Sugar Mummy (41 page)

Almost as if he's my saviour, not my tormentor, I shout, 'Jonathan,
hi, Jonathan, it's me, Andrew.' There is a silence and I wait for the door to open.
It doesn't move. 'Hello? Jonathan?' I push the door again, perhaps I just didn't
hear it buzz.

'How can I help you?' says Jonathan through the metal grill of
the entryphone.

'I just wanted to pick up my other cheques.'

'OK. Hang on, let me look at my file.'

'Can I come in?' I say but there is silence.

'I've got a record of another job but, like I said at the time,
I take the earnings from the first jobs to cover my expenses.'

'What, still?'

'Things like photographs cost money.'

'But I never had a photograph and ...' I realise I'm getting
off the point here. 'Look, what about the other jobs I did?'

'Well, you didn't do many jobs because you haven't been around
much. I've talked to your flatmate more than you,' he adds prissily.

'But I did do jobs for you - Marion, er the American woman, and
that girl, the young girl, in Clapham-'

'Have you got dates for these jobs?'

'Dates? Look, I can't ... erm ... there was one a few weeks ago.'

'Andrew, I'm really sorry, I need dates.'

'The young girl, Erren. It was ... let me think. Tuesday the
eighth. Yeah, it must have been. Or the ninth. Whichever was the Tuesday.'

'What about the credit card receipt?'

'I gave it to you.'

'Did you keep a copy with the job reference number on it?'

'What copy? What job reference number? Jonathan, can you let
me in for a minute?'

'I need the dates and job reference numbers, Andrew. I'm very
sorry but you'll need to be more precise. I've got a lot of guys working now - and
girls. I can't just dole out cheques willy nilly.'

'Willy nilly?' I repeat, probably because it's such a daft phrase.
'Willy nilly? Listen, you owe me that money, for Christ's sake.'

'Andrew, this is getting a bit boring. I told you: I need the
credit card slips and the references.'

I bang the door with my hand and take a deep breath, trying to
get a grip. Then I have an idea. 'What if I asked the clients for the slips? They
might still have them.' Does Jonathan laugh at that?

'I really don't want you pestering clients.'

'What about Marion, you know, the American woman in

Chelsea?' She must have noticed that the amount has been debited
from her card and she'll certainly remember the date. 'I can ask her tonight ...
hello?'

'Tonight? I don't have you booked to see her tonight. Laura?
Do we have any bookings for Andrew Collins tonight?'

'No, but I'm seeing her anyway,' I explain desperately, almost
hysterically and then it hits me.

'You mean you're seeing a client without the agency?' says Jonathan
calmly.

'No ... well, yes. We've started sort of going out, that's all.'
Oh, shit! Why did I say that?

'Andrew, as I explained when you signed up, dealing with clients
without the agency is strictly forbidden. I'm afraid I've no choice but to end your
employment with us. Goodbye.' 'What?' I screech. The entryphone is silent. 'Jonathan!
Jonathan!' I bang the door again, so hard my hand hurts but I don't care - I just
wack it again. I stab the button again and yell at the small metal box in the doorway.
'Listen, you fucking bastard. You fucking owe me.' I stand back and look at the
door for a moment as if it's going to give me a break and open by itself. Then I
kick it as had as I can. The force sends me staggering backwards. I lose my balance
and fall down the steps, landing at the feet of two middle-aged women.

One of them cries out in fear. They hack off quickly as I struggle
to stand up. 'Cunt!' I bellow above the noise of a passing motor bike at the impassive
building towering above me. 'You bastard.'

'Excuse me,' says a voice from behind me.

'Oh, fuck off,' I hiss without turning.

'Now, hang on a minute, sir.' I spin round, ready to punch someone
but it's a policeman. I look away from his intense, curious gaze.

'He owes me money,' I mutter.

'Well, I don't think you're going get it by swearing at him in
the street,' says the policeman in the kind of calm, patronising logic you would
expect of someone in a uniform in this kind of situation. 'I'm going to have to
ask you to move on.'

'I've got no money,' I hear myself saying.

'Look, you'll have to talk to a solicitor about recovering it,
then. You can't stand here shouting and swearing.' There is an edge to his voice
now. He is about my age. 'That's not going to get you anywhere.'

