by Irvine Welsh
I order a grilled tofu salad; Lena follows suit. — That’s 380 cal, plenty of protein, fiber, low but complex carbs and the fats present are good ones, I explain. — With a twelve-ounce glass of water they will fill anybody up for four hours!
Then Sorenson’s telling me about growing up in Potters Prairie, Otter County, Minnesota. It’s all fresh, piney woods, adorable trash-raiding black bears, and Momma’s apple pie. (Double helpings with loads of cream, no doubt.) The last I buy, the rest . . . sorry, Lena, you just ain’t cutting it, you chunky Scandinavian depressive, you. When did the Pop-Tarts start to get swallowed like M&M’s? What happened? I await the disclosure; the stepdad’s creepy touch, the dysfunctional alco mom, or the psycho kid’s bullying mob. Fuck them. But no. Sorenson ain’t moving from The Little House on the Potters Prairie script, and with a reasonably wealthy papa thrown in, just to suck any sting out of that rustic poverty.
The food arrives, and as she starts shoveling it away, Sorenson’s evidently impressed. — This is soooo good, she bleats, as a couple of skinny uberbitches give the oblivious blimp a disgusted once-over.
— Glad you like.
Then Sorenson moves on to Chicago, and her time spent at the Art Insitute. — It was my town, my place, my time; that was where I met Jerry . . .
Nee-naw . . . warning bells . . .
I’m all fucking ears now. We’ve been building up to this. Since I first heard that name mentioned by the bathroom scale. I let her tell the story of her and this “Jerry” character. It seems Sorenson left Minnesota for art college in Chicago, met this guy, got fucked properly for the first time, and partied like hell. The big problem, although she can’t quite bring herself to say it, was that he just happened to be a total asshole. This became more apparent when Sorenson and lover-boy Jerry went to Miami, him freeloading into an art scene that embraced Lena because of her talent.
— I had an acclaimed exhibition in Chicago, then New York—
— Can I say something here? I cut in. Sorenson looks at me, as if I’m about to violate her pussy, then her ass, with a vibrating, jumbo-sized dildo. But yet her eyes are telling me she fucking wants it. — Sounds to me like you let your own considerable talent go to waste in order to support this gutless leech who couldn’t get arrested if he tried to exhibit himself outside the gates of a junior high, I tell her. Somehow, when I think of this Jerry asshole, I get an image of that chicken-hearted pedophile fuck Winter, whom the pussy McCandless ought to have wasted. And that bastard in the park, from high school, the one I should have fucking laid to waste like the sick little insect he was. THE PARK THE PARK THE FUCKING PARK.
— But—
I raise a hand, and shake my head in the negative. — Hear me out. Maybe I’m outta line here, but I saw this book on you, up at that Books & Books store on Lincoln. You have talent, Lena. You’re fucking famous, for chrissakes!
Now she is shaking her head, her timid eyes nervously flitting under those bangs. Like a fucking retarded thirteen-year-old. — No. It was just a time when that thing was vogue. I was lucky. I had a lot of criticism from people in the art wor—
— From jealous, talentless fucks, who’ve never made a fucking dime from their shit! And you sold a little sculpture of bird bones and fiberglass that made you eight million big ones! Of course you had critics! I’m your fucking critic, you lucky bitch, and I punch her on the arm. — And that fact doesn’t make you a bad artist, it makes me one jealous motherfucker! Own your talent, Lena. Not facing up to your own unique and special gifts is what’s killing you. Junk food is just the device: your own personal little weapon of self-destruction. It could as easily be drugs or booze, and she nods grimly in agreement. — This Jerry character, he never had a book about his work, did he?
— No, she says, a little smile playing across her lips. It transforms her: she looks so fucking cute.
— But I’ll bet he preened around like a pompous asshole, thinking he was some sick shit. Right?
Lena smiles, shaking her head, then, as if worried about appearing disloyal by badmouthing this prick, says, — But Jerry has real talent as a photographer—
— Fuck that noise! I know jack about that stuff, but even I get that photography isn’t art! It’s just fucking around with light. Good photographers are like pigeons here in Miami Beach, I tell her, picking a piece of nut out from between my teeth.
