Big Society

I guess this whole thing really started when they set our building’s recycling bins alight and threw one of the the Tengazis’ cats in

, but — in a particularly cruel twist — only after the initial flames had died down so all the rubbish was hot and ash-heavy, like a charcoal grill, searing the poor animal on its sides.

There was some speculation as to whether they tried to flip the poor creature and whether — this is hard to even comprehend — they actually tried to eat it.

The first and only item on the emergency agenda at the next day’s Neighbourhood Watch meeting: “ANTI-SOCIAL BEHAVIOUR: Grilled cat.’

‘These are outsiders coming in,’ said someone. ‘They’re not local.’

‘Those poor Tengazis,’ said someone else. ‘And what are the police doing? You never see them around any more, except at that Polish bakery that’s just opened up.’

‘I think,’ said Martin, ‘That we need a plan.’

***

Martin, watch Secretary, was ex-Territorial Army, City accountant, and in a marriage of opposites to the floral-fragrant Linda, who you could just tell from the way she never finished a sentence and seemed to be trailed by a synthesised bassy soundtrack had been to a few chemically enhanced outdoor parties in her time.

I dropped by their flat after the meeting, which ended after two and a half hours with the passage of Association Resolution 2011-42, by 24 votes to 1: This Neighbourhood Watch condemns the recent anti-social animal abuse and urges residents upon encountering same to phone the RSPCA, police or bakery, whichever is appropriate and applicable. The lone dissenter argued that the RSPCA, being pro-pet, was actually anti-animal.

Martin stood by his mantelpiece, surrounded by pictures of him and Linda participating in various extreme sports. He held his beer bottle like a microphone.

‘It’s all well and good to have this talking shop,’ Martin said, ‘but I think we should consider some action that is rather more direct.’

Sitting side by side on the Chesterfield were our upstairs neighbours Robert and Holly. They were both teachers and wore the harried, sadly nervous look of people who had to spend all day around unruly children but had not been successful in breeding any of their own.

‘I agree,’ said Robert. ‘I’ve been looking into getting more powers for the Neighbourhood Watch. You can apply through the council. There’s loads of information on the website. Do these pretzels have wheat in them?’

‘I don’t really trust the government,’ Linda said. ‘They never, you know, really —’

‘No, quite right. The system is part of the problem.’ Martin made an expansive gesture and nearly knocked a picture of him and Linda skydiving off the wall. ‘I’ve been thinking of another solution.’

***

The next morning we found out they’d somehow got inside the building and managed to spray-paint blood red letters along the side wall.

PEEPZ LIVIN HERE IZ GAY PS UR CAT IZ DEAD

Which you can imagine how the Tengazis felt about that. Underneath the scrawl was a turd so large and strangely orange coloured it was difficult to tell whether it came from a human or a dog. And since the gardener was spending two weeks in Tenerife, there was nobody to clean it up.

It meant that there was a siege mentality when fifteen of us, handpicked by Martin, met that evening. The group included the five of us from the other day, and Mrs Grimsby and her son, and the Rastafarian from the fifth floor. The Tengazis weren’t there, I noticed, but the Thompsons were, and the Romanian family from 39, and a young couple I’d only seen every so often, hauling Tesco bags and a Maclaren pram up the stairs when the lift was broken, which was usually between September and March.

There were coughs and small shrieks as Martin held aloft a gun.

‘Wow,’ someone said.

‘Is that a good idea?’ someone else said.

Martin steadied his gaze at a fixed point on the far wall.

‘Relax. It’s only a pellet gun and we’ll never have to fire it in anger, but as I’ve demonstrated, it certainly can scare people. Consider this our primary weapon in the prevention of — anti-social behaviour.’

Robert, one of the coughers, coughed louder.

‘I think if we’re going to proceed down this route — and I’m less than convinced on that point — we are going to need strict rules, on engagement and protocol and so forth.’

Martin looked down at the gun; I thought I could see him roll his eyes.

