‘She never wanted you. In fact, she hated your touch,’ she called out.
I stopped. Her words chilled my soul. I never knew I could feel so empty and so lost. Now I knew the truth. She never wanted me. My knees felt stiff as if they were made of iron or some inflexible material. But turn I must. I had been so stupid. So blind. I should have known. My heart filled with regret. I had put the chicken in the care of the fox. I had defeated myself.
When I turned around to look at her my face was cold and utterly indifferent. I looked into her pretty eyes. I had never really looked before. I caught the glimmer of poison, but at the expression on my face, a new fear crept into her face.
‘You have mistaken my generosity for weakness.’
‘I’m sorry,’ she cried quickly. ‘I didn’t mean to say that. I love you.’ Her voice was passionate.
‘Don’t,’ I said, my voice icy. ‘You are relieved of all your duties as of now. I want you out in the morning. You will be paid two months’ salary in lieu of notice.’
‘You can’t do that. What about Meredith and Tia?’
‘Do not even go near them,’ I grated. Even hearing their names on her lips infuriated me.
I left her. My jaw was tight, my heart was broken. Truly broken. Filled with the dull sensation that I didn’t want to go on, but of course, I would.
I had lost her, and it was my own damn fault.
Chapter 26
Lena
When I woke in the morning I didn’t feel refreshed or energized. My eyes were red and swollen and I looked pale. I showered quickly, dressed in the white top and black skirt, put my hair into one neat plait down my back, and slipped into the only pair of shoes I now owned, which were thankfully my sensible black shoes, and I was ready. I went into the kitchen and Margaret was rooting about in the fridge.
‘Sit down and I’ll make you breakfast,’ she said.
‘You don’t have to make me breakfast, Margaret. You have already been too kind. When I get my first wages I am going to pay you back.’
She brought her head out of the fridge. ‘Oh, Lena. You don’t know what a pleasure it is for me to have you stay in my home. I am an old woman now. My children hardly come around and you are like a breath of fresh air in this tired old flat. Please, never talk about paying me back.’
I looked at her uncertainly.
She went to a drawer, opened it, and took two spoons out. She opened the freezer and put the spoons on its icy floor, then she turned back to me.
‘What are the spoons for?’ I asked.
‘They are for your eyes. You can’t go to work on your first day and look like you have been crying your eyes out. Come and sit down,’ she said.
I slumped into a chair. In truth I felt miserable. Disaster had been averted but my heart was breaking. Guy had abandoned me just like that. With just my passport. Not even a penny. He didn’t care at all. If Margaret had not helped me, God knows where I would have spent the night, or even what would have happened to me. I fought back the tears at his callousness.
‘There, there,’ Margaret said and, coming to me, patted my hand.
‘Oh! Margaret,’ I sobbed. What could I tell her? That I had fallen madly in love with a man who cared so little that he had thrown me in a train heading for London without so much as a dime?
‘Listen,’ Margaret said firmly. ‘You are alive and you are so incredibly young. No matter what has happened or gone on before this, you can start fresh. No one knows your past, or what you have done. Let this be a new beginning for you.’ She handed me a paper napkin.
‘Thank you,’ I sniffed.
‘Dry your tears, Lena. You have so much.’
It was not true that I had so much, but I had Nikolai. I made a massive effort to stop sobbing then. ‘Will you post an important letter for me, Margaret?’ I asked.
She smiled. ‘Of course I will.’
‘Thank you so much.’
She opened the freezer, took out the spoons and came toward me. ‘Rest the backs on your eyelids while I prepare breakfast. It will bring the swelling and redness down.’
I sat with the cold metal on my eyelids while she prepared eggs, warmed up half a can of baked beans and made two slices of toast. After we had eaten she insisted on coming with me to the restaurant.
‘London is a maze. You’ll get lost on your own,’ she said.
And to be perfectly honest I was truly glad she came because she showed me the way the Underground worked and bought me a weekly ticket.
