1982 Janine

by Alasdair Gray

  Most pornography fails by not being dramatic enough. There are too few characters. The author has only one sort of climax in mind, and reaches it early, and can only offer more of the same with variations which never excite as much again. Even in The Story of O, with its long slow drugged-sounding sentences twisting softly round the heroine like furry snakes, I never enjoyed anything which came later as much as the first two pages. To preserve excitement without masturb (I hate that word) without shooting my load (I hate that phrase) (I hate the thing, I hate orgasm, I’m lonely afterward) to preserve excitement my Janine must travel toward her climax through a world like a menacing forest, and just before she reaches it I must switch to heroines in other parts of the forest, women travelling toward climaxes which are different, but connected. I will work like a historian describing in turn Germany Britain France Russia America China, showing depression and dread growing within each for domestic reasons, but distracted by challenges and threats from abroad until the heads of government move to their controls in the hidden bunkers, and make certain declarations, and then the tanks start rolling through the streets with evacuations, concentration camps, explosions, firestorms, frantic last-minute propaganda and the awful togetherness of total calamity before the last, huge, final, bang. That is how a big piece of pornography should go. Sadistic? It would be, if de Sade were not so disappointing. He gives much the same masturbatory climax on every tenth page and fills the space between with a lot of pretentious excuses about nature being ruthless and cruel so why should we not be? Blethers. Nature is nothing but a name for the universe and how it behaves. You need ideas to be cruel and only men have ideas. Parts of the universe bump and break each other but storms and earthquakes are not cruelty. Not even animals are cruel. Yes, cats hurt mice for fun sometimes, but only because they are pampered parasites with a hunter’s instinct and no need to eat what they catch. It is men who have made cats cruel. Only man is evil. So now I will visit one of my imaginary mice in another part of the forest oh, a great cruel gamekeeper, me.

  19 A RECIPE FOR PORNOGRAPHY

  Superb is my nickname for her, being short for superbitch. But she needs an ordinary name too. I fancy something short and coarse, like Joan. Or Terry. She washes and dries her long black hair then phones her mother. She says,

  20 SUPERB AND HER MOTHER

  “Mother, hello. I’m not coming tonight.”

  After a moment her mother says, “Thanks for telling me.”

  “Mother, listen, you’re the only one I can trust. You see I’ve met this … this man. He’s the best thing that ever happened to me. He makes me feel a real … woman, you know? So I’m not visiting you. I’m going to stay with him for three whole days.”

  “Why tell me all this?”

  “Because I want Max to think I’m with you, like I arranged.”

  “So?”

  “He might phone and ask for me. He’s pathetically dependent when he isn’t talking to the press about tougher penalties for lawbreakers and wider powers for the police.”

  “So what do I say if he phones?”

  “Tell him I’m resting, put the receiver down, wait a couple of minutes, then pick it up and tell him I’ve a headache and don’t feel like talking. He’ll believe you. That’s what our marriage is like nowadays.”

  After a while her mother says, “Terry, I don’t like Max, you know that. He’s a male chauvinist fascist bastard as I told you when you got engaged to him –”

  “– And you were right mother so when I met –”

  “– so why not leave him? If the marriage is so bad why not clear out?”

  “Mother, I’ve no money. You walked out on father but you’re a businesswoman. You’re able to support yourself.”

  “Come and work for me. You type, I can always use a typist.”

  “Mother, you know that’s impossible. I can’t stand being bossed, even by you. If Max decides to divorce me, fine. He can afford big alimony. But he’s got to blame himself for it, not me. He mustn’t know I’ve been fooling around … Are you listening?”

  Her mother says something in a low voice. Terry says, “I didn’t catch that.”

  “Forget it.”

  “Did you say I was a selfish, frigid little bitch?”

  “That’s right.”

  “I’m not, I’m not little atall. And I’m not frigid either. Two weeks ago I thought I was but that was before I met Charlie. The point is, can I depend on your It Max phones, will you make the right noises?”