‘Robert, we’re in a state of emergency here. We need to get basic self defence down. If you want to load us down with lots of rules and regulations, I propose you start a subcommittee. The rest of us will get down to business.’

***

We tried to make the best of the fact that they’d somehow managed to uproot the birch tree out front of the building and lay it across Palace Road, and nobody was answering the Local Tree Action Line and so even at 10 o’clock at night there was a line of cars driving really, really slowly through a gap in the branches that had been beaten down by previous vehicles.

Martin sawed off a skinny teenager-sized piece of the tree and hauled into the courtyard, strung it up from the fire escape and marched everyone fifty paces the other way.

‘Are we going to hang them?’ someone said.

‘It’s just a target,’ someone else said.
Martin started shouting.

‘Listen up! Safety here, trigger here. Pump action so it goes like this —’ clunk, kerchunk ‘— safety off, grip here and here, sight with one eye down the scope just like in the movies, slowly squeeze, squeeze, not pull, not yank, just squeeze the trigger and —’

Pop. The tree-target didn’t move.

‘Right, next up?’ He handed the gun to Linda, who parroted her husband’s patter throughout the shot.

‘Pump action, Safety off, grip, squeeze, aim and —’
Pop, plink. Linda’s shot went so wide right it put a hole in the Tengazi’s bathroom window.

‘Everybody okay in there?’ Martin shouted. There was no response. ‘Must not be home. Hope they have insurance. Poor people have suffered enough. Next?’

We got better. I clipped a branch.

‘Nice. That would’ve taken off some yob’s middle finger,’ Martin said.

When Robert’s third attempt made a small but satisfying thud right in the tree’s breastbone, everyone cheered.

***

Patrols started that night in twos and threes. I got put with Robert and Holly.

‘I hear you did National Service,’ Martin said to me, after reading out the assignments.

‘That was fifty years ago,’ I said.

I remember doing something with hay in Devon, getting drunk and slow dancing with a girl in Exeter, and spending a lot of time on the train trying to get back to Shepherds Bush to see my fiancee.

‘Brave stuff,’ Martin said. ‘Shame they got rid of it. I can’t help thinking we wouldn’t have so many of these —’ he paused and looked up at the sky, or the sixth floor ‘ — problems, if it still existed.’

He turned to face us all.

‘Now, stick together, and communicate.’ He’d downloaded an app that turned our mobiles into walkie-talkies. ‘If suspects are encountered, take all necessary measures.’

And away we went. In the lobby of the building, with its yellow wallpaper and list of residents that had last been current in 1992, Robert refused to load the gun, mumbling something about the Human Rights Act.

Holly yanked it away from him.

‘Don’t be such a wet blanket.’ She popped a pellet in the chamber.

We walked slowly around the courtyard, then canvassed each floor in slow succession. The lift was still broken. We scrambled up to the roof and peered down through the streetlights, over the road, down across the roundabout into the posher neighbourhoods on the other side of the A40. You had to wonder if the people there had to wander around with guns in the middle of the night to keep incontinent graffiti artists at bay.

On the way back down we heard a rustle outside of Flat 42. Holly raised the gun and got a bead on the door. I ducked back into the doorway and flattened myself against the wall, a pleasingly deft manoeuvre. Robert just kind of froze.

‘What — what is it?’

Something rustled through a flowerpot and Holly moved, trying to follow the noise in her sights.
There was a strangling noise. Holly jabbed the gun barrel forward.

Then it emerged: the Tengazi’s other cat.

‘Pah,’ Robert scoffed. ‘This is ridiculous.’

***

When our shift was up we went back to courtyard and waited, but our relief team — comprised of Martin and Linda — wasn’t there.

‘Not like them to be late,’ Holly said, looking at her synchronised watch. Suddenly there was a noise from the lobby, like the brakes on a bus or a giant aerosol can. We rushed inside.

Martin was dousing the last sparks of a fire with an extinguisher he’d got from who-knows-where.

