I was near to achieving spiritual and physical oneness with the couch, holding bags of frozen petits pois against my face when Susan rang from her office number.  She left a white-hot voicemail message threatening legal action, vowing to withhold my final paycheque.

In a measured e-mail reply I expressed grave concern over Susan's inability to recall dictating every word of the tweets I sent.  How she begged me to represent Stephen and spin his separation from Prestige Media Accord as an amicable ascension in which he had traded up, not been turned out.

I attached the most sensational image from her blackout photo shoot.  Inquired whether to include the firm's solicitor in our next round of correspondence, or simply CC everyone on the fourth floor if Susan delayed payment of my wages and failed to take responsibility for directing my actions that night.

In closing I wrote:

Feel better soon. 

Majid gave me something to help me sleep.  Two sky-blue triangular tablets dissolved into sandy lumps under my tongue.  He woke me after dark when Tomasz came round to deliver a rubber-armored hard drive of footage from the cameras in his car.

I gargled salt water at the kitchen sink, spit the bitter film from my mouth and served coffee.  Tomasz wrapped tattooed knuckles around his mug, stood in the window and debriefed us on his spiritual ride-along session with Stephen.

Fatigue and worry blunted Tomasz' bright eyes. He had qualms about secretly recording the artist formerly known as Sir P.

"He should know we do this," he said, gesturing toward Majid hunched over his laptop, screening footage from the sandwich-sized hard drive.

I led Tomasz to the couch.  Sat beside him and pointed to the signed media release on the final page of Stephen's contract.

"For a limited time," I said, "I own the rights to everything from Stephen's DNA to his dreams.  He's given permission, he just doesn't know I've started filming.  The public will never grant him a second chance unless they can see he's been punished and humbled.  If you tell him about the cameras, his ego will turn every conversation into a performance and I'll have nothing to show but a case study in narcissism.  So long as Katie Price is breathing air on Earth he'll never stand out in that market."

Tomasz' expression flashed an international error code.  I diagnosed our disconnect as a cultural one.  Here was a committed grafter, a proud Polish family man who would sell a kidney before pushing his good name through a sausage grinder like reality television.  How could I make him understand that Stephen was a shameless publicity parasite who would take the bins out with his dressing gown wide open to remain relevant on any tier?

"Mate look," I said.  "You only feel like shit about this because you've actually met the real Stephen. That's who I'm trying to capture, the same likeable dickhead you drove all over London today.  Shame is all he has left to trade.  We're saving his life by keeping him in front of the camera.  He won't survive in the wild.  Working for a living would be fucking fatal."

Majid picked one earbud from his head and returned the hard drive to Tomasz.

"Can I just say something bruv?  Man your voice talent's comin-cross gorgeous in this footage.  You gotta scary kinda Slavic Darth Vader delivery when you're on about Jesus, and that's balanced by this warm sorta James Corden thing when you're talkin' addiction recovery.  You're like both Testaments.  The good copper as well as the bad, yeah?  Very big medicine."

A ride notification chirped on Tomasz' phone.  I followed him down to the street and for the second time he refused my payment of two hundred pounds.

"Please," I said. "For your time, your petrol.  And for driving Stephen from the press conference to rehab on Monday.  Swindon's not exactly around the corner."

Tomasz reinstalled the hard drive and buckled up.  Gestured for me to stand clear of his car door and pulled it shut.  I pressed the bank notes against the glass.  He frowned and powered the window down. 

"I don't take money for this," he said.  "You can donate to Salvation Army.  They save my life.  Now I give this back and help Stephen.  Someday, maybe he helps another man."

"There's no limit to the number of people we might help by documenting Stephen's journey to sobriety," I said.  "And I'll treble this donation right now if you'll reconsider working on the Sabbath.  I know Stephen is excited to attend church with you and your family tomorrow and I could really use some cam on that.  Maybe introduce him to your daughters?  Get him talking about his children?"

Tomasz said nothing.  I'd trampled the muck of my ambition over and beyond a white linen limit of decency and I couldn't bear to see disapproval in his blue eyes. 

He clipped his phone into a mount beside the Bible on the dashboard.

"You need to change the way you think in your heart," he said.

He drove off without saying goodbye.  

