Strawberry Tattoo

by Lauren Henderson

  “Are you still seeing that guy, Java? The lawyer guy?” Suzanne asked, changing the subject. I wondered if her thoughts had been running on the same lines as mine.

  “Oh, no. God. He had issues, you know?” Java put down her glass of energy juice, looking serious. “I was like, quit dumping all this baggage on me. In life we have to carry our own.”

  Even Laurence was nodding. Obviously Americans did not consider this gobbledegook. I tried desperately to memorise it for Hugo.

  “Plus he was an alcoholic,” Java added. “I really noticed it when we went away for that skiing weekend.”

  “Did he go on a binge? Were you OK?” Kevin asked, concerned.

  “He would sometimes drink three glasses of wine a night,” Java said sadly.

  Lex had frozen with his margarita glass poised on its way to his mouth.

  “My God,” I said. “Three glasses of wine. Did you try to get him into AA?”

  Java wasn’t stupid; she knew my words were loaded, even though she was unsure with what. She looked at me warily.

  “I did give him a card, yeah. When we got back to the city.”

  “Did you tell him why?” I couldn’t let this alone. “I mean, did you get him to realise that he had a problem?”

  “I don’t know,” Java said. “But, you know, I gave him something to think about. Like, it’s got to be his choice if he gets help or not.”

  Lex suddenly started choking on his food. Kevin, next to him, gave him a hefty pat on the back which caused him to splutter out what sounded suspiciously like a burst of laughter.

  “I couldn’t be with someone who was dependent on alcohol,” Java was continuing. “I’m not being judgemental, but to me it’s a real weakness. You know? It says, I’m needy and addictive.”

  Even Kim, the born-again teetotaller, looked as if she thought this was a bit much. I shot her a glance designed to indicate that this was the beginning of the slippery slope on which she found herself. Meanwhile, Lex had caught the waitress’s eye and was tapping at his margarita glass, indicating that he wanted a refill.

  Behind Java’s back, I held up my own as well. It was nice to have the company. At least I wasn’t the only member of the group with as much willpower and self-control as John Belushi. And I had made a bet with myself that by the time I left New York Kim would be tippling again. Between Lex and me, I was sure we could manage it. I was modestly proud of my abilities as a bad influence.

  I had been doing Lex an injustice: apparently I was the only needy, addictive person using drink as a crutch in social situations. Lex’s excuse was that he was stressed—despite having scored the night before—because he thought someone was following him.

  “Well, it’s not the cops,” I said reassuringly. “They’d have hauled you in by now.”

  Still, bells were ringing in my head. I remembered Lex saying this before, in Central Park. It wasn’t something he was just making up now to sound interesting, or dope paranoia. And I had thought there was someone watching me when I came out of my building the other day to go to the gallery. I put this aside to think about later. My mention of the cops had reminded me of a pressing appointment he had.

  I pulled out from my pocket the card Thurber had given me. “By the way, you’ve got to go and talk to them. Ring them right now and get it over with.”

  “What?” Lex jumped back from the card I was holding out as if it were Kryptonite and he was Superman. “Are you mad?”

  “Lex, you’re going to have to sooner or later,” Kim pointed out reasonably. She yawned and stretched back her arms. “God, I’m stiff. Maybe I should ask if I can have a game of bocci. Loosen my shoulders up a bit.” She nodded at the group of wizened and purposeful old men in caps who were playing bowls on a stretch of sand behind our bench. The game was hotly contested, but they were equally concentrated on hissing away any dog which strayed near them. I could understand that, from a dog’s perspective, the sand would be pretty tempting: the grass in the park was manky at best. The bocci players didn’t share this sentiment. One guy had a spare ball in his hand which he kept turning over while eyeing up every passing dog with a wistful gaze.

  “Hey! You! Get that mutt outta here!” he shouted unfairly at a passing man with an exquisitely groomed little fluff of fur trotting innocently beside him.

  “He is not a mutt,” the man retorted, theatrically wounded. “He’s a Lhasa apso. Heel, Oscar!”

  “Fairy,” said the frustrated bocci player.

