Seductive Viennese Whirl (6 page)

In the next second, hopes dashed, I'm cringing as Tom Cruise gets up and blows his nose, before using the handkerchief to wipe down the seat of the machine. Okay, so he's a total write off, but what about the man over there with the rather nice legs doing press ups? Something about the way he moves is jogging a memory.

Who the hell is he?

As he turns round I notice his crooked nose, his green, slightly hooded eyes and a mouth that's so hot it's smouldering. He's the spitting image of the Weasel.

Oh cripes, I think, stumbling off the StairMaster, it is the Weasel. I hurry on, past the Jacuzzi where Tom Cruise is stimulating himself on one of the water jets, anxious to get out before the Weasel clocks me.

After I've showered and dressed, I open my locker, only to find my DKNY trainers have gone. I get dressed, eyeing Pink Spandex Lady suspiciously, the only other person in there. She's stripped down to her thong and is slowly rubbing body lotion into her taut tan stomach. I peer behind her thong-clad behind, noting a pair of yellow laces hanging out of her locker, in the exact same shade as the laces on my DKNYs. Suddenly I'm bubbling with fury. Ripping open the locker door I find the yellow and black trainers, perched on top of her pink leotard.

"Excuse me," I say, grabbing the trainers. "But I think you'll find these are mine."

"Actually, they're mine," she says, coming over and swiping them from me.

"You nicked them, didn't you, while I was in the shower?" I say, grabbing one of the shoes and pulling. I pull and pull, but she just stands there, all composed. At the last minute she lets the trainer go and I crash to the floor, and sit there fuming up at her.

Now she's bending over me, anxious to get the shoe I've got tightly in my fist. She slips on the wet floor and before I know it she's flailing about on top of me.

"They're mine," I shriek, holding the shoe up over my head so she can't reach it. I can feel her hip bones chiselling through all three of my insulating layers of flab, tweed skirt and winter tights. While she wriggles about trying to grab the shoe, her elbows digging into me like wire coathangers, the pain becomes so excruciating that I start to yelp.

"If you don't give me back the other shoe this minute I'll fetch the manager," I shout.

"I am the manager," she says, finally pulling the trainer out of my hands. "And if you look inside you'll see they're a size four. What size are you?"

"Size six. Give me back my size sixes."

I get up and brush myself down. She holds up the shoes and I see that they are indeed fours.

"In that case I'd like to report some stolen trainers. DKNY. Size six."

"I'll make a note of it." She resumes rubbing lotion into her stomach. "Next time think about bringing a padlock for your locker, why don't you?"

Next time? What next time? I'm not setting foot in this gym again. It's obviously part of a smuggling ring in designer trainers.

As I pass Doreen's desk she gives me a big grin. "I just printed out your membership card." She holds it out to me.

"Actually, I've had second thoughts. Can I have my money back?"

"Shit Kate, you can't bottle out at the first setback. No pain, no gain, that's always been my motto and look at me now."

This smarmy antipodean bitch is really beginning to get on my wick. "Look, let me spell it out for you. I want to cancel my membership. Now."

"You have to wait three weeks before you can cancel. Didn't you read the smallprint?"

I swipe the card from her and storm out into the dark slush filled night. Wrapping my coat around me I cut across Soho to the sanctuary of Cafe Boheme where I'm meeting Eva. Once immersed in the familiar scent of expensive cologne, leather jackets and simmering coq au vin I begin to feel my sanity returning.

"How was the gym?" Eva asks, leaning on the mirror-topped bar. A jazz band is tuning up in the corner.

"I had a cat fight with a girl in a thong and almost bumped into the Weasel. Apart from that, perfect."

"I take it you'll be wanting a drink then?" she says, summoning the bar man.

