Sammy took a deep breath and approached the man at the bar. >Are you drinking daiquiri?<
>What does it look like?<
Sammy wouldn’t know a daiquiri if it squirted from a nipple, but it was exactly the evasive answer Nat might give. >Looks like you got here before me.< Sammy gave the lips a polish with an extraordinarily versatile tongue, knowing that drove Nat wild.
>Wanna fuck?<
Only Nat would be so upfront: Sammy knew it was him. >Can I finish my drink first?< It was important in this game to appear cool. Something Nat and Sammy had fallen into from the beginning, out-cooling each other, but like the sugar-frost cool of the rim of a cocktail glass. Sammy said nothing concerning his lie about being a woman, and Nat said nothing about the sudden discovery that Sammy was a woman too. Weird but exciting. Neither alluded to the fact that they’d known each other for six months on the Net. They were playing the strangers game: you crack, you lose.
Drinks finished, Nat took Sammy back to a shabby one-room bedsit. Nothing like the penthouse suite overlooking the Thames he’d often described when they set up Pinkland. Sammy was about to protest before being bundled, quite roughly, against the wall.
Sammy took a deep breath of him, a gulp, almost a lick. He smelled good, earthy, natural. No resistance was offered as Nat pushed up Sammy’s vest, slaking himself on the small, boyish breasts. Sammy’s nipples hardened instantly at the lashing of his tongue. Soft noises of encouragement seemed to make him rabid with excitement. He pulled up Sammy’s skirt, exposing a smooth midriff and the fur purse. Whenever they’d had Internet sex Sammy had never worn underwear but Nat seemed slightly surprised this time. Sammy felt his fingers probing, slithering inside, deep, up to the third knuckle. Then Nat crumpled to his knees, pushing his tongue where his fingers had been, swaying slightly as if made dizzy by the brim-stone-and-honey odour of sex.
Because the air was seeded, streaming, drenched with genital perfume. They had irresponsible and delirious unprotected sex, though Sammy complained when, losing control and with fingers tangled in sweat-matted hair, Nat inadvertently pushed Sammy’s head against the wall as he ejaculated. >Easy, Nat,
He flickered as he recovered his breath. As soon as he was able to speak, he said, >Who the fuck is Nat?<
Sammy hurried back to the Orbit Café. It was beginning to fill up, but by now there wasn’t a single person, male or female, sitting alone. There was nothing to do but hang around for a while, feeling naive, humiliated and furious with Nat.
Next time they were online together, Sammy gave him (or her, since now it wasn’t possible to trust a single word Nat said) hell. >You could at least have left a message, to say you weren’t coming.<
>I’m sorry. Something came up. I couldn’t make it.<
>You put me at risk!<
>Why? What happened?<
>Nothing happened. Forget it.<
>Are you sure nothing happened?<
>I said forget it.<
>I promise I’ll be there next time.<
>Next time? There isn’t going to be a next time. Listen Nat, after what happened to me I’m never going to trust you again. Final.<
But that was all talk. Sammy didn’t want it to end. What Nat got from the relationship was a mystery; but Sammy got insight, Sammy got experience, and most of all Sammy got language, the exotic kind that squished on the tongue like choux pastry or stung like liquorice.
Nat was endlessly critical of the shortcomings of the English language. >I don’t know how we’re expected to be erotic with these shoddy goods. I mean how erotic can a language be when there’s no word for the most tender and erogenous part of the leg? Or for the natural genital perfume of a clean woman? I don’t know why I bother.<
But bother Nat did, and Sammy learned that the Germans had a word, kniekehle, for that fold at the back of the knee, the erotic cleft to which Nat referred; and the French too were unafraid, in naming the cassolettes she so delighted in. And it was when Nat started talking dirty, foreign dirty, angelic dirty, that Sammy knew they were about to have Internet sex.
What Sammy truly appreciated was Nat’s sensitivity, a knowledge of when tenderness was required and when rough handling might be in order. Sammy was mightily impressed by this verbal dexterity, and Nat’s hoochy-coo was like a sexy English lesson, demonstrating a virtuoso’s ability to switch smoothly, despite his complaints about the language’s shortcomings, between the polysyllabic caresses of the Romance-root and the good old-fashioned hard-thrust Anglo-Saxon.
