Naked City

by Anthony Cropper

  I hear him come in, all unsuspecting, and part of me wants to fling myself onto him, wind myself around him like a cat, lick his ear and whisper a warning. The rest of me wants to cut his balls off. I pick up my phone and start to text Shell but I know she’ll only come back with a load of questions I can’t answer yet and an I-told-U-so. I’m waiting for the sounds of a row, him growling, her snarling, maybe a nice piece of china smashed. But nothing. I slink back down the stairs. Seems a bit too quiet to me. S’pose I walk in and find them snogging each other?

  They’re sitting at opposite ends of the long marble table. I could jump up and do a dance number or sashay down the middle like it was a catwalk and I wouldn’t feel any more stupid than I already do. My tits are firm, my stomach’s still flat as a board and I been hours on the sunbeds so I should feel well superior to the two of them hunched up like a pair of black crows. But I am dead nervous and I’ve this awful sinking feeling inside, like the first time I came here and heard him sharpening his knife. There’s plenty of room on that table top for a person to be pinned down, sliced open and sacrificed.

  Frankie is right pissed off, I can tell. What were you thinking of Jonathan? she says now. Or should I allow you some higher motive? You fancied yourself as pig male Ian perhaps?

  For Godsake, Francine.

  Why won’t he stand up for himself? Pig, who? I ask and she honks with laughter. Why didn’t you tell me about her? I shout as his head sinks further into his collar and his fingers tug at his tie, trying to loosen the knot round his neck.

  He groans. I was going to but we still had a lot to sort out. She’s been working in New York for a year. She’s been having an affair with a colleague. They’re both glaring at each other. I thought the marriage was finished.

  Jonathan, says the ice-queen, you’re lying.

  Why should I waste my time listening to this crap? I don’t care that I got no shoes on. The pavement will be warm from the heat of the day. I’ll go and find Shell and then we’ll find ourselves a couple of lads. I’ll go for vodka I think, force it down. Vodka don’t make you as sick as some of them other spirits. And I am going to get truly bladdered.

  I stay away a few days just to give him a fright like the one I got. I won’t answer his calls or any of his texts, though he keeps writing he needs to talk. Shell’s always said she don’t know what I see in Jonathan. Says I should make as much dosh from him as I can and then get out fast. Now I’m beginning to think she’s right. I don’t know what I’m after anymore. I thought I wanted a sugar daddy who’d be good to me and treat me like I was someone special. It’s nice that, when someone cares about you. For three months everything’s been clean and simple but now it’s all tangled up. I wish I’d not carried on with all the baby nonsense. I wish I’d not got us into such a fucking mess.

  When I do go back he’s still out at work so I stomp around his living room with the telly on loud – MTV because I need a good thump of music. I want to imagine I’m inside that television set myself, singing and dancing. I don’t hear him come in and when he pokes his head round the door, I pretend I int seen him and he goes off to get changed. When he comes down again he’s still damp from the shower, looks like he’s been left out in the rain, his casual clothes are a joke. And why did I ever think he had a nice face? He’s a rat, pointed twitchy nose, close-set beady eyes, sharp teeth. And I thought I liked the fella. I really did. I thought he was kind and classy and all the time he’s as much of a bastard liar as the rest of them.

  Look Vicki, he says. I’m sorry about Francine. I mean, about her turning up so suddenly like that. I should have warned you.

  I shake my head and shrug my shoulders, like I don’t care.

  He sits beside me on the sofa and flicks the mute button on the remote so the presenters are putting on silly faces and mouthing at us with no sound coming out. I pull up my knees and hang onto my toes and move away from him. I don’t want his leathery old hand creeping up my leg no more. But he don’t even try to touch me. Look here, he says. I think perhaps things went too far between us. I took advantage of you to get back at Francine and I shouldn’t have. I’m sorry.

  You two back in the sack then?

  He coughs. We’ve been doing some hard talking. We’re going to give our relationship another try.

  Now I’ve blown it. Shouldn’t of gone off in a temper like that. I eye him bitterly. Oh nice one. Have your fun and toss me out.