I turned to her. ‘In all my life I don’t think I have ever met anyone as kind and as generous as you.’
A shadow passed over her face, but all she said was, ‘Nothing gives me more pleasure than helping you, child.’
We parted at the entrance to the restaurant. ‘Do you want me to come pick you up at the end of your shift?’
I shook my head. ‘I think I know how to find my way home.’
‘All right, dear. I’ll see you at home. Good luck now.’
I pushed open the restaurant door feeling nervous. What if I dropped food on a customer or made a mistake with a bill? Roberto was not around, but a young woman was behind the bar. She smiled widely at me.
‘I’m Rosella. You must be Lena,’ she said. ‘Roberto described you well.’
‘Oh, what did he say?’
‘He said you have the face of an angel.’
I blushed and Rosella laughed. ‘You’ve never worked in a restaurant before, right?’
I nodded.
‘No problem. It’s very easy. Let me introduce you to everybody first. Remember, they are all Italian and they will all try to sleep with you. Just ignore them, unless you want to, that is. But whatever you do, don’t ever sleep with the chef. He is totally crazy.’
She took me around the back and introduced me to everyone. As she had predicted they all looked at me with hot, interested eyes. Thirty minutes later the waiters arrived. Rosella made it easy by giving me small jobs—filling the pepper and salt pots, laying the tables, folding napkins. By the time the first customer arrived I felt quite comfortable standing in my position behind the bar polishing glasses and watching her greet and seat them and hand them their menus.
Lunchtime passed as a busy blur. I was kept on my feet and when the last customer left, Marco, one of the waiters, told me I had done well.
‘Really?’ I asked, pleased.
‘He’s just trying to get into your pants, but you did do well,’ Rosella told me.
‘Fuck off,’ Marco said to her.
She ignored him. ‘See you this evening at five,’ she told me, shrugging into her coat.
‘What time do we finish at night?’
‘Depends on the last customer.’
‘But I have to leave before the last train,’ I said.
‘Don’t worry,’ Marco offered. ‘I’ll take you home.’
Rosella looked at him, and then at me, and shrugged. ‘There’s your lift.’
‘Thank you, Marco,’ I said quietly.
But when I told Margaret she was not happy. ‘You don’t know him from Adam. No, no, that’s a bad idea. I’ll ask Brian to pick you up.’
And though I protested she wouldn’t hear different. Brian didn’t seem to mind either.
*****
I’d been working at Basilico for two days when a man came into the restaurant. It was lunchtime and he was alone. His hair had been oiled and sculpted into perfect finger waves. He wore a cream shirt, an olive business jacket, and a pair of jeans. After his food had been cleared away he called me to his table.
‘What’s your name?’ he drawled.
‘Lena.’
‘Would you like to become a model, Lena?’
‘What? Like in a magazine?’
‘Yeah, like in a magazine.’
For a moment I was dumbfounded and then I found my voice. ‘Yes.’
‘Good. In that case there is a casting session tomorrow at three p.m. Here.’ He took a card out of his jacket
and held it out to me. I took the card and looked at it.
Models101 it was called, and the address was Macklin Street.
‘Arrive earlier than three p.m. Put your hair in a ponytail, wear skinny black or dark blue jeans, a form-fitting tank top in a solid color, high heels and no make-up. Got it? Can I take a quick photo?’ he asked taking his mobile phone out of his jacket pocket.
‘OK.’
‘Don’t pout and don’t smile,’ he instructed and clicked. He looked at the photo with narrowed, detached eyes. ‘Brilliant,’ he pronounced.
I glanced at Rosella and she raised her eyebrows, as in, What the fuck are you doing?
‘Thanks,’ I said quickly, and with a thrill of excitement I left him. Models make more money than waitresses, which meant the sooner I could get Nikolai away from my father.
I asked Rosella if I could have the next afternoon off instead of Thursday and Marco immediately said he would exchange shifts with me. I smiled gratefully at him.
That evening I found that Carrie had a tank top in one solid color. A pair of skinny jeans that were too short, but after I teamed them with high heels they simply looked like ankle-length jeans.
