Ornamental Despair (Painting for Ian Curtis, After Chris Foss) by Glenn Brown

Here're the young men, the weight on their shoulders.

Peppy's dad said: You live in a dark place.

Then five years passed. 

Peppy told a friend, Dennis Nilsen, what his dad had said. 

Oh, said Dennis.

It was around then that he confessed. Dennis did. He said he looked out of his bedsit window and saw some women. Then he said he went walking drunkenly up and down the street. His penis was dangling from his open zip, he said.

Another five years passed.

Then Dennis said: Remember when your dad said you live in a dark place?

Yes, Peppy said. Remember when you walked down the street with your dick out?