The Hunger Page 11

The night goes well. It was the most profitable White Lingerie Night The Club has ever run. The following morning I walk into The Office. I do not lean on the door. I am not sweating. I spend a few minutes running through the numbers with Mark. The Boss calls me into his office. I’ve prepared a schedule of parties for him running until the summer.

  —I’ve put two parties for the concierges, four parties for the bankers, a Poker Night and maybe we could introduce some new themed nights like this one.

  I’ve prepared a flyer for a party I’ve called Heels and Wheels, showing a couple of topless Wraps spread all over a Porsche 911.

  —I thought we could go to Porsche or Ferrari and get them to park a car outside The Club and inside we can theme it like the sexiest car showroom in the world. I might even talk to McLaren and see if we can get a Formula 1 car in The Club.

  —What other parties can we hold?

  —How about a Dinners for Sinners party and we can get Marco in to do the food? There’s loads, but what I want to do is hammer the Diamond Card Holders. We’ve got maybe four thousand of them on the database and we don’t work them like we should. They’ve got the card because they spend the money. They buy the Cristal champagne, they get a dozen girls in for sit-downs, so I’ve thought about a special club just for Big Spenders. I’ve called it the Secret Society. It’s a step on from the Jet Set. They pay maybe ten large each to join and we hold parties for them in The Club but also in villas in Cannes, Palma or the Algarve. We’ll fly the girls out and maybe twenty society members will pay an extra ten grand each for the weekend.

  The Boss is looking at me as if he’s meeting me for the first time.

  The Fifth Day

  The next day The Boss calls in before he flies to Ibiza. He puts a contract in front of me.

  —Stay sober and I’ll double your money. Drink and I’ll halve it.

  I sign it. Five days and my life is already changing. What will it be like after seven?

  It feels too good to be sober. I have started doing two hours instead of one every day in the gym. I’m bench-pressing over a hundred kilograms and doing over three hundred press-ups. I run at least five miles a day and there are even days when I don’t have sex. I’m shocked by my own thoughts. When I was running across the Heath before going into work, this is what came into my head:

  I must read some books on psychology.

  I’ll pay Bruno the money I owe him this afternoon. I’ll throw in a bottle of champagne as a thank you.

  Who would I really be if I never drank again?

  I want to give Suzie a grand. She’s struggling with her rent. I don’t want the money back.

  The sun feels good on my back.

  I feel happy.

  Ecstatic.

  I love The Boss.

  I owe him more than he ever knows.

  Who would I really be if I never drank again?

  I must call my Mum and go round to build her that rock pool.

  I never knew being sober was this easy.

  I’ll keep going to the meetings even though I don’t really need them anymore.

  I’ve lost the taste for alcohol.

  I’d rather have coffee than cocaine.

  The Secret Society is a brilliant idea.

  Esurio’s right. People like John make heavy weather of staying dry.

  I can be sober and happy.

  I meet Suzie. After we fuck I give her the rent money. She hugs me and says:

  —One day I’ll marry you, Lincoln. It might be five or ten years from now but I will.

  I am thirty-eight. She’s nineteen. Her mother kicked her out of the house when she was a teenager and she went to live in a caravan on the south coast. She says:

  —I just want a family. With you.

  We fuck again.

  I go to a meeting in the evening. During a break I say to John:

  —Two days to go.

  He looks at me. Like he is meeting me for the first time. And the last.

  When I leave the meeting, I’m walking along Shaftesbury Avenue when I think:

  —After the seven days are up I’ll keep going to the meetings. It’ll just be occasional. Maybe once or twice a month. I don’t need them but Tales of Misery and Despair are good for my soul.

  I catch my reflection in the glass of the Curzon Cinema and adjust my handkerchief.

