by Geoff Ryman
'There we go,' said the Angel, holding out his hands to the professionally set table. He's worked as a waiter, Michael realized. 'You got any serviettes?' the Angel asked.
Later, Michael waited for him under the duvet of the bed. The Guard was one of those people who brush and spray. They try to wash their private parts without making a sound of water splashing, and they powder themselves. Michael knew the result well: the Guard would taste of alcohol base and smell like the ground floor of Selfridges.
The Guard walked back upstairs from the John wearing Michael's robe and holding in his tummy. He still had on his socks. He would have been handsome if he didn't leer and his body language had been less jerky and angular.
The Guard dumped himself next to Michael. He did indeed smell like a floral tribute. But the body was alabaster – smooth, plump and cool to the touch.
The Guard asked, 'What do you like doing?'
'It's more important to know what you like doing,' said Michael. 'You're married.'
'Yeah, well, I do other things too.'
'What, are you bi?'
'Yeah, sort of. I'm not a thief, but when I was younger… well I got sent down. My brothers needed some help on a job and I got caught. I wasn't so big then, in fact as it happens I was a bit small for my age. Anyway, while I was in the nick I sort of found out that if you let the other guys do things, then they weren't so… I don't know, aggressive. They were still right little bastards…' He managed a kind of sneering chuckle. 'But they were placated.' He propped his head on his elbows. 'And you. What do you get up to, eh, with this little miracle of yours?'
'Too much.'
The Guard liked that. He settled down with a chuckle. 'Ho I bet. Come on, tell me, what you been up to? Who have you had?'
'Um. The New Zealand All Blacks. That high diver who's a Brit but his family's Italian. A very nice black musician… loads.'
'What, and they just come and perform for you?'
'Yeah. I think the real miracle isn't that they're here, it's that they want to sleep with me.'
'It's not surprising. You're a very good-looking man.' The Guard gave him an encouraging nudge.
The words sounded false. Michael suspected that he was being flattered. 'So who would you ask for?'
'Ooh. Someone like you.' The Guard grinned. One tooth was outlined in silver.
Michael knew he was being flattered. 'What would you like to do?' he asked, again, insisting.
The Angel ventured, as if onto thin ice. 'Well… would it be all right if we just… cuddled?'
'Yeah sure fine,' said Michael who was hardly up for it anyway.
On the night after you discover that you have destroyed your job, it is reassuring to be held. It was pleasant, even necessary, for Michael to feel a warm, smooth, soft body enveloping him from behind, as if it were there to shield him, as if it were offering him love or stability or both. There was a simple, catlike sensuality about feeling the other body stir, of taking its hand, of hearing someone murmur sleepily, 'You'll let me stay, won't you. Please?'
Michael awoke in the morning to hear a sizzling sound. He thumped downstairs to find the Angel at the stove, frying bacon and eggs. 'I couldn't find the coffee,' the Guard said.
The kitchen looked brighter as if the sun were out. The floor, Michael saw, had been cleaned. The Angel picked up his gaze as if it were a tip.
'I washed the floor for you,' he said. 'This place is filthy. There's shadows on your sheets. Probably skidmarks and all, only I didn't want to look too close. I still can't find the coffee as it happens.'
The Guard gave Michael a full cooked breakfast. Michael offered to do the washing-up, but the Guard said, 'Hadn't you better be getting on? Look, why don't you let me stay here and clean up a bit?'
Michael couldn't help but smile. 'You really want to stay as long as you can, don't you?'
The Guard grinned inexpertly – smiling was not his strongest suit. 'I like to make myself useful.'
'OK, stay and clean up,' said Michael. He found that the thought of going to work and facing the team all over again made the Angel seem a refuge of domesticity.
'I should have asked your name,' Michael said.
'Nick. Just plain Nick. Nick Dodder.' Then he said, 'Here, your tie needs straightening.'
At work that day, Michael tried to be committed. He started out well, planning expenditure until the end of the project. Then he had a bit of a blow. Emilio handed in his notice. 'I had an offer already, you see, for when… uh, this project finished.' He pronounced it finish-shed.