  “Peasant,” the man snapped back.

  “Never a dull moment in Washington Square Park,” Laurence said.

  Most of the dealers had already tried their luck with us, or rather Lex. Some people just attract that kind of attention. In fact he had rolled up and was now smoking happily away.

  “You couldn’t do this in London,” he had said. “Not with people passing so close by.”

  “Shit, that’s nothing,” Kim said. “I’ve seen people doing lines of coke on mirrors on their laps in clubs here.”

  The kindbud hadn’t helped to calm Lex down much. He was still eyeing Thurber’s card as if it would take away all his superhuman powers.

  “Lex, you idiot,” I said impatiently, dropping it in his lap, “don’t you realise you’re off the hook?”

  “You what?” He had been lying sprawled on the bench, legs splayed out, to Laurence’s obvious annoyance. Lex had a physical ease, a confidence in his own attractive body, which skinny, nervous Laurence would never possess. Now he drew his legs under the bench, sitting up straight. “Say that again?”

  “You have an alibi for when Don was killed. Me. And the doorman. We can both say that as far as we know you didn’t leave my building.”

  “Sammy to the rescue,” Kim said cheerfully. “Why don’t you call them now, big guy? No time like the present. I’ll come with you,” she offered. “I don’t have to be at work till ten.”

  “Really?” Lex brightened up. “I know I’m being a wimp. But it’s not just the cops. I tell you, I’m sure someone’s following me.”

  “Who could it be?” I said doubtfully.

  “Well, duh, the strangler,” Lex said crossly. “I mean, why the fuck do you think I’m so worried?”

  “But Lex, if the strangler’s following you, what are they doing it for?” I pointed out. “They can’t be trying to frame you, because otherwise they wouldn’t have killed Don when you had an alibi. And they haven’t killed you yet, and there must have been plenty of opportunities.”

  “The operative word being ‘yet,’” Lex said darkly. “That’s why I want someone with me. You can’t strangle two people simultaneously.”

  “Maybe I should follow you,” I offered. “See if I can spot whoever’s doing it.”

  “You’re not taking this seriously,” Lex complained.

  “It’s not so bad to lighten up a bit,” Laurence said, reentering the conversation from his own perspective. “I just wish Suzanne could. I’ve never seen her like this. She thinks she’s some kind of avenging angel.”

  “Why wouldn’t she say where she was going?” I asked him. Suzanne had left us outside the Mexican restaurant, intent on some hidden agenda of her own. Java and Kevin had peeled off too, but their attitude had spoken less of dark secrets to be tracked down than late-afternoon slacking.

  He shrugged. “I told you, she’s obsessed with this. I’m sure she’s trying to check out some theory about who killed Kate.”

  “Don’t you think it was the same person who killed this Don guy, then?” Kim asked him.

  “Oh, I assume so. It’s just—well, frankly, it’s not because Don’s dead that she’s gone on this one-woman crusade.”

  We fell silent, as if paying respect to the dead. In front of us, in the centre of the park, was a miniature amphitheatre, a sunken circle surrounded by rings of steps. In the middle sat a black guy, his face creased and lined into a rubbery mobility almost too expressive to be human. He had a big old amplifier next to him and a mike in his hand,
and was holding spellbound the crowd of people sitting all around him on the steps, rapping, talking, singing the blues, taking whatever came into his head and turning it into a performance. A posse of young white kids sitting right in front of him were clapping along as he sang, yelling: “Right on!” when he said something they particularly appreciated.

  Most of them were dressed in army surplus and camouflage, mercenaries in the urban jungle who had bought big into the Escape from New York myth. As I glanced round the people in the amphitheatre I noticed a girl sitting on the steps with her back to us who, besides the inevitable oversized army overcoat, was wearing a knitted hat which looked oddly familiar. Maybe I’d tried it on in Urban Outfitters a few days ago. I couldn’t help eyeing it up. It wasn’t really me, but it might work anyway. I was becoming corrupted by New York street style.

  “Right,” Lex announced nonchalantly, jumping to his feet. “I’m off to turn myself in. You still coming with me?” he said to Kim more hesitantly.

