And his face.
What else? I ask.
You know don’t make me say.
So I don’t. Let the silence fill. Let his fingers curl. But the hair in his eyes won’t hide it for long, or the blood working under his skin.
Paying, he says.
I knew that would be it. Same as I know I’d rather think of him as only lost instead of finding what he wanted inside some woman he bought.
First through some mate of a mate, he says I know this house, kind of thing and that didn’t seem too bad because we were all getting what we wanted, weren’t we? But there’re only so many times you can watch somebody fake before realising you’d rather do without the charade. So then somewhere a bit grimmer. Eventually just off the street because down there you really are what you are. Don’t care about teeth or clean underwear and because they’re so much more fucked than you are you hardly smell the fear.
And when you did? I ask.
I tipped. And it never once stopped me. Junkies mostly — how fitting was that? I think I preferred it. I felt at home. No words, just up against the wall behind King’s Cross. Or over the way in some derelict house, knee deep in shit and needles and dogs that died because their owners forgot to keep them alive and not caring either. Not giving a shit about the look or the smell or the state she was in or you were after. Just trying to clean up and calm down before going to the mate’s who’s invited you round — that you’ve kept waiting for over an hour because you just couldn’t do without. I remember having dinner once, at this couple’s house I knew. I was late because I’d needed to and, on this occasion, I’d nearly got nicked — only just managed to talk my way out — and by the time I arrived I was pretty tightly wound. But I opened with lies about seeing a dog knocked down, then made all this effort to be funny and charming, to prove my innocence. Because you carry it just behind the eyes, so you always think people can see it there inside and, whoever she was, she was with me all the while. The clammy body. The sore on her arm that wouldn’t close. I had to keep saying Sorry, what? to the woman sat beside. I couldn’t stop wondering if she could tell? The shame was so live I felt almost transparent. But the more I tuned into her, the more I got lulled by her talk. She was so gentle about the kids in her class and her Down’s syndrome son that I caught myself thinking If I asked you could you make me stop? I just wanted someone to, so badly. I must have looked a right state because she asked What’s the matter? and I didn’t say. I think I went to throw up instead. After that evening though it started happening a lot, feeling suddenly desperate for help but so shamed by why I needed it. And I never did ask. I always forced it back down then took some other remedy home instead. Anyway that’s enough.
And for the first time tonight, he doesn’t look ashamed. He just looks away.
Quiet we go, studying it. He stares at his own hand on the sheet. I watch his eyelashes blink to the twitch of his cheek. That’s horrible, I say. I know, he agrees. Quiet again. Then he gets off the bed. Walks around like ridding himself. Lights another cigarette while someone from the night beyond comes lumping up the stairs. Smoke hid, we wait as they find their key, go in and switch on their TV but, once they’re settled, he says If you want to leave I’ll sort you out a room in a hotel. And I imagine myself falling asleep on some clean white bed, safe from this but Still? I ask. Still? he says. Prostitutes? No! Jesus! Not for years. It was a short-lived thing, a year in the worst and if I could take it back I would here — he passes his cigarette but shuts his eyes to the light while I smoke. It scares me, I say. I know, I can see. It was a terrible way to behave and way to be in. But looking down on me now, he also looks young and frightened. Together at least in the fear of it. Hedging round the light. Can I touch you? he says then and I cannot think of anything I want more. So go put myself against him. Feel him all round me. I’m sorry, I’m so sorry, he says I can’t imagine what it’s like for you to hear these things. And what it’s like is I’ve pushed my fingers right through his skin, caught hold of his ribs and must now fall with him. Down through the world while he grasps at everything. But we make the same rattling sound I think. And so keep close together until we are calm. Can let go, finger by finger. Then sit back down. Person looking at person. Like shy and new again.
Did your friends know? The drinking, he says Not really the sex. They tried helping, feeding, sobering me up but he eventually said One day she’ll be back and what use will you be to her dead? Your body can’t take this drinking, love, knock it on the head. So I gave it up, for the next few years. Instead I tried to focus on work and the other thing occupied me a great deal.
Then one day an envelope arrived for me at their house. Three photos and an address. No explanation or news of her but it was my first gasp of air in years. I nearly collapsed. It changed everything because now I knew she was still there, somewhere, and I would see her again and I didn’t want her to know what I’d become. So I said to them I have to tell you something. Then I told them what I’d done. They both sat and listened. I kept nothing back. They were upset. Really upset. He yelled I was too old to be at that stupid shit and didn’t I know there were consequences to that kind of carry-on? Once he’d calmed down though he said Well, this is what you’ve been but you don’t have to be it any more, you know what you need to do next.
So I got myself back to the shrink. Threw out all the porn. Stopped answering calls from people I shouldn’t. Had a good going over at the clap clinic. And cancelled the Saturday hotel.
She was probably the hardest to face. I was so broken open by getting those pictures I didn’t know if I could handle a scene but she was owed.
I was waiting when she came in. Usually it was the other way round. Soon as she saw me she said Is this the last time? When I nodded she came sat by me on the bed and took my hand. We sat for a bit. What happened? she said. I said I lost my little girl. My ex took her away two years ago and didn’t tell me where until this week. Then I started to cry and she put my head on her knee. My poor boy, she said Why didn’t you say? But I could only keep repeating that I was sorry. You know I love you, she said Despite how this has been, I’ve never stopped and, if you ask me I’ll leave my husband, even now and we could start again. But I already knew how it would have to be for me so I said Don’t do that. She stood up then saying Well, I’d better go home. Take care of yourself my love. She kissed me goodbye with more feeling than I deserved. Then she left. And I left. And that was the last semblance of a relationship I’ve had. Once she was gone that chapter closed and I didn’t have sex again for two years.
Life without was difficult — all that energy and time. I didn’t know what to do with myself so I went back to walking and I spent hours walking, all over London, every night. I liked it. I still do — the time to think and how it wears me out. I can’t tell you how much better it was to be clean of all that, to feel sane again. I’ll always be inclined to be promiscuous I suppose but I pretty much keep it under control. I’ve had a few lapses over the years but I usually manage to sort it out before it gets out of hand — which is why the video gets intermittently packed away, you know, things like that. Nowadays it’s not so bad. Not a daily struggle at all.
And writing to my daughter helped. They never let me speak to her so that’s how I kept contact. Every Sunday night. It was something to look forward to. Occasionally I’d get a note from her mother saying how she was. Then, at Christmas and her birthday two, three photographs. I’d study them for hours to work out how she’d changed so that I’d always know her, so she’d never seem strange and I’d send her passport pictures of me. A few years later her own letters began. Great scrawly things with crayon drawings on or paintings she’d made, telling me all about her school, her toys, her friends. At first only once or twice a year then more than that, then asking Did I have other little girls? About my job? Did I have a wife?