Clutching our glasses of white wine we sink into a plush red sofa in the corner and soak up the ambience, all atmospheric lighting and mysterious looking foreign men. It's where she met Carlos, who at the time was on posters all over London, lead dancer of a Spanish troupe on tour in the UK. Although he'd been giving her the eye for a while she pretended to ignore him. I watched as he slipped a CD to the barman, and, once Flamenco was rippling through the bar he'd danced over to her, clicking his fingers and kicking up his heels in a rhythm that became progressively more frenzied and urgent, until pretty soon every woman's and quite a few of the men's eyes were glued to Carlos' perfect backside. I've known Eva long enough to know that when she licks her bottom lip and tugs at her earlobe she seriously fancies a guy. So while her face was a study in disinterested cool I knew he'd got to her. She was licking and tugging as he danced towards her, rhythmically stomping his heels, in preparation for a night in which she (and I, through the wall) would savour a great deal more of Carlos' unique sense of rhythm.

Tonight a couple of guys look in Eva's direction, but she doesn't notice. While I fill her in on my gym experiences I gobble down a plate of duck in plum sauce, while Eva picks the anchovies off a salad nicoise and leaves the rest.

Later on we find ourselves at a private members' club in Soho called The Blue Room. The mostly out of work actors who frequent the place are lounging about on satin bean bags. The guys have long fringes and wear shirts with long foppish cuffs, the girls are wafer thin and encased in black. I don't feel like sprawling, so I sit on one of the bar stools beside a table on top of which stands a spiked metal candelabra holding a purple candle dripping pools of wax. A waitress with short bleached hair and heavy black eye makeup comes up and takes my order for a bottle of red wine.

There's a velvet curtain at the back, which leads to a room where people go when they want to take drugs. I imagine all sorts of wild things happen there but I'm too much of a coward to find out. I'm far too uptight to indulge, say, in a ménage a trois, while inhaling opium in one nostril and coke in the other. But I like being in places where amoral people hang out, which is why I love The Blue Room. I guess it also explains why I was attracted to the Weasel. There's something dangerous about him. And the horror of it all is a part of me is still attracted to him, God help me.

And then, on top of that unpalatable thought I think of Ben. I'm about to tell Eva about bumping into him and how weird it felt, but I know that while she was sympathetic after the break-up, she's now growing impatient with my inability to erase him from my thoughts. She'll only roll her eyes and tell me to find someone new, so I decide to keep it to myself. Instead I ask her for the low down on her relationship with McManus.

She laughs. She had four glasses of wine at Cafe Boheme and is evidently quite tipsy. "You mean
Five Minutes
McManus?" That's what she's taken to calling him, as a term of endearment would you believe. I can only hope she doesn't call him that to his face.

"How do you put up with it? Him lasting such a short time?"

"How does he put up with me, more like?"

"What do you mean?"

"Well, last weekend, when I was up at Glynverstowe, it was cook's day off and McManus was out, so I took delivery of a pound of Beluga for a dinner party that evening. I tossed it in the fridge and forgot about it. When the guests started to arrive McManus asked me to open the jars and serve them on a pile of ice. Problem was, I'd put the caviar in the freezer by mistake. When I unscrewed one of the jars it slid out in a block of ice."

"Oh God, poor you. How did McManus take it?"

"He doesn't know."

"How come?"

"I heated the stuff up in the microwave, then plonked it on the ice."

"No way. Didn't it taste disgusting?"

"No one noticed, or at least, no one said anything."

"You're incredible. I would have totally freaked."

"I care about him too much to humiliate him in front of his friends."

"You do? You really care about him?" She's spent every weekend with him, either at our flat or up in Scotland, but I'm still unsure about the exact nature of her feelings. "I'm just surprised he's lasted longer than the others."

"The reason he's lasted longer," she says, sighing, "is that I really think he might be
The One
."

Before I can reply I hear a woman shrieking "Eva!" from across the room. As she comes towards us I recognize her as Lola Hemmings, a C list actress more famous for her ethereal beauty than her acting talents. As she air kisses Eva I'm mesmerized by her lustrous black hair, cut into a Louise Brooks' bob, not one hair out of place. As she straightens up it swings back to reveal tiny ears as delicate as seashells. And now I see them side by side, I realize that she and Eva look remarkably similar.

"Do tell Mark that I had a wonderful time up at Glynverstowe last weekend. Super caviar. I don't think I've ever tasted anything like it."

