Model Guy (31 page)

 
I smile.

 
"I know what you
mean. I think Lauren will probably do it if she wants to - she's very determined."

 
"Oh, I'm sure she'd
be very good. I hope she makes it," says Nora, quickly.

 
"She probably will."

 
"I never watch TV
myself. It just bugs the hell out of me."

 
"Quite relaxing sometimes,
though."

 
"No, see, I don't
think so. I hate it when you go to someone's house or apartment and the whole room
is focussed on the TV. Even when it's switched off, you sense this brooding presence,
almost like you should be trying to, pay it homage or at least bring it in to the
conversation. You know what I mean?"

 
"Blimey, you do hate
them." I suddenly feel I'm squaring up for a debate here. I wonder whether
to take the opposing view just for the hell of it. "Well, television can educate
and inform. I've learnt lots of things from it." Please don't ask me what,
though.

 
"What? You couldn't
have got it from a book?"

 
"Well, probably but
you can see moving images."

 
"From your position
lying on the settee."

 
"And I should be
reading some improving work, sitting on a hard chair, is that it?" She ignores
this comment.

 
"In fact, I think
the size of a telly has a direct bearing on the owner's intellect."

 
"Mine's 14 inches,"
I say. "My telly, that is". I'm not sure which is more embarrassing: the
Carry On style double entendre or the claim to be some sort of superior intellect.
Nora is just staring at me with interest. I wish she'd laugh or something. Instead
she says: "Like this guy I dated in New York when I was at journalism school.
He was a Wall Street trader, been to Stamford on a football scholarship or something."

 
"A bit thick?"
I ask, obvious, I know, but I'm keen to move on from my 14 incher comment.

 
"Could have rented
his head out for storage space."

 
I laugh.

 
"He caught me reading
a book once, when we were staying with his folks in the Hamptons. You'd have thought
I was doing drugs or picking my noise and flicking it at his family portraits. Finally
told me: 'I'm going to read when I'm too old to play sport.' Can you believe it?
I said 'Don't you mean you're going to stop playing sport when you're old enough
to read?'"

 
"Very good."

 
"That was that."
She drifts off for a moment.

 
"You're quite angry,
aren't you?" I tell her.

 
"Sorry, am I moaning?"

 
"No, I didn't say
that, I just said 'You're quite angry'."

 
"I suppose so."

 
"Anger's a good thing,
isn't it?" It dawns on me. "I mean anger, if it's directed properly, can
be quite invigorating, energising, empowering?" Why am I thinking of Lauren
and 2cool when I say this? "Can't it?"

 
She looks thoughtful for
a moment.

 
"Yeah, yeah it can.
A lot of people do what they do, create things, change things, improve things because
of anger, don't they I suppose."

 
She looks away and I watch
her, wondering what she's thinking now. She tries to catch the eye of Cole at the
bar.

 
"I'll get them,"
I say taking her empty glass.

 
"You've got to be
quite angry to write," she says when I come back. "Even fluff like I knock
out."

 
"What do you mean?
Just to stir it up?"

 
"Yes, I suppose so."
She takes a drink and looks around the pub. "So you've had the police in."

 
"How did you know
that?" I ask defensively.

 
"You told me,"
she says.

 
Did I? Shit, I've forgotten
what I've told to whom. "Yes, they've been in twice. They've taken away all
the financial stuff we've got."

 
"The Missing Persons
Unit took all that?"

 
"It wasn't the Missing
Persons Unit, it was the Fraud Squad."

 
"Shit! That's serious."

 
"I wish I hadn't
told you that."

 
"Why?"

 
"Why do you think?
Because I don't want it in the paper."

 
"Charlie. You still
don't trust me?"

 
I can't believe she's
just asked me that. My silence is more damning than any words could be. She looks
surprised, hurt.

 
"I promise I won't
mention it. Look, from now on I won't write about 2cool without talking to you,
OK?"

 
"I'd be very grateful,"
I say, underwhelmed by her offer. I look at my watch: it's gone nine. "Do you
want to get something to eat?"

 
"Yes, I'd love to.
I mean, that would be nice."

 
"Where do you fancy?"

 
She thinks about it.

 
"Somewhere where
they have pictures of the food on the wall outside."

 
"Mmm, yummy, slightly
faded ones."

 
"Exactly, or better
still a plastic model of them."

 
"Deeelicious - and
probably slightly dusty."

 
"Somewhere where
the waiters have name badges."

 
"Printed with those
dymo tape machines."

 
"And where they say
'Enjoy your meal'."

 
"And do their audition
pieces between each course, just in case you're someone who can get them on telly."

 
She laughs but I'm wondering
how far Lauren would go.

Chapter Twenty-One

After dinner in a little Italian place round the corner (one
bowl of salad knocked onto the floor during an animated description of the behaviour
of Mariah Carey's entourage during an interview, followed by a glass of wine while
attracting the waiter's attention about the salad) I decide to walk her back to
hers before I go to get a taxi home.

 
"Well, night then,"
she says looking up at me. We haven't done the key thing yet. We're standing so
close that I can smell the alcohol on her breath and then somehow I find myself
kissing her again. Her mouth is soft and she lets my tongue find hers.

 
I pull away - but not
to leave - and she takes her key straight out of her bag without any difficulty
and opens door. Silently, I find myself following her in. We go into her living
room where she switches on a lamp before turning to me and kissing me again. I know
I should leave now. Every second more that this goes on will make it harder to say
'good night', turn my back on her and walk out.

