by Naomi Foyle
Christ. His brain was whirring like a stuck DVD drive. He had to stop thinking about the future—actually, to stop thinking entirely would be best. In an attempt to focus on his immediate surroundings, he stared at the seat-back video screensaver: Han Air: Treating Our Customers Like Nature: With Attention and Respect. Corporate eco-speak was the new opiate of the masses, but it wasn’t nearly as effective as crap 3D vid-games. He craned a look down the aisle. Thank fuck: a trolley-dolly was tripping toward him with a plastic sack of headphones and Digi-IMAX glasses. He sat up straight and pushed his hair out of his eyes.
Jake always boasted that Korean women were the hottest in Asia. This stewardess was petite and heavily made-up—probably a Han Air’s executive’s wet dream, but she wasn’t Damien’s type; still, when her creamy fingers brushed his, he felt his face rush beet-red like some gangly schoolboy. Mortified, he busied himself with the headphones. Apart from a gut full of drugs, what was wrong with him today?
At least Han Air delivered a good range of games. Laptop guy closed his lid and logged straight on to the in-flight Starboarders. He was clearly at some ultra-high level of frequent flyer galaxy-building: within seconds of slapping his 3D glasses on over his Pradas he was zooming around, checking up on all the planets he’d colonized, punching the air as he racked up new points. Just watching him made Damien feel spacesick—though doubtless the ballooning sensation in his gut had a more immediate cause. He dug in his pocket for the Imodium tablets Jake had recommended. He’d taken two already, but a couple more would set his stomach like cement. He washed them down with the last of his duty-free water then, jittery again, got up to dispose of the box in the loo. There should be nothing suspicious on his person at Customs.
Ahead of him, the stewardess laughed: a high, girlie tinkle with a throaty catch. Damien blinked—and for a jolting moment, the blue-gray chairs were all tilted tombstones, and the giggle was a small, sharp fist: a punch from the past, landing right between his ribs.
He grabbed his seat-back. His mouth was parched, his vision swimming and that god-awful feeling was back in his stomach—not the anxious clamping and squeezing of the last eight hours, but that old, vast, burning emptiness, that scalding feeling of having been ripped open, torn in half, of dying to puke or sob or throw breakable things at the wall. A Jessica flashback—why now?
“Are you okay?” The stewardess touched his shoulder and he realized a small circle of Koreans in Digi-IMAX specs had interrupted their conquests of Andromeda to turn round and peer at him.
Guy Debord would have been proud, but Damien was in no shape to mentally compose Situationist Tweets. Resisting an urgent desire to clutch at his stomach, he muttered “I’m fine,” and slid back into his seat. He was running hot and cold now; he was trembling; his whole body was blistered with sweat. Jesus Christ, why was this happening? Did one of the condoms split? Was dope leaking into his system? If he did vomit, would the hash baggies come up too? Fucking hell . . . what would Jake “Godsend” Lee tell him do?
2 / Johnny Boyfriend
“Fin-ish-ee.” Jin Sok set his camera down on the long white studio table. “Super-fantastic work, gentlewoman, thank you.”
“Thank you,” Sydney croaked. Jeez, she sounded ridiculous. She was parched, that was why: she needed some water, but she’d squirted all hers down her cleavage. A towel would help too—the sweat was pouring off her like Niagara Falls. “Jin Sok,” she tried again, but the photographer placed a finger on his lips.
“Shhh.” From the back pocket of his NoChi jeans Jin Sok produced a pink hanky with a flourish. He patted her forehead and cheeks with the cloth, which exuded a light yet beguiling aroma. When she opened her eyes he was offering it to her in the formal Korean manner, one hand outstretched, the other supporting the opposite elbow. “Present for top new Canada model in Seoul.”
“Me?” she squeaked. Was she ever going to act normal in front of Jin Sok?
“Okay, top new Canada mousie in Seoul!” He guffawed as Sydney took the hanky.
She was pleased she remembered to bow slightly and to place one hand at her elbow. It was a square of traditional Korean linen, spritzed with perfume—and now smeared with gold make-up. She twisted it into the shape of a flower and buried her nose in the folds. Sun-warmed peach? And a drift of vanilla?
“It’s beautiful,” she whispered.
