#AnarchyDare

“The Ten Commandments dictate the fundamental principles of morality. Therefore, we still have a code to abide by. My congregation and I take comfort in that fact.” Maddox stared intently at Trystan’s shattered mobile phone in his Dad's palm. Partial visibility had been restored via his Dad's forceful shaking and the three of them watched intermittently flashing images of the female presenter chatting to a vicar in the studio.

“I understand your point, but a large proportion of the United Kingdom do not hold Christian beliefs. We very much live in a multi-cultural society. How do you think non-Christians will react?”

“Every religion is based on some variation of right and wrong. Those values will hold strong.”

“And what about those who have no religion? Do you see atheists feeling more carefree perhaps?”

“Every being on God's green earth knows good from bad. It is an intrinsic trait.”

“So, what do-”

“A lot has been said in the last hour,” interrupted the vicar. “The time has come for reflection, to consider what we have lost. Please join me in a minute silence.”

Just as it appeared the presenter had started the silence without agreeing, she smiled and said, “Yes, of course.” Presumably she, or the voice in her ear, considered it disrespectful to object.

“Isn't a minute’s silence for when someone important’s died?” asked Maddox.

“Not important, just famous,” replied Trystan.

“Well, whose dead?”

“Commonsense,” said Vaughan.

The vicar bowed his head and the presenter followed suit. A blue banner flashed up with, 'A time of reflection', explaining the unusual silence on a channel renowned for its constant stream of news.

Maddox closed his eyes, but instead of considering what he’d lost, continued his earlier daydreaming and imagined what he had gained: Seren. She was gorgeous, with big brown eyes, short curly brown hair, red lips and an innocent smile. He loved every contour of her powdery-white face and couldn’t wait to touch it.

Loud ringing from the landline sent the three of them jumping backwards. 

“Christ,” said Trystan.

“Watch your language,” reprimanded Vaughan as he stepped into the kitchen and grabbed the wall-mounted phone with his right hand, while his left still clutched the mobile. “Hello? Yes, I'm Mr Howell. She hasn't?” Vaughan checked his watch. “I'll be there in 10 minutes. Goodbye.” Vaughan pressed down the hook on the phone holder, released it and then dialled another number on the handset.

“What is it?” asked Trystan. 

“Your Mum hasn't collected Gwen,” said Vaughan, holding the landline to his ear.

Maddox couldn't see the mobile screen, but still heard the presenter. “International outcry has rapidly swept around the Globe. The President of the United States issued a brief written statement soon after the Prime Minister’s speech saying that he was 'surprised and disappointed' to have not been consulted or even informed before the announcement was made. He is due deliver a full statement within the next hour at a live press conference from the White House.”

Vaughan slowly placed the handset back into its holder. “No answer.” He grabbed his keys from the kitchen worktop and strode past the boys to the front door.

“My phone,” said Trystan.

Vaughan pointed his finger at Trystan. “Don't push it.” He opened the door and stepped outside. “You two stay here. Trystan, watch Maddox.”

“I won't let him out of my sight,” said Trystan, wrapping his arm around Maddox and smiling at him. It appeared there was an uneasy truce, with Trystan suspending hostilities to bring Maddox under his wing. Vaughan walked off down the path to his old Ford Fiesta parked on the road in-front of the small garden.

Maddox waved his Dad off, closed the door and turned around, when a coat landed over his head. He yanked it off, fearing Trystan was blocking his vision ahead of an attack. However, Trystan was entering the lounge, not wielding a weapon. A second later, he appeared with his leather jacket, barged past Maddox and opened the front door again.

“What are you doing?”

“He said keep an eye on you. I'm going out, so you're coming with me.” Trystan pushed Maddox out of the house, pulled the door shut behind them and paced away. 

Maddox stood stationary. “Hey, Trystan, hang on.”

At the end of the drive, Trystan stepped onto the pavement and turned right. “Hurry up,” he said without looking back. 

Maddox glanced at the locked house to which he had no means of reentry and then jogged to catch up. “Wait.” He arrived by Trystan's side and slowed to walk in step. “When he gets home and we're not there, he'll be well mad.”

“We better get back before he is then. He'll be gone about half an hour.” Trystan checked his watch and then started legging it up the road.

Maddox sprinted to catch up. “Where we going?”

“You'll see.”