  “Sure. I mean, until I have to go to work.”

  “Fine. Don’t suppose you want to come too?” he said to Laurence and me.

  “Yeah, right,” Laurence said nastily. “Just how I wanted to spend my Monday afternoon.”

  Lex looked wounded. “Sorry, mate,” he muttered, temporarily forgetting to sound American. “I mean, it’s me that’s got to go and face the music.”

  Laurence, abashed, was lost for words. Fishing in his pocket, he pulled out some gum, holding it out like a peace offering.

  “Careful, Lex,” I said to lighten the mood. “It’s probably drugged. Ro-hypnol gum. He’s going to drag you behind a bush and sexually abuse you.”

  “Drugged gum?” said Lex blankly. “I never heard of that.”

  “Yeah,” Laurence said, playing along. “I’ve just had one myself, actually. I always drop one when I’m out, just in case someone feels like taking advantage of me. I have to make it easy for them.” He gestured at his lanky frame self-deprecatingly. “Come and get me, I’m semi-conscious, is basically the message I want to send.”

  Kim and I were giggling by now. I took some gum and started chewing.

  “God, the sky’s very blue all of a sudden,” I announced.

  “Oh dear, Sam’s coming up on the gum. I must have got out the wrong packet,” Laurence said, pretending to fumble in his other pocket. “Don’t worry, I’ve got some Wrigley’s Downers somewhere….”

  We were laughing now, in the way that happens when the tension has been running high and everyone seizes gratefully on a funny moment as a blessed relief.

  “Jesus, look at those squirrels!” Lex said, as one bounded right in front of us. They were the tamest I had ever seen, bouncing from one small square of grass to another like feathers on springs, quite unafraid of the many dogs in the park. The latter were on leads and clearly, being city dogs, were quite unused to chasing anything; they stared bemused as the squirrels ran rings around them contemptuously.

  “Whoah!” Kim exclaimed, as a blader shot towards us just as a squirrel dashed across the path; there was an instant of confusion and then the girl jumped into the air, right over the happily oblivious body of the running squirrel, landing neatly on the other side with a smack of her wheels. We all clapped. She kept going, acknowledging the applause with a flip of her Angers.

  “Good luck, Lex,” I said as they turned to go.

  He swallowed hard, his Adam’s apple bobbing.

  “Yeah, right.”

  “Sam!” Kim swung round. “We’ll ring you later, OK? Or why don’t you come in to the bar?”

  “OK. Whatever.”

  “Well,” Laurence said when they had gone, stretching out his long thin limbs on the bench now that Lex was no longer there to compete with. “The afternoon stretches in front of us like an unrolling carpet richly embroidered with possibilities.”

  “You don’t much like Lex, do you?” I said bluntly, noticing how much he had relaxed with the latter’s exit from the scene.

  Laurence looked embarrassed. “He’s got a lot of charm,” he said. “But don’t you think he’s rather loud and childish?”

  “If you look at it right that’s all part of the charm. He’s this bad little boy who women want to mother.”

  “But not you.”

  “Nope. I have the maternal instincts of a nanny with Miinchhausen’s by proxy.”

  “Tasteless,” Laurence said appreciatively. “So tell me, is there something weird and suspicious about Lex being over here early?” He was horribly acute.

  “Why d’you say that?” I was instantly wary.

  “I just got the feeling there was more to it than he was saying.”

  “I think he was embarrassed he’d been caught out in the city without having come in and said hello to everyone at the gallery,” I suggested. “Shall we walk a bit? I’m getting stiff just sitting here.”

  We stood up and started strolling across the park, heading towards the south-west corner. It hadn’t distracted Laurence, though.

  “Lex doesn’t strike me as being that socially sensitive,” he commented witheringly. Laurence really was very like Hugo: the intellect without the sexiness. “I still think there’s something more to it.”

  “When are Mel and Rob due over here?” I said, wanting to slide away from this weak point. “Wednesday, isn’t it?”

  “Yup. So what are they like?”