'What will get me anywhere?' I ask but he just watches me silently
until I move off.

A few days later I also think I see Jonathan whiz past in a cab
when I'm sitting at a cafe in Brompton Road. I leap up ready to run after the cab
but whoever it is is on a mobile phone or something so I can't quite see for sure.
I could really do with that money. It's also the principle of the thing. He owes
it to me. Plus cab fares, plus hours of sleep, plus my job ...

My encounter with Jonathan, or rather his entryphone, is about
the only exciting event to upset the gentle rhythm of my pointless existence. Marion
gives me ten or twenty pounds or so every now and then and buys me some more clothes:
a really cool Dolce & Gabbana white T-shirt. If you look at it close up and
you know about these things you can tell it's expensive. Unfortunately, after Anna
Maria washes it it becomes a bit tight and when I catch sight of myself in it with
my shades I realise I look too gay. She also buys me an off-white suit from Hugo
Boss which looks pretty cool, especially with the aforementioned white T. Except
that there aren't many places I can wear it and Mark says something about Richard
Gere in American Gigolo having one. I sort of leave it at the back of the wardrobe
after that.

I think about Jane a lot and ring Paperchase a few times but
put the phone down before there is any answer. I can't work out what to say to her.
My prepared speech or plan to meet her suddenly sounds all wrong when I get ready
to say it. Sometimes I think it's pure lethargy that prevents me from arranging
to see her, or the thought of having to invent some story about Marion and where
I'm living now or simply not knowing what to say to someone so sensible, so organized,
so together. But in fact it's probably just shame that stops me from ringing.

One of my dad's books talks about something called creative visualization
- if you really see something happening you can actually bring it about. The square-jawed
motivator who wrote the book was referring to a more senior position within your
department, I think, or a pay rise or something else really worth having, but with
me it seems to work with Jane.

I'm sitting at the Picasso Cafe reading the paper I used to work
on for a change when I look up and see her. She is wearing Ray-Bans and a pale blue
summer dress.

But it's not her.

It's just another girl walking down the street. A girl with a
job and a flat who has friends she sees for a glass of white wine after work and
who reads glossy magazines at the hairdressers.

So I pay for my coffee quickly, pick up my magazine and Dolce
& Gabbana sunglasses and go off to find a phone box. I have to hold on for a
while because Jane is serving a customer but somehow I manage not to put the phone
down. 'Hello, can I help you?' she says finally. I'm slightly taken off guard by
her formal greeting. 'It's me, Andrew.'

'Oh, hi,' she says, surprised but friendly. There is a pause.

The phone box suddenly seems very hot and smelly.

'How are you?'

'OK, how are you?'

'Fine, thanks.'

 
'Great ... how's it going?'
Shit, haven't we just done this one?

'Good, yeah, busy.'

'Oh, sorry. Can you talk?'

'Yes,' she says but then she doesn't. She is obviously going
to make me do all the running on this.

'I was just ringing to say hello ...and .. .' Either she takes
pity on me for my faltering conversation or she is genuinely interested.

'Where are you? It's very noisy, it sounds like a phone box.'

'It is. I ... er ...'

'You not at work?'

'No ... I ...'

'Day off?'

I may as well tell her. 'Everyday's a day off at the moment.
I've been sacked.'

'Oh, God. I'm sorry.' She seems genuinely surprised, upset. It's
as if I've got my slick, yuppy come-uppance. 'That's awful.'

'Oh, don't worry. I'm quite relieved, actually. Stupid bloody
job.'

'Oh,' she says quietly. Perhaps I sound like I don't care at
all about working, like I don't have to.

'Jane, I just wondered if you wanted to do something tonight.'

'I can't, I'm going to see at film at the NFT with my friend.'

'Oh, of course. Sure.' A huge truck thunders past. I wonder if
she has said something that I didn't hear. 'Sorry, did you say something?'

'No,' she says quickly. 'No, sorry.' Why do words always get
in the way when there's something important you want to say?

I try again. 'Er, tomorrow night, then?'

'OK, why not?' She sounds quite pleased, quite enthusiastic.

