Sushi Central

by Alasdair Duncan

  270

  I almost stop myself on the way out of the house. I don’t know why I’m doing this. It’s fucking insane. Every so often things get like this. It’s hard to explain, but it’s like my mind detaches from my body. I’m outside myself, and I’m doing something and I don’t even know if I want to be doing it or not, but it’s as though my body is on autopilot so my mind can be elsewhere. A warmer place, or a safer place. When I’m like that, I’m almost happy. Almost. But my mind always has to go back. Even when I’ve managed to kid myself that I’m happy, even when I’ve almost managed to disconnect myself from the real world, there’s still a part of me that knows I will have to go back.

  As I’m opening the door, I have this moment of weird clarity. I want to know what it feels like to lose myself totally. I want to know.

  How stupid is that?

  271

  Bus to the city: Placebo are playing on my discman although I can’t even hear them properly, and I’m sure this is partly because of the noise of the bus but mostly because of the noise in my own head. The day is a negative image of itself and everything is strange and everyone is staring at me and I close my eyes and suddenly I’m not there any more; it’s early in the morning, and I’m sitting in the window seat and we’re flying, somewhere over the Pacific ocean, and I’m looking out of the plane and seeing nothing but a mass of clouds, as far as I can see, stretching on forever, and up here, the world as such doesn’t exist, it’s a different world, where the morning sun reflects off the clouds, beautiful, calm, and there’s nothing around you but sky, and you feel almost like you’re at peace, like everything is different up here and nothing matters, and if the plane would never land, you wouldn’t care, and you would stay up here in this world forever, because …

  272

  I’m at Sushi Central. Can of extremely sticky-sweet energy cola sitting in front of me. I feel good. Maybe not good, but different. I’m waiting for Jeremy, who said he’d meet me here later. I pulled a plate of tuna salad from the sushi train, but I’m not eating it. The music on the stereo is this loud and saccharine and incredibly highNRG electro-punk. One of the waitresses is dancing, swaying, but not to the music; she’s dancing to something else. I am thinking. Anthony. I don’t know how I feel. My notebook is in front of me. That picture of Stefan Oldsal is staring at me.

  273

  Picture of Stef: Even though this picture was taken not so long ago, he probably looks nothing like this any more. People change in so many minor ways. This is a picture of a version of him that probably doesn’t exist any more. But still, the picture exists, and it’s here, on the front of my notebook, and in a bunch of magazines all around the world, and on the net, preserved in some version of cold, digital eternity. This picture is Stef. He will change, he’ll get older, but this picture won’t. This picture will always be a record of a time when he was young and beautiful. This picture will preserve him. The real Stef won’t even matter. People don’t know him for who he is. I don’t know him for who he is. I know him from his music and, more importantly, from his pictures. Pictures like this are all Stefan is to me. As far as I’m concerned, they make up the whole of his identity. He will be remembered from his photographs.

  So if that’s the case, then …

  274

  Writing in my notebook: I’ve been trying since I was fourteen to turn all of this despair and hatred inside me into wild sexual abandon. I thought that if I could, I could defuse their effects. Give it all a context to make it seem worthwhile. I don’t know. I’ve been fucking around and giving myself to any old body for god knows how long and I wanted just once for sex to happen in the right place and at the right time and with the right boy and it would all be cool and it would all be beautiful and it would be stronger than the effect of any drug I could take, and it would be my salvation. A way out. So I hooked up with Anthony. It felt good, and it felt interesting, but in the end it didn’t mean shit. It meant nothing.

  So yeah. Big deal. People are what you want them to be. I guess you shut out a lot of the things you don’t want to see. I wanted someone to cling to, someone to save me, so I found that in Anthony. The real Anthony and the Anthony who existed in my head were two entirely different people. I don’t know how much was invented and how much was real. Maybe it doesn’t even matter.

  I wanted to stop being me and start being someone else’s toy, but I didn’t think I’d have it in me. But these photos once they get taken, they’ll still be there. They’ll still be there on the net or whatever, like, a record of me. A record of a time when I was young and hot and people wanted me.