  21 SUPERB AND HER LOVER

  “I suppose so.”

  “Thanks, mother, that’s all I need to know.”

  Superb puts the receiver down. What a splendid bitch I am making her.

  She lifts her legs on to the bed, shifts about till she’s lying comfortably, then phones again. She says, “Charlie, it’s all right. I’m coming.”

  Charlie says, “Honey, that’s good. When?”

  “I’ll leave in just sixty minutes.”

  “Why not now?”

  “I’ve this husband, you know. He likes us to eat together. We don’t do much else together.”

  “How do you look?”

  “Fresh and clean. I’ve had a bath and I’m wearing new jeans. I took half an hour getting into them, I had to lie on the floor and pull and pull and pull. So don’t say I don’t love you.”

  “What about the top?”

  “Nothing special. White silk blouse.”

  “No bra?”

  “Of course I’ve a bra.”

  “Honey, you’ve got to take it off.”

  “You bad mad boy!”

  “Terry, when I open the door to you tonight, the blouse yes, the bra no. Take it off in the car on the way here.”

  “What will you give me if I do that?”

  “Everything you want.”

  “You can’t, Charlie. You’ve got the energy, and the dirty mind, but there’s only one of you.”

  He laughs and says, “You’re a comedian, Terry. One day I’ll have you performing professionally.”

  “Don’t go on about that, Charlie. I’m no actress. The only performances you’ll get from me will be strictly private and exclusive, like tonight.”

  “I’m going to surprise you, though. I’m going to turn you into a professional. And you’ll love it.”

  “Charlie, I have to go. Max will be here any moment. See you in just two hours.”

  22 SUPERB AND HER HUSBAND

  “No bra, remember.”

  She laughs, kisses the receiver and puts it down. Helen never talked like that, she was too inhibited.

  Superb leaves the bed, pulls on her silver wedge-heeled sandals, I never talked like Charlie, I was too inhibited, pulls on her gold wedge-heeled sandals and stands examining herself in a tall mirror. The woman who stares appraisingly back is, no doubt at all, not a young woman, but a very very exciting woman. She thinks, ‘Calm down. Get the dinner ready. It’s too soon to get high.’

  She goes downstairs and Max is sitting in the lounge staring at the blank TV screen. This worries her for a moment though he is nowhere near the telephone extension. She says sharply, “I didn’t hear you come in!”

  “Why? What were you doing?”

  “Phoning mother.”

  She goes into the kitchen. He follows and stands listlessly in the doorway while she sets a salad briskly on the table. He says, “Please, Terry. Stay here tonight.”

  “You know mother is expecting me, Max.”

  “Terry, I’m begging you to spend this weekend with me.”

  “Why?”

  “I feel you’re avoiding me.”

  “Whose fault is that?”

  “Maybe I’m not the greatest lover in the world –”

  “Right. You’re not.”

  “– but I’m the man you married. Surely with some cooperation –”

  “Mother expects me, Max. Sometimes you spend a weekend doing forensic research and I spend a weekend with my wonderful sympathetic mother.
It’s too late to talk me out of it. My case is packed and in the car.”

  They sit down to eat. He says, “I’m checking the car in for an overhaul tomorrow.”

  “But you got a replacement? Surely.”

  “Yes, it’s in the garage.”

  “So what’s the problem?”

  They eat in silence but Superb is excited and sneaks a glance at her reflection on the darkness outside the window. She is struck by its contrast with the reflection of Max sitting opposite. She thinks, ‘Not forty yet, just three years older than me but a tired old man already. He and I could belong to different generations. I’m as young as Charlie is, the way I look just now. Charlie could have plenty of young women but he doesn’t need them, doesn’t want them with me available. He’s lucky. So am I.’

  23 SUPERB AND MY WIFE

  Why does this imaginary stuff seem familiar?

