Black Lipstick Kisses (13 page)

He'd paid me too, pointing out that he paid other people and could claim it back off his tax in any case when I'd tried to refuse. At that I'd given in, reasoning that had I sat as a model for an art class I'd have expected to be paid, so why not for Michael? After all, he stood to make plenty out of the story.

I wanted to see Snaz and Biggy's piece again, and took the railway alley. It was actually being buffed, two men painting it over with white masonry paint to create an eyesore where the piece had provided colour and life. I watched for a while, feeling more than a little down. The one problem with looking after All Angels was that it set me against people I might normally have got on with. Snaz seemed to be the sort of girl I'd been friends with at school, and since moving I'd hooked up with very few other people.

Not that there was anything I could do about it. She was going to think of me in much the same way as the transport police and council workmen, only weird. It was true, from her viewpoint, but as I walked back I
was wishing I'd known that she was a she earlier. That way I might have played things differently.

At the least I could stop being actively antagonistic, and I climbed the tower to take the hooded top down from the flagpole. I could see the railway, and part of the alley with the garage roofs, if not the actual piece. They'd almost certainly worked at night, but had I been on the tower I would have seen them. It was an intriguing thought, and carried an edge of excitement, although they were hardly likely to hit the same place again, at least not for weeks. I stayed for a while anyway, scanning the buildings alongside the railway and trying to read the distant dubs and pieces, those few which hadn't been buffed with white paint.

It brought back memories of the guilty thrill of tagging windows in buses, and later, moving from shadow to shadow alongside deserted railway lines, my stomach tight with apprehension. I'd always liked the night and the thrill of fear, and had never once gone back before completing at least something. Nor had I ever been caught. There had been bad moments, like when I was standing in the shadows admiring the big black and gold dub I'd put on a transformer box and all Hell had broken loose just metres down the tracks.

The local crew had been caught by the BTP, because some idiot hadn't switched his mobile off and it had rung as a patrol was passing their hiding place. Two of them had been caught and made to clean up, my dub included. They'd blamed me, which was hardly fair, and it had ended up with them tagging my bare chest. I'd fought like mad at the time, and not one of them had come away without scratches, but now the memory brought a bitter smile to my lips.

It had only made me worse, up every spare moment, trackside and anywhere else I could find blank space. I'd even got my job with the cleaning firm to pay for my paint. Then there had been my first piece, up painting on a switchgear shed all night, drinking Tennants until I was so off my face I didn't care if I was caught or not. It hadn't been that wonderful, and they'd still called me a toy, leading to my last piece, the grand climacteric of my writing, halfway up Solomon Brothers office block from a cleaning gondola, sober. Then they'd stopped calling me a toy. Some had gone for ‘mad bitch' instead, but there had been envy in their voices. It had been a wonderful feeling, but pale beside what I had discovered during my night-time escapades. I had experienced my first communion.

My idea had been to go trackside in the big international depot by Scrubs Lane in the hope of hitting a Eurostar. I'd been trying to figure out the CCTV coverage from the bridge when a security guard had challenged me. As I'd had a bag of paints with me I'd made myself scarce, taking to St Mary's cemetery for safety. It was the sensible place to go. Most men don't think a girl would hide in a cemetery, and fewer still will search one. I never did know if he followed, but I hid for a good half-hour, in the shadow of a huge granite tomb.

It was not my first time in a cemetery at night, by any means. I'd often wandered in the moonlight between the stones and tombs, letting my senses fill with every emotion that came. This time it was different, my overriding sense not melancholy, or peace, or regret, but a strange, malign humour, frightening and arousing too. As my heart had gradually slowed and my fear of being caught died away it had been replaced
with an urge to be naked, and more than that, naked in rude, blatantly sexual positions. I'd fought it, scared but too curious and too bloody minded to flee. Before I'd really known what I was doing my top had been up and my hand down the front of my panties to give myself an orgasm immeasurably stronger than anything I had experienced before. Only later did I discover who was buried in the tomb: Jean-Jacques Lamarche, a man who boasted he had enjoyed over a thousand women.