Nat was the perfect Internet lover. One hand on the keyboard, the other dipped at the thigh, it never took long for Sammy to come. Oddly, it was always the keyboard fingers Sammy sniffed for residual fuck after the event.
For Sammy, the imagined scent of Nat lingered there for hours. There was none of this so-called post-coital tristesse after Internet sex. Just the longing. And a back-brain howling, like the wind moaning through circuits girdling the planet.
So of course Sammy agreed to meet Nat again, though flatly refusing to return to the Orbit Café, certain that the rough lover was there even at that moment, laughing, regaling the waiters and customers, making a bonfire of the needs of the naive and the desperate.
Nat, of course, had indeed been joking around, and was a man after all. They met in a hotel lobby this time. Sammy, to get revenge, declared manhood. Nat was easy to identify because he kept approaching other men.
It was a laugh to see him hitting on passing strangers. >Are you Sammy?<
>No. Nope. Noedy. No sir. And no sireeee.<
Sammy’s smirk was a mile wide. Nat just wasn’t looking for a woman.
Finally Sammy tipped the wink. Trying to stay cool, Nat merely levitated an eyebrow. After six months on the Net, the joke was on him. Sammy enfolded long, slender arms about him, inhaling the scent of him.
>You smell good.< Sammy said. >Just like I knew you would.<
>How do I smell?<
>Sugar almonds; lychees; the wet earth. In fact you smell just like the taste of your come. <(It was what the rough lover from the Orbit Café had said: his words exactly.)<
>Very poetic. Want to go to a room somewhere?<
>No. I want to do it right here.< It was true. That’s what Sammy wanted, still slightly sore from that recent experience, but aching for excess and still fixed on exacting some revenge. Making his zip rasp and hooking his trousers down around his ankles, in one deft move Sammy had a hand inside Nat’s boxer shorts. Not until Sammy’s mouth was clamped around Nat’s fattening cock did either of them notice the conversation in the lobby around them had gone completely dead.
>Can’t we go to a room?< Nat wailed.
>Why bother?<
>I can’t do this.< Nat said.
>Just relax.<
>It’s too weird. I’m going.< And logged off. Leaving Sammy’s knees indenting the virtual carpet, as it were, sucking on air and mouthing noises to a lobby full of blasé onlookers, quite accustomed to acts of public sex. Realising Nat had withdrawn, Sammy hurriedly logged off too, and shut down the computer.
It was days before Sammy spoke to Nat again, having twice now been left in embarrassing and faintly ridiculous situations. Trust was at an ebb. Sammy sat contemplating Pinkland, reviewing all of the books and the music and the artwork built up there, thinking about destroying it all with a keystroke, when Nat appeared in an Instant-Message Box.
>I’ve had it with you.< typed Sammy.
>Why? You in Pinkland?<
>Yes. You don’t take this relationship seriously.<
>I’ll call it up. How can you say that? We’ve been together for over six months now. We’ve got a good thing going haven’t we?< Then he typed >g<, which in Net communication means grin, and that absolutely sickened Sammy.
>You don’t turn up when we arrange to meet. You log off when we’re in the middle of something. Why don’t we just forget it?<
>Sometimes, Sammy, I think you take things too seriously. It’s only a game.<
>IT’S NOT A FUCKING GAME!< typing this in capitals, even though it was considered bad form to shout on the Internet. Sammy wanted to shout. To scream. Instead, Sammy started deleting music they’d carefully downloaded to their room in Pinkland. The Pet Shop Boys. Deleted. Tom Jones. Deleted. The Monkees. Deleted.
>What are you doing?<
>What does it look like? I’m ending it. If it’s all just a fucking game I can’t win then I’m hooking over the chessboards.<
It was their first real Internet fight. Then, after a while, Nat started cooing, and finally he said kniekehle, and incredibly he got Sammy to agree to do it all over again; though Sammy did exact a promise that The Monkees would stay deleted. After all it was Sammy’s favourite Internet sex game, keeping Nat guessing over the current gender. Many times they’d agreed to meet up outside the safety and exclusivity of the Instant Message or the private Chat Room, on some preselected Internet site where other net users of any stripe were at large, and to behave as though they were meeting for the very first time.