With the funds Tomasz declined and a small bridge loan from Majid, I booked uncatered event space at Saint Pancras Renaissance Hotel and tweeted the time and date of the press conference to the world.  The bloodflow cooled and crawled beneath my flinching skin.

"Well fuck yes and lookit you making moves," Majid said.  "No turnin' back now, is there?"

He gave me something to keep me awake.  I cut thin shims from the red end of a wine cork, wedged them between my back teeth to prevent cracking my molars like hard candy and we worked through the night to finish the trailer for my untitled Sir Peanut project.  Jerky birds on the window ledge cooed and shat in grey morning light as I uploaded the pitch reel to YouTube and sent the private link to Deeandra Foyle, Marian Moore's second in command at CrashChannel.

For the first time in my life I followed Tomasz' Judeo-Christian superstition, stood down from all screens and observed Sunday as a day of rest.

Before muting my devices I texted a dress code to Stephen.

target aesthetic: a civil servant's funeral circa

1955 suit jacket pressed shirt tucked into

trousers with belt loops and a belt shave

your face and head no logos no brand names

no joggers no hooded sweatshirts no fucking

baseball caps turn up in anything but hard-

soled footwear and I will murder you devote

my life to the study of witchcraft reanimate

your corpse and murder you a second time

Majid recommended a chemical detour to reverse the flow of my mood.  An oblong tablet colored like a fresh hen's egg from my grandfather's farm.

The drug was an old friend.  One bar of a beautiful lullaby shaped like a bullet.  Maddasyn soothed me with that tune on a freezing night in Illinois when I was spun and buggy, skin-picking restless and desperate to achieve a few hours' sleep before another double shift dancing at the club.

I opened my mouth to swallow the pill and Maddasyn slapped it out of my hand, pinched it from the dusty floor between green scarab fingernails and scolded me.

"S'ain't Tylenol," she said. "Like you'll waste it that way.  Watch."

Maddasyn crushed the drug under a Bacardi bottle and sprinkled the powder in a creased strip of aluminum foil.  She held it up like a Victorian photographer's magnesium flash and demonstrated how to chase it down in bubbly streaks between a flame and a straw.

Time compressed into a mute season that passed without light or heat, worry or need.  I followed brassy bells of laughter out of the darkness and lifted my head to see Maddasyn hee-hawing and mocking me from the far side of the kitchen table.  My fringe had become stuck in the foil's black polydactyl tracks and the scorched tin sheet dangled over one eye as if I'd bolted from a cheap salon in the middle of getting highlights.

I knew Majid would appreciate the drug's hidden potential, but I couldn't afford to lose a day nodding and drooling beside him.  My tolerance was flimsy, fit only to navigate the calm shallows of the odd medicine-cabinet dabble.  The days when I could scoff at storm warnings and brave open water were far behind me.

I popped the pill with a shot of cold coffee and silently apologized to Maddasyn.

Monday morning Majid and I arrived at Saint Pancras to set up the room, test the projector and rig our rented lights and cameras.  My intestinal tract was a caustic canal of stomach acid, amphetamines and too many Red Bulls, dissolving my teeth at the roots and sending threatening sensations to my rectum.  I quietly swore, hardened my core with yoga megafocus and stooped to label a reserved chair front and center for Deeandra Foyle.

Two hours later Deeandra's place of honor was the only open seat when I looked at my scuffed faux Tissot, moved to the front of the room and began the press conference without Stephen. 

I did not apologize for his tweets.  Nor did I implore those in attendance to excuse Stephen as another defective product of an obsolete generation.  Instead I confirmed that every shocking rumour, every bad bit of press attached to my client was an absolute fact.

"Those accounts require no verification," I said.  "I'll tell you myself Stephen becomes quite loud and insensitive when he drinks. He can be equally obnoxious when he's sober and I don't expect that to change simply because the man completes rehab, so let's be quite clear.  Celebrated or cancelled, famous or forgotten, Stephen Cowles is just another man who will never be perfect."

Majid projected a still frame of HMS Sheffield on fire in the Falklands.  The image dissolved into a portrait of a young Royal Navy cook in uniform, then a photo of Stephen as a chubby smiling baby.

"Perfect people," I continued, "don't lose their fathers to Exocet missiles five days before they're born.  They don't grow up feeling unwanted at home, excluded in school, and then compensate by modelling themselves on raunchy comedians, Flava Flav and Mister Bean."