‘I can’t believe —’ Linda said, looking on.

Apparently they’d targeted the main door of the building with an oldie but a goodie: the flaming-bag-of-dog-shit-through-the-letterbox trick. The modern twist was that this bag was soaked with petrol and included condoms filled with paraffin. In the lobby the wallpaper was now brown and black, and the charred pinboard had been blasted off the wall by the force of the extinguisher. Burnt damp takeaway menus and notices about recycling collection were flying everywhere.

‘Contemptible,’ Martin said. He looked at us angrily. ‘This is exactly the kind of thing we’re supposed to be preventing.’ He jerked the gun out of Holly’s trembling hands. ‘Go get some sleep. We’ll deal with this.’

***

We took a tally at the next week’s meeting. Three attempted fires (two self-extinguished; these arsonists weren't campers), four stolen bikes, and over the weekend the Thompson’s five-year-old tied with plastic ring-pulls to the far fence and left there for god knows how long.

‘We’re going to take it up a notch,’ Martin said, waiving some new kit around. “Flash-bangs. They’ll stun the suspects but are still non-lethal. And when you get close enough, this is a Taser.’

I glanced around. Nobody looked fazed.

That night our trio was on duty again. Three hours passed quietly. Holly speculated that, it being a bank holiday weekend, the yobs were holding their fire.

‘More likely they’re still in the pubs,’ Robert muttered, uncomfortably hefting the Taser in his right hand.

As if in response, a clattering came from below.

‘Here we go,’ Holly said.

By the time we got down the stairs they’d constructed a pyramid of bins. A couple of them scattered. One last hooded figure was stringing up a trip wire to complete the crude booby-trap. A dog that looked like a cross between a pit bull and a labrador was tied to a nearby railing.

‘Excuse me!’ Robert shouted. ‘Sorry, but excuse me!’

The hoodie looked up, flashing a chubby moon of a face, and then took off towards a gap in the exterior wall. Holly aimed the air gun but instead of clearing the way for a shot, Robert took off after the yob, swinging wide around the yapping dog. Both of the humans disappeared through the gap.

We squeezed through after them, but there was nothing but dark suburban garden on the other side. We stopped to listen and heard a crackle from the Taser, and then a shrill scream, and then another crackle, and an even shriller scream.
Someone was running towards us. Holly threw a flash-bang at the figure, and it ducked.

“Hold on, it’s just me,’ Robert said, panting, clutching his chest. ‘I got the little gobshite, but then he got up, snatched —’

The flash-bang went off somewhere down the street. A car alarm went off. The dog had apparently dislodged himself from the railing, and ran past us, down the street.

Robert continued.

‘— the little bastard snatched the Taser and turned it against me.’

‘My god,’ said Holly, ‘are you okay?’

‘It’s my own stupid fault. I should have hit him again just to be sure.’

‘Martin’s going to be mad.’

‘I don’t care about Martin!’ Robert shouted, yanking the pellet gun out of his wife’s hands. ‘I just want my bloody life back!’

***

The next meeting was tense. Over the weekend, flyposters promoting a MASSIV NU GRIME RAVEUP had covered the entire exterior of the ground floor, including the window and doors. Whole evenings were spent outside with scrapers and buckets of paper-flecked water.

Martin sat in front of the group, frowning, propping up his chin with his fist.

‘It’s not working,’ someone said.

‘We’re losing the battle,’ said someone else. ‘We should sue for peace.’

‘Please people,’ said Linda. ‘This is not the right attitude to, you know —’

Martin got up suddenly.

‘I’ve taken the liberty of acquiring heavier arms,’ he said. ‘Specifically this .22-calibre rifle which we’ll be able to use in controlled conditions once proper training has been given. And an anonymous benefactor —’ he winked at Mr Shibaki ‘— has given us two pairs of nunchaku, the ancient Okinawan weapon.’

‘Hmm, weapons are fine, but what about our broader strategic focus?’ Robert muttered. Either nobody heard him — or everyone ignored him.

