Praise (21 page)

‘What about having kids? Did you ask them about that?'

‘I did. They said it shouldn't affect it.'

I thought about that.

‘Cynthia,' I said, carefully, ‘I think that's not too bad. Considering.'

She lit up another cigarette.

‘Easy for you to say.'

We lay there.

‘When do you go in?'

‘Two weeks time. The Royal Women's Hospital.'

‘Public?'

‘Public'

For the next two weeks, Cynthia made me work. She was frightened. The knife was looming. Fucking was her only defence. It held back the fear. If she could fuck, she was still alive.

I did my best.

I appreciated the philosophy.

The operation came and went.

It was a moderate success.

They went in with the lasers and left an open wound on her cervix. The cancer was gone. They were quite sure they'd got it all. But then they gave her the bad news. Nothing and no one was allowed near her vagina for a month.

I found her sitting up in her hospital bed. She was angry.

‘A month,' she said. ‘A whole fucking month.'

‘Cynthia, they saved your life ...'

I, at least, was grateful.

To the doctors, to the cancer.

It was the break I'd been looking for.

But it was hard on Cynthia.

I was out of her reach and she knew it. She'd lost her grip, she'd been betrayed by her own body and there was nothing she could do. The cancer had scared her badly. She didn't dare take any risks, she didn't
dare
try to fuck me. The frustration drove her crazy. She counted down the days.

We existed.

It wasn't good, it wasn't bad. The luck was long gone, we were on our own. The times were quiet. We drank and played Scrabble. I could live with Cynthia this way. Possibly it was the only way I could keep living with her. All the problems were still there, but they were bearable. Sex was the thing that would kill us. It was only in bed that the balance fell apart, where it was all too naked and ugly to ignore. The possession and the hatred. The love and the manipulation.

And the scheduled Resumption of Fucking Day was closing in. I insisted we keep it to a month. A month exactly. I was playing for time. I had a taste of freedom. I knew, one way or the other, giving it up was going to be bad.

It was a Saturday night.

It was
the
night.

We were at a party at Molly's house. Everyone was there.

Cynthia was up, as up as she'd ever been. She'd come through, she'd lasted it out. It was a triumph. In a few hours time I'd be hers again. I'd be under control. She moved around, talked, yelled, laughed. She was wild and beautiful. She was drinking fast.

So was I.I was depressed. I couldn't break out of it. I sat on the lawn and watched the crowd. Watched Cynthia. I didn't know what to do. The alcohol was bringing me down. I'd been drinking for the last three nights. Heavily. I was hungover and beaten.

Frank was with me.

There were still problems with Maree.

‘It's getting worse,' he said. ‘It's over, but we keep ending up in bed. And it's violent. It's hatred.'

I said, ‘It's a lot to bear.'

‘I don't know what she wants from me. She cries after the sex. But it goes on happening.'

‘Why?'

‘I don't know. I don't
know
.'

I looked at him.

Frank was a good man. I respected his opinion. He tried in a world where very few seemed to. But he was no better off than the rest of us. He was no closer to understanding.

He said, ‘We don't compare to them, do we?'

‘No.'

We sat there.

We drank. We watched the party.

We waited for our women.

Maree joined us. She was looking her age. Bony faced, tense. Then Leo came along. He produced a joint. It went round. I took a few deep pulls. It was good. It was strong. Cynthia came over. She sat down behind me and pulled me down into her lap. Her face hung over mine.

‘My beautiful boy,' she said.

I stared past her, up to the sky.

I went upstairs to piss. I went in, shut the door, flipped up the lid, began. I looked around. The walls were covered with painting and writing. Circles and spirals and demonic signs. Poems. I read some of them. They were long and involved. They depressed me. Someone must have taken time to write them all up there. For a limited audience.

After I'd finished I wandered into the kitchen. Sophie was there. I hadn't seen her since the New Year's Eve party. She was inhaling from a large golden hookah pipe. She had two of the hoses in her mouth. Her cheeks sucked in around them. The cone was packed.

