Valentine enters the room and discovers Gene standing in front of her tiny shrine, gazing – with some astonishment – at a large, black and white photograph of a vagina which hangs, lopsidedly, on the wall behind it.
‘That’s not what it looks like,’ she says, bending down to blow out a tea-light (which still flickers away, doggedly, before the tiny, roaring, cartoonish image of Kali). ‘I mean it’s not pornography, it’s art. It’s a tattoo. The hair on the … the hair’s not real. It’s a tattoo.’
‘But it’s so incredibly lifelike,’ Gene murmurs, squinting, then drawing in still closer, amazed.
‘Yeah.’
She runs a nervous hand through her newly bobbed fringe. During her brief absence she’s removed the curler and changed into a pair of high-waisted jeans: classic, dark denim, American-made; tight on the hip, baggy on the legs, with matching, beige, elasticated braces attached, and a snugly fitting gingham shirt underneath.
‘It’s not normally hung up there,’ she adds, ‘I was just showing it to a client.’
‘The wicker was impressive,’ Gene muses, ‘but that’s actually quite astonishing.’
‘Wicker?’ Valentine’s slow to catch on.
‘At the hotel. Your brother removed his shirt …’
‘Really?’ She scowls, irritated. ‘Why’d he do that?’
‘I’m not sure.’ Gene turns to face her and immediately notices how the elastic of the braces curves around her breasts. He quickly turns away again. ‘To show it off, I guess.’
‘The wicker was an early piece,’ she mutters.
‘And now you’ve moved on to … uh …’ Gene points, lamely.
‘Merkins.’
She isn’t afraid to say it out loud.
‘Merkins,’ Gene parrots, ruminatively.
‘I got into it by accident,’ she expands. ‘I was offering a cosmetic tattoo service at my dad’s parlour. He’d sent me on a course – learning how to do permanent eye-liner and lip-liner; that kind of stuff. I developed a really good technique for doing eyebrows – for tattooing hair, basically. I did some work on a woman with alopecia and she really loved it. She was quite a character; a performance artist. It was originally her idea for me to tattoo her … well … down there …’
She grimaces. ‘Word quickly got around – especially on the internet. She helped me set up my website. Since then I’ve mainly concentrated on’ – she clears her throat – ‘on what you might call “specialist clients”.’
‘I suppose this gives true meaning to the phrase “a niche market”,’ Gene jokes, lamely.
She glances over at him.
‘Niche,’ he explains, instantly regretting this light-hearted foray, ‘a shallow recess.’
‘A niche?’
She returns her attention back to the photograph again, somewhat perplexed. ‘I’ve never really thought of a vagina in that way before.’
‘Me neither,’ he mutters, humiliated.
‘I’ve done my fair share of nipples – for women who’ve had reconstructive surgery on their breasts. I’m pretty good at them – matching the woman to the nipple; the right size, the right colour. It’s really rewarding work. Bread and butter stuff. I’ve taken a lot of photographs. Some I’m really proud of. I mean I’m quite into scars in general. There’s a specialist scar market – people who want scars’ – she shrugs – ‘and I can do that. I’m into all that …’
‘I had breast cancer myself,’ Gene murmurs.
‘Oh … okay.’ Valentine nods, distracted. ‘It’s not only about the body, though,’ she continues. ‘It started out that way, but now I’m mainly just obsessed by textures,’ she confesses, ‘abstract textures: wools, woven grasses, woodgrains, marble, even concrete. I’ve got this house-brick on my thigh …’
‘A brick?’
His brows rise.
‘A couple of bricks.’ She nods. ‘I tattooed them there myself. I’ve got a photo in my portfolio …’
She walks over to a large, black art folder which leans behind the door, unzips it and then pages through some photographic prints inside. Each piece is separated by a sheet of tracing paper. She eventually locates the one she’s looking for and pulls it out.
‘I’m completely obsessed by Louise Bourgeois,’ she says, carrying it over, the tracing paper still in place. ‘D’you know her work at all?’
He shakes his head.
