by Bark, Jasper
“Or cock juggler,” said Alfie. He was a short guy, no more than five foot five, with dark hair, shaved at the sides. He had a Cypriot look on account of his Greek dad and spoke in a broad east end accent. He was also an inveterate gossip and sold the best blow in North London. Nothing went down north of the river that he didn’t know about within hours, even though he hardly left his high rise flat.
Jimmy had a ton of things he’d promised to do that day. He also had five large in his pocket from a quick job as camera man on a corporate video. So his first order of business was procuring a few grams from Alfie.
“D’you think they’ll make a film about dickwad here?” said Tim, shifting onto his sizeable left buttock so he could fart.
“Dunno,” said Alfie. “But they wouldn’t call it Blow they’d call it Blown It, innit.”
“Very funny guys,” said Jimmy. “But I nearly got killed, thanks to you.”
“What’s that s’posed to mean?”
“Well you introduced me to Ashkan.”
“I set you up with a backer for one of your films. Someone who was gonna lend you a shitload of money, with no interest, so long as you gave him a part, that’s all. And did I get any thanks? Did I fuck. I didn’t tell you to spunk all his dosh on a dodgy fucking drugs deal now did I?”
“I guess not.”
“Course not, so don’t come pissing and moaning to me about it. You’re just lucky things turned out the way they did.”
“What do you mean?” said Jimmy, turning suddenly cold.
“What, you ain’t heard? Thought you’d be made up.”
“Heard what?” Jimmy was struggling to keep the frustration out of his voice. He knew Alfie would only wind him up more if he spotted it.
“Well you know Charlie McKenzie’s been looking for him.”
“No!” Jimmy was startled. He didn’t know many people in the criminal underworld, just his drugs connections and the few criminals he’d met through them, but everyone had heard of Charlie McKenzie. He was one of the most feared crime lords in the city. He had his hand in everything from drugs to prostitution.
“Fuck me,” said Alfie, half annoyed. “You don’t know nothing do you? I don’t know why I bother telling you anything if you can’t keep up.”
“But why is Charlie McKenzie after Ashkan?”
“Why d’you think, you dozy bleeder? Why does anybody go after someone. For money, ’course.”
“Wait, Ashkan owes money to Charlie McKenzie?”
“Quite a lot by the sound of it. Not been paying his dues or summink. Anyway, the important thing is, Ashkan’s done a bunk innit.”
“He’s disappeared?” Jimmy tried to sound as surprised as he could without over egging it.
“Totally,” said Alfie. “And not just Ashkan, his whole crew too. No-one’s seen hide nor hair of ’em in days. Charlie’s boys have turned over his house, his office his crash pads everything and they haven’t found a fucking thing.”
“What about the lock up in Bethnal Green? He showed us it once, said we could film there.”
“Oh that, they cleaned that right out, didn’t find jack.”
“What, no blood or nothing?”
“Didn’t I just say they found nothing? Are you even listening to me? Why would they find any blood?”
“I dunno, I just thought . . . maybe there’d been a gangland killing or something.”
“Gangland killing, fucking listen to him.” Aflie shook his head and sneered.
“Yeah,” said Tim. “Maybe he’s worried they’ll find out he rubbed ’em all out.”
“That’s right,” said Alfie. “Regular fucking Lepke B this one, one man Murder Inc.”
For a second, Jimmy was back in the lock up with the piles of shredded flesh and blood dripping from the ceiling. He couldn’t understand how all that could have gone by the time Charlie McKenzie’s men turned up. Did someone come and clean the place up?
Jimmy felt a sharp pain in his side. He turned and saw Alfie had punched him.
“You even listening to me?” Alfie said.
“Sorry,” Jimmy said. “I’ve got a bit on my mind.”
“I said are you here to score or what?”
“Oh yeah right.”
Jimmy pulled out a wad of notes and practically threw them at Alfie. He grabbed the ziplocked baggies of powder that Alfie produced, and headed straight for the door. It seemed that all trace of the massacre had disappeared. Jimmy had to speak to Sam as soon as he could.
