I Came to Find a Girl (10 page)

Flood says, “Tell me, Nicholas, do you have trouble remembering what you own?” Flood lifts the camcorder from the table in order to study Drake’s face as he speaks. It is an intelligent face: thin, with a long nose.

“That’s enough, now,” Drake says, after a moment.

Flood’s attention drifts to the next table where a sleek-haired redhead talks loudly above her ample cleavage.

“I do have trouble recalling my collection in its entirety,” Drake says. “That’s the measure of a true collector. Naturally, everything is catalogued.”

“You didn’t mention any female artists?” Flood says.

“What’s the point?”

The three men laugh.

“You exhibit everything you own?”

“The collection’s grown too big. I rotate pieces around my three homes and often lend out to galleries for particular exhibitions. I also employ a freelance curator to direct how they are hung.”

“You need your own gallery.”

“It will happen.”

Beluga caviar is served. The waitress is young and attractive. Flood zooms in for a close-up of the shiny coils of her dark hair.

“Anyway, enough about me, I want to know about you, Jack,” Drake says.

The camera shifts back to Drake, studying the lines round his eyes.

Flood says, “I’d like to know what it is that attracts you to a particular piece.”

Drake smiles faintly. “I’ve been called a gambler, but I take calculated risks.”

“You have an eye. I can vouch for that,” Marcus says.

Drake says, “I like to think I can spot something special.”

Flood’s camera focuses on the redhead’s lips and pale freckled cleavage.

“Do you mind!” A man’s hand blocks the lens and Flood swings the camera back to Drake.

Drake says, “I want to be challenged – shaken up a bit. It doesn’t matter if I don’t understand a particular piece as long as it evokes a strong response in me.”

“I can see that,” Marcus says.

“You see, when you want for nothing, life can become tedious,” Drake says.

“Trouble in paradise?” Flood knocks back another glass of red wine. “Paradise syndrome, isn’t it – when you can’t enjoy having it all?”

“We’ll have another bottle of this,” Marcus calls out to the waitress.

A little while later, after yet another bottle of wine, Flood drains the dregs from his glass and abruptly stands. “Nicholas, Marcus, it’s been a pleasure, but you must excuse me, the muse has spoken as it were.”

“Surely, you don’t have to leave quite yet,” Marcus says.

“Let the man go,” Drake says. “Just make sure I get to see the new works before anyone else.”

Flood nods, and says. “Enjoy the rest of your meal, gentlemen.”

Outside, a few drunken suits make their way home.

“Hey!” Flood shouts across the street to a black cab, its yellow light on.

The cab does a U-turn and stops by the kerb.

“St Pancras, quick as you can – I must catch the last train to Nottingham.”

A hotel room, a different one: smaller and obviously downmarket. The tartan-covered double bed almost fills the room leaving a small walkway and space for a dressing table with a white plastic tray containing coffee and tea-making facilities.

Flood is preoccupied sifting through the complimentary drink sachets. A portable TV is on in the background – the local news.

“Powdered milk, and look at this kettle – did you ever see such a short, pathetic cord?” Flood holds the kettle up to the camera, stretching out its tiny cable. “It can barely reach the plug.” He stretches the cord taut and forces the plug into the socket. “Cheap or else it’s down to health and safety – prevent the odd auto-asphyxiation or hotel suicide.

“I’ve swapped hotels. Marcus kept saying, ‘What is so special about Nottingham?’ Blah blah... ‘There’s nothing there you can’t get tenfold in London.’ I told him he was missing the point. I’ve started something – I can’t just abandon it. I’ve too much invested. If he can’t see the importance of what I’m doing and where I’m doing it, I may as well seek representation elsewhere.”

“Fears are growing for a young Nottingham woman missing since Friday night. Local chef Jenny Fordham was last seen leaving Saviour’s Bar and Restaurant on Goose Gate in the Hockley area of the city at 11.40pm.”

Flood stares at the small TV.

“Police are unwilling to link her disappearance to the recent discovery of two women’s bodies in the city.

“Mother of two Loretta Peters was found dead last month in the Forest Fields area of Nottingham while last week an as yet unnamed woman was found on Lenton Boulevard.

“Police say they are extremely concerned about the whereabouts of Jenny Fordham and ask anyone who thinks they may have seen Jenny to call the number below. All calls will be treated in the strictest confidence.”