So after the office block hit I'd given up writing. It was fun, but it could never approach the blinding exhilaration of communion. Besides, anyone with a marker pen could tag and there was endless beef. Communion was mine alone, wonderful and absolutely secret until I had shared it with Michael. Who had promptly cast doubt on my experience . . .

I was still on the roof when a voice called up to me from the street – the postman. He was used to me, and a friend of sorts since I'd persuaded Lilitu that he was not fair game. I called back, climbing down to find that he had a parcel which I was supposed to sign for. Intrigued, I took it into the vestry and quickly pulled the wrappings off, to find a mobile phone within. There was a single number in the memory: Stephen's.

IN A WAY,
accepting the phone from Stephen was one more step towards being in his control. I soothed my pride by calling him during the day in the hope of catching him in the middle of some frightfully important meeting and starting to talk dirty the moment he answered. From the formality of his voice when he responded I knew I'd done it, and he was not best pleased when he rang back later. It didn't stop him wanting a date though, and I agreed to have dinner at his flat on the Friday.

That left the rest of the week to myself, and Michael. I went down most days, to fuck and model and fuck some more. The Goat of Mendes quickly grew to a full story, and I grew so used to being Bernadette that I had begun to think like her even when I wasn't posing. Michael lapped it up, quite happy to be pushed on the ground and mounted, but always taking his turn on top.

It was great sex, but I knew I couldn't take it further and invite him to commune with me, not when he didn't believe. That I set aside for when I could convince him I was drawing on something other than my subconscious. I didn't bring it up in conversation either, although we frequently skirted around it. Another thing that didn't come up in conversation was Stephen Byrne. I knew I should say something, and with each time we had sex I grew a little more guilty, but I just couldn't bring myself to speak out.

Making my excuses for the Friday evening made me more guilty still, especially when Michael accepted them with his normal casual style. I was feeling a complete bitch on the bus, and not a lot better as Stephen drove me across town, although he was in the brightest mood I'd seen him, full of nervous energy and wit. I knew I could at least tell him, and that it would make me feel a little better. I let him have it as soon as we were in his flat, straight out.

‘I um . . . I think you should know that I have another lover.'

‘You do? Great.'

‘Great?'

‘Well, yes. Don't take this the wrong way, Angela, but I need discretion and common sense in a woman. After all, however much the rest of the populace may screw around, a politician is expected to set an example.'

There was more than a little bitterness in his voice as he went on.

‘I wouldn't mind so much, only I've never spoken up for family values and all that rubbish in my life, so I can't very well be accused of hypocrisy, but they'd still come down on me like a ton of bricks. Still, things are getting better, slowly. An MP can be openly gay and get away with it, more or less, which is a step in the right direction. Anything less politically correct though, let alone . . .'

He stopped, pursing his lips and for a moment I wondered what he'd been going to say, but he went on.

‘Risky business, affairs.'

‘Why do you do it then? I mean, I take it I'm not the first?'

‘Why do I do it? How can I not do it? Do you know how long ago I last had sex with my wife? Guess.'

‘I don't know. A month? A year?'

‘Fourteen years. OK so we married for expediency's sake, but I did try. We had separate bedrooms from the first. Damn it, she cares ten times as much for her precious job as she does for me, and her bloody horses, even the dog! I can't handle the idea of paying for sex either. It turns me right off, and it's risky too. A woman who's prepared to sell her body is quite likely to be prepared to go in for a bit of blackmail, or at the least to cash in by selling her story to the papers.'

‘Isn't that a risk anyway?'

‘Yes, but I choose carefully.'

‘I'm flattered.'

‘So you should be. Normally I spend quite a while getting to know a woman before I make my intentions obvious. I need to be sure she's honourable, safe if you prefer. With you I took a bit of a risk, I'll admit. Then again I've had a great deal of practice at judging people and I've not come unstuck so far.'

‘Why take a risk on me, some ditzy skater-girl with a beef?'

‘You really have no idea, do you? No. Young women never do.'