“See you then, you rude bastard,” said Alfie, as Jimmy slammed the front door behind him.
CHAPTER TEN
The studio they were renting was on the top floor of a converted warehouse by the river. Sam was with Melissa, filming the scenes where she, as Nadine, was alone in bed, dreaming of torture in a dingy cellar. Jimmy wondered what Melissa would think if she could see the footage they were going to splice in as the dreams she was having? He guessed she would see some of it eventually, just not in its current form.
Sam and Jimmy hadn’t finished the script yet, but they’d worked the bedroom scenes into shape. Those seemed the best things to shoot first. They both agreed it was the easiest way of breaking Melissa into the project.
Neither of them was sure she was going to show as they waited for her that morning. They’d had no contact with her since the audition, nearly three weeks ago. She did turn up though, and only twenty minutes late. She’d been firm about keeping to her condition of having only one person on set with her at a time.
She’d chosen to work with Sam that day. Jimmy wasn’t quite as bothered by this as he might have thought. He was almost relieved to leave her alone with Sam, though he wasn’t sure why. There were a ton of things he had to do, and it had given him a chance to go and score from Alfie, something he felt a pressing need to do.
Jimmy loitered in the courtyard when he arrived, smoking a couple of cigarettes. Sam wasn’t due to wrap for another half an hour, and Jimmy didn’t want to disturb him, even if they needed to talk pretty urgently. To take his mind off what he’d learned at Alfie’s, Jimmy tried to think of creative ways to get around the conditions Melissa had set. He wasn’t sure why, or even when, they’d agreed to these conditions.
They’d have to shoot all her scenes twice, film her dialogue in close up, then use a stand in, shot from behind, when they reshot the scene with Harlow, who they still hadn’t cast. Jimmy kept thinking there was a clever way to get round this challenge. Some brilliant technique or concept he hadn’t thought of yet. But, for the life of him, he hadn’t come up with it yet.
Maybe he needed a little powdered inspiration. He had three baggies of it burning a hole in his pocket. It wouldn’t hurt to nip up to the first floor toilets and do a couple of lines. He still had some time to kill before Sam and Melissa were done.
Jimmy bounded up the stairs to the first floor landing where the toilets were. He had his head down, so he didn’t realise there was anyone on the landing until he collided with them.
“Hey, I’m sorry,” he said, then looked up to see Melissa, hand on her chest, smiling with surprise. “ I didn’t realise you were done already. I didn’t hurt you did I?”
“I’ll live,” said Melissa. She tucked her hair behind her ear with her little finger in a way that was alarmingly familiar.
“Look,” Jimmy said, suddenly awkward. “I’m not checking up or anything, I mean we’re sticking to your conditions and everything. I was just waiting to see Sam when you wrapped.”
“That’s alright, I saw you out of the window, down in the yard. Sam was setting up another shot, so I asked if we could finish for the day.”
“Why? I mean we’re on a pretty tight schedule.”
“I don’t want you to think that I prefer Sam to you, just because I asked him to film my segments.”
“What? Oh no, don’t be silly. I never thought anything of the . . . that is I know your request is erm, unconventional but y’know we’re all professional here.”
>
“Good, because I don’t prefer him.”
“Of course not, I never imagined you, erm . . . ”
“In fact, I’m not sure I could trust myself if we were alone for any length of time.”
Jimmy felt the sweat break out along his back. Melissa stepped a little closer and his heart rate soared. He could smell her perfume, sandalwood, incredibly evocative, old memories stirred in a dark place at the back of his mind. Someone, very close to him, had also worn sandalwood.
Melissa seemed to change as she leaned into him. Her eyes were downcast and her mood suddenly solemn. She looked up at him gravely and said: “I can trust you can’t I?”
“Trust me? Of course . . . of course you can.”
“If anything were to happen, to me that is. I could count on you.”
“Melissa, are you in some kind of trouble?”
Melissa looked away, her eyes seemed about to tear up. “No, it’s nothing, I’m sorry, I’m just being silly. Forget I said anything.”