“Is ‘Summer Passion,’ classic aroma from Yi Min Hee, Korean movie star. Heliotrope and many secret fruits. I recommend for you.” Jin Sok saluted her, then picked up the GrilleTexTM jacket and folded it carefully over the back of a chair.
She gasped. “Oh please, let me do that.” Her first time modeling ultra-expensive thermo-tech gear and she’d been throwing it all over the floor.
“Ani. You go crazy in photo-shoot, you need relax now. Sit, have water!”
Obediently, Sydney perched on a stool and took a bottle of IceCap from the bar. Jin Sok was absolutely by far the nicest person she’d met in two months in Seoul, and super-sexy too, with his rock-solid buttocks, bossy roar and simple black T-shirt-and-jeans style. So what if he was camp as a sequined tent? She didn’t need a new boyfriend, she just needed a friend, not to mention, please please, a six-month high-end modeling contract. Still, glugging her water, she couldn’t help but admire Jin Sok’s biceps as he packed away his Leica.
Briskly, the Korean snapped the case shut. “Sy-duh-nee, you know today longest day?”
“Longest day? No?”
“Yes, is summer eating party day. Come to Stack Bar. Lots of models, nice girls, dancing. You wear Day-Glo wig. I promise.”
An eating party? She so wanted to say yes, and for a moment she almost did, then her stomach contracted and something like a chill whistled through her. “I can’t,” she muttered. “I told Johnny I’d go back to Itaewon right away.”
“Ah, yes, Mr. Johnny Boyfriend. He come too. Tell him no funny stuff, I very good boy.” He gave an exaggerated wink.
She smiled, but didn’t laugh. “I’m sorry. He wants me to meet some, umm, friends of his. Another time, I promise.”
Jin Sok threw her a mock-stern look. “You promise? Good! Tonight Itaewon is lucky, Apkuchong must wait.”
“Shiteawon, Jin Sok, is where I have to go.”
“Shiteawon! I like,” he roared. “Thank you. Thank you.” He bowed three times, and now she did laugh, not so much at her own joke as at the photographer’s clowning determination to cheer her up. “But I am think for you, gentlewoman, Apkuchong is better,” he continued, wagging his finger at her. “I want you move to Apkuchong.”
Apkuchong was heaven in concrete: designer shops, cafés, rooftop terraces . . . Jin Sok’s studio. But Johnny hated it—he called it Fag Central—and there was no way she could afford a place here on her own.
She sighed. “It’s so expensive, Jin Sok.”
“Okay, yes, and I am think so. Shinch’on, Hongdae better for you. I show you, north of Han River, old city. Night-life, my friend bar, I take you. In location van. Soon.”
“Yeah?” For a moment, Sydney dared to believe she might do it: go out dancing with Jin Sok, without Johnny; get her own apartment, be a famous model in Seoul.
Heading for the changing room, she squeezed the pink hanky in her fist. What right did Johnny have to tell her what to do?
A bus pulled up beside the Caddy, its engine rumbling like the guts of a North Korean farmhand. Elbow resting on the wound-down window, Johnny Sandman raised the volume on his MoPho ear-clip and placed his middle finger into “Fuck off” position against his cheek. Longest day of the year, a cool breeze cutting the heat: perfect weather for cruising with the top down—and he had to get a call from that nitpicker Kim.
“Sorry, Doc. Say again?”
“The girl has been here for two months,” Kim repeated tightly from some white-cube “environment” high above Seoul. “GRIP is on schedule. We need to know that the Project will be put to her as soon as possible.”
Johnny patted his jacket pocket.
Where were those OxyPops? He might need them. “Look, Doc,” he replied suavely, “she’s coming along nicely, but like I said last week, now is a delicate phase.” The light changed and he stepped on the gas, though not nearly as hard as he felt like. It was rush-hour in the glass heart of Seoul and bumper-to-bumper Hyundais and Kias were nudging through the shadows of corporate HQs. “She’s still complaining about the pollution. And the food,” he improvised as he fumbled in the glove compartment for the Oxys and chucked the bottle onto the passenger seat. “We both agreed she’d have to fall in love with Seoul before we scooped her into the deal, did we not?”
“Fall in love with Seoul, or fall in love with you, Mr. Sandman?”