I start laughing.

"Who's your friend?" she says, noticing me.

"Kate Pickles."

"Oh, and what do you do?"

"I'm a copywriter."

"Really?" she says, eyes glazing over with boredom.

"Actually, I'm McManus' copywriter."

Her face twitches into a smile. "Mark? He's one of my oldest, dearest friends. Any friend of his is a friend of mine. Won't you both come and join us?" she says, gesturing towards a dark corner where a bunch of people are laid out on cushions.

"Thanks, but, actually, we're really rather tired," says Eva. "We just popped in for a quick one. Maybe some other time." She air kisses Lola and pulls me away.

"Thanks," I say to Eva, once we're out of earshot.

"I didn't think you wanted to go over."

"You thought right. Stuck up cow. Who does she think she is?"

"Oh, Lola's all right. It's just that I saw the Weasel at their table and thought you were keen on avoiding him."

I glance over. In the candlelight I can just make out the Weasel, sitting beside Lola, draping his arm around her shoulders, turning to whisper in her ear. They get up and slip behind the curtain at the back of the club, disappearing into the cavern of sin.

"You thought right," I say, clutching her arm. I suddenly feel unsteady on my feet. "Let's get out of here."

And now I'm home and all I want to do is sleep, just sleep. Why won't the Weasel just disappear?

Yours,

A tired little Gherkin

To: [email protected]

From: [email protected]

Subject: Is it legal?

Date: 22 April 2011

Gherkin my darling,

Thanks for your last letter and sorry that it's taken me yonks to get back to you, but you know what life is like at the moment with two kids, it's go go go. Right now I've a half hour window before Blair goes to his baby yoga class so I thought, as you're at work, that I'd drop you an email. I'll be frank with you, I'm getting a little worried about your state of mind. And since no one in your circle seems to have an ounce of common sense I'll tell you this: You are not making mature or wise decisions. This Weasel creature keeps appearing because secretly you want him to keep appearing.

As for the matter of Ricky, well, it leaves me speechless. Snogging in cupboards? With an eighteen year old? Is that even legal? I don't know what to tell you except to knock it on the head, now. And judging from your extreme reaction to meeting Ben in the street, my guess is that you're still hanging on to some half baked fantasy that he'll take you back. Well even if he did I'd tell him to shove it. You have a very selective memory. You were always unhappy when you were with him - how easily you forget. He was always criticising you, picking at you. I remember that time we were visiting and he made a great big fuss because his food wasn't warm enough, a right baby he was. And you just sat there, humiliated, and then ran into the toilet for a cry. And I know that sort of thing happened fairly often. You were always sobbing on the phone asking me if I thought he loved you. Well, for the record I don't think he ever loved anyone but himself. You're kidding yourself if you believe otherwise. You're worth ten of him and don't you ever forget it.

Maybe it would be better if you stepped out of the dating game for a while. Hmm? What do you say?

Well done you for joining a gym!

Must dash.

Love,

Egg

Ms Kate Pickles

96B Trumble Road

Camden

London NW1 3BX

England

15 May 2011

Dear Egg,

I've been chewing over what you wrote in your email for a while and the truth is I really don't know if I have an accurate recollection of things or whether my memory is playing tricks. Were things really that I bad between Ben and me? Yes, he sometimes made me cry, but he was so full of life - don't you remember? The life and soul of any dinner party, and okay maybe he could have been more affectionate but, deep down I'm sure he loved me. Didn't he? He must have. I'm still confused about it all, to tell you the truth.

And please don't worry about me dating Ricky, because things reached a climax (not mine, alas) with him some time at the tail end of April. We'd been pawing each other in the post room and before I knew what was happening we were slumped on the parcel weighing machine. He was trying to pull my shirt off over my head while caressing my breasts, when the machine gave out a mighty shudder.

"Oh shit," he said, as he peeled himself off me. "What was that?"

I stood there, one breast hanging out of my bra, my shirt twisted around my neck, watching him thump the machine.

Tucking my breast back into its cup I said, "This isn't working."