There were a few others around the table. One of them was Darren. He owned the pipe. I knew Darren. He was the supplier of most of the grass that I sometimes bought from Leo. Darren had his own plantation out in the mountains. He was a theology student. He had the shaman eyes.

Sophie finished her cone. She coughed up the smoke.

‘Hello, Gordon,' she said.

I sat down. ‘Can I have one of those?' I asked Darren.

He beamed. ‘Certainly.
Certainly
.' He took the cone out, blew it clean. Then he rolled his fingers round in the mull bowl. ‘Do you want it big or do you want it small?'

‘Make it big.'

He nodded. He filled up the cone and packed it in.

Sophie was leaning back and looking at me with cool, distant eyes. ‘How
are
you, Gordon?'

I said I was fine.

Darren was ready. He said, ‘Be careful. This stuff will burn.'

I took the lighter. I slipped two of the hoses in my mouth, snapped the flint and held the flame over the cone. I began inhaling. The water bubbled. The smoke flowed through.

I coughed. He was right. The stuff was ugly. I went back to it, got a better run, finished the cone.

It swung into my head.

Sophie was still watching me. ‘So, what d'you think?' she said. Her eyes were getting emptier and emptier.

‘I think this was a mistake.'

My head spun. I felt ill. The world shrunk to a cocoon.

Sophie stood up. ‘Come with me.'

I looked up at her. I went.

She took me to one of the bedrooms. I didn't know whose it was. Even with the light on it looked very dark. The windows were hung with heavy patterned curtains. There was a double bed secluded away in a cave between two wardrobes.

She closed the door.

I said, ‘Whose room is this?'

She had hold of both my hands. She was pulling me over towards the bed. ‘I don't know,' she said.

She kissed me. I kissed back.

‘Do you want to make love to me, Gordon?'

Did I want to make love to her?

No. I didn't want to make love to anyone.

I wanted to go outside and lie on the lawn and wait until everything passed. Reality was slipping away. I wanted to go outside and lie on the lawn forever.

But we were pulling at each other's clothes. Someone turned on the stereo in the living room, turned it up loud. Then we were naked, kissing, rubbing. Sophie's body had changed from what I remembered of it. It was round. She was getting fat. Her breasts were round, her stomach was round. Her nipples had vanished. She was tall and ugly. I was tall and ugly. We were tall ugly giants. She was down around my waist.

I sat on the bed. She moved to the floor, knelt between my legs. I was already erect. Then I was in her mouth. I leaned back on the bed. My prick was miles away. It was a distant tower. She moved back up and we were kissing again. I felt sad. The kisses were cold. Our mouths were dry. I thought about heroin. I thought about the bathtub. It was all gone. I was never going to kiss like that again ...

I found myself on top. I moved down. Sophie let her legs fall apart. I sank my face in. There was no hair. There was just naked skin and wetness. The slit was wide. I worked up to the clitoris and stroked it with my tongue. Sophie made noises. I didn't know what they were. I was lost. It was a dream. I brought up my hand and slid in a finger, then two. I fucked her with my fingers and my mouth.

She said, ‘I want you in me.'

I remembered the wart virus. ‘No.'

I stood up and went to one of the wardrobes. I opened it. I found a white tie. It was magical. Significant. A white tie. I went back to the bed. I looked at Sophie. I rolled her over. I gathered up her hands and bound them together behind her. I pulled it tight. Her shoulders arched. She closed her eyes. I rolled her back.

I kissed her breasts, her stomach, her cunt.

She was all flesh. It went on and on.

I stood up. I went back to the wardrobe. I found a scarf. The scarf was black. I wrapped it around Sophie's head, her eyes.

I saw a roll of masking tape on the desk. I picked it up.

I came back and sat across Sophie's hips.

Her head moved blindly.

‘What are you doing?'

I didn't answer. I couldn't find the edge of the tape. There was a long silent moment. The music had stopped. I found the edge, ripped a strip off. The sound was loud.

Sophie tilted her head up.

I took the strip and laid it down across her chest, in between her breasts. I pressed it flat.

‘Oh,' she said. Quietly.

I peeled it off.

‘Gordon ...'

I took another strip. I laid it across her right breast. I pressed it down over the nipple.