  In the afternoon before the meeting I went to dig the rock pool at my Mum’s house. I was relentless. The early spring sunshine was beating down on me and I pounded the earth for maybe two or three hours without stopping. As I was beating the ground I smiled at how, even now, without a drop of alcohol or a grain of gear in my body, I still couldn’t stop. It took me three hours. Mum said:

  —Thank you, darling. That’s lovely.

  Then:

  —You’re a good lad, Lincoln. Underneath it all, you’re a very good lad.

  But underneath what? And how far does she have to dig to find a seam of decency?

  We never had any money when I was growing up, and after Dad died things got even worse. So I used to go to school and boast about how rich we were, how we could afford anything we wanted. My Mum said:

  —It’s no use lying all the time. It doesn’t change anything. She was wrong. It changed everything. I learned that if my world was breaking apart, I had the power to put it back together again in any way I wanted. This is how the process works:

  Their Lie:

  We haven’t got any money.

  My Truth:

  We can afford anything we want.

  Their Lie:

  You’ll get caught.

  My Truth:

  I’ll always get away with it.

  Their Lie:

  My Mum can see through me like glass.

  My Truth:

  I can hide anything from anyone.

  Their Lie:

  If you carry on drinking and using, you’ll have a heart attack like your Dad.

  My Truth:

  I’m going to live forever.

  Their Lie:

  You’re in pain.

  My Truth:

  I love pleasure.

  And there was another reason I didn’t have to lie. We were, in fact, rich in ways I couldn’t see, as my gaze was lost in the search for the money we never had. Here’s the evidence I missed as I struggled to solve The Mystery of the Missing Money:

  • My Dad took me dog-racing at Dalston and we ate pies and jellied eels.

  • My parents never argued.

  • They laughed together. A lot.

  • Dad took me to the seaside and we ran down a long pier and played on the fruit machines.

  • My Dad knew Marty Wilde and we all played golf together.

  • My parents took me to the Tower of London and didn’t leave me there.

  • My Dad had a great sense of humour.

  • He made me laugh. A lot.

  But when you’re a wounded detective and you can’t stop trying to solve The Mystery of the Missing Money, you can’t see the truth because you’re too busy laying down one false trail after another and following them all as fast as you can, in the hope that one day you can find a reason to stop running.

  The Sixth Day

  Being sober feels like a drug.

  I’m in a meeting and, as I look around the room, I feel sorry for the people who have been coming to these meetings for years, so at the end of the meeting I stand up and say:

  —I want to thank everyone here and those who aren’t here today for helping me stop drinking. I couldn’t have done it without you.

  I feel a bit of a toady because the truth is I know I could have done it without them but this is the New, Nicer Lincoln. I like him and so do they. I tell them that Esurio has a special party organised for me on The Seventh Day, so I won’t be at tomorrow’s meeting but, before I sit down again, I add:

  —You’ve helped me rediscover my True Self. Thank you. I don’t know where that came from, but when I’m walking along Wardour Street after the
meeting Esurio is chuckling at my shoulder.

  —Ah, your True Self. That was a bit grand, don’t you think?

  —Maybe, but it’s true.

  He is swinging his cane as he walks. He’s brighter than I’ve seen him for some time. He sneers at me:

  —What, Lincoln, is Truth?

  —Don’t get all clever with me. I’m just saying, being sober feels like being me.

  —Oh, dear, you really are in a muddle.

  —What do you mean?

  —If there is such a thing as a True Self, I imagine yours to be . . . mud-coloured

  —Mud-coloured?

  —Let me put it another way. How can you be sure that the man walking along this street with me right now, taking in the lights and ladies at a safe distance, is the real you? Are you not a murkier man than that, Lincoln?

  —Less murky than I was.

  —I see. So when did this great change take place?

  —I don’t know. It just happened on the Fifth Day.

  —I grant you that a change has taken place in you, but how can you be sure that this change isn’t taking you away from your True Self, as you like to call him?

  I wipe the back of my right hand across my lips. I can hear Esurio laughing. When I turn to smack him, he is nowhere to be seen.