  “Well, Mel’s quiet, almost withdrawn. But you get the feeling that there’s loads of stuff swirling around beneath the surface. She’s got this reputation for being pretty obsessive, but I haven’t seen any sign of it. Mind you, I don’t know her that well. Rob seems nice and easy-going. A bit boring. Lex and I are definitely the loudmouths of the group.”

  “Do they drink much? I don’t think BLT could take four Brits with the alcohol problems of you and Lex. Needy and addictive,” Laurence quoted winningly. “I wanted to ask Java for some help cards for the pair of you.”

  “Piss off,” I said, grinning.

  We passed a group of little folding tables, each with a chess set on top and a very bored man sitting behind them.

  “Chess hustlers,” Laurence said absently.

  But the only table with a customer at it bore a neat handwritten sign which read: “My name is STEVE. I am a chess teacher. I can teach you. NO GAMBLING.”

  “No gambling, no drinking. The new puritans,” Laurence said, “purged of the sins of the flesh. Plenty of ’em around.”

  “Which reminds me,” I said thoughtfully. “Talking of the sins of the flesh.”

  I had got Lex to give me Leo’s phone number. I wanted to go dancing tonight, and it would be a bonus if I could lubricate my energy channels with some magic powder. Tom would have shot me down in flames for that metaphor, but he wasn’t here, and I hadn’t said it out loud.

  “Let’s go and find an unvandalised phone,” I suggested. “And then maybe we could cruise up to Urban Outfitters. There’s a hat I want to try on.”

  The toilets of the Angelika Film Center were the most foul I had ever seen in a long life of attending cutting-edge cinema. The queue stretched right out into the downstairs lobby, and when I finally reached the head I realised why. Two of the toilets were blocked and the door of the third wouldn’t lock; it kept swinging open while the occupant was still engaged in whatever she was doing. When I finally emerged into the lobby I was feeling dazed, a sensation which the ultraviolet lighting did nothing to dispel. It was like tripping underwater, if you imagined the water bright mauve and the sea bed thick carpet; the violet slowed you down, made you dizzy, and threw in the weird white gleam of strangers’ teeth and eyeballs into the bargain. I was glad to locate Laurence—impossible to miss, with the UV lights mercilessly highlighting his dandruff—and head upstairs.

  “I can’t believe we went to see that,” Laurence said as we pushed our way through the self-consciously arty black-clad filmgoers in the entrance lobby. They should twin this place with the Hampstead Everyman.

/>   “It was worth it for the curiosity value alone,” I argued. “And we laughed.”

  “We certainly did.”

  “That bit where they find her in the jungle—”

  “Wearing mascara, and that pair of panties she’d somehow managed to weave out of plant stalks—”

  “And then they take her back to civilisation and find out that apart from being Demi Moore, which you would have thought quite enough of a disability in itself, she’s deaf and dumb as well.”

  “My favourite bit was when she tries on the tights for the first time and starts stroking her legs in girlish wonder—”

  “No, no, when she puts on the wimple and looks at herself in the mirror—”

  “—and you see Brad Pitt behind her turn away sadly because he’s lost her to the Carmelites—”

  “Oh God, I nearly wet myself laughing.”

  “Thank God we saw it here. They’d have thrown us out of a multiplex.”

  “There were lots of other people laughing.”

  “Not like us.”

  “And the bit”—I started giggling again—“right at the end, when she sees the jungle out of her cell window, and starts talking to herself in the mirror in sign language about whether she should go back or not.”

  “God knows what she’d wear for knickers, they must have thrown her plant-stalk ones away when she joined the nuns.”

  “Maybe she wove herself a new pair every morning,” I suggested. “Hy-genic, with a built-in deodorant… New! Jungle Chlorophyll Fragrance For All-Day Intimate Freshness!”

  “Ugh, I hate the word intimate, it’s so knowing,” Laurence said.

  “I have to go,” I announced. “I said I’d meet Leo at eight.”

  “Go with God,” Laurence said sourly. I hadn’t actually told him I wanted to get hold of some coke, but he had a pretty good idea of why I was meeting Leo, and he didn’t approve. And I doubted that he would be mollified if I said that I also intended to see if Leo had any theories about who might have killed Kate.