‘She’s really old now, French, has this huge retrospective coming up at the Tate Modern …’ Valentine glances over, briefly, towards the slumbering Nessa. ‘Not that I’ll get a chance to see it.’ She shrugs.
‘Childcare a problem?’ Gene speculates.
‘Too scared to leave the house,’ she murmurs, smiling.
‘Too scared …?’ he echoes.
‘I’m agoraphobic.’
As she speaks, she places the bottom edge of the print on to the rug, removes the tracing paper and reveals the image for his perusal.
‘Her work deals mainly with issues surrounding women and domesticity,’ she explains (focusing entirely on the photo now), ‘women and the home, basically – women being defined, psychologically, by the actual fabric of their homes. That’s my own, particular area of interest: ideas surrounding intimacy, privacy, anxiety; the textures of my immediate environment – the comfort I find in them and at the same time the feelings of disgust they sometimes evoke in me …’
Gene stares at the photograph as she talks, struggling to process the glut of information she’s feeding him. It is a beautifully taken picture of the left-hand side of her body – from knee to hip. On her thigh are two exquisitely well-tattooed bricks – house bricks, with a thick slick of cement oozing out from between them. Even as he marvels at the extraordinary artistry of her work, he is intensely conscious of the flesh that surrounds it – the quiet, soft canvas of her nudity.
‘Did you take the photo yourself?’ he asks.
‘Yeah. My ex – the monk …’ – she grimaces self-deprecatingly – ‘he was a professional photographer. He left me most of his equipment when he headed off to India. I enjoy dabbling. I use my bedroom as a darkroom. I mean they’re not anything to write home about –’
‘I don’t agree,’ Gene interrupts, ‘I think they’re really wonderful.’
‘I heard this radio interview with her once,’ Valentine continues, returning to her former subject (almost as if embarrassed by Gene’s compliment, although – somewhat paradoxically – seemingly unperturbed by how exposing the photo is). ‘The journalist asked her what her motivation was and she simply answered, “To survive.”’
She shakes her head, fondly. ‘You could hear in her voice – this cracked, dry, old, French voice – that she really, really meant it. She said her art was a way of creating order out of anxiety; making shapes out of this gnawing terror that burrowed away inside of her. I suppose that’s basically what I’m aiming to do myself, but my medium has always been the skin – transforming the skin …’
‘Did it hurt much?’ Gene wonders, seemingly transfixed by the image.
‘It killed!’ She laughs. ‘I have a pathetically low pain threshold.’
‘But you were pleased with the end result?’
She peers down at the photograph, frowning. ‘I guess what most outsiders don’t tend to understand is how little of tattooing – or body art in general – is about the design aspect; the formal decoration. From my perspective it’s always been as much about the process as the end result …’
‘The pain of the needle?’ he muses.
‘Look at the Maoris.’ Valentine nods. ‘For them tattoos are a rite of passage. They’re a marker of bravery, of maturity, of cultural acceptance. The tattoo represents not only a willingness to accept pain – to endure it – but a need to actively embrace it. Because life is painful – beautiful but painful …’
She places the tracing paper back over the image and returns it to the folder. As she does so another print attracts her attention and she pulls it out.
>
‘Here’s a perfect case in point …’
She carries the print over, places the bottom edge down and removes the tracing paper.
‘This woman was forty-seven when I tattooed her vagina – a widow. D’you see the hundreds of shiny, white marks all over her skin?’
Gene studies the image, closely. ‘What are they?’ he asks. ‘Stretch marks?’
‘Nope. Little cuts. Self-inflicted. She used to slice herself with this special piece of shell …’
Valentine lays the print down flat on to the floor, goes over to her shrine, kneels down in front of it and carefully removes something from behind the picture of Kali. She holds it out to him. He steps forward and takes it from her, gingerly.
‘It’s wonderful to the touch don’t you think?’
‘Is this the actual …?’
He runs his finger over it, appalled.
‘Incredibly cool and light and smooth, but still razor sharp …’
He passes it back to her with a slight shudder.