Some cunt laughed.  My twitchy vision tightened from a distant macro, where I saw everyone but perceived no one, to a nightmare micro where the rows of faces formed a hive of shaved and scrubbed holes sucking in precious air, exhausting warm humid poison into the cramped room where I was fighting for survival.

I chose a face at random.  Stared between its eyes to defuse the power of the mob and conquer them as one.  I tilted my head like a puzzled Buddhist monk watching a bare-knuckle brawl and revealed the heart of my treatise for sympathy.  

"Sir Peanut Majestic was never Stephen's career choice," I said.  "That lucrative charade was the evolution of a lonely child's coping mechanism.  He's learned the hard way that playing edgy jester is not sustainable.  I'm not asking you to forgive my client's actions out of pity, but to give him the chance to grow up and find new ways to contribute, right alongside the rest of us who might feel imperfect." 

A red-faced Mirror reporter filming me with his phone frowned at my image and shouted at the real me:

"Is Sir P not here?"

I paused.  Searched and found what I needed.

"He struggles," I said.  "Today is hard for him.  That's why Stephen feels his story is worth sharing.  To help the addict who still suffers."

Eyes rolled.  I pressed on.

"Stephen wants very much to be seen as a success story.  A source of inspiration and comfort for anyone brave enough to seek victory over addiction.  Those and them clever enough to have attained perfection in this life, I can't imagine their reaction to Stephen's quest for redemption would be anything but supportive."

Majid dimmed the lights.  The suicide-sad piano score we chose for the pitch reel kicked in and I stepped aside, squinting to see past the video projector's glare and monitor the crowd's engagement.  I found Susan standing tall at the back of the room filming me with a new phone in a Hello Kitty case. 

I plugged my arse into Deeandra Foyle's empty seat and quietly crumpled the RESERVED sign.  My neck burned with the urge to turn and watch the doorway for Stephen but I didn't dare risk making eye contact with Susan. 

The reel ended.  Majid brought up the lights and the room filled with applause.  My bowels slithered to spell urgent phrases, creating serious doubt about whether I could stand up and not soil myself.  I firmed every muscle and slowly rose to face the audience for questions.  Susan was gone.

A stout blue bollard of woman in a Salvation Army uniform filled the doorway and cruised to the front of the room.  Tomasz trailed behind her, dressed like a TK Maxx hitman in a double-breasted charcoal suit with a crimson three-point pocket square.

That sweet coffee-loving Bible-thumping Uberjockey actually fucking came through for me.  I went a bit wet at both ends and began reviewing a lurid list of acts I would perform to demonstrate my gratitude toward Tomasz, if he were not a husband, father and sworn Salvationist. 

"Ladies and gentlemen," I said, "Stephen's journey began with a stroke of good fortune when he met this man.  I am pleased to introduce Tomasz, and with him today, representing The Salvation Army is ... "

I nodded, hung out one hand and grinned, a clueless prize model showing off a flash motor on a fucking quiz show.

The woman took a deep breath.  Plump pumpkin cheeks nudged her earlobes against the epaulets on her shoulders as she spoke.

"Hello everyone and thank you," she said.  "I am Major Wheeler.  Yesterday I had the privilege of welcoming Stephen Cowles into the Salvation Army as an adherent member.  Today, Stephen wishes to announce the end of his persona and career as a secular entertainer.  He will have no further comment to the press, now or in the future.  He asks for privacy during this difficult time of reflection and spiritual healing for himself and his family.  Thank you all, and God bless."

The room erupted.

Tomasz plowed a path through the mob.  Major Wheeler followed in short heavy steps and I shuffled behind her like a dumb duckling, too stunned to bat away outstretched arms thrusting lights and lenses into my face. 

The journos piled up in the doorway, then regrouped to swarm me in the hall.  My peripheral vision tracked Susan smirking, strolling alongside and filming the bizarre procession.

I shut out the shouting.  Held my brass tight, turned it shiny-side up.  Ignored the jostling, the smell of bad breath and fags and concentrated on a silver seam of hair in the tight chestnut skein atop Major Wheeler's blocky head.

That shiny streak ran dull in the light of day.  Cool air and diesel fumes restored my senses.  I had followed Major Wheeler all the way to Tomasz' car.  Ever the gentleman, he reached past the valet and held her passenger door.  The sedan rocked on its shocks.