‘In the meantime,’ Martin continued, ‘I want to step up the patrols and do some more training on the firearms we already—’

He was interrupted by a loud beeping sound: the front door alarm.

‘I’ll check it out.’ He looked at our armoury and picked up the air rifle. ‘Wait here, I’ll be right back.’

We did no such thing and instead all crowded out to look. One of them had cracked open the entry system and was doing something destructive with the wires inside.

‘Hold it right there,’ said Martin. The kid froze and put his hands up.

‘Hey mate, you ain’t gonna blah nyah rii?’ the yob said, backing away, his sentence descending into incomprehensibility. ‘See ya.’

The kid turned around and started running. For once Martin looked conflicted.

Then the shot came — a loud crack, definitely not the sound of the air gun. The kid yelped, grabbed his arm, and kept running.

Martin looked around to locate the shooter.

It was Robert.

Robert, who hadn’t ever seen a live-fire rifle half an hour before, was reloading.

Robert, who donated a tenner a month to Amnesty International, was taking aim.

‘Hold fire,’ Martin said in a shouted whisper. ‘Hold fire.’

Robert, who taught a special sixth-form module on Mahatma Gandhi, ignored him and squeezed another shot off at the yob. It was a good one too — clipping him in the leg even though he was a hundred yards away. A pedestrian on the other side of the street stopped and looked back and forth at the shooter and the kid, frozen, wondering if she was actually seeing what she was seeing. The yob kept running, albeit with a heavy limp.

‘That’ll larn him,’ Robert was saying, chuckling through his affected American drawl. ‘Don’t think we’ll see the likes of him ‘round here any more.’

***

For the next three nights we went into what Martin called ‘delta high alert’ — two teams on duty at any one time, plus a lookout on the roof (ie, me). We were bracing for a revenge attack, new vandalism, and the police coming to haul Robert away.

‘They’ve all gone into the centre for the big anarchist marches,’ Linda said. ‘They’re not going to have time to look into a petty shooting, that is even if that boy did report —’

We could tell Martin was nervous. He kept polishing the rifle and kept a close watch on the weaponry. Sign-in and sign-out procedures were implemented.

‘Security reasons,’ he said, without elaborating.
On the third night I saw them coming from about half a mile away. Six, or a dozen, maybe thirty of them, with sticks, bats, bicycles, wearing hoodies, masks, black shirts, the whole kit. I tried to send an SOS text to the rest of the squad — but sometimes it was tough to get reception in our building.

By the time I stumbled down the six flights of stairs the situation had developed into a pitched battle. The kids had scattered and were hiding behind lampposts, garden fences across the street and the smashed-up bus shelter. Somewhere off to my right a Taser was crackling, and I could see Martin with the airgun, firing, reloading, deliberately aiming, and reloading again.

‘Man the barricades!’ someone said.

‘Cover me!’ someone else said. ‘I’m going in!’

There was a yelp from the courtyard. I turned and saw Robert dragging one of them by his hood, into the boiler room. I followed Holly inside as he slammed the kid down on the concrete floor.

‘How many are there?’ Robert snarled at the yob.
Martin had kept him away from our conventional arsenal but he’d fashioned a weapon out of broom handle and a nail which he held to the hoodie’s nose. It looked nastily medieval.

‘I just — I er — I — maybe ten or twuny bruv. Let’s just call peace, yeah?’

‘Knives? Guns? Bottles?’

The poor kid couldn’t help but smirk.

‘You asking me about weapons, you got Tasers and flash bangs? Look, we don’t mean nuttin by it.’
Holly stepped forward and cracked the kid on the head with half a brick.

‘What the —’ Robert gasped. ‘I mean, Holly, I'm as angry as you are, but was that really necessary?’

A stream of blood was running down the kid’s ear. He wasn’t dead or even unconscious, but he wasn’t talking either — most of his effort was concentrated on getting his eyes to focus again.