 
The newsreader’s face brightens: “Shoppers at the Broad Marsh Shopping Centre are in for a treat this week as local manufacturers Pork Farms will be offering samples of their new range of Tikka Masala sausage rolls. Sally-Ann Webb reports...”

Flood smirks. “From dead women to sausage rolls...” He picks up his phone and dials. “Carmen, it’s Jack Flood – that’s right, the artist. Can we talk through the Tesco 24-hour rota? When are you free?” He nods. “See you then.” He turns towards the laptop on the dressing table and reads from the screen:

“Nothing exists until or unless it is observed. An artist is making something exist by observing it. And his hope for other people is that they will also make it exist by observing it.” William Burroughs.

“Take these girls, for example – what are they before they meet me?”

Exterior, Pukka Palace: an upmarket curry house with purple lettering edged in gold. Inside, there are plush purple seats, white walls and framed black and white prints of the Taj Mahal, Jodhpur and Jaisalmer. Flood, dressed in a black suit, white shirt and skinny tie, is shown to a table.

“I’ll take over from here.” Flood reaches out to take the camcorder from his driver. “Two Bellinis, please,” he tells the waiter as he films a young woman in skinny jeans and a pink shiny top as she approaches. It’s Carmen, the Tesco cashier, and she is wearing her signature heavy hoop earrings.

She sits opposite. “Why do you film all the time?”

“It’s a search for answers.”

“Like the meaning of life and all that?”

“You could say that.”

“I’m not sure I can eat this food. Is there anything not too spicy?”

“I’ll order for both of us,” he says.

“Do you know where the loo is?”

“On the left down there.” He films her backside as she walks. She looks good in tight jeans, high heels and the pink backless top – her skin flawless.

Camera cuts to the end of the meal. Carmen has barely touched her food.

“Have another Bellini,” Flood says.

“I saw you in the paper again. How famous are you exactly?”

“To be honest no one ever recognises me, but then I do usually have a camera stuck in front of my face.”

Exterior, a city street: there’s a road sign saying Lenton Boulevard. Carmen’s heels clack against the pavement as they walk past boarded-up shops.

“Where are we going?” Her face, although heavily made up, appears ethereal in the moonlight.

“I want to film you.”

“Film me where?”

“Just down there, on the corner.” Flood points the camera towards the end of a dark alleyway.

Carmen stops, her arms folded. “What do you take me for? I ain’t stupid.”

Twelve

Is Jenny already a lost cause?
I kept asking myself.

I liked to think I’d find her walking in a daze, a little confused, lost, and suffering from amnesia. She’d be spaced out after some nasty incident that had culminated in her being dumped back on a side street in the city centre. I would find her. There would be a hurried press conference and I’d look a little nervous in the spotlight, uncomfortable with all the media attention and there’d be Jenny beside me battered and bruised but alive, very much alive.

My eyes welled up and I shook the image from my head. It was a wonder I’d made it to university – if people really spend a third of their lives asleep, I had to spend another third daydreaming. I’d try to snap out of it, especially when it went on too long. But really, I could spend half a day and an evening immersed in fantasy land, stopping only to eat or watch TV. Then there’d be fresh opportunity to whisk myself away to a better world where Jenny was safe.

I tried to sleep. Only I couldn’t because I was too excited by the prospect of this parallel universe where everything was right and I was the hero. But the daydreaming didn’t help Jenny and it didn’t help my coursework.

“It’s fucking weird,” Slug said. I’d roped him into helping me carry the completed canvas down to college in time for the crit later that morning. He stood back in order to get a better look. “It’s supposed to be you? You’re weirder than I thought. How heavy is it?”

“Not heavy – just awkward.”

We shuffled out the door and past the crossroads where the prostitutes normally sat and began the walk downhill to college.

“Everyone’s looking,” Slug said. “It’s nothing to do with me, mate,” he told a passer-by.

“Slug!” I could have done without it. I was nervous enough about the crit and how my work would be received without him drawing negative attention to it.

“Where do you want it, Picasso? Fucking hell, look at that.” Slug was staring at a large, colourful sculpture of what looked like a cross-section of skin. He’d never been in the fine art studio before. “You lot are weird.” We manoeuvred the piece into my studio space. “Good luck, I think you’ll need it.” He shook his head. “Weirdos,” he said. “Don’t forget those beers.” (I’d had to bribe him to help).