'Great!' I say. 'I'll see you - where? Sloane Square Tube? At
what? Eight? And we'll have something to eat. You know somewhere cheap and cheerful.'

'All right.' She seems to warm to it. 'All right, that'll be
fun. See you, then.'

*

'Marion,' I say over dinner at Ciccone's that eight. 'I've been
thinking about this marriage thing.'

'Yes?'

I take a deep breath. 'Well, I think I'll do it.'

Yep, I will do it. I'll take the money and then get the hell
out of this. No more Ciccone's perhaps but no more tight lead, no more killing time
over coffee in the King's Road - oh, and no circumcision. I might get out of here
in one piece.

So now I've got to escape from this mess, cut my losses, get
what I can and get out of it. A bogus marriage was not what I had originally planned
but it's better than carrying on like this. At least it's money - perhaps cash.
Quickie wedding, quickie divorce, take the money and run. Like Mark says, everybody
does it. And Marion will be getting something out of it, too. So will Anna Maria.

'OK,' says Marion coolly.

There is a pause.

'Well, you know, if it's still on, if you still haven't found
anyone?'

'Mark had a friend, I think, but, as I said, I would prefer to
give you the opportunity.'

'I know, thanks for that.'

'I'll speak to the lawyer in the morning and he'll tell you what
to do.'

'I don't fancy talking to Mr Markby again.'

Marion spears a piece of ravioli. 'Don't worry, I've found another
one.' She puts the pasta in her mouth and chews gently for a moment. 'More amenable.'

I ring Jerry, the more amenable lawyer, the next morning and
he is very amenable - and very reassuring. Over his mobile phone in what sounds
like a Coffee Republic he explains exactly how it all works. He tells me to let
him sort out the forms. He's done it a hundred times. No one ever gets caught. Easiest
thing in the world.

After my experiences with Jonathan I wonder whether to ask him
to draw up something between me and Marion for the little matter of the £15,000
but that sounds just too tacky.

Besides she'd never go for it. I'll have to trust her. When I
tell her how helpful Jerry was and remind her of the payment we discussed, she says,
'I should hope he was helpful - the amount he's making out of me.'

Following my conversation with Jerry I've made a careful note
of what we have to do and then I go into the kitchen to explain it all to Anna Maria.
I realise that we haven't spoken about this before and perhaps she doesn't even
know that I've agreed to do the deed. As soon as I walk into the kitchen and say
her name she senses something is afoot. I suddenly feel rather nervous and realise
that I am, in fact, proposing to her. It almost makes me laugh for a moment and
then I realise that this is how it's going to be: a grotesque parody of what should
be one of the most serious and moving events of my life.

We are going to do it 'by licence' since this means we only have
to give three days' notice. We'll do it Chelsea Registry because technically I now
live in the Royal Borough. We just need two witnesses. Marion will ask two discreet
friends to do that, probably Charles and Victoria. Then, after a few months we will
send our papers to the Home Office in Croydon and they will lift the residency restrictions
on Anna Maria's passport and she can stay in Britain as long as she likes without
any difficulty. Later she can apply for citizenship if she wants.

I think she takes it all in. Later that afternoon the driver
takes us to the Town Hall to register. The clerk in charge with his over-used suit
and brown striped shirt seems to radiate disapproval even though he doesn't say
anything beyond what he is legally bound to tell us. He looks at me and then at
her and then back at me again. I give our names, spelling them in an attempt to
be extra helpful and curry favour. He types them into a computer and asks for our
addresses. There is something about the formality, the smell of disinfectant, the
polished lino floor, the faint echo of our voices and the forms on the desk that
reminds me of school exams and I begin to feel slightly sick. Suddenly Anna Maria
is tugging at my sleeve. I look round and realise how ridiculous we must appear
- she's got to be less than five feet tall.

'What?' I say, trying to look lovingly at her. 'My name.'

'Yes, dear.' I say. It sounds ridiculous, like I'm taking the
piss out of this whole thing even more. 'He's got to put them both into the computer.'

'No, my name no like that.'

'What?' I was hoping that this little tiff made the whole thing
look quite convincing. What comes next doesn't.