Work Text:
Robert Maxim was known throughout the town of Rigwell.
He ought to be.
That's what he thought.
He had been operating his fish and chip shop for a number of decades, and that was the kind of feat that gained name recognition in a town such as Rigwell.
For, you see, Rigwell wasn't the most exciting place. It had a small, fairly quiet town centre. Even Saturday middays were rather quiet. It had a couple of decent schools where rich parents (who generally didn't live in Rigwell itself) would send their offspring. There had been little success on the sporting front in recent times.
It was in this context that Robert Maxim was already a legend in the town.
The events of the next few years would make him even more of one.
It began in the late 2000s and early 2010s.
This was around the time when most people began to live on the internet.
For sure, it had been around for a while prior to then, but this was when many people chose to talk to their friends online rather than at the pub or in the park, when many people chose to complete their essays using online resources rather than making a trek down to the library.
This was also when people started to make their complaints regarding food (and much else) online rather than (literally) voicing them.
Robert Maxim knew where the wind was blowing. He made sure that his fish and chip shop had a decent online presence. It was listed on several prominent review sites before a lot of his local competitors were.
The first few reviews his business got were good. As he expected. He had, after all, requested to a few of his loyal and long-time regular customers to leave a kind word online for their favourite fish and chip shop.
Then things began to head in a different direction.
In 2014, a woman called Laura left a review for Robert Maxim's fish and chip shop.
She talked about how 'ghastly' Robert's fish and chips were and how she wouldn't ever set foot in the shop again.
All local fish and chip shops (indeed, food establishments all over the country and the world) got negative feedback online. Generally speaking, their owners would ignore such reviews, or leave a polite response saying how sorry they were that they didn't enjoy the experience, that kind of thing.
Not Robert. He was a different kind of character.
"You are clearly working for a competitor. We have full confidence in our fish and chips".
Evidently Robert wasn't a football fan. He didn't know that the last bit of his response sounded like the chairman of a football club who was expressing 'confidence' in the manager (the manager would inevitably be sacked within 48 hours).
Robert didn't sack his fish and chips. He continued on with his frying, although that single experience put a significant dent in his heretofore unblemished ego.
Another handful of negative reviews came along.
Robert had come up with a stock response, saying something about how the negative reviewers weren't welcome in his shop and how he was the 'uncrowned king of fish and chips'.
In his mind, this was certain to shut them up, to make them acknowledge his superiority in the field of fish and chips.
Then came another review, something which greatly challenged this notion.
It came from a person by the name of Timothy.
Timothy's review wasn't much different to most of the others, except in one crucial aspect: it was articulate. No spelling mistakes, no grammatical errors.
It also had a particular focus on Robert's donner kebabs, something which Robert prided himself on as his most excellent food he sold (well, apart from the fish and chips themselves, of course).
This really pissed off Robert, to such an extent that he wrote a reply which amounted to something approaching an essay. He quite literally felt exhausted by the time he pushed his chair back from his desktop and went to bed that night.
The nightmares about Timothy began that night, and cemented his status in Robert's mind as the mortal enemy of himself and his fish and chip shop.
Robert liked to come up with running themes for his replies. Another one he came up with was 'mad and barking', a reversal of the usual phrase 'barking mad'.
In Robert's mind, this was apt to describe anyone who didn't fully believe that his fish and chips were the pinnacle of cuisine.
2020 came along, and with it Covid, meaning that Robert was forced to close down his business for a few months, and for a year or two after he put in place social distancing measures within his shop.
This didn't really make much of a difference to the online world, of course, except perhaps for the fact that the reviews came in evermore increasing frequency.
The first review after he re-opened following initial lockdown measures was a negative one.
Someone by the name of Allie objected to none other than the donner kebabs. That pissed Robert off enough in itself, but it had the added detail of the supposed rudeness of the owner (i.e. Robert).
Robert had heard whispers that his name was being widely discussed around town, but he thought little of it, thinking that such people weren't even worth the hassle of thought.
It turned out that Robert was becoming more (in)famous than his food, and he responded to Allie's review angrily, saying the usual stuff about how good his food was, how 'mad and barking' Allie must be to take a negative opinion of his fish and chip shop.
Robert didn't even begin to grasp the irony that he was making himself the story via the tone of his replies.
A cliched kind of review that Robert hadn't yet received was that of the food poisoning accusation.
The first one that Robert got was in 2022 or 2023, when a disgruntled reviewer called Rahul noted that he had been kept up all night with toilet visits following eating Robert's food the previous evening.
Robert reached a new level of anger. He wasn't going to take this anymore. He typed out something he had been considering for a long time, his secret weapon as it were.
"Please, review site moderators, can you forward the IP address of this individual. Given that he has made this accusation, I intend to prosecute him for slander."
Robert took a deep breath after clicking on the 'post' button, convinced that this would make his problems go away, that the threat of losing vast amounts of time and money via legal battles would scare these trolls away for good.
He was wrong.
It was an autumn night, and Robert had just finished cleaning up his shop after his shift. He pulled his phone out to see if the world had blown up or not.
It hadn't, but something almost as bad to him caught his eyes.
A review from someone ominously named Wayne Kerr.
"Came here with my dying grandma last week. She was expecting a final cod and chips before her death. Little did I know that the ghastly owner decided to violently take her shin pads off of her legs and kick us out. Not excusable. I most definitely would NOT be coming back here."
The owner did a double-take. Then a triple-take.
Then he felt his heartrate and breathing speed up significantly.
He turned off his phone, got on his knees, and prayed for a better world. One without the likes of Wayne Kerr.
It was now 2025. The owner was getting rather long-in-the-teeth, more so in his own mind than those of others, who kindly talked about how energetic he continued to be in the running of his chip shop.
The reviews had been rather quiet for a while, but then (inevitably) came a certain form of one, and this would have a final straw effect.
Someone simply called John left the following review.
"I wanted a filling meal this evening. Unfortunately I entered the shop and the owner was clearly under the influence. Slurring his words, stumbling all about the place. I left without buying anything whatsoever. Please avoid."
The steam began to come out of Robert's ears, nose and mouth, but then something strange happened.
He calmed down.
He had a Eureka moment.
This was the time to finally retire, to effectively tell these trolls where they could go (the answer: to another fish and chip shop where they could leave negative reviews on their online pages).
Robert had been retired for just a matter of days or weeks. He wasn't expecting any further reviews, but one came along.
The account leaving it was called "Edward's Chippy". He knew that as the name of a local rival chip shop which he was usually successful in avoiding even thinking about.
"This chip shop is crap."
Straight to the point from the reviewer.
Robert also got straight to the point.
"CUNT."
For good measure, he sent the same response to a review from someone (not) coincidentally called Timothy - the name of his long-time enemy from the review sections.
Robert made the biggest smile across his face and threw off his work clothes for the last time.