TheRapist

by J. Levy

  *

  Someone and

  TheRapist

  ‘First of all I must tell you that I hate my name. I have always wanted to change it but I’ve always been too scared, because what if I changed it and then began to hate what I had changed it to? Could I change it back again? Revert to the original? You have to pay every time to do that. I can’t be doing with that. My mom always called me Stuie. All my life I felt like a fucking duck. One girl I knew, she shortened it to Art. She just totally dropped the Stu part! She was crazy like that. We used to have some wild times. Her name was Maria, but I used to call her Ma. Ma and Art. We thought we sounded like some sort of drug store or something. Like we could rule the world. That was years ago. Minnie, my fiancée now, she calls me Stuart. My whole real name. Even when we’re in bed she calls me Stuart. Stuart she yells! It’s not the kind of name that a girl can groan is it? I wish she’d call me something else, something romantic or even whisper it maybe. But it’s the whole thing. There I am, trying my hardest to make her come, spending hours fiddling with her pussy, but then she calls out Stuart! in her high, tinny voice and it just breaks my concentration. Then she says things like, ‘Twiddle my thingy Stuart!’ and it puts me off. Thingy? What the fuck kind of name is that? It’s even worse than Stuart. I love her though. She’s got a good job with the postal service. She’s a postal worker. She comes up for promotion soon too. Sometimes she comes home with stuff like Christmas stamps with frayed edges or grubby Easter stamps. It’s OK though, we can use all that stuff. Once she came home with hundreds of air mail letters, those ones that you fold three times and then stick down. Remember those, you had to kind of turn the letter to read the last flap. They pretty much became exempt when e mailing took over. I bet you can’t remember the last time you even saw an aerogram. Then we realized we didn’t know anyone abroad we could write to, so Minnie found a website, a sort of regressive Facebook thing, and we got ourselves a few pen pals each and wrote and wrote every night until our arms felt like they were dangling off and the aerograms ran out. We made some great friends. Yeah, we thought they were friends for life but we haven’t heard from them since. When we get married and she takes my name, her name will change and then she’ll be called Mrs Wrecktom. She’ll be Minnie Wrecktom. Do you think she’ll get the piss taken with that name? Maybe I should forget about changing Stuart and just change Wrecktom. I don’t know what to do. I just got a good new job myself. I drive this gal around. I don’t know what she does, but she spends a lot of time with different men. She’s super thin. Not like Minnie. I’ll bet her pussy doesn’t droop the way Minnie’s does either. Do you think I should change my name to something simple, like Reeves or Sutherland or something?’

  Frankie

  Frankie Bruce stood at the school gates on a dull, grey afternoon. Nothing unusual for London, but people would comment nonetheless, or rather the few people who were born and raised in the city would make mundane, civil conversation.