Johnny scowled. A minor point had been scored. Breathe, he reminded himself, breathe deep. Don’t sweat the small stuff; paint the big picture. Don’t fight the losing battle; win the war.
In his ear-clip Kim started ranting on about unauthorized operations, inexcusable delays. For the next five minutes he concentrated on negotiating the swankiest crossroads in the city, a grid of space-age towers yoked together by four-lane ramps full of morons watching flocks of 3D starlings swirl out of vidboards instead of where they were going. In any other country that would be illegal, but Korea had invented CGI Skylife, and its good citizens had decided they were going to fucking well watch it, even if a busload of school kids was killed in the process. Johnny’s knuckles were bloodless and his fingers practically indented into the steering wheel by the time he exited the intersection.
But at least he was out in the open now, floating past the central flower bank of the boulevard down to Namdaemun, catching some rays. At last Kim paused. Johnny smiled his broadest milk-and-cookies smile—you could hear a smile, Beacon had said—and crooned, “Doc, baby, calm down. The more Sydney digs me, the more likely she is to say yes to the Project. As far as the night shift goes, she’s a natural, and she likes the spending money.”
“There is absolutely no need for her to be entertaining your private clients,” Kim hissed. “You are well aware that once she signs she could be independently wealthy in a matter of weeks. GRIP insists that you make your overtures immediately.”
GRIP insists? GRIP insists? Johnny nearly put his fist through the dashboard. If it weren’t for Johnny Sandman, GRIP would still be splicing the stem-cells of aborted poodles into the livers of rich drunks. Not only had he sourced the clinic, he’d convinced the head honchos in Cali to invest in the Doc’s own personal Whacko-Jacko wet dream. He’d been telling ConGlam for months that post-Fukushima, post-Arab insurrections, post-Alpine snow-melt, Korea—with its cherry blossoms, spicy food and luxury ski resorts—was primed to become the globe’s top tourist destination: the new Japan, Egypt and Switzerland rolled into one. Yeah, ConGlam’s top Southeast Asian trend-spotter and fixer had backed the Doc’s “creative contribution” to the Project down the line—for a cut and benefits, of course—but you’d never guess that from the way Kim talked to him now.
“Sandman? Are you there?”
“Just turning a corner, Doc.” Fuck Andrew Beacon; it was time for some chemical assistance. He reached over and grabbed the OxyPops bottle, flipped open the cap and tipped a couple of pills under his tongue. The concentrated oxygen fizzed into his blood stream and rushed right up into his brain. Almost instantly, his shoulders relaxed. These things worked like magic. A shame you could only take them every four hours.
“Good. Now can you assure me that you’ll speak to Miss Travers this week?”
This week? Johnny sucked his teeth. Obviously he was going to have to talk to Sydney about the Project at some point, but the last thing he wanted to do right now was give the girl any leverage. She’d been such a pain since old Stinky Gym Sock asked her in for that test shoot: bitching about everything, leaving her shit lying around the apartment, criticizing his favorite DVDs, even forcing him to watch that bizarre catwalk channel while they were having sex. It had all been getting to him, and last night he’d reacted. Not in a good way, in the old Black Label Johnny kinda way.
But as Beacon said, you shouldn’t dwell on the occasional backslide. Right now he needed to play softly softly catchee Sydney again. Not hand her a twenty-year ConGlam contract: do that, and the girl and her candy-apple ass were likely to swing right out the door.
“Look, Doc,” he cajoled. Now he was relaxed, it was so much easier to try the Beacon approach: mirror back your opponent’s feelings; assert your authority in a calm, inclusive manner; posit a win-win scenario. He’d practiced it a hundred times on the course. “I know GRIP’s all ready to go. I know you’re anxious about deadlines. But LA trusts me on this one, and I’m sure it would help build ConGlam’s confidence in GRIP if we at least appeared to be working together out here.” Another bus farted a cloud of concentrated smog in front of him. Fuck, when were they going to go hydro in Korea? He’d have to dry-clean his suit tomorrow, and get the Caddy washed—not to mention buy a whole new pair of lungs.
“All right.” You could almost hear the tooth enamel disintegrating. “So when do you suggest we talk to her?”
