly flavoured crisp ever created. My brain realises what’s going to happen a millisecond before it actually happens.
The burn.
The agonizing burn as the flavouring seeps into my open wound like paint-stripper, and the pain shoots half-way up my arm. I clutch my injured hand and stagger sideways.
What follows next is nothing short of a massacre.
A woman screams.
I look up, and she has a hand over her eye, blood seeping out from underneath her fingers. Another victim of Nobby’s Nuts.
Someone bumps into me and I go sprawling over a table. My eyes alight on the chair opposite, and I’m staring at a pack of Mini Cheddars. It stares back, twitching slightly as if it’s shocked to see me in such an inviting and vulnerable position. But before it can pounce I roll off and land heavily on the floor at the feet of my drinking companion. He’s slumped back in his chair staring into infinity with glazed eyes, his throat split wide open. A tell-tale sprinkle of white powder surrounds the crimson wound. As I watch in horror, the packet of Mini Cheddars leaps up onto his chest. My friend’s neck starts pulsating grotesquely as the packet burrows its way into the wound until only a corner is visible. A small, detached part of my mind can’t help but notice the irony in his gruesome demise - he’s a horror writer with a penchant for gore.
“Open the fucking door!” someone yells. It’s Bob. Bob who never says anything. He’s standing in the middle of the pub clutching a half-broken pint glass. His face is a grimace, a few strands of oily hair stuck to his forehead. A packet hurls itself through the air towards him, but he disembowels it with a swipe of his glass and it drops to the floor shedding crisps.
Someone rattles the doors. “They’re stuck!” Not the best night for a lock-in, I think blackly.
“Kick them in!” snarls Bob, lashing out like King Kong atop the Empire State Building as more packets throw themselves at him.
A single blow to the doors, and then another scream. No more door rattling.
My legs give way as shock and blood loss begin to take their toll, and I slide down the wall by the fruit machine. By the time Bob finally succumbs to the assault, the last man standing, everything’s going grey and fuzzy before my eyes. A horde of Quavers is advancing menacingly, but they won’t find much resistance from me.
Last orders at the bar.
“Same again?” I point to my companion’s empty glass.
“Yeah.”
As the barmaid pulls two more pints, I glance around. It’s pretty quiet tonight. Two young women I’ve not seen before start laughing at a nearby table. They’re fashionable; too fashionable and pretty to avoid drawing attention to themselves. I notice a couple of the regulars staring - weather-beaten, wiry men with musty leather jackets and too much blue denim.
Bob’s sat at the bar as usual. No matter what day you go in, he’s always there, hunched over his pint of mild like a morose panda, his dyed, slicked back hair shining in the spotlights. He never says a word, never even has to ask for another drink: the barmaid has one ready whenever he finishes. I know he’s married, and I wonder what his wife does during those long, frequent evenings he’s here. Bingo with friends? Watching TV? Or sat stony-faced staring out of the bedroom window? Maybe that’s just what happens to a marriage when you both hit your 50s.
A shout makes me turn.
One of the young women is standing up, holding a packet of crisps over her face and making a muffled screech. What the hell? Then I realise she’s not holding it in place, she’s trying to pull it off.
The packet is attacking her.
Her friend jumps up and tries to help. Woman no.1’s screech turns into a bona fide scream as she tugs at the packet, her friend pulling too. They struggle for a few moments, the people in the pub staring in bewilderment, until abruptly the packet does come off, and the woman’s scream doubles in intensity. Her face is a glossy, deep red and for a split second I wonder why she’s painted herself with lipstick.
It’s blood, you idiot.
I glance at the packet still in her hand. It’s writhing and struggling to escape from her shock-fuelled grip, and I notice something stuck to the side of it. Something red and floppy, like a dripping cloth. I stare back at the woman’s face and realise what it is. Not a cloth.
Skin.
The packet of crisps pulled half her face off.
Her friend vomits over the table then collapses in a faint.
The sound of smashing glass from the bar makes me turn away from the horror. The vision that greets me is less gruesome than the faceless woman but is enough to make my insides condense into a lump of ice.
The display of crisps and nuts has come away from the wall, and packets are leaping onto the counter. More spring up from the boxes underneath. Lots more.
The barmaid is overwhelmed in seconds, dragged down out of view, her screams cut short with shocking speed.
A packet of Nobby’s Nuts flops down and begins firing out chilli-flavoured pellets so fast they’re just a blur. An old couple are hit in the forehead and drop like marionettes with their strings cut.
A different packet flops down on the counter and swivels to face me. The end rips open and a flat disc shoots out towards my head. Instinctively, I put my hand up and feel a sharp tugging sensation. When I look, I see that the top half of my forefinger is missing. Blood is pumping out in a small, steady jet.
Oh. My. God.
There’s a whitish powder round the stump. I can’t help but brush it with the forefinger on my other hand and taste it. Salt and vinegar. Very strong salt and vinegar. My finger was severed by a Salt and Vinegar Disco - the most harshly flavoured crisp ever created. My brain realises what’s going to happen a millisecond before it actually happens.
The burn.
The agonizing burn as the flavouring seeps into my open wound like paint-stripper, and the pain shoots half-way up my arm. I clutch my injured hand and stagger sideways.
What follows next is nothing short of a massacre.
A woman screams.
I look up, and she has a hand over her eye, blood seeping out from underneath her fingers. Another victim of Nobby’s Nuts.
Someone bumps into me and I go sprawling over a table. My eyes alight on the chair opposite, and I’m staring at a pack of Mini Cheddars. It stares back, twitching slightly as if it’s shocked to see me in such an inviting and vulnerable position. But before it can pounce I roll off and land heavily on the floor at the feet of my drinking companion. He’s slumped back in his chair staring into infinity with glazed eyes, his throat split wide open. A tell-tale sprinkle of white powder surrounds the crimson wound. As I watch in horror, the packet of Mini Cheddars leaps up onto his chest. My friend’s neck starts pulsating grotesquely as the packet burrows its way into the wound until only a corner is visible. A small, detached part of my mind can’t help but notice the irony in his gruesome demise - he’s a horror writer with a penchant for gore.
“Open the fucking door!” someone yells. It’s Bob. Bob who never says anything. He’s standing in the middle of the pub clutching a half-broken pint glass. His face is a grimace, a few strands of oily hair stuck to his forehead. A packet hurls itself through the air towards him, but he disembowels it with a swipe of his glass and it drops to the floor shedding crisps.
Someone rattles the doors. “They’re stuck!” Not the best night for a lock-in, I think blackly.
“Kick them in!” snarls Bob, lashing out like King Kong atop the Empire State Building as more packets throw themselves at him.
A single blow to the doors, and then another scream. No more door rattling.
My legs give way as shock and blood loss begin to take their toll, and I slide down the wall by the fruit machine. By the time Bob finally succumbs to the assault, the last man standing, everything’s going grey and fuzzy before my eyes. A horde of Quavers is advancing menacingly, but they won’t find much resistance from me.
Last orders at the bar.
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