On his left were more buildings; light industrial and office premises topped by flats. Outside an open door of something called the Wells Workshop, at the kerb, stood a large American sports car. It was a Trans Am. Graham frowned as he passed it, partly at its loud white-lettered tyres and obtrusive styling, but partly because it reminded him of something; something to do with Slater, with Sara even.

Then he remembered; appropriately enough it had been at the party when Slater had first introduced Graham and Sara to each other. The coincidence amused Graham.

A smell of new shoes from another workshop wafted around him as he looked up at the old, stopped clock jutting out, two-faced, over the pavement from the first floor of the workshop, hands frozen at twenty-past-two (he glanced at his watch; it was actually 3:49). Graham smiled to himself, and recalled that night, another of Slater's never-to-be-written plots.

"Right. It's Science Fiction. There's this -"

"Oh no," Graham said. They were standing by the mantelpiece in the front room of Martin Hunter's large house in Gospel Oak. Mr Hunter - Martin, to his students - was one of the lecturers at the Art School, and was giving his customary late Christmas party, in January. Slater had been invited, and had persuaded Graham he would not be gate-crashing if he came along too. They took along a box of wine they bought between them, and were drinking the red vin de table from plastic half-pint glasses. Apart from some salty garlic bread, neither of them had had anything to eat for some hours beforehand so, despite the fact that the party was hardly properly underway yet, they were both feeling the effects of the drink.

Music played loudly from the dining-room next door, where the carpets had been rolled back so that people could dance. Most of the people in the front room were sitting on couches or beanbags. Martin Hunter's own paintings, large gaudy canvases which looked like close-ups of minestrone soup seen under the effects of a powerful hallucinatory drug, adorned the walls.

"Just listen. There's this lot of weird aliens called the Sproati and they decide to invade Earth -"

"I think this has been done before," Graham said, taking a drink. Slater looked exasperated.

"You won't let me finish," he said. He wore a pair of grey shoes, baggy white trousers and what appeared to be a red tuxedo. He took a drink and went on, "Okay, so they're invading Earth, but they're doing it as a tax dodge so that -"

"A tax dodge?" Graham said, leaning forward and looking Slater in the eye. Slater giggled.

"Yeah, they have to spend so much of the galactic year out of the Milky Way or the galactic tax federation hammers them for gigacredits, but instead of paying for expensive inter-galactic travel they camp out on some backwater planet still in the galaxy and just hide, see? But: something goes wrong. They're coming in on a starship disguised as a Boeing 747 so that the locals won't suspect until it's too late, but when they land at London Heathrow their baggage gets lost; all their heavy weaponry ends up in Miami and gets mixed up with the luggage of some psychiatrists attending an international symposium on anal-fixation after death, and: Freudians take over the world with the captured high-tech, arms. The Sproati all get interned by the British immigration authorities; thanks to a false reading on a spectograph when they were planning the operation they've all taken too many tannin pills and they're almost black. Usually they're light blue. One -"

"What do they look like?" Graham interrupted. Slater looked confused, then waved his free hand dismissively.

"I don't know. Vaguely humanoid, I suppose. Anyway, one of them escapes and sets up home in an abandoned but working car-wash in Hayes, Middlesex, while the rest die of starvation in the internment cells."

"Doesn't sound like there's all that many of them, for an entire species..." Graham grumbled into his glass.

"They're very shy," Slater hissed. "Now will you be quiet? This one Sproati - we'll call him Gloppo -"

A couple of girls entered the room from the hall. Graham recognised them from the Art School; they were talking and laughing. He watched to see if they would look over at him and Slater, but they didn't. He had on his new black cords for the first time (they were a Christmas present from his mother. He'd told her what to get; she'd been going to get him flared jeans!), and he thought he looked pretty good in his snow-white shirt, black jacket, white trainers and lightly blonded dark hair.

"Look, stop looking at those females and pay attention; you are following all this, aren't you?" Slater put his face towards Graham's, leaning forward along the mantelpiece.

Graham shrugged, looked at the red wine in his glass, and said, 1 don't know about following, feels more like I'm being pursued."

"Oh, tres droll." Slater smiled artificially. "Anyway, Gloppo installs a brain in the car-wash so he can have sex with it- all those brushes and rollers and foam and stuff, you know? - while in Florida the Freudians are tightening their grip; they ban all phallic symbols including gear sticks, Jumbo jets, submarines and rockets and missiles. AH motorbikes have to be ridden side-saddle and bondage is right out: rolled umbrellas, stretch jeans and fishnet stockings are banned, on pain of having a Sony Walkman taped permanently to your skull playing a looped tape of Barry Manilow's Greatest Hits... except for Barry Manilow fans, who get John Cage instead."

"What about," Graham said, pointing one finger at Slater, who pursed his lips and tapped his foot impatiently on the fire-surround, "those people who like Barry Manilow and John Cage?"

Slater rolled his eyes. "This is Science Fiction, Graham, not Monty Python. Anyway, Gloppo discovers the car-wash has been unfaithful in his absence with a metallic-blue Trans Am -"

"I thought that was an airline."

"It's a car. Now be quiet. Gloppo finds the Trans Am has been screwing the car-wash -"

"And the car-wash's been riding the car," Graham sniggered.

"Shut up. Gloppo disconnects the low-fidelity car-wash. Now then..."

There were more people in the room now; groups of men and women; most of them young, about his age, stood and talked and drank and laughed. The two girls he had noticed earlier were standing talking to some other girls. Graham hoped they all realised that just because he was standing talking to Slater, that didn't mean he was gay too. He looked back, nodding appreciatively, as Slater, talking quickly, waving his arms about, eyes glittering, seemed to approach the end of the story.

"... shit-scared because he's about to be blasted into particles even smaller and more radioactive than Ronald Reagan's brain, goes to the loo; by sheer coincidence the crap he does solidifies in the intense cold of outer space and the pursuing spaceship runs into it at about half the speed of light and is totally destroyed.

"Gloppo and his pal discover the joys of oral sex, the Freudians blow up the world, but that was going to happen anyway, and our two heroes live comparatively happily ever after." Slater grinned widely, took a deep, panting breath, then a drink. "What do you think? Good, isn't it?"

"Well..." Graham said, looking at the ceiling.

"Don't tease, you young blaggard. It's terrific; admit it."

"You've been reading that book," Graham said. "You know; that book by that guy

"Specific as ever, Graham. What an incisive mind; straight for the capillary. I stand in awe."

"You know the one I mean," Graham said, looking down at the blocked-off fireplace and snapping his fingers. That one that was on the telly

"Well, we're narrowing it down," Slater said with a thoughtful nod. He took another drink.