After five minutes, Trystan pushed through a small black gate of a dowdy brick house on the corner of a road and walked up the garden path.

“Whose house is this?” asked Maddox, still following.

“Don’t know.” Trystan walked past the front door and continued on the path down the side of the house. At the end was a small fence, which he leapt over, landing in the back garden of another house. Maddox looked up and down the deserted street and then climbed over a little more cautiously.

“What are you doing?” Maddox followed Trystan through the long grass and over the cracked flagstone patio covered in f*g-butts.

Trystan pulled down the back door handle and pushed open the door. “We aren't knocking at the front?”

“No,” said Trystan, walking in.

Maddox’s heart raced and he glanced around anxiously. Trystan gave no indication that he knew anyone inside and appeared to breaking in. Was he immediately taking advantage of the suspended laws? But why this house specifically, and how could he have known the door would be unlocked?

“Get in here. Or are you too posh?” Maddox bit his gum and then stepped inside, quietly closing the door behind him. Trystan sneaked through the house, prompting Maddox to do the same. The inside was as run-down as the outside. The over-sized filthy green carpet crawled up the skirting board, yellow flowery wallpaper peeled from the walls and the ceiling was black with smoke. Trystan grabbed a box of cereal sat on the side of the pink sofa and began eating it as he crept upstairs. Maddox stopped at the bottom, until Trystan glared at him and signaled for him to come up. Maddox didn’t usually get caught up in Trystan’s antics, mainly because Trystan wouldn’t normally have anything to do with him, but Maddox had somehow been sucked in.

At the top of the stairs were three shut doors. Trystan pointed to the one with ‘Hold your nose’ written on it. “Do as you’re told, if I were you,” whispered Trystan.

Maddox leaned in to Trystan and spoke so quietly he wasn’t sure he had even asked, “Why?”

“Stale farts!” shouted Trystan, swinging the door open.

A fat boy jumped up out of his chair. “F**k’s sake, Tin.”

Trystan laughed and patted Lard on the back. Maddox hated Lard. He had a permanent smile attached to his face, but he wasn’t friendly, not to Maddox anyway. He was ugly, thick and smelt like the dump. “Why Posh here?” And he called Maddox, ‘Posh.’

“Gotta watch him. How old are these?” Trystan threw the box of cereal onto the messy unmade bed and the contents spilled onto the floor. Lard didn’t seem to care, and it was easy to see why, the frosted wheat bites just merged in with the squalor. This was a room, and a home, fit for a pig. Which was lucky, because it was inhabited by a family of them.

Lard adjusted his thick round glasses and sat back down at his desk, where his old PC computer sat. He had a small screen, but at least he had one; the only Internet access Maddox had was at school.

“What’s the latest?” Trystan placed one hand on the back of Lard’s chair and leaned over to look at the screen.

“F*****g mad,” said Lard.

As reluctant as Maddox was to go anywhere near Lard, he needed to see what was going on, and so leaned over Lard’s other shoulder. Lard looked up at Maddox in contempt. “What you doing, Posh?”

“He’s so gay.” Trystan just couldn’t help himself, trying to look cool in-front of his mate by insulting Maddox. Whatever. He’d get his, one day.

Maddox skimmed the page.

A box appeared at the top: ‘2,218 new results.’ The number continued to grow exponentially and within a moment it was 21,027.

“Never seen anything like it,” said Lard. “It’s a phenonema, phenomina, phen-”

“Phenomenon,” corrected Maddox, unable to listen to Lard try again.

Lard directed his big chubby arse at Maddox and farted. Maddox backed away to the other side of the small room, while Lard and Trystan cracked up.

“What the locals saying?” asked Trystan.

Lard clicked on the mouse, but Maddox couldn’t see anything. He looked around the disgusting hovel, ensuring not to touch anything. Patches of mold lined the walls and crusted food and sticky scum covered every surface. Comics and porn mags poked out from under the bed. The sight of a blond girl fondling her own large tits while biting her lip seductively gave him an erection.

Lard began laughing. “Look what she’s put!”

“She always was game.”

“You got off with her?”

“We sneaked in to form class and hid before they locked up at lunch.”

“And?”

“She was gagging for it. I gave it to her.”

“Who you talking about?” asked Maddox.

“Seren.”