*****
‘Do you think I look right?’ I asked Margaret. She was sitting at her dining table flipping through a magazine, but she was dressed in a brown suit as if she was going out.
‘You’d look divine in a sack,’ she said with a smile.
‘Why are you all dressed?’ I asked her.
‘I’m going with you,’ she informed me.
‘Oh, I don’t know if I am allowed to bring anyone with me.’
‘Don’t you worry, chaperones are the norm in the modeling business. This is a sleazy business and you’re just a child. I don’t want anyone thinking you are alone and can be taken advantage of.’
I grinned at her. ‘OK, that will be great. Thanks, Margaret.’
Together we took the Tube to Holborn Station, walked down Holborn High Street, took a left at Newton Street, then a right turn into Macklin Street. It was a one-way back street. We had to go through a blue entrance and up a set of stairs to 13 Macklin Street. I climbed them with my heart in my throat. As my mother would have said, there was a whole bag of chinchillas in my stomach. At the next landing I saw the black on lilac sign that read Models101, and beside it a set of glass double doors. I could see a white reception desk. It looked very posh. It felt like the big time. Even though Brian had done some research and told me that Models101 was the agency of the moment, and what to expect, some part of me had not believed that it was all real. That a real model scout for Models101 had spotted me working in a restaurant and asked me to a real casting. That was the stuff fairy tales were made of.
Brian had told us to go early for the casting since the rules of casting were that anybody not seen inside the allotted hour would be sent home. Being early assured that you would be seen first. He had told me that it would most probably be a pre-interview, and had very subtly hinted that there was a rather large possibility that I would be sent home with the polite message that the agency would call me if anything came up. And that was probably a bad sign. Or if I was very lucky and had the right face I would be sent in to see the owner of the agency. A powerful woman called Georgina Carangi. She was known in the industry simply as Geo.
But there were no other girls waiting in the tastefully decorated reception area. And instead of the pre-interview I was immediately whisked away by the receptionist to see the boss of the show—Geo. I followed the receptionist but turned back to widen my eyes at Margaret. She grinned irrepressibly like a child, pulled her shoulders up to her ears, and mouthed, ‘Good luck.’ Outside the dragon’s lair, I wiped my sweaty palms on the sides of my jeans and went to meet my fate.
It was a big room full of windows. A thin, dark-haired woman was seated behind an ornate white desk elegantly smoking a cigarette when I entered. She killed the cigarette expertly, without looking at what she was doing. Smoke swirled around her. She was the stuff legends were made of. She made a small beckoning movement with the fingers of her right hand.
It was time to strut my stuff, and strangely I found it easy. I thought of Guy and did it for Nikolai. I raised my chin, pushed my chest out, and slowly glided in, long legs first. I stopped in the middle of the room and waited.
The swirling smoke cleared and I saw her formidable eyes. They were dark and shone with barely suppressed excitement. She leaned back in her chair, flashed a mysterious smile, and let her gaze travel appraisingly down my body. Then she returned her impassive eyes to mine.
‘You’re not English. Where are you from?’ She had a voice like sandpaper.
‘Russia.’ Shit. My passport claimed I was British.
She smiled very slowly. ‘Luckily for you the only things the world will still accept from Russia are petroleum, caviar and long-legged models.’
I attempted a natural smile and failed.
‘Turn around,’ she instructed.
I did. Slowly.
‘Face me again.’
I turned around.
‘You’ll do very nicely,’ she said.
And I broke into a huge grin.
‘You won’t be doing any Victoria’s Secret gigs with those breasts,’ she warned, ‘but there’s work for those legs. A lot of work.’
All I heard was ‘A lot of work.’
‘Sit down and let’s talk,’ she said, reaching for her cigarette box.
I was so happy I almost skipped toward her.
On the spot she took me on. She called someone on the phone and told the person on the other end to bring in a contract. A heavily pregnant woman came in with a thin sheaf of papers and handed the document over to me. I took it in a daze.