  After the meeting, I’m pleased with myself. I think:

  —Quite an achievement. At least now I can get on with my life.

  I crease my brow.

  —But which life am I going to get on with?

  I don’t like that question, so I ignore it, although I can’t shift it completely out of my head. Danielle comes into my mind. She was a Wrap who worked in Soho. She started as a dancer and ended up as a Paid-For. Then she fell in love with a punter. They were married within three months and before the wedding all she could talk about was what she would be wearing, how her little nieces were going to be bridesmaids and how she wanted a ‘chocolate box’ wedding. The Big Day was her wall, too thick and tall for her to see past it, so she got married. The beatings started on her honeymoon and within a month she was back in Soho. Three weeks later she was dead. As I leave the meeting, I think:

  —This is my Big Day. I made it.

  When I come out of the meeting, I find myself standing outside The Office. I can’t remember walking there. One minute I’m in the meeting. The next I’m outside The Office. I can see the boys at the back, laughing. A few Wraps are hanging around, waiting for some coke and taking cock as payment. Esurio puts his hand on my shoulder.

  —Go in, Lincoln. You haven’t been in for quite a while, have you?

  I walk towards Oxford Street. I feel Doubt. Not about anything in particular, just a gnawing, mud-coloured Doubt twisting in my gut. Seven Days? Is it enough? Does the Geek with Glasses really know what he’s talking about?

  On the night of The Sixth Day I go to bed early and dream of snorting some gear off a Wrap’s back. As my head touches her skin, her spine, in the form of a snake, breaks out of her body and twists around my throat. I wake up gasping for breath. Then I’m in The Office and I order a vodka tonic. I’m alone at the table when Mario brings it to me. He serves it to me as if he’s been expecting me for some time. He seems pleased I’m back. I look at it forever. I can feel the smell rising up into my nostrils and circulating through my body. I inhale deeply and hold my breath. Then I let go. I dare not touch the glass. I know if I touch it I will be lost. I need a drink. I need this drink. NOW. I sit there for maybe half an hour then something pulls me out of my seat and within seconds I’m running through Soho. I’m laughing. People stare at me then lower their heads. They think I’m insane. They’re right. I’m mad with happiness. I passed the test. I sat there and I didn’t drink. I am Immortal. Powerful Beyond Measure. I wake up sweating and smiling. My chest hurts. I ignore it and wipe my hand across my lips.

  The Seventh Day

  I begin the Seventh Day with a trip to the best Thai massage parlour on Brewer Street. A stunning Asian Wrap bends me like a doll before giving me the happiest of happy endings. When she’s done I wonder if I should stop thinking of young women as Wraps. They can be Girls. Simple, beautiful Girls. I walk out of the massage parlour and Esurio is standing on the opposite side of the road. He’s smiling.

  —It’s the Seventh Day, Lincoln, and I want you to see just how much your life has changed. Tonight you will have as many young ladies as you wish without a drop of alcohol passing your lips. I feel you are ready to start a new life where you have more control over your impulses, where you can indulge one pleasure without being overrun by another. Let’s meet in the Townhouse on Dean Street and take it from there. Bravo, Lincoln, bravo!

  I smile back at him, proud of how far I’ve come in such a short time. I spend the rest of the day getting myself ready. I go for a facial in Mayfair and, when I get back to the flat, I take a couple of hours removing surplus body hair before going to the gym.

  In the evening I am not hungry. I get a sandwich from Starbucks and on my way back I think of how my life has changed over the last Seven Days. A week ago there was me and the drink and the drugs and we were all heading in the same direction. Then I took a small step on a different path and now we are worlds apart. I guess it’s what happens when parallel lives go their separate ways. That is the Truth. My Truth. How difficult can that be to grasp?

  The Grand Ball of Immortal Addicts

  Midnight on The Seventh Day

  I’m sitting by the bar in the Townhouse.

  I’m drinking a glass of water.

  I’m sober.