Sorenson gives a collusive smile, before doubt slams home, almost jackknifing her. — I know how it looks . . . but you don’t understand, she begs, then sniffs, raising a napkin to her moist eyes, — Jerry wasn’t just bad . . . there was more to him than that. There was more to us than that!
— I’m sure there was, but that’s gone now, Lena, I’m whispering urgently. — It’s the outcome you gotta think about. Him, playing you for a fool, then probably going off and fucking some model bitch . . . I can see the truth in that one as Sorenson takes a sharp inhalation of breath, — . . . and you, mutilating yourself, cause that’s what it is Lena—self-mutilation with sugar and fat!
A defiant pout, as Sorenson sweeps back her bangs. — Have you ever been in love, Lucy?
What the fuck has that got to do with anything?
— Yeah, I have. And yeah, sometimes it sucks, sometimes it ends bad, I tell her, and I’m thinking of Jon Pallota. We had something, but were both a little too fiery to make it work on a day-to-day basis. I always thought that maybe we’d get back together sometime, but that was before the big fish came along to fuck up his dick and his head. — But it never has any chance of working out if you don’t love yourself, and go into a relationship looking for the other person to affirm your fucking existence!
— Jerry gave me so much!
— And took plenty, I’ll wager. I meet those sad green eyes. — Lena, it’s obvious his art stuff sucked serious ass, and nobody gave a flying fuck. I don’t need your coy shrugs to tell me what happened next—seen that shit a million times before. This Jerry creep undermined you, didn’t he, Lena?
— He could be so fucking cruel, she spits, back to riding her anger.
— While spending your money, I’m betting, I tell her, as the two bony-assed uberbitches settle up and leave. One shoots a nakedly hateful glance at Sorenson, catches me catching her, and we exchange flashbulb screwed-up controlling smiles. Fucking bitch.
Sorenson is sitting in a livid silence, tapping a fork against the table. I swear if this Jerry creep walked in here right now, she’d gouge his fucking eyes out of his head.
— He watched you bloat up with the cookies as consolation, while he drank, snorted, and popped his way through your money, made through your work.
— Yes, he did! I hate him! I fucking hate him!
A couple at a nearby table look over at us, and Sorenson, my Lena, faces them down with a glare. God, I’m so proud of her! They grow up so fast!
But I gotta keep this bee-yatch on the boil. I bend into her reddened profile. — And as you blimped up, he hooked up with a younger, slimmer chick. You sought even more solace with your nose in the donut bag. Am I right on the money, or am I bustin that piggy bank with a fucking claw hammer?
— Yes, she says, turning to me despondently. — How come you understand all this?
I take a deep breath. For a second I feel like I’m going to say shit I shouldn’t. Like how I know this psycho Jerry creep, how we all do, and that with generic pricks only the name ever changes. But no: keep it client–customer. — I see a lot of clients; it’s an archetypal story. Too much investment in the supposedly ideal guy, the supposedly perfect children, or totally high-flying career, and not enough in Y-O-U, I point at her. — Then the big love comes and goes, and with it your sense of affirmation. So that prick left you a worthless couch potato, too depressed to paint and sculpt, to use the God-given talent you have. Transplanted down here, his idea, on your money, I’m betting again, while he played the big shot, then fucked off?
A slow but empathetic nod. — He’s in New York. Brooklyn, I believe. Liv
ing with some rich . . . some wealthy woman who owns a gallery, and Sorenson is struggling to keep her breathing even.
I reach over and grab her hand and give it a squeeze. — I’m proud of you, Lena.
Her eyes are filling and she grips the table edge. — What do you mean? I’m a goddamn clown! I’ve been a fool!
— Yes, but show me a person on planet Earth who ain’t, and I’ll show you a liar or a dead asshole, or, worse, somebody who might as well be. At least you’re getting to the root of the problem. You’re facing up to things about yourself that it’s easier to repress. To keep buried, I tell her, as the hunky Italian approaches with the check. — To bury under layers of fat.
— The art world can be cruel if you aren’t producing, she moans. — I thought I had friends there. I guess I was wrong. Jerry was always the gregarious one. I was just a loner.