  The real me won’t even matter. The real me will be taken out of the equation. And it will probably be a lot better that way. That’s really all that matters, isn’t it? Those pictures of me will always exist. Keeping a record of myself. That way at least there’ll be something. One day soon I’ll be old. I’ll probably be dead or something. I don’t know.

  My whole identity will be tied up in them.

  275

  I feel a hand on my shoulder. It’s Jeremy.

  276

  Jeremy: You sure?

  Me: I’m sure.

  He picks at a plate of salmon and avocado rolls, and I take another sip of that fizzy green hyperactive energy cola caffeine drink thing.

  Jeremy: Okay. This is where you can meet him.

  277

  When I open the door, I can’t see him at first, and the entryway is extremely narrow, and when I turn my head I see a brownhaired boy, a little too thin but basically pretty cute and with this worried look on his face, and I realise it’s me, because there’s a mirror set into the wall, and I turn back quickly, move into the main part of the apartment, and when I look around I see him sitting there, in this lounge chair, new and expensive-looking, though the others in the set don’t seem to be here, and he’s older than I expected, bigger, and better dressed — he’s wearing a tie, like he’s just come from a meeting or something — his hair is silvery and very neat, and when he sees me come in, he looks up and says, ‘Hello there,’ speaking in slightly accented English, and I sort of give him this nod that could be interpreted as hello, and he can tell I’m nervous and I can tell he’s getting off on it, which is not, like, unexpected, but it’s disturbing nonetheless, and he says to me, ‘You must be Calvin,’ and I tell him yes, I am, as far as I know, anyway, and he smiles at me and says. ‘Well, just like Calvin Klein,’ and I’m not sure if he’s making a joke or not but I force this little laugh out anyway, like, trying to be cute or whatever, like I need to win his approval or something, which is just pathetic but let’s not even think about it, and he sort of motions me over, gives me a smile and then he says, ‘Come a little closer so I can see you, Calvin Klein,’ and I do, I mean, I feel myself moving closer to him, sort of taking these tentative little steps, checking out the decor of the apartment, but not really, because I’m nervous, although there are some blinds that are drawn, and I guess that if they were open you might be able to see the river, and there really isn’t much in the room, like, for a place that’s so new and seems so nice, it’s oddly bare, like someone’s only just moving in, or moving out, or something, I don’t know, but there aren’t even any boxes sitting around, just this armchair, a tiled white floor leading onto cream-coloured carpet, and he’s nodding at me, I’m treading cautiously, stepping onto the carpet in the main part of the room, and once I get there, I’m standing more or less in front of the sofa, and he says nothing at all, but after a while, what seems like an incredibly long time, he stands, and he’s a lot taller than I am, and he puts his hand on my chest, leaves it there for a long time, and the feel of it, the weight of it, and the heat, like he’s feeling for a heartbeat or something, and it’s a gesture that in any other context could be interpreted as compassion, like, a tender gesture, but here it’s twisted out of context and horrible, and my heart’s beating, like, incredibly fast and he can feel this and all he does is smile at me, this incredibly, warm smile, like a
family doctor kind of a smile, like a smile the doctor would give to a four year old before giving him his shots, and he asks me after a while, ‘You nervous there, Calvin Klein?’ and I really wish he’d stop calling me Calvin Klein, like, really, more than anything, it just seems so familiar and every time he says it it’s like being slapped and I just wish he’d, like, STOP IT already, but he just keeps smiling at me, then he runs his fingers through my hair and asks me if I’m ready, and I find it in me, somehow, to speak, and I ask him, you know, am I ready for what specifically, and he asks me if I’m ready to have my picture taken, and I sort of stall, and I’m not really sure what to say, I mean, because, it’s the reason I came up here, and I don’t say anything, just look at him, and he’s still giving me this warm, genuine-looking smile, although now it has the faintest edge to it, like, maybe because of what he’s doing with his eyes or whatever, and he pretends to be confused, and he asks me, you know, ‘You did come up here so I could take your picture, didn’t you, Calvin Klein?’ and I suddenly wonder about running away, just, like, running, as fast as I can, and I wonder about the door behind me, whether it’s locked or not, because I heard it click when I came in, I think, and, and oh god, god, I’m really doing this, I’ve got myself into this and it’s something I can’t get out of, and I can’t call my dad or Anthony or anyone else to come rescue me, I’m all alone with this guy who keeps, like, smiling at me and calling me Calvin Klein and he could pretty much do anything he wants to me, and I realise the only way to get out of this is to just go with it, it’s a transaction, remember, just take myself out of the equation and it will be like nothing’s happening at all, so I look the man in the eyes and tell him, ‘Sure, okay, I’m ready,’ and just like that his expression loses that edge, like he’s really pleased with me or whatever, and I’m thinking, you know, if he patted me on the head and told me ‘good boy’ that really wouldn’t surprise me at this point, and thinking about that I suddenly almost choke with laughter and he asks me what’s wrong and I tell him nothing, and he asks me if maybe I want to smoke a joint or something to calm me down before we get started, and I think it seems like a really good idea, so I give him this pathetic/cute little smile and scrunch my eyes up a bit and nod at him, and his hand is in the small of my back and he’s leading me through another door, into the next room, a bedroom, which is darker, and there are several things in here, like, a rack, a big silver one, with all kinds of clothes hanging from it, and I realise they’re all uniforms, like sports uniforms etc, which makes sense considering what Jeremy has already told me, and an umbrella, to reflect the light, I guess, I never know what photographers use them for exactly, and on the far wall, a poster for the movie Last Tango In Paris, and something about the word Paris gets me, because I remember when I was young, when I was eleven or something, my parents took me to Europe, and we travelled all over, for weeks and weeks, but the place that really sticks in my mind is Paris, because to me, at the time, Paris was magic, like, genuine magic, the way magic can only be when you’re a little kid, when you’re impressionable and optimistic and the possibility of magic is still real, and the word Paris sends me into a trance for a second as everything it represents to me begins to come back, and if I can put myself there when what’s obviously now about to happen starts happening, then I won’t feel a thing, and as for the rest of the room, the space in front of the camera, it’s like a set, I mean, it’s a bedroom, but it’s obviously not the bedroom of the person who lives here, it’s designed, contrived, to look like of a teenager’s bedroom, I guess — a bed, with this quilted bedspread, a desk nearby with some trophies and I guess they must be textbooks lying around on the desk, and all these other insane little touches, and the end result actually looks pretty genuine, like it could actually be some kid’s bedroom if you don’t look at it too hard, but I guess whoever’s looking at these photos will be looking at me most of all, and I can’t tell whether that thought comforts me or not, and I’m sort of wondering how the hell it’s possible for something this, like, elaborate, to be here in the city without anyone noticing, but the man’s hand is still on the small of my back, and soon I forget all about it, because from a table that also has sitting on it some camera equipment and various other things I try not to look at, he grabs a joint, already rolled, and lights it for me, and it’s really strong weed, which is good because I need something to knock me out at this point, and I sort of offer it to him at one point but he declines and I end up smoking the whole thing, and I can already feel it starting to take hold, the seasick feeling of it, when he walks over to the rack and pulls off what I realise is a basketball uniform — a red singlet top with a big number sixteen on it, an extremely loose pair of shorts — and he looks at me and says, ‘I think so, yes,’ mostly to himself, and then when I don’t do anything, just stand there, he starts to look impatient, and I realise he wants me to undress, and the pot has loosened me up a bit so I start, I sort of kick off my shoes, slip my T-shirt off, ball it up, then my pants follow, and I’m left standing there in my underwear, and he looks at me and tells me, ‘Take those off too,’ and his tone of voice