  ‘Enjoying the weather, that’s England for you isn’t it?!’ A rhetorical question from one born and bred Londoner to another, spoken with a thimbleful of jest, an occasional snigger or duplicitous snort, as if the weather were a conspiratorial and interesting statement. Frankie grimaced, slightly hiding it beneath the fake fur collar of her padded coat and pushing windswept tendrils of pale brown hair behind her ears. Made in China, even though she had paid what seemed like a small fortune for her outerwear. Her ‘Nanny’ pay was good and she liked to buy herself nice things. Sometimes she felt as though her years at Leeds were all for nothing. She had gained a first in Media Studies, but had grown to think that soft degrees were a waste of time so had temped as a nanny while she looked for a more rewarding position. It was two years on and she was still with the same family. The money was great though and this coat she wore, this thing from an Italian designer was Made in China and didn’t even keep her warm. Her hips were slight and her ribcage jutted through her jumper. The mothers and other nannies stood in little groups, buzzing around each other like a temperamental flock of seagulls which had diverted en route to warmer climes. Their clothing combinations were strangely odd, combinations of designer items that possibly only a fool with money would purchase. Heliotrope, knitted coats with flecks of gold thread running through them. Boots adorned with so many Swarovski crystals that to wear them in the glare of sunlight could cause road rage. Elaborate bags that were entirely unnecessary. They nudged and twitched, gossiped and guffawed, moaned and griped. They made Frankie sick. But deep within the pit of her stomach, she had the stirrings of an adventure. Having found socializing exhausting and tired of the bar and club scene, she had decided to try out online dating sites. After months of endless twenty minute trysts in Starbucks or Costa and global virtual meetings, Frankie had met a man she liked. There really wasn’t any embarrassment attached because everybody was doing it, even though nobody admitted it, which she supposed meant that internet dating did still hold a soupçon of stigma. She had even met some of the fathers from school online, making them huge promises that she wouldn’t breathe a word of her discoveries at the school gates! This was her secret. But the man she had met, or rather e mailed and IM’d a million times, the one that she thought she liked (she dreamt about him!), this one she really wanted to meet. And she felt sure that she would. The only hindrance was that he lived practically on the other side of the world and she would have to wait for the school holidays because she couldn’t go off and let Sid down in the middle of a term. She loved the feeling of checking her e mail every morning looking for something from him! When she saw his name in her inbox or a red asterisk glinting at her from her Blackberry, her heart leapt. She sometimes felt a little like a story from The People’s Friend, that sweet, ancient, innocent weekly magazine containing pure, open-hearted romances between sweet women and respectable men, where nothing dastardly ever occurred. A weekly magazine from another time, that she sometimes bought and secretly read between the pages of Marie-Claire or Cosmo. Frankie wrote to her virtual man last thing at night and the feeling of going to bed with him on her mind was one that made her feel warm inside.

  The sky began to spit and within a minute it was pouring. Her coat was incapable of keeping out the rain and Frankie could feel the wetness trickling through her clothes. The shower was swift and over by the time the kids were spilling out of school. They dragged themselves across the courtyard towards the gates, pulling gym bags behind them, laden down by the weight of their backpacks. Bunches were flying everywhere, caps at half mast. Grubby socks either up and down, but never equal. Hems undone. Coats akimbo. Buttonholes void of buttons. Little faces grubby and tired and stomachs growling. The rumbles could be heard across the courtyard as the huddle of very small people made their weary way to their delegated person. Their mums or nannies or friends mums or grandmas or occasional anachronistic dad-at-the-gates. A little light visible in their small faces as they alighted upon their own person. Sandwiches or cakes or rubbishy sweets were brought out of pockets or bags and thrust upon the kids, turning them into tiny vultures. Food at last. Sid lunged towards her. Her pale blue eyes smiled at the sight of him and their hands met as she held out the offering of a slightly mushy tuna and salad cream bagel. Tearing off the greaseproof wrapper, Sid sank his assortment of big and baby teeth, some wobbly, others firm, into the soggy bread. Feeling better immediately, he smiled at Frankie. She took his backpack. He took her hand. They walked off together without a word, only the silent understanding between a child and the one who cares.

  *

  Meringue

  Meringue sat at the bay window of her charming little apartment just south of Sunset, bored out of her skull. Today the sun was out (big deal in LA), the sky vibrantly blue(!) and she did not have a morsel of energy for anything. She had got in late by LA standards, almost midnight and she was shattered and fed up. She hadn’t heard from her agent in weeks, despite her constant ‘casual’ calls to him. ‘Hi Bruce, just checking in, anything going on, any calls
, did you ever hear back from that casting director, oh you know the one, what’s his name again? The one who thought how terrific I…….’ To which Bruce would interrupt, hitting her with yet another charming response along the lines of, ‘Fuck off Meringue, I’ll call you when someone gives a shit.’