— No. He built a psychological prison around you, and handed you the key. Then he said “jail yourself.” And you did that, because he and other assholes in your life undermined your own sense of self-worth to the point where you thought that’s all you deserved. I’ve seen that shit sooo many times.
Sorenson’s silently stewing in her own sweat.
— Listen, I want to try something out. Have you ever heard of Morning Pages? Julia Cameron?
— Yes . . . Sorenson says warily, my friend Kim said I should try it. I gave it a try, but I dunno, I don’t think it was for me . . .
— Might be worth giving it another shot, I tell her, and she looks blank as we settle up and head down to the beach, walking, at my instigation, along the sand. We’re talking about the concept of writing those pages, how they are designed for artists and creative people.
— That’s what Kim said . . . I will try it again, and stick with it.
— Cool, I nod, but the reason I’ve brought her down here is to see how Miami Beach flesh should look, how she should look. I’m checking out some fuckable young frat boys, all waxed, bronzed bodies, throwing a Frisbee to each other, trying to impress the giggling girls sprawled out on sunloungers. Then we fall upon a volleyball game featuring these fabulously surgically enhanced Brazilian chicks who commandeer this section of the beach. Lena is still gassing away, looking ahead, miserably, into space. We take a stroll down the sand, heading south, looking at the glistening domes of skin stuffed with silicone, and the sleazebag trawlers gawping at them, the more shameless snapping pics.
— Now we start again, I tell Lena.
— What?
— C’mon, I urge her, breaking into a trot. She hesitates for a bit, then starts to follow.
We cut off, heading down 5th toward the Biscayne Bay. Lena is slow, so slow, but steady. We pass West Street, the skyscrapers easing away, and on Alton a blaze of heat hits my back as a low, slanted sun falls mercilessly on us, stretching our shadows out in front of us like beanstalks. Sorenson’s now starting to sweat like a truck-stop hooker waiting on her crank connection. — I don’t think—
— You don’t need to think! Just do! Come on! Compete!
We turn back toward the ocean, calling it a halt in Flamingo Park, as Sorenson struggles to get her breath back through her elation. — I feel . . . so . . . good . . .
— Deeply, in through the nose, hold it . . . hold it . . . and out through the mouth . . .
Once she recovers, we head to Starbucks on Washington, where I order two green teas. Sorenson glances enviously at a neighbor’s mocha, which would have decimated her entire food allowance for the day. She tells me that she usually has a blueberry scone (400 cal) or a couple of oatmeal cookies (430 cal) as blueberries and oatmeal are good for you. And that’s not counting the fucking coffee . . .
— Oatmeal was meant to be eaten as oatmeal, blueberries as fresh fruit. They were not intended to provide flavoring to a filthy chunk of flour, dough, and sugar. A woman your size can easily eat half of her daily calorie allowance in one visit to Starbucks.
— But . . . I go twice a day.
— There you go. I also go twice a day. And I only drink green tea. Calories: zero. Antioxidants: high.
A copy of Heat has been discarded on our table. The twins have now become full-fledged celebrities. To get to that point from being a news story seems to take about two days. The Valerie Mercandos of this world don’t let the saw grass spread under their manicured feet. The headline:
AMY: I’D LET ANNABEL SLEEP WITH STEPHEN
Further below, a picture of Stephen, displaying a miffed pout. The caption:
Stephen: “This has all gotten too much.”
Lena’s warbling voice in my ear. — I feel so sorry for those girls.
— Yeah, it’s tough shit, I tell her, then I hear myself saying, — How would you like to go out tonight?
Sorenson looks sheepishly at me. — I haven’t had a night out in ages.
— All the more reason. Pick me up at nine-thirty.
So we depart the coffee shop as the sun goes down. Sorenson leaves with a decided spring in her step. When I get home, via Whole Foods, I grill myself some high-omega wild salmon with brown rice, as my cal count is a bit low today. I give it an hour to go down, then do a workout on my hand weights and wall bar. I really wish I had a heavy gym bag here as I feel like pummeling off some aggression, but there’s no room in this fucking shoebox.