Outnumbered and surrounded I tugged on the locked rear door.  Tomasz' cold stare killed any budding hope of rescue.  He gently closed the Major's door and handed me an Aldi forever bag containing the hard drive microphones cameras and wires Majid installed in his car. 

Tomasz unbuttoned his suit jacket and slipped behind the wheel.  I rapped on the glass.  Major Wheeler rolled down her window.

"Stephen and I have an agreement," I said.  "He's granted permission for my production company to document his recovery-"

"I don't dispute that," Major Wheeler snapped.  "But you will never see the inside of my clinic while representing interests that would undermine client confidentiality."

"He signed a release," I said.

"This sounds like a legal matter," she said.  "I do not deal in legal matters, I deal in addiction recovery.  But I am familiar with your motivations.  Here."

She twisted in her seat and put a sturdy pay envelope in my hand.  The reporters hovering over my shoulders crowded closer.

"What's this?"  I asked.

"Your pieces of silver," Major Wheeler said.  "I believe that's the going rate."

She powered her window up.  Tomasz' tiny hybrid clicked and wheezed away into traffic.

I hung the Aldi bag in the crook of my elbow.  Dumped the small change from the envelope into my hand and counted ten, twenty, thirty five-pence coins.

"One pound fifty, what the fuck?" I said, to no one.

A few cunts laughed.

"Oh lass," the red-faced reporter said to my image on his phone.  "Missus Major's fuckin' hadya there. 'Sfrom the Bible like.  Joodis Carryit took thirty pieces a'silver fer grassin' on Jesus."

The flying monkeys I'd summoned to carry news of my come-up and Stephen's comeback now turned on me, begging comment, barking for answers.  In a horrified state of hypnosis my fried eyes fixed on the red-faced reporter's phone, bobbing inches from my face.  It was filthy like his fingers, smudged and smashed, scratched to fuck.  White webs of dried snot crisscrossed the sleeve of his dandruff-dusted North Face puffer.

My vision went swimmy with ripples of shock.  Shadows between the paving stones stretched to dizzying chasms.  I was seconds from shitting myself.

I elbowed free of the scrum, tottered away and gave the coins to the boy at the valet podium.  I had a moment to speak privately before the reporters circled me again.

"I'm not well," I said.  "I have a disability and I need a toilet.  Please help me."

The valet led me past a cordon, through a door marked STAFF ONLY to a cramped frigid toilet stall papered with pornographic pin-ups and pages torn from topless Pirelli calendars.  The sweet young man stood guard and checked in on me once, rapping gently.  My thighs were nearly numb from sitting when Majid hammered on the door.

"They've all gone," he shouted.  "Cleaners wanted the room.  I've got everything packed if you're ready.  Are you ready?"

I daubed my raw asshole once more.  Folded a rough ribbon of tissue into an origami insurance policy and tucked it in place.  Washed my hands and flashed a held-hostage-at-gunpoint sort of smile as I passed my prince valet on the way to Majid's car.

We drove home in silence.  If I hadn't towered over Majid and outweighed him since childhood, I would have cried like a baby until he carried me up to the flat in his arms, but I was stuck with a business partner who was built like Bugs Bunny.

Every step required a level of mental effort that reminded me of mountaineers perishing in the Death Zone on Mount Everest, where voluntary tasks of locomotion and self-preservation become impossible to execute at altitude.

I summited the staircase, binned my fouled knickers and showered.  Collapsed on the couch in a towel and asked Majid for something to help me sleep.

He hesitated.  Ducked into his room and returned in a fresh cloud of cologne, holding another egg-colored passport to Much Much Later in the palm of his hand.  Not on offer, but on display.

"We should chat at some point," he said.  "About our arrangement I mean.  Your series with Stephen?  If that ain't goin' forward, the money you borrowed can't be repaid as we agreed, we should ... you know.  We ought to talk and, maybe come to an understanding.  Not today, I know you're not feeling your best.  But.  Soon.  You know?"

I knew.  I nodded and held out my hand.

Majid gave me the pill.  It came with a look I didn't like but that's life in fucking London and business is business.

He returned to his room.  I went looking for a straw and some foil.  Shut myself in my room and didn't bother stacking cans.  He wouldn't come for me like this.