  I wipe my hand across my mouth.

  I look at my watch. Esurio will be here any minute.

  9 p.m. on The Seventh Day

  I’m in my flat on Old Compton Street with two Regulars, an Occasional and a Paid-For.

  I am bored.

  No amount of anal can raise my spirits.

  After an hour I put a hundred and fifty on the bedside table for the Paid-For and leave the Wraps to get on with it.

  As I walk down the stairs I have this thought:

  —When you have changed your life, what happens next?

  10:15 p.m. on The Seventh Day

  I bump into Lisa, the Pilates teacher on Berwick Street. She’s in her early seventies and one of the sexiest women I know. I banged her once a few months ago. I think if I bang her again it might raise my spirits.

  —Lincoln, this is Joanna. She’s one of my Pilates students. Joanna is a petite, little Wrap with one of those pretty, picture-book faces. I imagine what that face would look like after I fuck her. I smile at her and shake her hand with just enough pressure for her to know what I want. She smiles. Nervously. She waits for me to let her hand go. The deal is done: passive Wraps are easily banged. I say:

  —Let’s go for a drink.

  Lisa replies:

  —Sure. Where do you fancy?

  —Well, I’m off the booze and the gear at the moment, so it’s up to you.

  Lisa looks at me like I have beamed down from a distant galaxy.

  —Well . . . that’s . . . great . . . great . . . Are you sure you have . . . I mean . . .

  —I’ve changed my life in seven days.

  She looks relieved. I don’t understand her relief but I seem familiar to her again.

  —That’s OK then. Why don’t we get a coffee at my flat? We were going there anyway.

  Joanna follows close behind us, her hand touching my arm when she speaks.

  Lisa’s flat is littered with pictures of the Buddha and some old prints of Asians banging. It stinks of incense.

  She puts on some music. I look at the CD cover: half-a-dozen Wraps dressed like angels and chanting to some pipes. I imagine banging them until I realise they bore me. I look at Joanna. She says something about the fucking universe and waves her arms above her head in a soft, rhythmic movement. I think she really needs a good pounding to sort her head out. I’m just about to surrender and leave when I have a thought:

  I’ve
never banged a Granny and a Wrap at the same time.

  I have another thought:

  My life can never be complete until I bang a Granny and a Wrap at the same time.

  I say to Joanna:

  —That’s lovely the way you move your hands above your head. Shall we all do it together?

  —That’s a wonderful idea! Why don’t we do a sacred circle?

  In a few minutes, we’re all hugging, touching, waving, while that ridiculous fucking music drones on in the background. This is what happens next:

  I kiss Joanna.

  She likes it.

  Lisa freaks out.

  She says: Lincoln! She’s my student. Not with her . . .

  I begin taking Joanna’s clothes off.

  Lisa gets up to leave.

  She says: Lincoln! I’ve never done it with one of my students.

  We both pull Lisa towards us.

  Gently.

  She looks at me.

  Joanna strokes her.

  Gently.

  I say: Why don’t you connect to Joanna’s energy?

  They begin to touch and then the first kiss.

  I think: I am a fucking genius.

  They strip. The Wrap is nice but Lisa is compelling.

  She may be a Pilates teacher, but she is still a Granny in her seventies and it shows. I love the maturity in her face. The flow of her body. And the sadness she hides in her crystals and bells.

  I look at them, a Granny and a Wrap. My Spiritual Bitches.

  They fuse into one body

  I don’t like being left out.

  I look for a way in.

  Every road is blocked.

  I wish I had some gear.

  But I don’t have any gear and, without it, the coiled fury doesn’t spring into life.

  I take a last look at them.

  They are serene.

  Their world is not mine.

  I think: I want to destroy their world.

  Then I think: I want to belong to their world.

  I feel pain.

  I wonder who the pain belongs to.

  I lower my head as I leave.

  Esurio opens the door for me and says: I hope you’re happy with the change, Lincoln.