‘Have a look over it or get a lawyer to look at it for you,’ Geo said, killing another cigarette. ‘Then sign it and make another appointment to see me. You could have a very brilliant future in modeling. And that isn’t true of every girl in modeling.’ She smiled warmly and, standing up, walked me to the door.
When I walked out of her office Margaret stood and looked at me expectantly. I ran into her arms and hugged her so tightly she squealed.
‘Oh, Lena,’ she crooned. ‘I’m so happy for you.’
Chapter 27
After I signed the four-page document Georgina Carangi and I met again over lunch. She wore sunglasses on her head during the entire lunch and picked at a small salad, cutting the leaves into tiny pieces that she reluctantly slipped into her mouth, as if eating was some sort of intolerable ordeal. In response I tried not to eat so much.
She told me my accent was too thick and that she would be sending me not only for a quick modeling course—you need to walk beautifully—but also for elocution classes.
‘The real world needs illusions,’ she said.
I nodded silently.
‘The first thing I want you to do is a shoot with DZM, a stocking company. The money is lousy, but the photographer is great and very in. French. Get the right photographer behind you and you’ll soar. With any luck he will take a picture of you that will look outstanding in your portfolio.’
*****
The photographer’s name was Louis Cirilli. He wore skin-tight trousers and had a life-sized black and white photo of a naked man with a very big penis on his studio wall. He looked at me, bit into an apple, and chewed thoughtfully.
‘I don’t know your history, but you look very vulnerable. It is part of your beauty. As if you can be broken. It is an appeal.’ He waved his hands in small circles around his face. ‘A beautiful riddle. You know, sexy and dynamite and alive. Like Lady Diana or Marilyn Monroe. If it comes out in the photographs it will be everything.’
I frowned, not sure if I had understood any of that or how to use it.
‘Let me explain—every shoot is just looking for that one picture. That one perfect picture. It doesn’t matter if it is the first or the last of thousands of shots. But what every photographer will die to capt
ure is that certain faraway look. That certain inner fire.’
With those words of wisdom he sent me off to the make-up artist who began the unbelievably painstaking process of layer upon layer of creams, bases, powders, and pencils that form that impossibly perfect make-up job required for high fashion photography.
‘The bright lights will steal all your color, so you need more,’ she explained. She also did my back, shoulders, arms, and chest. She even painted my nipples a deeper pink on the off-chance that they could peek out.
It was two whole hours later that I climbed into a see-through blouse and a pair of tights wearing no underwear and six-inch purple heels. I presented myself to Louis nervously.
He clapped his hands. ‘Great. OK, get in front of the white screen and move.’
‘Move?’ I asked.
‘Do whatever your body tells you to.’
I stared at him cluelessly.
‘Tease me,’ he coaxed. ‘Make me chase you. Look at me as if you are naked. Tease me like you want me.’
I remembered Geo saying my bum is easily my best asset. I turned away from him and, pushing my ass out, turned my head and looked at him with a fierce expression on my face.
For a second he was surprised. ‘That is how you look at people you want!’ Then his eyes lit up as if a light bulb had just gone on under his skin. ‘Actually, that is perfect…’ He began snapping excitedly. ‘That’s it. Hold it. Fabulous. Fabulous. Fabulous.’
I unbuttoned the see-through blouse and sucked my thumb.
‘Great, yes. Face the wind machine. Kick your leg back. Higher, higher. Fabulous, fabulous, fabulous. Laugh, laugh, laugh. Throw your hands forward. That’s it. Beautiful. Marvelous.’
After the session he gave me a can of warm Pepsi. His eyes were almost glazed with professional excitement. ‘You were born to be in front of the camera. The way you move… You know your face, you know your body. That cannot be learned. You have to be born with that. You were born to be a model. You will leapfrog all the other new faces at Models101 and every other agency. You are about to become the new cheetah of the fashion world,’ he predicted.
From that session one stunning image emerged.
Disfigured Love Page 14