I peeled if off, slowly. The nipple tilted up, swelled.

I unravelled yards of the tape. I wrapped her in it. Her breasts, her belly, her shoulders. I stretched it down her sides, onto her legs. Inside her thighs. Upwards.

‘Not too close,' she said. ‘Not too close.'

I tore off some more and covered her mouth.

She grunted at me.

Then I started peeling the tape away from her skin. I did it slowly. It pulled out hairs. She squirmed and made noises through the tape. I slid two fingers into her. Three fingers. I held them there. She started fucking my hand. Her cunt clutched and pushed. Her body rolled. She pumped and pumped. The breath whistled through her nose. The sounds in her throat got frantic.

I took my fingers away.

I peeled the tape away from her mouth.

‘Damn it,' she said. ‘Christ.'

I climbed on top of her. My head was between her legs, my prick over her face. I nudged her mouth with it. She held her lips closed. I pushed harder. She opened up. I began fucking her mouth. I drove it in. She choked and gagged. I moved my fingers into her cunt. I jammed them deep. She kicked, struggled. I was crushing her, I was lying flat on her body. My prick was in her throat. Her teeth grated into it. I heard animal sounds. I fucked on. My fingers plunged in and out of her cunt. She was wet. She was slop. She was mud.

I came.

I took the blindfold off and untied her.

She didn't speak.

We dressed in silence.

I went back downstairs and sat with Cynthia and Frank and the others. No one was talking much. The party was already dying.

Maree was holding Frank's hand.

‘Cynthia,' I said. ‘Let's call a cab.'

We got home. Cynthia went off to the showers. I undressed. I lay in bed, feigning death. It
was
death. Cynthia came back. She took off the towel. She slid up next to me. Her arms went round my chest. She kissed me.

‘I can't,' I said.

‘What?'

‘I can't do it, Cynthia. It has to stop. I don't love you.'

‘
What
?'

‘I'm sorry.'

‘You don't
love
me?'

‘No.'

‘Oh my God. I can't believe it. I can't believe you're doing it
now
. I was so happy. All night I was so happy. All through the party I was thinking I could go home tonight and fuck you at last ... and you're saying no?'

‘It's wrong, Cynthia.'

‘Oh bullshit.' She was choking back tears. ‘Christ. The only thing that kept me going through the operation was you. I sat there in hospital and thought it'd all be okay because at the end of the four weeks you'd be waiting there for me. And now you're not, now you're fucking not.' The tears came.

I lay there. I didn't move to comfort her. I couldn't. I was evil. I was lying when I said I didn't love her. I did. She was the only person I loved, whatever love meant. But something somewhere was hugely wrong with me. I wanted her to go away.

‘You can't do this, Gordon,' she was saying. ‘You can't be so cruel. You can't
hurt
me this much.'

‘I don't want to hurt you, Cynthia ...'

‘Oh fuck
off
! You're
enjoying
this!'

I rolled over, faced her. ‘I am not enjoying this.'

‘Then why are you doing it?' she screamed.

And there was no answer.

It was on. For real this time. The same arguments, over and over, day after day. It was long and vicious and exhausting. We drank heavily. We screamed at each other. We were two stray dogs, battling it out to the death over the bones of love. Cynthia was the aggressor. She fought it hard and fast and with increasing creativity and desperation. The drinking spurred her on. Between the cortisone and the alcohol, she was uncontrollable. She screamed, cried, attacked me with her fists, knives, scissors. She meant to keep me or finish me off for ever.

My only goal was survival.

I didn't ask her to leave. I didn't have the power or the will for it. I'd made my one and only move. All I could do was ride the attack out and wait for her to tire.

Vass looked at me strangely in the hallways.

It was entertaining times for the old men.

From time to time I took the car and fled for a few hours. I didn't know where to go. I didn't want to see Leo or Molly. Maree and Frank had their own difficulties. And Sophie was out of the question. I had only vague memories of what had happened at the party. It had the substance of a dream, a bad one. Where had all the hatred come from? But at least I finally understood one part of the situation. And fucking had nothing to do with it.