‘The client had these overwhelming feelings of inadequacy,’ she explains. ‘She’d been raised by an aunt. Her parents had gone to live in America when she was five or six. They’d taken her younger brother with them but they’d left her behind in Japan. She never really knew why. She felt …’
She searches for the right word: ‘… gagged … choked … smothered. She had all these frustrations that she didn’t feel it was socially acceptable for her to express. And crazy as it sounds, some of her deepest feelings of inadequacy were centred on her lack of pubic hair. The other girls at school used to tease her about it, and then, later on, after she was married, her husband did the same. She felt trapped – both physically and emotionally – in this pre-pubescent state …’
Valentine returns the piece of shell to its original place, rises to her feet and picks up the print again.
‘So when she found out about the work I was doing she spent virtually every penny she had to fund her trip over here. Aside from the cutting, she felt like the tattoo was her first, real act of self-determination. And once it was complete, she presented me with the shell as a thank you. She said the tattoo made her feel whole. And it wasn’t the tattoo itself so much as submitting, voluntarily, to the pain of the needle. It was the journey of the tattoo, if you like, which is basically what this photo represents. I mean it’s not beautiful or glamorous …’
‘Is it enjoyable?’ Gene asks, sensing that he should contribute something, yet feeling unable to commit – wholeheartedly – to the stark image itself.
‘Enjoyable?’
She bursts out laughing. ‘How d’you mean? In a kinky, Readers’ Wives kind of way?’
‘No!’ Gene’s horrified. ‘I mean the process – the actual tattooing …’
‘It’s hard work’ – she shrugs – ‘a lot of bending over and craning. I get a certain amount of neck pain, twinges in my lower back, eye strain, cramping in the hand …’
She tenses and un-tenses her right hand. As she does so he notices that three of her finger pads are an odd, purplish-blue colour.
‘But you get used to it after a while …’
She carefully covers the print with the tracing paper. ‘And obviously it depends – to a large extent – on the attitude of the individual client. Most of my customers are from the Far East. They’re generally really excited about the process – scared but excited …’ She grins, going over to place the print back into the folder. ‘They’ve waited a long time for the work. It’s a transformative act – the culmination of many years of stress and many months of planning –’
‘How long would it take?’ Gene interrupts. ‘I mean a tattoo of this size …’
He points to the photo on the wall.
‘Four or five hours. And I generally have to turn the tattoo around in one, long session, which can be fairly challenging …’ – she grimaces – ‘both for me and the client. There’s no margin for error in this line of work. Then there’s the weight of their expectation – which is huge …’
She walks over to the wall and straightens the painting on its hook. ‘The work’s compressed into this tiny, little area’ – she points – ‘but it’s very, very detailed, and the needle needs to go in deep enough or the ink comes away with the scab …’
Gene winces.
‘The skin over the pubic bone is especially delicate,’ she continues. ‘I mean it’s always harder to tattoo over bone – the hands, the ribs, the foot … You have to be really, really careful or the ink can bleed and the overall effect is –’
‘I wasn’t snooping around,’ Gene interrupts her, suddenly anxious. ‘I saw a wisp of smoke through the open doorway, so I came in to investigate. But it was only …’
He points at the shrine where a stick of incense has recently burned out, leaving a powder-fine trail of grey ash in its wake.
‘I chant,’ she explains, adjusting one of her braces. ‘Chanting with beads. Mischa taught me. He was really into Kali. It’s his old shrine. I do it to relieve stress, sometimes.’
As she speaks her eyes travel from the sleeping child on the sofa to the crazy image of Kali, to the tattooed vagina above.
‘I suppose this must all look a little … uh …’ She bites her lip, self-consciously. ‘… nuts.’
‘Not at all,’ he insists, slightly too loudly, before frowning down at his clipboard, uncomfortably, as if preparing himself to say something, then not saying it and turning to inspect the azure-cloaked Virgin Mary that stands, close to his elbow, on the bookcase.
‘My mother’s a Catholic,’ she explains. ‘At least she was a Catholic,’ she corrects herself, ‘before the accident.’
In the brief, awkward silence that follows, they both listen out, instinctively, for the distant strains of the piano, but it is no longer audible. Neither of them has the slightest notion of when the playing actually stopped.