  No Vicki. That’s what I want to explain. You’re welcome to stay.

  Is he some kind of perv or what? Does he really think I’m going to crawl into bed with him and his skeleton wife so they can get off on a bit of young flesh?

  Why?

  You still need a room, don’t you? And Francine still has business to wind up in New York so she’ll hardly be here. Later on…

  Yeah?

  After you’ve had the baby. I mean, you’ll want to get another job and perhaps move in with a friend… He runs his hand over his hair which is slicked back close to his scalp. He looks embarrassed and I think how tough and mean he has to be at work and I think how he’s got a wife like a witch and a house that’s black and white and dead as a photograph and I’m pleased I can still make him squirm. You see, he carries on. We’ve talked it over and what we’d like, Francine and I, is to adopt your baby.

  My mouth falls open, silent as the girl on the telly. Don’t know whether to laugh or scream. A baby in this place? With those two? They wouldn’t even know which end was which. She might break a fingernail poking a bottle between its gums. He’d get dribbles down his Armani ties. Makes sense now though. All them lectures about looking after myself, not smoking, not drinking, not staying out late. Bloody miracle he didn’t insist on coming to the quack with me. He says they don’t know why they couldn’t have kids of their own, though it’s mighty clear to me. Probably int even a woman, that Frankie of his, mincing about on her high heels. Probably not got no sex organs.

  It caused problems in our marriage, he says. And a great deal of stress for both of us. It was one of the reasons we decided to separate, why she transferred to New York. We’ve looked into adoption of course. And surrogacy, which is easier in the States but still a minefield. And then you turned up…

  You never gave a shit about me! I was just a fucking incubator.

  No of course not. His fingers are fluttering all over the place. You’re a sweet girl, Vicki, and I’m sure you’ll have a delightful baby. Bouncy and beautiful just like you.

  I think I’m going to puke. You don’t know nothing about me. Like it turns out I didn’t know nothing about you.

  In my job you learn to become a good judge of character.

  Yeah right. And I thought all you did was shift columns of numbers around and trample poor sods into the ground. In bar work you get to be a judge of character too. I know a fucking wanker when I see one.

  Dear girl, calm down.

  And anyway, how d’you know what my baby’s dad is like? Tell me that. How d’you know he int no thieving junkie psycho rapist?

  He clears his throat and his voice gets even more pompous. Well, I admit we’ve had considerable discussion on the subject, Francine and I. Obviously we’d like some assurances from you before we go ahead. And possibly the father may need to be consulted – but that’s up to you, of course.

  I keep quiet. It’s not often that I’m struck dumb but he’s done it. I feel as if the skin is stretched tight across my cheekbones like a mask, his mask with all the carvings that’s staring at us. Fertility icon my arse. Wish to hell I’d smashed the bloody thing.

  This is the way it would work, he says to the window because I won’t look him in the eye. I will take care of you until the child is born. We will then begin the adoption process – and let you have visiting rights of course if you want them. Naturally we still have to work out the figures.

  Shell would have focussed on the money. She’d of asked him what he had in mind and doubled it. She’s gonna be mad with me, Shell, whe
n she knows what I done. Trouble is, I don’t trust him anymore.

  She’d have everything she needs, he goes on. She’d be very comfortably provided for. You know that. After all, I’ve looked after you pretty well haven’t I?

  What the fuck makes you think I’m having a girl? Can’t wait to shag her too?

  If he was anyone else he would of hit me and I would of deserved it. I know that. I start to cry and he backs away, don’t pass me his hanky this time.

  He has his hand on the doorknob, but before he goes, he says: Clearly you get pregnant easily, Vicki. And you’ll have other children. This is a good offer and I hope you’ll be sensible enough to think it over.

  I’m back at me mam’s. She’s okay that way, Mam, lets me kip at home for a bit in between boyfriends. She has about three different jobs so she’s not in much. I can snuggle down on the couch with a pack of Marlboros and a pile of catalogues and no-one going to tell me to keep my feet on the floor. And she don’t know what Shell knows neither, so she don’t go whinging on about how I could of made a mint and am I a crazy bitch or what?