‘It’s a state of emergency,’ Holly said. ‘So I say stuff the Geneva Convention!’

She threw me a frayed length of rope from the corner.

‘Tie him up tight,’ she said. “We’re going back to the front line.’

She took Robert’s hand and led him towards the door. Just before stepping outside she paused for a second and flicked her head around at me.

‘Since that shot heard round the block we’ve made love three times!’

I picked up the rope and looked at the kid.

‘It’s for your own good,’ I said. I knew it was a lie, but I still made sure the knots were tight.

***

The battle developed out on Palace Road, in between the bins and the entrance to the alleyway. The kids were skittish and prone to panicked retreat, but they had an endless supply of reinforcements, all dressed in the same baggy clothes: a renewable zombie army. We held them back with a fraction of the manpower but a vastly superior arsenal.

Martin suggested a war of attrition until morning. We mostly fired over their heads.

‘They’ll get tired soon enough, or they’ll have to go to school or their electronic tags will go off,’ he said. ‘We’ll be stronger playing defence.’

‘Where are the police?’ someone asked.

‘There was a fight at the all-night bagel shop and a drug bust at the club,’ someone else answered.

‘Keep morale up,’ Martin said, passing around strips of dried beef and packets of Haribo sweets. ‘Not long until dawn.’

A crack came from the roof. Everyone ducked, although it would have been too late, if Robert was aiming at us with his rifle and his manic grin.
Even the kids stopped milling around and looked up. Things were now definitely serious.

‘Hold your fire!’ Martin shouted.

Again this prompted Robert to do the opposite. When he raised the gun the squadron of yobs across the street scattered. Robert fired and clipped one of the poor sods on the shoulder, knocking him down.

‘Yeee-haw!’ Robert shouted, unconvincingly. He reloaded and aimed again.

‘Stop!’ Martin yelled. ‘That’s a direct order!’

There was another crack and the kid’s body jerked.
From the direction of the Polish bakery, we could hear a siren.

***

By six o’clock the police had created three zones around the building: a Total Exclusion Zone close up, a Heavily Restricted Area 400 meters beyond and a Selective Buffer of about a square mile around that. The retirement home across the street afforded the best view of our roof and had been taken over by sharpshooters, the residents cleared out and given a free day trip to Brighton. Four armoured vehicles were parked around the block, like compass points.

Some of the yobs had put their hoods down and were posing as normal everyday spectators, while Martin was in heavy conversation with the police commander. Robert was pacing the roof with military precision: five steps one way, heel turn, five steps back.

‘We’re not sure where he got the gun,’ Martin was saying. ‘It was supposed to be a peaceful self-defence protest. This does nothing to help our cause and we certainly don’t endorse his actions, sir.’

‘He’s got a hostage inside so you’d better not shoot,’ Holly chipped in. ‘And he’s celiac so if you send in food make sure it’s gluten-free.’
The commander eyed her up, as if assessing a low-gauge weapon.

A small bald man with a notebook in his hand dipped underneath the wooden barriers demarcating the Heavily Restricted Area.

‘I’m from one the Currant Bun,’ he announced to no one in particular. ‘Geddit? What happened here? How many dead? What are their names? Who’s talking?’

‘It’s hard to say what, really, I dunno —’ said Lisa.

The reporter shrugged and turned to the rest of us. Martin stepped forward.

‘He’s gone off the deep end,’ he said, gazing at the roof. ‘Just a normal chap turned insane.’

‘That’s good,’ said the Current Bun man. ‘I like. Keep up the talking. Pitter patter.’

‘The streets are out of control. It’s anarchy. That’s what’s turned him. A sad comment on the state of Britain today, if I’m honest. He’s got a hostage.’

‘Wait,’ the police commander said. He listened to his radio. ‘We saved the hostage. Although the dog has died.’

‘Brilliant!’ the reporter shouted. ‘Thanks everybody for your time and all that, I’ll send you a link.’

Half an hour later a van pulled up outside the shop on the corner and unloaded stacks of newspapers.

