that full toothy smile as she says: — . . . Barry White . . . Prince . . . you’ve got great taste in music . . . there’s loads of soul and garage stuff here . . .
And it’s not just the glow from the brandy because as she picks up her glass from the stained coffee table I feel the imaginary zip in my belly starting to open up, and I think NOW. Now is the time to fall in love. Just open that fuckin zip up and let the entrails of love engulf you both in a messy rapture, as this raging bull and mad cow get on board the love boat. Look stupidly into each other’s eyes; talk shite, get fat. But no. I do what I always do and use sex as a means of undermining love by grabbing her, enjoying her theatrical appearances-sake shock, and we’re snogging, then undressing, frigging, licking, teasing and fucking.
Prior to this though, I’ve ascertained that her salary, position in the organisation and social background are not as impressive as I first envisaged. She’s a fuck, that’s all. You sometimes have to fight hard not to get to know somebody.
After a bit of kip we’re at it again in the morning. As soon as I’m hard I’m back up her and we’re shaking and pumping away as the 7.21 express to Norwich thrashes through Hackney Downs station, almost like it’s going to sweep us up to East Anglia with it and she’s going: — Oh my God . . . Simon . . . Si-mehnnnn . . .
Rachel falls asleep and I get up, leaving a note, which informs her that I have an early start and that I’ll give her a bell. I go over to the café across the road and sip at some tea, waiting for her to come downstairs. I get a bit dewy-eyed when I think of her pretty face. I fantasise about going back up those stairs, maybe with some flowers, opening my heart, pledging undying love, making her life special, being that prince on the white charger. It’s as much a male fantasy as a female one. But that’s all it is. A sickening feeling of loss hangs over me. It’s easy to love, or for that matter hate, somebody in their absence, somebody we don’t really know and I’m an expert at that. That hardest problem is the other bit.
Then, like the polis on a stake-out, I see her leave by my stair door. Her movements are tense and jerky, as she struggles to orientate herself, looking like a chick who’s fallen out of a nest; ugly, gawky and graceless, a different girl from the gorgeous alcohol-assisted fuck who shared my bed, and briefly my life, last night. I turn away to the sports pages of the Sun . — I think England should have a Scottish manager, I shout over at Ivan the Turkish proprietor. — Ronnie fuckin Corbett or somebody like that.
— Ronnie Corbett, Ivan repeats with a smile.
— A Jambo cunt, I tell him, raising the hot, sugared tea to my lips.
When I get back up the stairs, Rachel’s left some of her scent behind in this squalid box, which is welcome, and a note, which is less so.
Simon,
Sorry I missed you this morning. I’d like to see you again. Give me a call.
Rachel. X
Aw. It’s always nice to leave somebody when they say they’d like to see you again, because there will inevitably come a time when you leave them because they don’t want to see you again. So much more pleasant all round. I crumple the note up and stick it in the bin.
I can’t really place Rachel on my matrix. When I started off in London in a Forest Gate squat, I was determined I’d work my way west: Essex Girls to North London Jewesses, ending up with Sloane Rangers. They know the score though. While the first ones want to exchange sex for the trinkets of life, the middle ones will swap neuroses, and the last will bang you till the cows come home but the ring on the finger’s not for you, it’s promised to Chinless Chuckie. These fucking feudal inbred rich-peasant cunts always have arranged marriages. So I gave up scanning Debrett’s , and checked back into Hampstead.
Now Tanya, who doesn’t even hit first base on my
Janwillem van de Wetering