  This town was downright nasty she thought to herself, gazing at the red tiled roof below and the tree with huge orange flowers that just reached to the edge of her balcony. She hated it here. Hated LA and everybody in it. Of course she would never say that aloud. Who knew who might hear her tirade? Disappointingly, Los Angeles was an insidious city. It drew you in and spat you out time after time. Like a cow with two stomachs; chewing you up; sucking you down; regurgitating you and swallowing you all over again. It took a very strong and stable girl to get up and get out and never come back. Meringue was unsure that she could do that, although she so much wanted to. She so much wanted to run back to Florida, into her mother’s arms, sit at her mother’s tiny kitchen table and be fed proper food. But that was impossible, at least partly. Just another six months she would tell herself. Just one more pilot season. Just until the leaves begin to change. But there were no seasons in Los Angeles. The leaves, devoid of color change, just stayed green and envious, like the people. Mindless, endless weeks that turned into months that turned into years. And here she was. Still here. Just like that waitress in IHOP, the one on the cusp of La Cienega and Santa Monica. The wrecked old girl with dusty, crispy, iodine tinted hair. Lipstick that began at the edges of her creased mouth, losing itself somewhere in the furrows of her rouged cheeks. The young, pretty thing who had come to LA some fifty years earlier, bringing big dreams from a small town and still hoping for her big break. Her biggest role to date was asking if you wanted syrup or sugar with your pancakes? Little did Meringue know that unless she found a bale of inner strength, that waitress was going to be her in a few decades.

  *

  Jezzy and Adrian

  Jezzy's heart was pounding on the entire flight from New York to London. She felt like she was in a Danielle Steel novel. Nobody ever gave those books their due. I mean come on, rugged handsome men who sweep women off their feet into Happy Ever After Land? That was exactly how a woman wants a man to make her feel! Then she felt like a schlemiel, a total fool for being so stupidly and awkwardly overly romantic. She had learnt a few Yiddish phrases from her maternal Grandmother, Eve. Jezzy’s middle name was Eve. She had loved her so much. Now she was getting choked up, as tears threatened to trickle down from the back of her eyes. This was most definitely not a time to be getting emotional. But here she was, sitting beside an unfinished love on a seven hour flight. Adrian leaned in and stroked her cheek. She felt sick. In a good way, if there were such a thing. She knew that she had to take him home. Or go somewhere with him. Or get under a blanket here and now. This was not like her. Was it? Jezzy Wanted Adrian. Again. She studied his baggy cheeks as he spoke to her. He had furrows in them and was a little jowly. He still looked at her that way though, the way he always had. Into her. As if he could see right into her depths. She suddenly had a fleeting vision of them in bed together, six, seven years before. His head was between her legs, his tongue lost somewhere inside of her and his long, dark shiny hair was draped across her stomach. She remembered feeling close to explosion. Then and now. OK, this was not such a fleeting vision anymore. This mustn’t happen here, on a plane, in the front row! A lost longing fought its way back from jailed depths to the front of her heart. Hating the feeling due to its potency and control over her, Jezzy realized that she was lost to Adrian. Again.

  *

  Devon

  Devon opened the Blackberry attachment from her agent with the itinerary of her forthcoming trip. Her book had been such a success stateside, six weeks on the New York Time bestseller list so far, three talk shows, a national book tour and now her publicist had told her that she was going to launch it on a book tour in London. London. It had been a long time but now she was going back. As a different person. Devon Cage was going back to London, the city she had left more than twenty years ago. What was there for her? She had run so fast to get away, as soon as had been possible. She had left as a stupid, frightened creature and was going back a successful, confident woman. Her cell rang, pounding out the latest hit from the charts. Really not her thing at all, but part of being Devon. Devon Cage. Who was Devon Cage anyway?

  It was Dorothy her publicist on the phone. Such an old-fashioned name, but Dorothy was convinced she had been a Munchkin in a former life. Dorothy repeated everything she had sent Devon by e mail.

  ‘Devon, honey you’re booked on Virgin Upper Class, LAX to Heathrow and you’ll be staying at The Berkeley for a week. You’ll love it, it’s the hottest shit hotel in London. You’ll be signing the book at Harrods, Selfridges and two malls. Westfield and Lakeside. They say Lakeside in pretty far, Essex or something, but worth it for the fans. What do you say Devon. You are such hot shit baby and you are off to Oz!’

  ‘Thanks Doro, just pulling up for gas, speak later.’

  Devon didn’t pull in anywhere, she just wanted time to digest.

  Perspiration had begun to form along her forehead and her heart began to pound heavily. Essex. Again.

  *

  Alternative Devon

  The dark, dank hallway of the ‘apartmotel’ stank of old beer and piss. Furry red flock wallpaper peeled from the grimy, faded walls, revealing green flock paper beneath. Strains of Chopin were paradoxically playing from an ancient, griping hi-fi in room 204, the 4 tilting away from the other numbers, as if drunk.