‘ANARCHY’ said the headline. Then in smaller print: ‘Hostage killed by dog’. Smaller print: ‘Just a perfectly normal average chap turned completely and utterly insane by drugs.’ Smallest print: ‘Broken Britain, witnesses say: a terrible comment on this country, modern morals, the government.’

Up on the roof two police officers were poking their heads out of a skylight and using a rake to gingerly push a tray of ham, cheese and crispbreads towards Robert. When he noticed them he turned and pointed the rifle. They scurried back down the ladder as he kicked the meal off the roof. It fluttered down to the pavement.

‘Yeee-haw!’ he shouted, for real this time. One of the yobs’ dogs went after the ham.

You could see the idea develop on Robert’s face. He got out his wallet and chucked down credit cards, John Lewis vouchers, photos of his nephews, used train tickets, 40 quid cash.

Some of the newly arrived crowd hadn’t seen the paramedics try to restart the twice-shot kid’s heart before loading him into the ambulance. They didn't notice the trickles of blood tracing new routes on the bus map or the way the hairdressers' across the street was strangely devoid of frontage glass. In other words, they had no idea how serious things were. Three hoodies rushed the Total Exclusion Zone and went for the cash. One of them perplexedly picked up a credit card, stared at it, rubbed the hologram, and turned it over.
Robert reeled off a shot. It missed. He must have been tired. The sharpshooters on top of the retirement home took this as their cue and blasted away. Holly screamed.

Whole chunks of our building’s leaky roof cracked and flew upwards. Robert awkwardly retreated, through clouds of cement dust, to the corner of the roof furthest from the retirement home. It was hard to tell if he was injured, but he was still waving the rifle around.

A man whose job it was to hand the police commander a megaphone, handed the police commander a megaphone.

‘Robert!’ he said, shouting despite the amplification. ‘Robert! If you come down right now you can receive medical attention immediately! A lawyer will be provided for you at no additional cost! We have a warm comfortable place for you to stay, with a clean bed! We can negotiate the particulars if you sign a release! Make it easy on yourself!’

Holly leaned towards the megaphone.

‘And I’ll make you your favourite flour-free brownies!’

We waited. The street was mostly deserted. Outside the shop was dog-gnawed ham, Tesco receipts, £10 of Robert’s cash, and a metal sign advertising Cornetto that was riddled with bullet holes.

Finally, when the biggest police van had retreated beyond the boundary of the Heavily Restricted Zone, Robert emerged. He was limping, and in one hand he was holding both the gun and his wrist. He stepped to the edge of the roof, put the weapon down and got a piece of paper out of his breast pocket.

‘This is my ...’ His voice got lost in the wind.

‘What?’ someone said.

‘Get him that megaphone!’ someone else said.
Somehow it was hoisted up on the roof with a rope and a pulley.

‘We’re going to need that back when he’s done,’ said the commander. ‘It’s public property.’

‘Shhh,’ Martin said.

‘Shhh,’ Holly said

‘Shh—’ Linda said.

‘THIS IS MY MANIFESTO!’ the heavily amplified Robert said. ‘WE HAVE HAD ENOUGH OF THE YOBS RUINING OUR LIFES — that’s supposed to be LIVES — AND WE’RE NOT GOING TO TAKE IT ANY MORE. LET THIS BE THE FIRST —’

Something hit Robert in the chest. He stumbled backwards.

‘Rifle Taser,’ said the commander. ‘More or less harmless.’

‘Wow,’ Martin said, admiringly. ‘Nice shot.’
Robert clutched his chest and stumbled forwards.

‘Oh no!’ someone said.

‘Oh no!’ someone else said.

For an instant his body paused, balanced on one leg, on the roof edge.

Then momentum took over, and Robert spun and fell, snapping tree branches and illegal satellite dishes, down six stories, towards the spot where someone had dumped a broken Hoover and a discarded double-glazed window on the other side of our building's urine-stained concrete wall.