Maddox felt his stomach twist in knots. He knew Trystan had kissed her, and had been jealous as hell, but didn’t think he’d gone all the way. He wanted to punish Trystan, to rip out his guts and wear them around his neck. Trying not to think of how Trystan had corrupted Seren, Maddox leaned back in to read what she had put.

‘#TheAnarchyState balls or baby? go (il)legal and prove it #AnarchyDare.’

“Wild thing,” said Trystan.

“You going to do something?” Lard asked Trystan, who stood up straight, pondering.

“What about you, Posh?”

Maddox looked him straight in the eye. “Yeah, definitely, sounds fun.”

“Like what?”

It came back to what Maddox was thinking earlier, and he hadn’t exactly come up with a long list of crazy things. Skipping school, ditching his exams and making Seren his girlfriend would hardly impress these two. The only other thing on his mind was dismembering Trystan.

“Anarchy Dare? You’re more like Anarchy P***y,” said Trystan. He and the fat boy burst out laughing and looked back at the computer. Maddox turned away in disgust. Not in disgust at them, but in himself. He didn’t have anything worthy to do and he didn’t have any means to show the world anyway.

His eyes came to rest on the bed and a small black item sat on top of the scrunched up duvet. A mobile phone. Two for the price of one. His first go at #AnarchyDare could be to steal the phone with which he would then use to record and upload his future exploits.

While the two idiots were absorbed in social media, Maddox casually wandered over to the bed. Once at the side of the small single bed that seemed incapable of holding someone of Lard’s size and weight, Maddox turned around and placed his hands behind his back. He was ready to fall back onto the gross bed and pretend to sit while actually swiping the phone, but something held him back. He remembered what the vicar said, that every person instinctively knew right from wrong. Maddox had thought it bullshit, but the vicar was bang on. Stealing was immoral, and no matter the reward, Maddox’s conscience wouldn’t let him do it.

“Lame or what?” said Trystan. “Standing in the road isn’t anarchy! It was barely illegal when there was laws.”

“Looks like a big pansy, like you, Posh,” said Lard.

Rage rose within Maddox and any doubts evaporated. Lard didn’t deserve the phone, so Maddox was justified in taking it. He sat down on the bed and his hands searched around behind him. Unfortunately, the phone wasn’t where he thought.

“What you doing?” yelled Lard, standing up. “Get off my bed!”

“I’m resting,” said Maddox, his hands fumbling about desperately.

Lard clutched Maddox’s t-shirt and tried to lift him up, but Maddox grabbed Lard’s wrists and resisted. He’d given up on the phone, but wasn’t going to let the fat f**k boss him around.

After a moment, Lard gave up and instead pushed Maddox back onto the bed, where he felt something hard dig into his back; presumably the phone.

“Get f*****g off,” said Lard panting, the exertion more than he could cope with.

“Okay, fine,” said Maddox, his brain trying to work out how he could swipe the mobile without the two people staring at him noticing. “Argh!” Maddox reached for his back.

“You hurt yourself falling on a bed?” said Trystan.

Maddox grabbed the phone and slipped it into his tracksuit trousers pocket. “No, no, I’m okay.” Maddox rose to his feet and looked at the unsuspecting morons. He was so impressed with his manoeuvre that he wanted to tell them about it. Of course that would defeat the purpose, so he’d settle for gloating online.

“Don’t ever touch my bed again.”

“I have no desire to,” said Maddox, his confidence sufficiently buoyed to answer back. “Where’s the… bog?” he asked, carefully choosing his word as a veiled dig.

“Next room. Don’t do a log, I don’t want to smell your s**t all day,” replied Lard. Maddox’s s**t would smell like roses compared to the stench in this hellhole. Maddox walked out as Trystan and Lard repositioned themselves in-front of the computer again. Reluctant to touch the bathroom door, Maddox kicked it open, entered the garishly pink room and kicked it shut. The smell from the sodden towels and dripping clothes hanging over the bath made him want to hurl.

Maddox removed the phone from his pocket and used the touchscreen to navigate to Twitter, where he set-up a new account under his standard username, ‘MAD-dox’. Once complete, he clicked on the ‘Compose new Tweet…’ box and typed as he whispered, “Great game @SirenSeren. Stole this mobile. Only proof is this message, but follow me, I’m just getting started. #AnarchyDare.”