  Devon, encased in a sheer black chiffon sheath, her hair covered with a pert little blonde bob wig, strode along the hallway to room 210 and knocked. Three times.

  ‘Yeah, come on in,’ croaked a male voice, laden with cheap whisky and beer.

  She pushed open the door, the stench of the airless room blasting at her senses. In a fraying armchair, the padding oozing out of the faded fabric, sat a man, another man, in a graying ‘wife beater’ with thick fresh yellow stains dripping down the front. His shiny, rheumatoid fingers were grasping something half hidden between his wallowing fat, hairless thighs. He smiled at Devon, revealing yellow stumpy shoots of decaying teeth.

  ‘You again,’ he croaked, more sweat forming on his greasy forehead as Devon swept over to him, dropping her dress as she dropped to her knees.

  ‘You bitch, you…’ he began to pant as Devon reached into his filthy underwear, pulling out a mound of fleshy globules. A used up prick and saggy balls. Crap.

  She looked him in the eye, disgusted by what she saw and spat out, ‘Shut your fucking filthy mouth you piece of shit.’ She wrenched the mass from the open zipper, catching it along the jagged metal teeth.

  ‘Owee!’ screeched the man with the fatty dick.

  Devon pulled harder, twisting it in her hand.

  ‘Shut your mouth shitface, don’t breathe a word or I’ll leave now.’ Her breath was hot and sweet.

  He sucked in his lip, puffing out his cheeks as she bent down. Devon Cage then took his filthy dick between her perfectly glossed lips and $20,000 worth of veneers, sucked the life out of him, then spat his stinking come straight in his eye.

  ‘You disgusting, dirty, fucking sonofabitch,’ her voice seethed as she stood up, her eyes glaring down at the whimpering mass of a man.

  She wiped her mouth on the back of her hand, snatched a wad of cash from the chipped, stained table, kicked him sharply in the balls with the toe of her red Louboutin and left, the strains of Chopin fluttering behind in her wake.

  *

  Manny and Meringue

  Manny sat in his office chair; taupe leather; high-buttoned back; walnut wooden arms. To match his walnut wooden desk. He swiveled round and round, gaping ahead, until he made himself feel physically sick. He had a huge deal coming up which would jolt some of the markets into submission, but couldn’t wrap his mind around the job in hand. He kept thinking about Devon and as much as he tried to pus
h the thoughts from his mind, they just kept flooding back, like an unstoppable raging torrent. She had really gotten to him. The woman had almost totally consumed him and there wasn’t a thing he could do about it. He had to see her. Picking up his cell, he punched the speed dial to her phone and breathlessly, she answered.

  ‘Yes?’ Even the sound of her voice was enough to send shivers down his spine. Manny felt foolish and fell silent. All his life he had been in control. Until now. He thought he was actually surrounded by her scent, the sweet, heady fragrance of her flesh.

  Click. She had hung up. He kicked himself in the ankle and pressed redial, but it bounced to voice mail. He furiously threw the phone across the desk, then ran around to pick it up, cradling it to make sure it was intact.

  He had always been able to take his emotions and put them on the back burner, be in love with women for merely minutes until they were no more than out of sight. Clichés came to mind. Some of them so true. ‘Outa sight, outa mind’ had always been an apt description of his feelings with women, but now with Devon, it was undoubtedly ‘absence makes the heart grow fonder’. Manny sickened himself. He had become a cliché.

  He stamped his feet on the floor like a child while he re-dialed again. Voice mail. Shit.

  ‘Devon, honey please I need to see you. I have something for you, call me as soon as you get this message. Bye hon.’

  He put his cell down carefully, going over the message he had left, wishing that he had worded it another way, then transferred the phone to his pocket so that he could feel the vibration when it rang. Hopefully, when it rang. One of the secretaries knocked softly at the door, peeking her head around as she opened it a few inches. She was small and skinny and wore her jet black hair in a choppy, pixie cut with a white slashed highlight at the front. Faux pearls around her white throat, a starched white shirt with over-sized frilly cuffs and a knee-length black jersey skirt with a huge teal colored bow tied over her sharp, right hip.