The point of this game was to preserve the excitement of novelty. Although they’d known each other on the web for six months, they could still surprise each other this way. They could, and often did, pretend to be someone of the opposite sex. Both of them.
Deep down, Sammy suspected Nat of being a woman.
Sammy had tried, over the last couple of weeks, to look for deep clues. Little mistakes, insensitivities, gaps in knowledge, things a woman should know, things a man shouldn’t. But the Net allowed for such a range of improvization that one’s persona could easily become subsumed by the alter-ego. There was always, and in everyone, a shadow just aching to come out and play, to don the leather trousers or the frilly frock, to taste the whip, to pop the amyl, bind the cord, lick the cream, crush the fruit, sting the skin and to stretch the neck right up to the hissing wind of mortality’s scythe.
Sammy’s preference was for coming on as a man, set upon by a small crowd of rampant women, stripped and molested and then re-clothed in somewhat tarty women’s gear before they began a systematic programme of mild abuse, leaving Sammy aching, and sore, and spent.
Even on the Net this fantasy was difficult to deliver.
But then Nat shocked Sammy. >I’m not talking about meeting on the Net any more.<
>Any time, any place.< Sammy said, pretending not to have grasped the significance of what Nat now proposed. A meeting in real real life. Beyond cyberspace was another country.
>Stop it!< Nat said sharply. >Stop making out you don’t know what I’m talking about. Things have come to a head, as you knew they would. That’s what all this pouting and complaining is all about. If you want this to be a real relationship – and I mean a corporeal, physical, off-line thing, a caring relationship where yes means yes and no means no, where people have flu and sour breath in the mornings and where we have to endure each other’s black moods and we do all that ’cos we genuinely love each other – then we have to meet. Engage. We have to press flesh, Sammy. Press flesh.<
Love? thought Sammy. Who said anything about love? This was getting weird. There was a hierarchy of steps to be taken before making the thing corporeal. A file transfer here and there; a telephone call; an exchange of the kind of mail which requires a postman to come whistling up the path; a trading of photographs; gifts even. Love wasn’t something you just downloaded.
But Nat hadn’t finished. >Just be clear, I’m not talking about faking it all over again and again and again. I’ve been thinking about this for a while. I don’t know what happens to you when we go off-line, but me, I’m left alone, trying to guess whether it really is just a game. Totally alone. Longing for you. And if you’ve felt me retreating lately, that’s why. So there it is.<
Long pause while Sammy’s cursor blinked, waiting for a response. >Can’t we keep things as they are? We’ve got a good thing going, haven’t we?< Sammy typed those words fully aware of how weakly they echoed Nat’s earlier remarks. Even in typescript it was possible to make words curve, wail. >Can’t we just stay in Pinkland? Aren’t you happy here?<
>Do whatever you want with Pinkland. But on your own. If we don’t meet, we don’t no more greet. That’s it. That’s what it means to me.<
Nat would brook no argument, and since they both lived in London there were no practical constraints. He proposed that they flesh-rendezvous the following Saturday in a bar just off Soho which he said was quiet, where he sometimes went alone. He said he’d be there whether Sammy showed or not. >Now I’m logging off. The choice is yours. Forever Sammy.<
>But how will I find this place?<
>Got a tongue in your head, haven’t you? Lingual, aren’t you?< A sneer in the words made Sammy afraid.
>Wait, wait, how will I know you?<
>You’ll know me.<
>I don’t even know if you’re a man or a woman!<
Pause. >You’ll know me.<
Sammy agonized about going. They’d played this game too many times on the Net, with dire consequences, for it to be merely intriguing.
The journey in on the Tube was awful. Sammy’s pulse rate rose and fell with the approach and departure of the underground trains. On the Internet it was always possible to touch a button and scuttle away. Real life has no keypad. Throat dry, hands trembling, Sammy kept asking what was to be gained from doing this. But the answer was the same every time. Sammy didn’t want to lose Nat. The thought of life without him was worse than the thought of meeting him.