'When will you go?'
Emilio flinched and didn't answer. He probably wanted to go as soon as possible. Emilio was the project's IT man. Any real problems with the network, or any fresh programming to be done and they would miss him.
Michael sighed. 'OK. Well. Your contract holds us both to a minimum of a month's notice, and I'm going to need you to work out your notice. Basically, we need to audit what we've got in terms of reports, generate any new report forms, and train up Hugh and Ebru to use them.'
Emilio looked discomfited. 'If… if I finish all that before the month is up, could I go? It is three years' work, Michael, guaranteed.'
'I'll think about it,' said Michael. He meant no. 'Thanks for letting me know.'
The day darkened, Michael slowed down. The truth was that he had destroyed his project. This truth did not go away like an unwelcome guest. The truth stayed, like a dysfunctional family, like your inescapable self. Michael hid his face.
And when Michael got back home, the flat smelled of roast beef. The entire ground floor was in order. The books were on shelves. Places had been found for all of Luis's canvases, bags of clay, splattered wood, old newspapers, plastic ice cream containers, rope and bits of tyre.
Nick was pleased with his work. 'A lot of it's upstairs if you want to go through it. Personally, I'd just chuck the lot. Have you insured this place?'
'Yes, why?'
Nick took Michael's shoulder bag to hang up. 'Because if your friend has even started to sell his stuff, each one of those paintings is worth at least three hundred pounds. And there's forty of them. That'll be worth twelve k. You like roast potatoes?'
At dinner Nick was full of schemes. 'You should do this place up and sell it. Those are Regency banisters. You could do up the whole place as Regency. It's just opposite the tube, it's got a roof garden, only one point of access on the street, no neighbours. If you put in a second lockable door at the head of the staircase, this place would be worth three hundred, four hundred thousand. Hell, two bedrooms, Camden Town, I tell you, a year from now it would be worth half a million. If you needed help doing it up, I'm pretty handy, as it happens.'
'It might be a good idea.'
'It's a brilliant idea. It'll be work, mind you.'
'I'll think about it.' It was what he had said to Emilio. There was something Michael didn't like.
'Come on, get up off your arse, this place will never get back in order if you don't get into some habits. Why don't you let me wash, and you put away? You know where things go?'
So rather neatly, as a team, they got the dishes washed. Nick soaped them lavishly, rinsed them in water so hot it steamed, and shook them.
'This thing of yours, this miracle,' he said, scrubbing between the teeth of Michael's forks. 'You say you can call up anybody? I mean, we could call up James Dean? He was gay. He'd be happy to do anything. From the sound of things, he did.' Nick chuckled darkly. He rinsed a glass. 'People would pay to see him do it as well.'
'What, do you mean make a film?'
'We could do, yeah.' As if it were Michael's idea.
Michael had an answer. He shook his head. 'The instant he went back, the film would show nothing. And that I do know for certain.'
Nick seemed absorbed in polishing a wine glass. He held it up to the light. 'So you mean they can't be photographed?'
'The image only stays as long as they are here. Every trace of them goes. Think of it as a fast d
eath. Like I said, being an Angel's a shortcut. It's what happens to all of us. After we're gone, the children sell the house, the new owners tear out the garden to make a driveway, and throw away our old photographs. It just happens quicker to Angels.'
Nick tried to look philosophical. He succeeded in looking like a contestant on a quiz show. 'Yeah,' he said, his brows touching. He put a plate in the rack. 'So. If they hang around, these Angels, their photographs stick around as well?'
Michael imagined them, hundreds of Angels hanging around Camden Town so people could see them wanking in films. 'That,' said Michael, 'would be like a run in reality.'
'Reality's already running, mate,' said Nick, with eyes like cash registers.
And after dinner Michael found himself caught in a fleshy hug. 'Hmmm,' said the Guard, kissing him as if he were still washing plates. There was something awkward in the way he did it; his arms pushed Michael away as much as they held him. Nick leaned back and looked at Michael, in what could have been affection, if it hadn't looked appraising.
'I'm into a lot of things,' the Angel promised, rubbing his crotch against Michael's. You couldn't fault him for being over-subtle.