Yo: re-sult. The almighty Doctor Kim was backing down; chalk one up for the guy in the vintage convertible. And Andrew Beacon and the OxyPops parent company too, natch.
“After I get back from China.” Revving the engine, Johnny overtook the bus.
“China? That’s weeks away.”
“No point getting her all excited until Beijing is sorted, and LA agrees.” He was coming up to the night market now; time to merge and swerve. He’d bring Sydney here soon; a little underground bargain shopping at two a.m. was sure to turn her on. Yeah, all he had to do, now he’d bought a little time, was spoil the girl rotten, get her all loved up again.
“There’s been far too much excitement already, Mr. Sandman,” Kim spat. Johnny let the poison run off him. Ya di ya da. The Doc sure needed a fuck. “If you don’t approach her the day you return from Beijing, I’ll go over your head so fast the Venturi Effect will rip your hair out by the roots.”
Johnny frowned. Who knew what the Venturi Effect was—and who cared? No one, but no one, threatened the Sandman, or his fine head of hair. “Now, now, Doc,” he replied coolly, “there’ll be no need for Air Force One.”
“I sincerely hope not. Now, what about your appointment with Rattail? Don’t tell me that’s been delayed too?”
“Heading there right now.” A girl on the back of a scooter gave him a cool once-over; he adjusted his balls and returned the favor, clocking the crack of her ass cheeks, just visible above her belt. Nice.
“Did you get my message about the vital stats?”
“Sure, sure: female, five-four to five-five, skinny. Mid- to late- thirties. Nice tits.” He couldn’t resist.
“Not essential,” Kim snapped, “just the height and ballpark weight. That’s one hundred and ten pounds. Perfectly average for a Korean woman.”
“Whatever you say, Doc; whatever you say.”
But Kim had already rung off. Johnny jammed his MoPho back into its holster and chucked it hard onto the passenger seat. The Doc being rude, issuing warnings, trying to muscle in on his patch? All Not Good. ConGlam, he was aware, practically venerated their new Korean-American scientific genius, and that was a potentially big problem he should have foreseen. Right now, though, GRIP could go fuck itself with a broken test tube because he was still in charge of Sydney Travers. Who had a big date with her boyfriend tonight, and she’d better not forget it.
At the next red light he sent Sydney a text and a photo, then, prodding his Gotcha Watch, he buzzed her EarRinger—three times, meaning “Urgent: check MoPho.” Sydney hated it when he did that; she called it Communication Accessory Overkill. But he didn’t want her to miss the humdinger he’d snapped earlier: Long John Silver and pearls, if he said so himself. That would inform her last night was to be wiped from the hard drive.
Keeping one eye on the road, he browsed his MoPho playlists and sent Sinatra to the car stereo. “Between The Devi
l and The Deep Blue Sea,” that’s what he wanted to hear, something jaunty before his meeting with the body-snatcher. Rattail—what kind of street-scum name was that for a GRIP subcontractor? Though knowing Konglish, the guy probably thought he was Dean Martin.
That was a good line; he’d have to remember it. Snickering to himself, Johnny swung a left, cut up a Porsche and powered into Namsan Tunnel Number Three.
As Sydney closed the dressing room door her EarRinger vibrated three times. She started; it still shocked her every time Johnny buzzed. And it was beginning to piss her off, too: what the fuck did he think he was doing, bugging her during her shoot?
At least it wasn’t a call, just a quick prod to let her know to check her MoPho. How many times had she told him not to use the EarRinger and Gotchas like that? The matching jewelry sets were supposed to be intimate—a way for couples and best friends to exchange private messages, not boss each other about. She should stop wearing the twisted hunks of platinum—a twisted hunk, just like him, she’d yelled at Johnny once. They’d laughed, but the joke was starting to wear thin.
The MoPho was in her bag, on the chair in front of the make-up mirror. She tossed the pink hanky down on the counter and checked her inbox; maybe he was canceling and she could go to the party.
Fat chance. There was a text, all “baby” and “dollface,” reminding her to meet him at the kalbi place and be ready for a big night with the suits—as if he hadn’t already told her a hundred times before she left. Plus he’d sent a photo. “Thinking of You.” Which she ought to look at, if only to avoid the hassle of explaining why she couldn’t be bothered.