I tacked a couple of nails onto one of my boards and hung the canvas, fussing over the angle.
Is it OK?
I couldn’t tell and had to walk around to compare other work with my own. The whitewashed studio was full of colour and energy.

The project had sparked something in everyone, although my initial enthusiasm had waned after the hotel incident and now Jenny had gone I wasn’t sure anything else mattered.

Ten minutes later, Mike Manners’ cowboy boots descended the office steps into the studio followed by Mike Cherry’s Gucci-style loafers.

Mike Cherry rubbed his hands together. “Right, take it away, Graham.”

We all turned towards Graham’s space – the two tutors and twenty-six students all gathered round the 3D model of a sample of skin, which had huge glittering hairs sticking out of the epidermis and subcutaneous layers cut away like a monster slice of birthday cake.

“You doing Damian Hirst now?” Kelly said.

Mike Manners rubbed his chin and said, “It’s always a hazard. Everything may very well have been done before but there’s always room for a fresh take. How did you get to this point, Graham?”

“I reduced myself down to what separates me from the rest of the world. It is skin that contains me as it were.”

“Oh I say, yes, and so well executed, it really is a lovely piece.” Mike Cherry’s hands were on it then, feeling it, stroking it, and testing its weight. “The colours, they’re almost jewel-like – is there a reason for that?”

Graham nodded. “I wanted to move away from the biological model and show that even though my skin is like everyone else’s, to me it’s special – it represents the ego if you like.”

“What does everyone think?” Mike Manners asked the group.

“It’s lovely to look at,” Kelly said, “but if I didn’t know Graham, it wouldn’t necessarily tell me anything about him.”

Again, Mike Manners rubbed his chin. “That’s an interesting point.”

“It’s well executed, superb, well done, Graham – moving on.” Mike Cherry took the couple of steps to Kelly’s space, now filled with a series of huge, spidery drawings in coloured pencils and felt tips. “My word, what texture,” Mike Cherry said, and everyone laughed as Kelly’s self-portraits included hirsute limbs and luxurious pubic hair.

“Talk us through it, Kelly,” Mike Manners said.

“They’re hypnotic drawings,” Kelly said.

“They’ve certainly got me hypnotised,” Spencer said. And a few people laughed, while others groaned and Kelly ignored him.

“I went for hypnosis – I wanted to be able to draw the way I did when I was a kid to get an insight into my early sense of self before any conditioning or other outside influences took hold.”

“The old nature versus nurture,” Mike Cherry said.

“I think they’re brilliant,” I said, but I guessed everyone thought I was just sucking up to be a good mate but that wasn’t the case. I loved them.

“Certainly interesting,” Mike Manners said. “I’d like to see you take them further.” And Mike Cherry agreed, before moving on to the next person.

We all traipsed round after them: two tutors leading twenty-six students in varying degrees of nervous apprehension. We looked at light boxes, knitting, neon signs and oil paintings. There were found objects in specially made boxes and one student called Gavin even had photographs of his chaotic alcoholic parents. Eventually they came round to me, stopping three feet in front of my canvas. Mike Cherry exhaled a quick puff of air, then silence.

“Well...” Mike Cherry said.

“I like it,” Spencer said. And I had never felt such warmth and gratitude towards my housemate.

“Don’t you think it’s a bit sixth form?” asked Mike Cherry.

My throat tightened.
How could he?
I’d put so much into that piece.

“I wouldn’t say that,” Mike Manners said.

“So, what have we here? Pray do enlighten us,” Mike Cherry said.

The canvas hung there between us looking inadequate. Somehow it seemed less than it had the night before when I had finally declared it finished with a moment’s satisfaction. I was starting to well up. It was ridiculous. I bit the inside of my cheek.
I can’t let this silly little man get to me
.
Jenny is missing – that’s all that matters
. I had a lump in my throat as I struggled to speak. “It’s sort of what it feels like to be a girl.” My nails pressed into my clenched fists.

“The project is
Who Am I
– not how does it feel to be a woman.” Mike Cherry pursed his lips. “I thought we’d got over all that years ago.”