There was one side of Michael's sensuality which had not been explored of late. He crunched a bitter pill, and Nick offered up his buttocks. Michael was surprised. The things that were unattractive on the front of Nick – his pale plumpness – were beautiful from the back. His buttocks were white, flawless mounds. Though his body gave evidence that it had been penetrated many times before, Michael was aware from the clenching of Nick's jaw that it was not comfortable for him. But that was not what Nick said.
'Shall I stop?' asked Michael, pulling back.
'Naw, naw, it's great, go on.'
Pumping from Viagra, headachy and breathing thinly because the drug had swelled up the inside of his nose, Michael came, squirting from a penis that was artificially clogged with swollen veins. His cock felt like a cake decorator squeezing out icing from a tiny hole. The orgasm kept coming, as it were, until his balls ached and he felt drained, and he actually wanted it to end. Someone Michael didn't even like had just given him the most thorough orgasm of his life.
So Michael woke up once more with Nick in the flat. This time, Nick was putting away his clothes. 'You,' said Nick, 'need to do your laundry.'
Yeah maybe, but it's my laundry, thought Michael.
'You have a washing machine?'
Michael knew what was coming. 'No.'
'Well, I can go to Coin Operated while you're at work if you like.'
'What is it with you? I can do my own laundry.'
'Do it yourself, if it suits you.'
Michael hated the whole business of going to the laundry. 'I'll give you some money.'
'Wouldn't want to rob the coin-op, would we?' Nick grinned.
That night Michael found all his socks individually stored in transparent plastic bags, and sorted by colour, blue, black, brown, white.
'Why did you do that?' Michael demanded, feeling trespassed upon.
Nick was cooking again: 'Stops you losing them, mate. Otherwise they get separated and nobody needs a drawerful of half pairs of socks. Trick of me Mum's. You can say thank you if you like.'
Michael felt helpless. There was absolutely no way to say that it wasn't useful. You could even see which colour each pair was.
'Just… just ask me next time you're going to change something.'
Nick bowed. 'To hear is to obey, oh Master of the Lamp. Incidentally, I'll be polite about the contents of your fridge, but let's just say that some of it had prices on in shillings and pence. It's all still in the bin, and if you want to go through it, please feel free.' He canoodled his way forward and gave Michael a kiss. He was actually wearing an apron. It was like watching a character in EastEnders who the writers have decided would go suddenly gay.
At dinner he helped himself only after first serving Michael. 'You don't use it for anything do you? This miracle of yours.'
'I get my socks put in plastic bags.'
'Well there's a thrill. Look, why don't you let me make a few suggestions.'
'You did.'
'Well, let's make some more, see who we can get in here. It's such a waste not to use it. What? You go and ask any other bloke in the kingdom, gay or straight, what they'd do if they could have anybody they wanted and they'd tell what they'd do soon enough, I can tell you.'
'And that would be what they say. Not what they'd do.'
'Look. Let's go to bed after dinner, and see what takes your fancy. If there's something you really want, I'll just hive myself off. Give me the power to come back by myself and I can come and go as convenient.'
Michael lied. 'I can't do that.'
'Have you tried?'
Michael lied. 'Yeah, a couple of times.'
Nick seemed to find it funny. He chuckled. 'Like hell you did.'
There was some kind of issue about power. Michael now knew that.
In bed, Nick insinuated himself next to Michael. 'Now, let's see. Who shall we have then, eh?' He mentioned a boyish, not-so-young film star beloved of young girls. Nick nuzzled up against Michael. Michael didn't fancy the little squit.
'I'd like to piss on him,' said Nick, with a sudden surge of aggression that made Michael go still.
'I wouldn't want to do anything to him at all.'
'He is a bit wimpish. Maybe you'd like something a bit more butch.' He mentioned a boxing champion, low of brow, high of aggression, who was currently in prison for pummelling a waiter in a restaurant. 'That could be a bit more of a challenge. I hear he's hung like a horse. Talk about biting off more than you can chew, eh?'
'Oh, all right,' sighed Michael.