  I tell you, I learned my lesson in that Hammer House of Horror. Everybody’s after something, but they got some nerve, that Frankie and Johnny. They’re so busy making money and calling the shots and turning everything into an object to stick on a wall, they think they can take whatever they want. They got to think again. The way I see it, I’m well off out of it even if I am still signing on. Shan’t be looking for work just yet, not till I feel a bit stronger. Right now I feel hollow and fragile inside like an egg that’s been blown – or scraped out with a spoon. No regrets though.

  Wings of a Dove

  Andrew Parker

  You are sitting in the Hare and Hounds with Russell and Rosalind. It’s a mild Thursday evening in the merry month of May and the pub is slowly filling up with the same old faces. It also happens to be a special occasion of sorts, for on this day Rosalind has reached the milestone of her twenty-fifth year on the planet; a magical quarter-of-a-century of living. Raise trumpets – cue fanfare. For you, that particular milestone - more like millstone- passed by unnoticed by all and sundry, but it’s different for girls and they like to celebrate such tripe accordingly. So Russell has splashed out and bought her – undoubtedly at her request – a girl’s best friend (simple setting, plain gold band) which she can’t help but flash for the benefit of surrounding females who mince past jealously. But for crying our loud, never have you seen a more obvious created diamond in all your life, for if this monster rock were kosher it would be a veritable Cullinan. The thing’s got zirconia written all over it, but who cares? Rosalind is happy with it and to that end, it serves its purpose.

  But you can’t help wondering why it’s just three of you at this intimate get-together. Surely Rosalind’s mates will soon turn up rat-arsed and falling over themselves but no, you’re informed categorically to the contrary; it’s just the one two three of you. Being the suspicious sort, and half the time bordering on the paranoiacal, you just can’t help wondering why that might be. There’s normally a big gang of you whenever there’s a sesh up at the ’aries; why would these two orchestrate it otherwise? And now you come to think of it, they do seem unusually nervous about something; they’ve each quashed three bottles of beer to your one and Rosalind is already at the bar ordering their fourth. Mmm.

  So with Rosalind in splendid isolation over at the mock-mahogany counter top, Russell leans over your table – left eyebrow debonairly raised – and makes a request of your services that in a million years you did not expect to hear.

  ‘Hey Lucas,’ he whispers matter-of-factly, ‘You up for a threesome with me and her, or what?’

  If you were hooked up to an electrocardiograph, a nurse would be running around hysterically shouting ‘Tachy at one-eighty, call the crash team, call the crash team!’ but as it happens, you’re just quietly sitting in your local with your long-standing friend and his bird whom you now see in a profoundly different light. Your pulse is going hammer and tongs, you can feel sweat beading on your forehead, and you’re dumbstruck to the highest attainable degree. It takes a while to process his request.

  ‘What?- us, but- where though – the three of us, like…’ you bumble.

  ‘Yeah. She’s up for it. She suggested it. For her birthday, like.’

  You realise you’ve got to make a decision one way or the other before Rosalind gets back from being served. You glance over at her and she’s looking back at you with enormous belladonna fuck-me eyes. If it were just you and her, no problemo. She’s blonde, well built, gorgeous enough, in fact for the couple of years she’s been around you’ve always quite surreptitiously fancied her. But with Russell there too, in the same room, it’s not a roll-in-the-hay situation you look upon with any relish. The thing is, and you’ve thought about this before, you don’t ever want to be in the same room as another man’s erection. No way José. You don’t want to be in the same fucking street as another man’s orgasm, and whilst you’re on the subject of all thing erectile, you doubt you could even get good wood with a naked male in close proximity, especially one you’ve known since childhood. In all matters three-way, you’re positively Virgo Intacta. If you were to be the minority sex in such a deal, that would be a different matter entirely. Rock ’n’ roll and all that. But as the offer stands, you just can’t see yourself accepting. You think about suggesting a conventional twosome, just you and her like, but you don’t want to hurt Russell’s feelings. Then Rosalind comes back from the bar wearing an optimistic smirk across her birthday face and she wants a yay or a nay in response to her/their generous offer.

