Pack Animals - By Peter Anghelides Page 0,1

confession?’

‘Forgive me, Father,’ said the soft voice, ‘for you have sinned.’

Now Father Ninian did peer directly through the grille. He saw a figure in an orange Cardiff United shirt. The unblinking green eyes stared back, so shockingly direct that the priest flinched away. He knew this boy. No longer a boy, of course, he was… who? Father Ninian’s mind reeled as he tried to compose his thoughts. One of his altar servers from… eight years ago, perhaps more. Gary or Gareth or Graeme. Gareth, it was Gareth. Must be in his twenties now. How could he have forgotten Gareth?

‘You’re not going to forgive me,’ Gareth said coldly.

Father Ninian fiddled with his trouser leg. He couldn’t leave now, he’d barely been in here two minutes, what would the Wendles think? ‘It’s not me who forgives you, my son. I absolve you in the name of—’

‘I don’t want your absolution.’

‘You could have sought penance at any church. Why choose Holy Innocents?’

‘Holy Innocents?’ Another snort of laughter. ‘You’re not wholly innocent yourself, are you, Father?’ He rattled the partition between them. ‘I’ve brought you this.’

A piece of coloured card was pushed through the side of the grille. It was like a large playing card, the size of a paper sheet folded in half. Father Ninian plucked it from the frame and studied it quizzically. His question died on his lips when he heard the fizzing noise, like a match being struck. Absurdly, the priest’s first thought was of Health and Safety regulations that forbade smoking inside the building but still allowed his altar boys to light a thurible and wave incense around the church.

A bright flare of illumination filled the confessional. The priest felt his heart pound. The place was ablaze with light. In the confined space, a squat human shape was forming before his eyes, dark against a brilliance brighter than the rose window.

No, not a human. Now he could see a monster in human form. Rags loosely covered its creased leathery hide. A skein of scraggy hair tufted around a snarling face of deep-set eyes and drooling mouth. Its forehead was marked with deep wrinkles, brutal furrows scribbled across its brow. The enclosed space filled with its foul stench.

‘Oh God!’ cried Father Ninian.

‘As usual,’ said Gareth’s calm voice, ‘God has nothing to do with it.’

Father Ninian choked a scream. The creature cocked its hideous head and turned its attention to him. It seized him in one savage movement and raked the flesh of his face and neck with its sharp teeth. The priest shrieked and slipped from its grasp. He squirmed between its straddling legs, through the curtain, and out onto the parquet of the aisle. Mrs Wendle craned her neck out of her overcoat, and stared down at him like a startled turtle.

Inside the confessional, the monster lurched to left and right in a furious attempt to escape from its wooden prison. The curtain wrenched aside and the creature loomed in the frame, bellowing. The Wendles fled.

Father Ninian scrambled backwards down the side aisle, too terrified to decide whether to waste time trying to stand. The creature slammed two pews aside. Beyond it, the priest could see Gareth swiftly but calmly walking away into the shadows at the rear of the church.

‘Gareth, help me!’ pleaded Father Ninian.

Gareth’s orange football shirt continued to move away. The young man’s calm voice floated back in the church’s echo. ‘Help you? I can’t even forgive you.’

Just as Father Ninian reached the altar rail, the monster reached Father Ninian.

ONE

Banana Boat was driving Rhys Williams crazy. Rhys hated shopping trips at the best of times, and his long-time school friend’s relentlessly cheerful running commentary during their progress through the out-of-town mall was wearing him down. That parking was impossible, said Banana. These food court prices were a rip-off, announced Banana. Those lasses in Valley Girl were well shaggable, declared Banana. And is that kid wearing a Halloween mask, or does being that ugly come naturally?

He’d been hyper since getting back from Lanzarote. Rhys was almost sorry that the Spanish authorities had released Banana from his brief stay in police custody. He’d been caught flogging bootleg CDs in Tias, but unexpectedly allowed home with just a warning. ‘They kept my bloody CDs, though,’ Banana had grumbled, to Rhys’s incredulity.

The way today was going, he’d be behind bars again before lunch, they wouldn’t have the wedding coats hired, and they’d both miss this evening’s international at the Stadium to boot.

‘Hello?’ called Banana from the nearby changing room. He