suggests that it would not be a good move to do anything else, so I do, I sort of nervously hook my fingers into the band and slide my boxers down, kick them off, and I’m standing there naked now, and he can see all of me, everything (… and I’m eleven years old and in Paris and my father is buying me this really big ice-cream cone, which is vanilla I think, and it’s cold, on such a hot day, and it’s the best ice-cream cone ever … ) and he walks over to me with the uniform, tells me to put it on and it’s cold to the touch, and I sort of shiver as I’m slipping on the oversized pair of shorts — Nikes — and the singlet with the number sixteen, and when I’m done I just sort of stand there, not sure what to do, and he messes with my hair a little, and I let him, and when he’s satisfied — he tells me to pose — don’t remember exactly what he says because my heart is beating so fast and the pot has made its way to my brain now so I’m feeling kind of fuzzy as well, but I walk over to the set and position myself on the bed, sit there, my hands behind me, trying to assume a pose that could be considered, like, ‘cocky’ or something, which is probably what he’s looking for, and the whole time I’m thinking of Anthony’s words, out of the equation, and I realise, yeah, this is only a transaction, and the look on my face, what I’m wearing — the costume — none of it means anything, because it’s not really me, it’s all part of the transaction, and that’s a thought I can deal with, I’m happy with that, and I don’t even notice that he’s walked up to the camera or that it’s started flashing: click, whoosh, bright light, click, whoosh, bright light (… and it’s night-time, a cool breeze, and we’re standing on the balcony of our hotel room looking out across the city, at the rooftops, and the lights, millions of them, the whole city lit up as brightly as I’ve ever seen, and I can’t even speak, because to me it seems like magic, for something as beautiful as this to be possible … ) and the man tells me to move around; stand up; go over to the desk; lean against it; touch myself; and I give him this look which is my best approximation of ‘bedroom eyes’ and I’m not even there any more, I’m playing a character, and he’s loving it, and I’m giving him what he wants, and it’s great, because I realise, I don’t care, I don’t feel anything (… and we’re at the zoo, staring at this big polar bear, and I’m, like, amazed, because I’ve never seen one before and when it slides into the water and I can’t see it any more I get really upset because I want it to come back out again, but it won’t, and … ) he tells me to get back on the bed; lie down; slip my shorts down a little; I slip them down just past my hipbones with, like an inch of smooth flesh showing there, and I’m looking right into the camera the whole time, eyes half closed, flash, flash, and he’s fucking loving it, I can tell, he’s getting off, I’m getting him off and it feels fucking great, I’m young and I’m hot and he fucking wants me and he tells me to jerk off so I sort of sneer at him, dare him to ask me again, and he does, like he’s pleading now, ‘Je
rk off,’ and I do, and I close my eyes and throw my head back, this wholly calculated gesture that I’m sure will get the message across, and it does, and I keep jerking off, sort of writhing around on the bed, the covers getting all twisted, and I don’t hear the camera any more, and I don’t care, and when I open my eyes he’s standing by the bed, just watching me, and I stop, he looks into my eyes, like, right into them, and I nod (… and later on, in a big toy store, I think, my father is buying me a big, plush polar bear …) and I try not to feel anything when he’s inside me, and after a while I don’t, I’m somewhere else.

  I’m gone.

  Acknowledgments

  Nick Earls, Moses Aaron, Madonna Duffy, Venero Armanno, Robyn Sheahan-Bright, Julie Geiser, Julia Stiles, Ellen Fenlon, the UQ gang, the New Farm gang, Rohan, Kristy, Heidi and my parents.

  First published 2003 by University of Queensland Press

  PO Box 6042, St Lucia, Queensland 4067 Australia

  Reprinted 2003

  www.uqp.com.au

  © Alasdair Duncan

  This book is copyright. Except for private study, research, criticism or reviews, as permitted under the Copyright Act, no part of this book may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any foram or by any means without prior written permission. Enquiries should be made to the publisher.

  Typeset by University of Queensland Press

  Distributed in the USA and Canada by

  International Specialized Book Services, Inc.,