  ‘Well?’ she says, sitting down. You’re relieved to see she’s suitably embarrassed, and at the same time lustfully flushed across her ample cleavage.

  ‘Erm, well, I’ll just go to the bog,’ you spout yellowy, and retire to the seclusion of the gents for a more thorough consideration. Your reluctance is understandable: a partie a trois needs thinking about properly; it’s no use jumping in feet first without your wellies on when you don’t know what you’re jumping into. That way anything could happen, all manner of problems could arise, people could get hurt, friendships and relationships might irretrievably capsize. But on the other hand, you tell yourself whilst making use of the slash-catcher, a soixante-neuf with Rosalind would really make your day, even though it’s a partie double she’s drooling after. Oh baise-moi, the endless possibilities!

  As you zip up your fly, in walks the local dealer in all things euphoriant, aptly nicknamed ‘The Borg’ (resistance is futile) by some wit of a Trekkie. This is a man who for some years has kept you well supplied with an unlimited crop of cannabis; your regular drug of choice. It’s this ability to please that makes him a true friend and confidant to much of the town’s pot-smoking populate. Even during periods of drought he has unfailingly come up with the goods; a most reliable connection. As you greet him he holds his hand out flat.

  ‘Alright Lucas,’ he says, ‘Have a dekko at that.’

  On the palm of that upturned hand lays a beige tablet with a bird of the ornithological variety deeply embossed into one side. For a second you can’t quite believe what you are seeing, can’t quite believe your luck because for you, this is a strike of eureka proportions. You ask him if that’s what you think it is.

  ‘Dove,’ he states emphatically. ‘Twenty-five nicker. Mates’ rates.’

  Now this is a real turn-up for the books. Last time you saw The Borg you had asked him to keep his eyes peeled for just this very item. He had laughed in your face when you told him you’d never taken ecstasy before, but he had promised he’d do his utmost to ‘sort you out’. Pure unspiked MDMA is a hard commodity to come by at the best of times, and what an opportune moment to be offered it! This could be just what the doctor ordered: an aphrodisiac, an anxiolytic, an antidepressant, and a restorative wonder drug stroke potential dick-stiffener all rolled into one. A transaction is made; you buy at the index-linked asking price. The felon
ious acquisition goes under your tongue and leaving The Borg in the bog, you make your way back to Troilis and Cressida having had your decision made for you.

  You sit back down at the table; they are all ears. You take a swig of flat beer and your pill disappears stomachwards. With a stealthy flourish, you actually wish the fucker Godspeed. Then your eyes are met with a scene effused with silent dialogue as the aforementioned duo apprehensively await your verdict.

  ‘What the hell,’ you say. ‘Nothing ventured.’ And with those five words you officialize the proposed soirée. Everybody goes crimson with the finality of your pronouncement and slump eyes-down into their beer. It’s a goer then, and all you can do is hope against hope that the Dove you’ve just let loose brings you some lasting internal peace; forget the fucking olive branch.

  During the next thirty minutes or thereabouts, the methylene dioxymethamphetamine plays merry hell with most of the delicate neurotransmitter systems in your brain: noradrenaline, serotonin, phenylethylamine, in fact every one of the aromatic amines; Ecstasy intoxication renders these brittle mechanisms kaput. But its primary action, and the effect everyone raves after, is its ability to block the re-uptake mechanism of dopaminergic neurons, thus increasing five-fold the amount of circulating dopamine in the cerebral cortex and the reticular activating system. Mamma Mia! It’s like taking a shower with the plug left in the bath; you end up knee-deep in your own dirty water.

  So half-an-hour passes; you feel yourself coming up good-style on the Dove. Whereas Russell and Rosalind have understandably become increasingly aloof as the evening progresses, you find yourself seething with nothing less than humanity-embracing benevolence. Every cell in your throbbing body seems to be perfused with joy and happiness; felicity has somehow become an intrinsic bodily component. You are surer than you’ve ever been about anything, that everything, no matter what, will turn out all right in the end. And it’s at the moment of idealistic realization that the formerly silent jukebox suddenly kicks in with Solsbury Hill by Peter Gabriel.