  IMPORTANT DIFFERENCES BETWEEN SUPERB AND MY FORMER WIFE.

  1 Superb has long black hair. Helen had light brown.

  2 Superb (though not fat like Big Momma) is a plain well-built woman with big etceteras. Helen was, is, she isn’t dead, more slender, more elegant, slightly haggard when depressed but beautiful when I first saw her, beautiful when she left me twelve years ago.

  3 Superb has a sharp tongue. Helen went quiet when she was hurt or angry.

  4 Superb is a greedy sexy bitch who knows how to get what she likes. Helen was a gentle woman I want not to remember, shy of sex and with no greedy appetites (could I be wrong about that?)

  5 Superb is imaginary. Helen was real. Why can’t I keep them apart?

  ‘Not forty but a tired old man already.’

  (And now I’m almost fiforget that.)

  Not forty but yes, Helen saw me as a tired old man good for nothing but his job. Security installation, an expanding field. I looked tired and uninteresting to her because she looked tired and uninteresting to me. We were killing each other quietly, gently, in the respectable Scottish way. The wife-beaters and rabid bitches are mostly among our unemployed and poorly paid. Then Helen met whatsisname and grew younger yes, and beautiful yes, and I was growing interested in her again when forget all that.

  She was right to leave me but forget all that because Superb is a greedy bitch with long black hair and a well-built sensual body whose arse is deeply cleft and she wears these tight jeans which show it and she is thinking, ‘Charlie could have plenty of young chicks but he doesn’t need them with me available. Yes, I’ll take off this bra in the car like he said, he deserves that, we’ll meet with no boring preliminaries like: What sort of day did you have?’

  24 COARSE WORDS AND A NEW CAR

  Max asks quietly, “Why dress like a whore?”

  She stares at him. He says quietly, “Why dress like a whore to visit your mother? You can’t tell me those jeans are comfortable.”

  With an effort she manages to say just as quietly, “It happens, yes, that these jeans are very comfortable. And very fashionable. And I happen to feel good in them. I’m sorry you don’t like that. You’ve no doubt seen a lot more whores than I have –”

  “You’re right. They look like you.”

  “– Coarse language doesn’t suit you, Max. You’re too much of a momma’s boy. And I’m a momma’s girl so you know where to phone me if you think up some last-minute insult you’d like me to hear.”

  She gets up at once and opens the door leading to the garage. He follows her. She feels her face flushed, her heart thudding, the question “Why dress like a whore?” resounds in her head. She thinks how she looks from behind, strutting on tiptoe on the steep-soled sandals, buttocks thrust back toward him under the tight white denim. She hears him say,

  “Terry, I’m sorry I said that. You look great. Really great. I just wish you’d stay the weekend.”

  She stops and looks at a sparkling new pale-grey Mercedes. She sighs loudly and says in a weary voice without looking at him, “The keys.”

  He hands her the keys. She opens the door and says, “Get my case from the back of the Ford.”

  She gets into the driving seat. He fetches a case and lays it on the seat beside her. He starts to say something which she interrupts with a firm, “Good night Max.”

  He raises the garage door and touches the switch that opens the gate at the end of the drive. She can see him in the car mirror, standing looking after her in the lit garage doorway and getting smaller and smaller until she turns on to the road, and that is the last she sees of him for at least a month. A month that feels like several years. But she hears from him much sooner than that.

  25 ADVENTURE AND CONFIDENCE

  Half an hour later she stops the car in a lay-by. Some trucks whip past on the road and when their lights fade she crouches down, unbuttons blouse, slips it off, removes bra then slips on blouse again, fastening just the two lowest buttons. Can I now have her sit back and light a cigarette, smoking with one elbow out of the window (it’s a warm night) and feeling the cool silk support her breasts? Yes. The row with Max has upset her, she wants to calm down, she thinks, ‘Let Charlie wait another five minutes, it’ll make him that much keener.’