“I’m sure you’re not being silly. You can tell me, I won’t judge, honestly.”
Melissa put a hand over her mouth and blinked to stop her eyes watering. She was gathering herself. “Okay,” she said. “It’s just this myth, the one my character’s studying. I was thinking about Dum . . . er . . . ”
“Dumuzi.”
“That’s right, I was thinking about how he goes to Hell for Inanna and . . . well, oh God, you’re going to think me really foolish.”
“Of course I won’t.”
“It’s just that I’ve known a lot of men you know.”
“I’m sure you have.”
Melissa blushed, suddenly coy. “That’s not always a good thing, I mean they all promise you the world, but they never deliver. And I know Inanna’s a goddess and all, but this Dumuzi was only a man and yet he still went to Hell for her. I can’t think of any man that would do that for me.”
“I find that hard to believe.”
“You don’t know the men I’ve known. They’re not all like you.”
Now it was Jimmy who blushed.
“Would you . . . I mean . . . no, this is crazy. I’ve only just met you,” she said. “I shouldn’t be asking this.”
“No, that’s okay, I don’t mind.”
“So you do care a bit about me?”
“More than a bit.”
“You’re not just worried about your film?”
“I’m always worried about some film or other. That doesn’t mean I won’t help if I can. But you do need to tell us if anything is going to affect the shoot.”
“If I wasn’t here you’d look for me wouldn’t you? You’d try to find me. Like Inanna, you’d be my Dumuzi wouldn’t you?”
“I’m not sure I follow you? Why wouldn’t you be here? Is someone threatening you?”
“What I’m trying to say is, you will come for me won’t you? Promise me you’ll come back for me and not leave me too long.”
The memories began to stir again, like rats under a nest of newspapers in the dark cellar of his mind. They broke free and swarmed into his thoughts. It wasn’t just Melissa’s scent, it was more than that.
In an instant he was back by the side of that road five years ago. Jennie had just stepped out of his car. She was hugging herself agains the cold and drizzle, smiling with hesitation and apology, her pupils huge from all the E she’d taken.
What Melissa had said was uncanny. Those were Jennie’s very last words to him, before he left her at the side of the road and headed back into town. Her exact last words.
The loss Jimmy felt, whenever he thought about Jennie, came flooding back. It was like a sledgehammer to the chest, knocking the breath out of him. He was never going to see her again, never going to hold her, never tell her how sorry he was.
If Melissa noticed the effect her words had on Jimmy she didn’t show it. She just slipped past him and headed down the stairs. She turned back to him when she reached the bottom.
“That’s a promise now, isn’t it, Dumuzi?” she said.
Jimmy nodded, his breathing still shallow, his feelings too intense to process.
As soon as the door slammed shut, Jimmy came back to himself. What the hell was Melissa playing at? Did she know what effect those words would have on him? Did she know about Jennie, had Sam mentioned something to her? Jimmy tore down the steps. He was going to confront Melissa and find out what her game was.
He tore open the front door, only seconds after it had shut. There was no sign of Melissa, she’d vanished. A lady in her late thirties stood a few steps from the door. She was wearing a cardigan with a cami and a pair of worn jeans. She looked very confused.
“Where am I?” she said.
“Riverbank Complex, on Wharf Road,” Jimmy told her. “Have you taken a wrong turn?”
The woman looked right through him, as if she hadn’t a clue what he was saying.
“What time is it?”
“Around half three,” Jimmy glanced at his watch. “Listen, you didn’t happen to see the woman who just left this building did you? Slim, curvy, strawberry blonde hair.”
The woman gazed around her and shook her head in disbelief. She didn’t seem to have heard a word Jimmy said. She wandered away from him in a daze. Her dishevelled state, her confusion and vulnerability all reminded him of Jennie.
He closed the door gently and laid his forehead against its cool metal. He would never get over Jennie. Guilt and recrimination welled up inside him like an angry geyser of bile. He wanted to move on, to put the loss behind him, but he felt too guilty, as though he still deserved to suffer.