The brute arrived in an Italian suit, with a neck that was wider than his head.
'Imagine that on top of you. You wouldn't need the Viagra with him, he wouldn't care if you were hard or not.' Nick's merry little eyes said: you didn't know I knew about the Viagra, did you? He nudged him. 'Look at the size of it. That would cure your haemorrhoids.'
Michael felt something move in the air that was also a tickle inside his head. He felt it move and clench and try to hold.
'Go on,' said Nick, to the boxer. 'Drop 'em.'
Michael extended himself into the air. He felt himself grapple with something. Michael pushed it back down, and saw a tremor in the muscles around Nick's mouth. Nick had tried to make the boxer lower his trousers.
'I call the shots,' said Michael.
Nick chuckled.
Nick had tried to take control of the miracle.
With a single swipe, Michael pushed the boxer back to where he had come from. He felt his eyes blaze.
Nick looked surprised. 'All right, you didn't like him.'
Michael was angry but could find no words.
That was not Nick's problem. 'I was just trying to find something you might like. Or do you only want me?' His eyes, made of blue ice, simply could not do melting warmth.
'I may not want you at all,' warned Michael.
'Aw baby.' Was he being sarcastic or affectionate? Michael couldn't tell; both explanations fitted his behaviour, his tone of voice. He stroked Michael's arm. 'Let's just go to sleep.' Nick turned off the light and swung his best feature towards Michael. Michael felt his penis creep out of its shell. In the dark, Nick's body was as warm and as comforting as a lover's.
Nick was loyal. Nick never left him. Nick never gave up thinking of things to do for him.
'I thought I'd finally tackle the old studio today,' Nick said at breakfast. He meant the place where Picasso used to work. It was still crowded with stuff the artist had thought he might use: bicycle wheels, a single fur-lined glove, masses of magazines stained with paint, sheets and towels crusty with dried colour.
'Don't do that. Let me call Luis and see what he wants from it first.' Michael looked at the flat, with the newly polished wooden floors and clean kitchen counter tops. He thought of Luis and knew: Luis would demand he keep it for hi
m.
'No. On second thoughts, just chuck it for me.'
Nick passed him a packed lunch. Michael ate it alone at his desk: chicken sandwiches, an apple, sticks of celery. He got back from work and Nick said, 'You got the Internet, right? Do you think I could use it?' The throw rugs were out on the roof garden, drying.
'What for? No downloading whole videos.'
'No, no, just a few images. You're a mean bugger, ain't ya?'
'Yes, I am. How many images?'
'Look, I'll be careful, all right.'
Each night, dinner was direct from cookbooks: boeuf en croute; curries with raisins and homemade chapatti. Every day a different part of the flat would have been scrubbed and polished.
Michael would come home to be presented with Internet images of twelve-year-olds in loincloths; students in a wrestling school in India, pubescent under folds of cloth. 'Doesn't that look sweet? Go on, admit it, they're lovely.'
Nick moved the computer into the bedroom. He downloaded images of a man who had cut off his penis and was now hammering nails through his testicles. The man had posted it himself, with an e-mail address for responses. Nick giggled. 'More like an e-nail. I mean that one would let you do anything to him, anything at all.' Nick's eyes burned with a tiny pin-prick light and his high greasy forehead gleamed like an icefloe.
Michael would be reading a book in bed and Nick would call, 'Here, you got to see this.' Michael looked up wearily. 'Look at this fat old whore. She loves being made fat. Look, she's got a progress chart here, she's fattening herself up like a goose. She says she wants someone to keep her in a dungeon, and force-feed her and then cook her and eat her!' This struck Nick as being wildly funny. 'I mean she actually wants to be cooked!'
Michael looked at the woman's face. She was smiling, bright and intelligent. She looked like someone who might work for him. He felt sick. 'I want that stuff off my hard disk. I want you to go and empty the cache and make sure it stays empty.'
Nick laughed at him. 'Oh-ho-ho man, you don't know the half of it. You really don't.'
'And I don't need to. That stuff is illegal and it's criminal.'
'No, it's not, they do it to themselves.'