Not only was Nat Sammy’s demon lover, Nat was number one best friend. Nat was the only person who could make Sammy fall from a stool laughing, whenever at the keyboard. Sammy had never met anyone half so witty or funny. Presented with a problem, Nat always had something for Sammy. When Sammy’s Dad died just five weeks into the relationship, and Mother was useless and remote, Nat was the one who brought Sammy through it, weeping at the keyboard sometimes; and Sammy suspected he was weeping at his end of things, too. Nat was the only person in this world who treated Sammy as an adult, with respect, with recognition, with responsibility.
On reaching the nominated bar Sammy dithered outside for a while, trying but failing to peer through the semi-frosted glass; finally stiffening the sinews and finding the courage to enter. It was dark inside, with a double row of tables lit by soft amber light. A candle burned at each table.
An irritating couple, hopelessly in love, sat holding hands in the corner. Apart from a barman crunching an ice-machine behind the bar, there was only one other person, deep in the gloomy recesses of the bar. Sammy knew instantly it was Nat.
Nat looked up at Sammy, and exhaled a rich blue plume of cigarette smoke. Betraying no sign of recognition, Sammy marched up to the bar and ordered a daiquiri. The barman turned slowly and winched a single eyebrow very high. Sammy tried to outstare him. The barman notched his eyebrow a fraction higher still. Sammy coloured and muttered something about accepting a Coke.
Taking the Coke and sitting at an empty table, Sammy tried to take a drink, the glass colliding with teeth. Nat gathered up cigarettes, lighter, drink and handbag, clearly preparing to come over. For Sammy, everything went slow-mo.
Nat was very tall. Sammy simultaneously marvelled at and was horrified by the extraordinary length of Nat’s legs. The calf-muscles were too large. They were exaggerated by stiletto heels and an excessively short skirt. Even under the dim light Sammy could see that Nat wore too much make-up.
When Nat slid into an adjacent seat, Sammy felt suffocated by the scent of cheap perfume. Sammy looked round wildly for that keypad, that escape button. But on this occasion there was no way out. Nat lit another cigarette, offering one for Sammy to decline before extending a hand that wanted shaking. Sammy accepted the hand. It was very large with prominent blue veins, highly manicured and with brightly polished fingernails.
“Sammy?” Sammy nodded an answer. Nat’s voice was rather husky. “Does your Mother know you’re out?”
“She thinks I’m at a friend’s
.”
“Thought you hadn’t got any friends.”
“I invented one.”
“You sure did.” Nat let out a sigh and a lungful of smoke altogether, on which cloud Sammy heard Nat float the word Christ. Then, “I’m surprised they even let you in here. If I’d known I’d have arranged to meet you at a milk bar or something. Did you qualify for half-fare on the train?”
“Sorry.”
“I suppose that’s it, then. Over before it’s begun.” Nat whisked a compact mirror from his handbag, smoothed an eyebrow and plucked at something in the corner of his eye.
“Is that a wig? You’re a – ”
“Don’t!” Nat said sharply. Then more gently, “It’s only words. And I can be anything I want.”
Sammy saw the light from the candle starbursting in Nat’s eye. “Are you upset?”
“Upset? Listen, kiddiwinks, I’ve been upset by the best of them. It takes more than a fucking teenybopper to get me upset.”
“Shall I go?’
“Yes. Run along. Run along, for Christ’s sake.”
Sammy got up from his seat. He tried to offer a handshake but Nat wasn’t having any of it. He wouldn’t even make eye contact. In the end Sammy got out very quickly. In fact he didn’t even finish his extremely expensive Coke.
The ride back was a nightmare. Sammy spent the entire journey from Leicester Square to Hounslow with his ears between his knees and the palms of his hands pressed against his flaming cheeks. The other passengers just thought he was a sick boy.
Sammy knew what he had lost. He also felt he had let himself down in a way quite mysterious. Because at the same time he knew it was hopeless. He had, during this brief encounter, stolen a glance at Nat’s kniekehle. The blue vein in the fold at the back of the knee had pulsated in a manner quite threatening. It was not at all erotic. Indeed it made him feel slightly queasy. The thought, too, of Nat’s cassolette made him want to faint away.
Some days later he resolved to try to find a new partner, and not on the Net either. But real life wasn’t the same. It wasn’t possible to converse in the same way. He discovered, with a girl his own age, that ordinary relationships often consisted of spending large blocks of time together saying nothing; whereas on the Net the convention was always to be saying something. Even if it amounted to nothing.
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