After I’d calmed down a bit on a bench at the side of a big concrete slab labelled the ‘East Bloodside Play Area’, I thought about what I could do next. It was still early so I could always just put this dud of a day to one side and get home in time for the footy. But that wouldn’t be right. I’d been promised a pint, and you never turn down a pint with your mates once agreed on. Even if your mate is a shape-shifting millennia-old demon by the name of the Dreaded Dread. In fact, let’s just call him Tim from now on. Tim sounds nicer.

So, not to disappoint good old Tim, I decided I should really be getting on with that whole breaking the seal job. Trouble was, my ride there was well and truly finished, unlike my mug of tea. I nearly cursed myself for my stupidity, but just in time I remembered where I was and thought a throwaway hex might really ruin my afternoon.

I knew where I should be going - that nice in-focus glowing church on the hill. But there was another problem - I was bloody clueless when it came to sense of direction. When I’d been in uni I got lost coming out the shower and spent three days in jail while they interviewed all my flatmates about the poor girl I’d barged in on belly-first in what I thought had been my room. So it probably wasn’t wise for me to start wandering round here. Had it been east? West? I knew it was further out from town - there’d been actual green around it rather than grey and brown and despair - but that was all.

So I had only one option. I needed more tea.

That was when that lovely brain of mine kicked into fifth gear again. Magic tea was obviously like a drug, with all that careful brewing and the weird floaty feeling and then leading you into a brawl and then leaving you feeling just slightly sick on a park bench after. And if it was a drug, there’d have to be dealers. And if there were dealers, then I could pay for more.

They say you’re never more than a hundred feet from a heroin dealer back in the mighty Boro. Drug abuse is the only thing we’re top of the league for there - lord knows it’s never the football - and you had to be proud of things you were top for. So that whole article had stuck in my mind. There probably weren’t tea dealers every hundred feet in Raughnen (we are top, remember?) but I knew my hotspots, too. The real gathering places for a floaty sick time. And I was sitting right next to one.

It only took two subtle circles of the playground before I found him behind a tree just inside the railing. He was a small-time crook judging by his Badidass trackies and whole set of teeth, but when I mumbled something about leaf, he nudged open his jacket to reveal rows and rows of little bags tied to the inside and I knew I was in.

“Do you have Earl Grey?” I braved. There were some pyramids in there and if I got PG Tips I might as well just buy a rope and hang myself from the anaemic elm above us.

“Yeah mate,” came the weedy reply. Out it came, and out came a little one-cup battery powered kettle too which I fawned over so much that I eventually paid a tenner to be told you could get one for a fiver on Amazon. Mental note made.

“Where you off to?” he said next, clearly sick of my kettle fawnings.

I told him what I could.

“Not much to go on there mate,” he said, drawing out a cup and saucer and setting them down next to a stray carrier bag and rather impressive turd. “Fuck knows where you’ll end up.”

I gritted my teeth and said nothing. I had to risk it. Tim was a real-life Walter White when it came to magic tea. I couldn’t expect the same homing quality as his stuff from this little scrote. As long as I got to within fifty yards or so of that church I might just make it.

The kettle bubbled in good time for a couple of double As and the teen carefully poured it out over the bag. Something chuckled inside, but I didn’t flinch. It clearly wasn’t normal tea, was it, and maybe I was finally getting used to this mad town. It really was a sorry state of affairs.

I almost reached down, but the transaction wasn’t done. I took out my wallet again instead. “How much?”

The teen’s eyes gleamed. Instinctively, I put my wallet away and changed my question. “What do I pay?”

He twitched in excitement. “Like you, bud. Special price. Just one.”

“One what?” I was not certain I wanted to know.

The dealer tried a whiny little snigger. Honestly, the teabag did it better. “A memory. A good one. Something you really treasure. It will be mine forever.” He leaned closer, and I could smell his sweat and aftershave, though which was which I’d never know. “Don’t worry, once I take it you won’t even remember it happened. Won’t hurt a bit.”

I thought for a long time. The screams and cries for mercy from up in the square were a bit distracting, but finally I had it. I allowed myself a fond smile, and the dealer sensed he had his payment.

“Good...” he said, closing his eyes. The tea looked pretty good for a milkless monstrosity. “I can almost feel it.... I’m seeing a greasy duvet.... drink, drink!”

This time, I did what I was told. Down in one. Then I was off. And, just before the memory faded, I looked down at the poor youngster, who was sobbing in a heap with his ear squelching through the shit, and smiled.

It was too beautiful for one so young as he. I had given up a true treasure, that September night with my ex just before college so long ago. I’d lasted fifteen, yes fifteen! seconds, but I’d had a few bottles of vodka by then so I can’t take all the credit. It was the best ad-break of my life, and suddenly it was gone.

But only temporarily. As I floated off through the last remnant of an ancient seesaw I reflected that the world of magic had at least one major weakness in this day and age - the wonders of modern technology. Because, while that payment was supposed to turn me into a whinging mess, I’d known it would come again.

I’d recorded the whole glorious marathon on my phone. It was a bit potato quality because this was back on a Nokia in 2007, but it had been preserved in all its grunting joy. The phone was long gone of course. But, one lonely night, I would once again scroll through everything I’d seen at least a hundred times to those I’d only seen dozens, and there, on Pornhub page 793, the footage would reignite my past once more in pixellated, vague shapes that might just be me.

If only I could forget the comments.