Her flat is crammed with ornaments and books. Three huge book
shelves dominate it. Well-used paperbacks, their edges scuffed and worn are packed
in any old how. I turn my head to read some of the titles: The Beauty Myth by Naomi
Wolf, Fast Food Nation by Eric Schlosser, No Logo by Naomi Klein are rammed in alongside
Pride and Prejudice, Catcher in the Rye, Little Dorrit and Animal Farm and even
The Koran. I suppose quite a few people I know could claim to have the same titles
on their shelves but these books are so obviously well used. Read, re-read and consulted.

 
Having turned on one table
lamp and switched the main light off she walks up to me and stands expectantly in
front of me. I look at her and smile. What would Lauren say if she could see this?
Stupid question. But I'm wondering. Would she dump me immediately? Or would she
be hurt and angry and want to know why I was doing this? Why am I doing it? I've
never been unfaithful to her in our entire relationship so why am doing it now?

 
Because everything's different
now. I'm doing things she doesn't approve of, doesn't understand. 2cool is unsafe,
unpredictable and just a bit frightening. Modelling is safe, familiar, attractive.
It's also sensible and well thought of - even my parents were won round to it in
the end.

 
Lauren is modelling. Nora
is 2cool. That's why I want Nora now. Like that moment at a teenage party when someone
first hands you a cigarette and you know you shouldn't because it's dangerous and
naughty and stupid and your mum and dad could so easily find out but something makes
you do it. Is it the environment, the mood you're in or just an angry, rebellious
desire to hurt and disappoint the people who love you and think they know what's
best for you?

 
I could argue that Lauren
is pushing me into this but I don't believe that. Perhaps I'll feel better when
I've done it. I'll realise how much I love Lauren, how I don't need or even want
anyone else and then I'll go back to her and will be well.

When Nora reaches up to me I kiss her but I'm much taller than
her and it feels awkward so she giggles, embarrassed and then leads me the settee
where we sit down and continue to kiss, our hands exploring each other's bodies.
I almost pull away a couple of times but something - that self-destructive, first
cigarette moment, perhaps - makes me want to carry on just a little bit longer.

 
I also want to get close
to this girl, so close that I can see inside her, find out what makes her tick,
see what else she hasn't told me. I run my forefinger over her smooth, clear pale
skin. Her eyes are wide, expectant, intrigued, drinking me in.

 
As she takes off her top,
I realise I've been wondering for some time what her body would be like. She looks
at me, nervously, very un-Nora. She has full milky white breasts and dark pink nipples.
Her stomach is rounded, so unlike Lauren's taught, tanned belly. For years now I've
been sleeping with one of the most beautiful bodies any man could ever wish to see:
that swan neck, those long legs with their lean thighs and gently rounded calves
that have earned their owner a fortune. Those perfect, pert breasts that every woman
who sees them under crisp white shirts or soft, relaxed T-shirts in an advert would
kill for - and most men too. Here I am with Nora, remembering what it is like to
touch a real body, not a masterpiece of nature which has been carefully honed to
perfection for commercial purposes.

 
I take her breasts in
my hands and kiss one then the other, running my tongue over her nipples, closing
my eyes to give myself up to the experience but also to try close off my mind from
thinking about Lauren and how she would feel if she could see this scene taking
place. Nora gasps and begins to run her hands through my hair, leaning down to nestle
her face in it. I raise my head and kiss her again. She undoes my fly, massaging
my erection. After a while I lift her away from me and stand up. She looks surprised,
anxious. But when she sees me slipping off my T-shirt and jeans, socks and trainers
she takes her remaining clothes off to. We stand opposite each other. I'm so much
taller than her that my dick is poking into her stomach. I lean down to kiss her
again but she kneels and begins to suck my dick, working it gently with her hand.

 
Then she gets up and leaves
the room, muttering:

 
"I'll be right back."
If I was going to do the sensible thing this would be the time to do it. Embarrassing,
yes, ungentlemanly too but she'd understand and I'd go home with only a mildly guilty
conscience and we'd talk the next day. But, instead I stand there, gently playing
with my dick. I catch sight of my flushed face in the mirror and turn away quickly.
Nora is back with a condom. "I suppose we should..er..."

 
Silently I take it from
her, tear it open and slide it on. I'd almost forgotten how to use one of these
things. I realise that with the height difference she'll have to sit on me so I
lie on the settee, chucking some superfluous cushions on the floor and she carefully
straddles me, groaning and biting her lip as she slides down on me. I reach up and
take her breasts in my hands. She gasps some more and then, after a while, reaches
down to kiss me.

 
She comes pretty quickly
and so do I. Then she reaches down to kiss me again, bumping into my nose and smiling
with embarrassment before she gets off me and goes into the bathroom. I pull the
condom off and hold it carefully to make sure it doesn't leak. I'd forgotten how
disgusting these things are. Not sure of what to do next I wait there holding the
slithery manifestation of my wrongdoing in my hand until she comes back. Wearing
a T shirt and knickers, she smiles uncertainly at me and then sees the condom.

 
"Oh, right. Bathroom's
just through there to the left."

 
It smells damp and slightly
mildewy. There is a scummy ring around the bath and sink and some of the wallpaper
peeling off at the top of the walls. Next to the loo is a huge pile of glossy magazines,
crinkly with condensation. I pull off some loo roll, wrap up the condom in it and
flush it away. The bastard floats to the surface again so I wait for the cistern
to refill, chucking more paper down so that at least I don't have to see it. I shiver
slightly, standing there naked in someone else's flat.

 
Looking around me I realise
that this is perhaps my only chance to see the real Nora. The toiletries themselves
come from Boots and Sainsbury's - none of Lauren's fantastically expensive French
pseudo scientific stuff in white bottles but every else in the room has a girlish
prettiness about it. It is packed with things like frames with shells stuck on them,
on the walls and around the mirror are starfish and scallop shells. The shelves
are filled with little ivory carvings, blue Islamic bowls, a mother of pearl box
and other little toys and knick knacks.