Sorenson calls about nine (I said nine-thirty). I buzz her up, concealing the Future Human book in my bedroom closet. She looks a total fucking grenade; it’s certain I’m getting no action tonight double-teaming with that little dweeb. Even the things a normal chubby chick can do to minimize the damage a greedy mouth inflicts seems to be beyond her. Her clothes are way too small, from a previous life; a skirt that cuts her in half, letting her doughy muffin flesh spill over its band, and a tan blouse that clings to her like a second skin. Through superhuman effort of will I remain silent, but as we head down to Washington, she gets the “who dat retard” look from the gangbanger doorman at the velvet rope outside Club Uranus. I even worry that we’re going to be denied entry. Fortunately, he knows my face, and looks from me to Lena, then back to me, his expression a mix of contempt and compassion.
Thank fuck it’s dark inside. The DJ has dropped that catchy tune “Disco Holocaust” by the Vinyl Solution. We find a nice corner, away from the pulsing light. A waitress appears and we order some drinks; vodka and diet tonic for us both. (Around 120 cal, at a rough estimate.) A few faces nod at me, but they don’t stop to engage in conversation above the loud, pumping track, where the diva vocalist asks and answers: Did six million really dance, yes they did! One chunky straight bitch, adorned in the saturation-bombing Washington Avenue tattoos people get when they are having their cocaine year out, or exiting from a volatile long-term relationship, looks in open-mouthed contemplation from me to Sorenson. The Liposuction Fuck, a chisel-faced blonde who’s had more work done than the City of Miami Port, arches a superior brow and toys with her white wine and a half-her-age Eurotrash suitor. Two almost-dead anorexic chicks known to go on the elliptical three hours a day, and who have been banned from at least four SoBe health clubs as they keep working to (and often past) their point of collapse, briefly interrupt their suicide pact to gape in gaunt, undisguised horror at my companion. Yes, I’m with a fat chick and if you’re obese in Miami Beach you might as well be in the advanced stages of leprosy, and be crumbling over the dance floor. I’ve committed a major faux pas by bringing a whale to a nightclub. I deserve to be ostracized, and if I wasn’t me I’d be the party leading the fucking charge.
Lena looks around, wondering, like just about everyone else in the place, exactly what she’s doing here. — I never really liked going out to clubs. I never liked loud noise. And that song is pretty darned tasteless.
— It has a good beat and the artists are just young kids; all that war shit is nothing to them. I just come out to stop myself vegging. But there’s another South Florida which isn’t all parties and hedonism. Sports. The beach, I say, nodding over toward a sculpted
blond hunk, simpering at the bar with a Latino partner. If it’s who I think it is, I don’t recall him being a fag back in the day. — I think that guy went to the University of Miami at the same time as me.
— I hear the University of Miami is a really good school, Lena nods.
— Don’t kid a kidder, girl, I say in those sage, world-weary tones that disconcertingly remind me of my father. — When Sly Stallone and Farrah Fawcett are your best-known alumni you know that a degree there is worth less than a Twinkies wrapper. And to think there was a time when I was proud to go to a place of learning where the campus bookstore displayed only rows of sports clothing, mainly for the Miami Hurricanes, and you had to ask for the textbooks, which were crushed into an understocked corner upstairs. Now I feel like an asshole and I wish I’d gone to a school instead.
— But that’s what you wanted to do, that sports science stuff.
— Yeah, it was.
— It’s important to do what we want. Heck, I wish I’d been more athletic. I never got into it.
— I always was. My dad was sports crazy. He wanted boys, so my sister and I were on every team—basketball, soccer, softball, tennis—then she went bookish but I stayed sports crazy. I did track and field, karate, kickboxing, you name it.
— That must’ve been tough, Sorenson suggests, — exhausting, I mean.
— No. It gave me discipline and strength, I tell her coldly. Fucking fat troll. What right does that loser have to try and psychoanalyze me? — So what else do you do in your spare time?
— Well, I read a lot, and I watch movies.
— Yeah, I go to that joint on Lincoln sometimes. The last film I saw there was Green Lantern. Only got dragged along cause my friend thought Ryan Reynolds was hunky, I explain, feeling a bad taste rise in my mouth at the use of the term “friend,” as I was there with Mona.
— I prefer the Miami Beach Cinemateque. You ever been there?