  How long has she known Charlie?

  A week, and now her life is an adventure.

  Have they made love yet?

  No, and never will, though wearing a mask he will rape her in an hour or two if I keep control of the situation. Where did she meet him?

  At a singles club like the one in Motherwell where I was too nervous to speak to anyone. But Superb is in America rich and free. She wants adventure and joins a dramatic society no no no a yoga group in a town with a singles club. After three or four weeks, when she feels Max is used to her yoga evenings, she visits the club instead. Charlie approaches. He tells her, over drinks, that he is a theatrical agent, that she looks really good, and asks if she has ever thought about becoming an actress. She laughs at him and says, “There’s no need to hand me that crap. I like you without it. I think you look good too.”

  Are women ever as direct and open as this?

  Not British women. Not Scottish women. We are all timid and frigid here.

  Could I be wrong?

  Yes. Confident, tactful, attractive men can inspire openness in women anywhere. Courage encourages courage. I once had a good friend who taught me that. Nobody else ever taught me that. The parents and educators of this damned country teach cowardice, herding us toward the safest cages with the cleanest straw. If I had a clever son I’d be terrified if he showed signs of courage, especially if he was honest too. People in charge nowadays don’t want clever brave honest men, they want security systems. I’m clever but a coward and as dishonest as the rest of us, I’ve never been unemployed. And my Superb, this adventuress, smokes and remembers how she met Charlie and is not greatly worried when she hears a car pull in behind her, especially when she sees it is a police car.

  26 POLICE BELLY BANGLES

  A police car pulls in behind her. Two men get out and walk forward with their hands on their guns (this is America). (But it could be Ulster.) One of them says,

  “Janine Crystal!”

  “That’s not my name.”

  “Get out, Janine. And keep your hands well in sight.”

  “You’re making a mistake,” she says sharply, but opens the door and gets out. She is puzzled but not alarmed. Max is a policeman. If she gives his name and phone number they’ll check with him and let her go. But it will ruin the weekend. She is not on the road to her mother’s house, how can she explain that to Max? A white beam of torchlight strikes her face. Dazzled she feels something cold snap round her wrist, the other wrist is wrenched back and with another cold snap her arms are handcuffed behind her. “Pigs! Bastards!” she hisses as the lightbeam lowers to explore her body, breasts nude under tight silk, no, tight satin. Let her also be wearing a long scarlet belt of the sort that goes tight round the waist once, leaving enough leather to loop loosely a second time. The second loop lies like a necklace on the mound of her b
elly snug in its white denim why have women’s stomachs had so little erotic publicity compared with bums etcetera? The slimming adverts keep telling them to get flat stomachs. All right in men, I wish I had a flat stomach, but a woman with a flat stomach? Ugh. The sweetest line in the world was the profile of forgethername’s belly curving out suddenly from her navel then down in a swooping line to oh, I can never go there again, never never never again. Entering there was such sweet homecoming, I can never go home again. But Superb’s thighs, how is she standing? Astride, of course, weight mainly on right leg. The jeans are short and show a lot of ankle, she has a couple of silver bangles on one. Her gold, no her silver wedge-heeled sandals are open-toed to expose nails varnished a bright cherry scarlet. Her face? Astonished, enraged, like Jane Russell again, I can’t avoid Jane, but ah! new earrings have just occurred to me. Each delicate lobe is pierced by four slender silver hoops of different sizes, the largest 7 inches across, the smallest 1½. I love her like this.

  27 SONTAG NIPPLES EDITOR

  I love her like this and wish I could prolong the fantasy of possessing her without putting her into increasingly complicated and perverse positions. I wish I could excite myself with memories of real lovemaking. Sontag could excite herself that way. She told me she masturbated by caressing herself while remembering a nice time with a former lover. But my past is a pit full of regrets. My few nice memories of love with real women conjure up remorse and rage at what I have lost so the policeman with the torch chuckles and says,