I loved the normalcy.
Mee popped her head into the room and looked at Win. He mouthed a no in her direction. Her pretty face vanished.
Win said, "It's not yet Mee time."
I shook my head.
"What specifically is your problem with Mee?"
"Mee as in the stewardess, right?"
"Flight attendant," he said-again with the terminology. "Like with solicitor."
"She looks young."
"She's almost twenty." Win gave a small laugh. "I so love when you don't approve."
"I'm not in the judging business," I said.
"Good, because I'm trying to make a point here."
"About?"
"About you and Ms. Collins on the plane. You, my dear friend, see sex as an act that requires an emotional component. I don't. For you, the act itself, no matter how physically mind-blowing, is not enough. But I view it from another perspective."
"One that usually involves several camera angles," I said.
"Good one. But let me continue. For me, the act of two people 'making love'-to use your terminology, because I'm happy with 'boink' or 'boff' or 'screw'-for me, that sacred act is wonderful. More than that, it is everything. In fact, I believe the act is at its best-at its purest, if you will-when it is all, the end-all and be-all, when there is no emotional baggage to sully it. Do you see?"
"Uh-huh," I said.
"It's a choice. That's all. You see it one way, I see it another. One is not superior to the other."
I looked at him. "Is that your point?"
"On the plane, I was watching you talk to Terese."
"So you said."
"So you wanted to hold her, didn't you? After you dropped the bombshell. You wanted to reach out and comfort her. That emotional component we just discussed."
"I'm not following."
"When you two were alone on that island, the sex was amazing and purely physical. You barely knew each other. Yet those days on the island soothed and comforted and tore into you and cured you. Now here, when the emotional has entered the picture, when you want to blend those feelings with something as physically benign as an embrace, you can't do it." Win tilted his head and smiled. "Why?"
He had a point. Why hadn't I reached out? More than that, why couldn't I?
"Because it would have hurt," I said.
Win turned away as if that said everything. It didn't. I know that there were many who concluded that Win used misogyny to protect himself, but I never really bought it. It was too pat an answer.
He checked his watch. "One more drink," Win said. "And then I will go in the other room because-oh, you'll love this-Mee so horny."
I shook my head. The hotel phone rang. Win picked it up, talked for a moment, hung up.
"How tired are you?" he asked me.
"Why, what's up?"
"The officer who investigated Terese's automobile accident is a retired policeman named Nigel Manderson. One of my people informs me that he is currently getting soused at a pub off Coldharbour Lane, if you want to pay him a visit."
"Let's do it," I said.
14
COLDHARBOUR Lane is about a mile long in South London and joins Camberwell to Brixton. The limousine dropped us off at a rather hopping spot called the Suns and Doves near the Camberwell end. The building had a third floor that got only about halfway across the top, like someone had gotten tired and figured, ah, hell, we won't need more space than that.
We headed about a block farther down and turned into an alley. There was a good ol'-fashioned head shop and a health food store that was still open.
"This area has a reputation for gangs and drug dealing," Win said, as though he were a tour guide. "Thus Coldharbour Lane 's nickname is-get this-Crackharbour Lane."
"Known for gangs and drug-dealing," I said, "if not nickname creativity."
"What do you expect from gangs and drug dealers?"
The alley was dark and dingy and I kept thinking Bill Sikes and Fagin were lurking against the dark brick. We reached a grotty pub called the Careless Whisper. I immediately flashed to the old George Michael/Wham! song and those now-famed lyrics where the heartbroken lothario will never be able to dance again because "guilty feet have got no rhythm." Eighties deep. I figured the name had nothing to do with the song and probably everything to do with indiscretion.
But I was wrong.
We pushed open the door, and it was like walking into a past dimension. Madness's classic hit "Our House" poured out onto the streets along with two couples, both with their arms around each other, more to keep themselves upright than out of affection. The smell of sizzling sausage wafted through the air. The floor was sticky. The place was loud and jammed and clearly whatever no-smoking law had taken effect in this country had not stretched down into this alley. I bet few laws had.
The place was New Wave, which was to say Old Wave, and proud of it. A large-screen TV showed a petulant Judd Nelson in The Breakfast Club. The waitresses maneuvered through the boisterous crowd clad in black dresses, bright lipstick, slicked-back hair, and nearly Kabuki whiteface. Guitars hung from around their necks. They were supposed to look like the models in that Robert Palmer "Addicted to Love" video except, well, they were rather, uh, more mature and less attractive. Like the video had been remade with the cast of The Golden Girls.
Madness finished telling us about their house in the middle of the street, and Bananarama came on offering to be our Venus, our fire at our desire.
Win gave me a little jab. "The word 'Venus.' "
"What?" I shouted.
"When I was young," Win said, "I thought they were singing, 'I'm your penis.' It confused me."
"Thanks for sharing."
The trappings might have been eighties New Wave, but this was still a working-class bar, where hardy men and seen-too-much women came after a full day of labor and damned if it wasn't deserved. You couldn't fake belonging here. I might be wearing jeans, but I still didn't come close to fitting in. Win, however, stuck out like a Twinkie at a health club.
Patrons-some wearing shoulder pads and thin leather ties and Terax in their hair-glared daggers at Win. It was how it always was. We know about the obvious prejudices and stereotypes and Win would be the last to ask for sympathy, but people saw him and hated him. We judge by looks-that's no surprise. People saw undeserved privilege in Win. They wanted to hurt him. It had been that way his whole life. Even I don't know the full story-Win's "origin," to use superhero lexicon-but one of those childhood beatings broke him. He didn't want to be afraid anymore. Not ever. So he used his finances and his natural gifts and spent years developing his skills. By the time we met in college, he was already a lethal weapon.
Win walked through the glares with a smile and a nod. The pub was old and run-down, and it looked almost fake, which only made it feel more authentic. The women were big and chesty with rat-nest hair. Many wore those off-one-shoulder Flashdance sweatshirts. One eyed Win. She had several missing teeth. There were little ribbons in her hair that seemed to add nothing, а la "Starlight"-era Madonna, and her makeup looked as though it'd been applied with paintball pellets in a dark closet.
"Well, well," she said to Win. "Ain't you pretty?"
"Yes," Win said. "Yes, I am."
The bartender nodded at us as we approached. He wore a FRANKIE SAY RELAX T-shirt.
"Two beers," I said.
Win shook his head. "He means two pints of lager."
Again with the terminology.
I asked for Nigel Manderson. The bartender didn't blink. I knew this was useless. I turned and shouted out, "Which one of you is Nigel Manderson?"