He couldn’t cope with these feelings. Not now. He had to self-medicate. He headed straight to the men’s room and chopped himself a massive line.
Say what you like about Alfie, he sold the best blow in North London. Jimmy’s nose and throat, even his front lip, were numb from the stuff. His synapses burst into life like the grand finale of a firework display. He was sharper now, more focused and more creative, able to knock this film into shape.
More importantly, a glacial sheet of ice had crept over his emotions, numbing them all. This was why he stopped smoking weed and switched to blow. The crippling pain of remembering became a manageable throb, a dull ache he could live with.
Melissa had caught him off guard with her perfume. Total coincidence it was the same as Jennie’s. So she’d repeated the last thing Jennie ever said to him, it wasn’t an unusual phrase or anything, anyone could have said it. He was still a bit stressed about the incident with Ashkan, that’s all. Having Alfie go on about it had put him on edge.
He took a deep breath, checked himself in the mirror, left the toilets and headed up to the studio.
CHAPTER ELEVEN
Sam had taped signs saying: ‘QUIET PLEASE—FILMING IN PROGRESS’ all along the corridor and also at the entrance of the studio. Gone were the days of a red or green light over the door. Even though he knew they weren’t filming, Jimmy still entered tentatively.
Down the opposite end of the studio was the bedroom set Jimmy had helped Sam build and dress over the past couple of days. Furnishing it as cheaply as possible, from charity shops and market stalls. He had to admit Sam had done a great job of lighting it.
Sam was in a different part of the space, standing over the makeshift desk they’d set up. It was covered with recording equipment and several laptops. Sam was staring at one of these laptops, frowning over the footage he’d just shot.
“So how’d it go?” Jimmy said. “Melissa any good?”
“She’s okay,” said Sam, after a long pause. “Nothing special in the way of talent.”
“Really? That’s a surprise. Her looks though, she’s perfect for the part. So long as she’s not embarrassing we can fix everything in the edit.”
“She’s not embarrassing, I’ll give her that. There’s an issue with the camera though, the one we . . . y’know . . . acquired. I think it’s the one they used to shoot the footage we saw.”
>
“Really, that’s kind of freaky. Gives us a bit of an edge though. Could be good for the production.”
“Possibly. It must have some kind of setting that I don’t know about. I can’t work out how to turn it off.”
“What do you mean?”
“Do you remember how there was some kind of filter that obscured the guys who were doing the torture?”
“Yeah, made them all blurred and shadowy, have you worked out how to do that?”
“Not yet, but that’s how Melissa came out on the film. Everything else in the frame is perfectly in focus, all apart from her. There’s even a moment when it looks like there’s been a double exposure.”
“A double exposure?”
“Yeah, like there’s someone else in the shot, like Melissa’s been superimposed onto another woman, it’s only for a couple of frames but it’s totally inexplicable. Never seen anything like it before.”
For a moment Jimmy thought of the lost and confused woman in the courtyard, but that brought back more memories of Jennie, so he banished her from his mind.
Jimmy sighed. “So we can’t use anything you shot today?”
“Doesn’t look like it.”
“There’s a way around this.” Jimmy’s brain was whirring. He could fix this. “That weird effect looks pretty spooky. We drop little jump cuts of the stuff you shot today, between frames, when we want to get all atmospheric and it’ll help us build to the big climax when the blurry shadows get to work.”
“Maybe.”
“What do you mean maybe. Have you got a better idea?”
“I guess not. It’s kinda strange though. It’s why I didn’t mind so much when she suddenly took off, out of the blue.”
“Yeah I heard.”
“When did you hear?”
“Well I . . . err, ran into her on my way up.”
“Oh. She wasn’t pissed off about you hanging around then? Didn’t think you were breaking one of her conditions?”
“No, not at all. Listen, you didn’t say anything to her about erm, Jennie or me did you?”
“No, why on earth would I bring that up?”
“I dunno, it’s just . . . well she said something a bit weird about me coming to find her if she went missing.”