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interested in how far past the deadline it is. I’ve got enough faith in you to assume you need to make this change, I just need to know what are you doing about it?’
    He glances back over at the designer.
    â€˜He’s making the changes. I’ve told the client they don’t get another proof, then I’m sending it back to the paper on the same reference number. I’ve emailed them to tell them to expect it and to use the latest version.’
    â€˜Phone them for fuck’s sake. You know as well as I do they never check the ads. You could send them a picture of your cock on the right reference number and they’d print it. Phone them and make sure they’ve picked up the new ad or you could end up looking pretty fucking stupid.’
    He nods sagely and spins around, phone already to his ear.
    â€˜When you’ve finished sorting that, Collins, I need a word, come to my office as soon as you’re done.’

12.
    The silence is more disturbing than anything. This is not the contented silence of an early morning, not the calm of a snow-covered landscape, or the comfortable silence of an old couple deeply in love.
    This is the silence in the eye of a storm.
    The silence as the executioner raises his axe.
    The silence as the explosion sucks all the air out of a room.
    I pick The Pirate up again and hold him at eye level. There is the suspicion his silence is brooding, and picking him up somehow emasculates him.
    That I will pay for this later. I always pay for it later. One thing I’ve learned about The Zoo is that it doesn’t forget. It looks after its own. Hurt gets passed up the line. Dropping The Pirate doesn’t mean I’ve just slighted The Pirate.
    Because the order goes: The Cowboy, The Knight, then The Pirate.
    The Pirate is the last of The Figurines and the first of The Plastics. His sheen and gloss is peerless amongst them. This is the reason he is first, because he is quite childlike in his rendering, certainly nowhere near as delicately drawn as The Knight. It is his sheen that saves him. As head of The Plastics he has his own subjects to lead, but he answers to The Metallics. The fact that there are only two of The Metallics must rankle with him. They are a pair. Confidantes. He has to control those below and report up to them. He is a Figurine, but he is more of a conduit between The Figurines and The Animals. In some ways he is more Animal than Figurine and the fact that he is a Plastic and not a Metallic can only exacerbate this.
    He has black boots, a Tricorn, blue coat with yellow detailing. If he was a real pirate it would be gold, and a ruffled white shirt. I think of him as a brute enforcer; there is certainly not a hint of intelligence on his pink plastic face. His eyes are black dots, his lips as red as a harlot. He makes me uncomfortable with his brazen aggression and crimson lips, there is something almost sexually intimidating about him. I cannot deny his place because he comes third. I would like to remove him, but it is not up to me to do so. A parrot perches on his left shoulder, a smudge of badly formed yellow and blue and this represents his position in relation to The Animals.
    He is a childhood of reading Treasure Island and all the mystery and romanticism that goes with it. He is hidden coves and smuggling. He is the Jolly Roger and scurvy. He is pieces of eight, plank walking and dancing the hempen jig.
    He is William Kidd, Long John Silver and Blackbeard.
    The camp of a Gilbert and Sullivan opera.
    He is Captain Hook and Johnny Depp doing an impression of Keith Richards.
    Peg leg. Hook hand. Eye Patch. Cutlass. Gold earring.
    He is about taking what is not yours by force, the lure of gold and the evil men will commit for it.
    He is third in line to the throne and I dropped him on the floor.
    Â 
    I focus on the pay phone, becoming aware that I am holding the receiver in my hand. A string of drool from my bottom lip joins to it like a