‘Is she fully recovered now?’ Gene asks.
‘Hang on a second …’ Valentine cocks her head, still listening, ‘D’you hear that?’
‘What?’
‘A crackling sound … kind of like …’ She gestures with her hand.
‘Uh …’
Gene’s eyes move from her face, to her hand, to her brace (which is now applying the lightest of pressures to her right breast), then over to the shrine, panicked.
‘D’you have a phone?’ she wonders.
Gene pats at his pocket, feeling for his phone, then pulls it out, looks down at it, aghast, and quickly shoves it to his ear.
‘Hello?’
He listens for a moment.
‘Yeah. No. Sorry. I didn’t … I must’ve …’
As he speaks he winces at Valentine, apologetically. She shrugs.
He listens again.
‘No. No. It’s not …’
He scratches his head, embarrassed. ‘Could we talk about this later? I’m actually out on a …’
He listens again, perplexed. ‘Generous as the offer is, I really don’t think Sheila would … I mean she’s still furious about …’
He inhales, sharply.
‘Pussy-whipped?’ he echoes, affronted, then glances over towards Valentine (who is covering her sleeping niece with a crocheted, patchwork blanket). ‘That’s hardly fair …’ he murmurs, hurt.
A brief silence follows.
‘Okay. Okay,’ he finally concedes, his resolve palpably weakening. ‘So where …?’
He removes a pencil from the front pocket of his overalls, bends over and scribbles something on to his clipboard, whilst balancing it, unsteadily, on his knee.
‘I’ve a fair idea …’ he mutters, ‘… just past the Lea Valley walk, then Someries Castle, and it’s … Yeah. Fine. Six o’clock, sharp. But please don’t …’
A long pause. Valentine stands by the sofa, watching him from behind. As he leans forward, the collar on his overalls moves back and is pulled askew. On the area of skin just below his neck she sees the upper region of a bruise. S
he stares at it, fascinated, then looks down at her hand.
‘Well it’s big of you to admit that.’ Gene scratches his head again, suddenly disarmed. ‘And I suppose no real lasting damage was …’
An extended pause.
‘The Hummer?’
He straightens up again. ‘I don’t think …’
He gazes up at the ceiling.
‘I mean the cost of petrol alone …’
He stares down at the floor, frowning. ‘What kind of a uniform?’
He slowly shakes his head as he listens, ‘No. The hat’s too big and the jacket has this huge tear under the … Hello?’
He gazes at his phone for a second, confused, puts it to his ear again, removes it and stares at it, then shoves it, grimacing, into his pocket.
‘Good. Right,’ he says, turning back to face Valentine, a slight sheen of perspiration glowing on his forehead. ‘Sorry about that.’
‘Look,’ Valentine says, taking a couple of steps towards him and reaching out her hand. He inspects the hand for a second, cautiously.
‘The bruise,’ she directs him, ‘on the index finger. Circling the index finger …’
She points to an angry bruise on her index finger.
‘It’s where I tried on your ring yesterday – Cheiro’s ring. The whole area is bruised. And see here …’
She turns over her hand and shows him her finger pads. Three of these are also bruised.
‘Don’t you think that’s weird?’ she asks, glancing up.
‘I should probably have a quick word with you about the reading,’ Gene answers, plainly unnerved by how close she’s standing. ‘One of the screws came loose …’
As he speaks, upstairs – in the furthest reaches of the house – a loud crashing sound is audible.
‘Piano lid!’ Valentine clucks, turning to glance over at the sleeping child, suddenly anxious. The child shifts her position, with a gentle sigh, then settles.
‘I should probably head back to work,’ Gene mutters, losing his nerve. He glances down at his watch.
‘Of course,’ she answers, then reaches out her hand – the right hand, the bruised hand – and places it, softly, matter-of-factly, palm flat, fingers outstretched, over the area just below his right nipple. She rests it there for a second and then lifts it and places it at the base of his throat, just above his collar bone, then lifts it again and places it at his left shoulder, close to the armpit.
The Yips Page 18