‘How do you mean?'

He laughed and shook his head.

‘Seriously, how do you mean?'

‘You really have no idea how beautiful you are, do you, how alluring?'

‘Yeah, I turn heads, but I never know if they're thinking “she's cute” or “what a weirdo”. I don't really care either.'

‘You see. You wear your beauty like a paper crown.'

‘No. I spend hours on make-up, and most of my money.'

‘You're equally lovely naked. You'd be equally lovely in an old sack with bits of straw in your hair.'

‘Sure!'

‘The first time we met, when you came into the hall, just to be near you made me ache, everything about you, the way you move, your elfin face, those huge eyes, full of innocence and determination, your little round bottom . . .'

‘Which I fell on?'

He laughed.

‘Have you any idea, the least inkling of how fresh, how delightfully, deliciously free that made you seem, sweet and lovely and naive and . . .'

He finished with a sigh. I had known, sort of, but I'd had no idea the effect had been so strong. He went on, wistful and earnest.

‘All the women I meet are impossibly sophisticated – a word with a Greek root by the way, meaning “false wisdom”, which just about sums it up. They know how beautiful they are, to the last penny of their manicures or in some cases their last Botox shot. The irony is that by the time they learn it's usually too late, you see. Anyway, I have a special treat for tonight, lobster, fresh down from the Suffolk coast, the wine, a Clare Valley Riesling, but first oysters and champagne.'

He gave a sweeping bow and walked into the kitchen. I composed myself on the settee, quite ready for another session of being pampered with fine food and attentive sex. Having admitted to being with Michael had made me feel better, a lot better. I couldn't help but wonder if Michael would take the news equally well. He hadn't staked any particular claim to
me, but then men generally don't, not at first, they just assume.

I was determined not to let my bad feelings spoil the evening in any case, and hit the champagne pretty hard. The oysters I couldn't eat, horrible slimy things that were still alive. It was like swallowing come, but without the kick from knowing what you're doing. The lobster was delicious though, as was the sticky chocolate cake that came afterwards, leaving me feeling stuffed to the brim, pleasantly drowsy and also naughty.

Stephen was different. Before he had always been pretty sure of himself, except when I'd first suggested sex in the graveyard. Now he was anything but, and getting rapidly worse, still full of nervous energy, but with more of the nervous. Once we'd finished the cake and the sweet, heavy wine he'd served with it he rose, crossed to the drinks cabinet and took out two brandy glasses and a bottle. He poured a generous measure into one glass and a smaller one into a second, only to suddenly change his mind and fill it properly. One he gave to me, the other he put to his lips, swallowing about half the contents in one gulp, then spoke.

‘Lie down a while, let your food settle.'

As he moved towards the bedroom door I followed. Something was going on, and I was expecting it to be dramatic, maybe his bedroom transformed into a full-on Gothic dungeon, complete with rack and iron maiden. There was nothing of the sort, not so much as a whip or chain. Feeling slightly disappointed I laid myself down on the bed, flat on my back, once again too drunk and too full to pose. He went to the TV, turned it on and pushed a video into the slot. I smiled
to myself, wondering if it was a porno and if that was what all the fuss was about.

‘Do you like Westerns?'

‘Well . . . er . . . not particularly.'

‘Indulge me. This is
McLintock,
with John Wayne and Maureen O'Hara.'

I propped myself up, completely puzzled but quite happy to watch old movies with him if that was what he wanted, so long as we got down to business eventually. It was actually quite funny, especially because I was so drunk, well over the top, and before long I had my head on his shoulder and we were laughing together. His arm was around me, his fingers just inches from the curve of my breast, and I kept expecting him to touch me, or to kiss me, start stroking my legs, anything.

He didn't, but I could feel his body trembling against mine, and as I recovered from the meal my arousal grew steadily, with his warmth and scent slowly working their way into my head. We had to be waiting for something, but I had no idea what, and as the film moved on I determined that the instant it was over his cock was coming out and that was that. Meanwhile I could at least tease.