Beautiful Beast (Gypsy Heroes)

by Le Carre, Georgia

His mouth is too close to my ear and the horrible sound startles me out of my dream. Suddenly, I feel the length of his body on mine, all the rough hairs on his legs and belly scratching my skin. He rests on his elbows and looks down at me with heavy-lidded, blank eyes. I stare back at him wordlessly.

  ‘Poor Snow,’ he says. For some inexplicable reason, his pity breaks the protective numbness.

  ‘Don’t,’ I whisper, and I feel my eyes fill with tears. They roll down the sides of my cheeks ‘Please don’t.’

  ‘For fuck’s sake. I’m sorry, OK? Don’t cry. Just fucking don’t cry again, OK?’

  But I cannot stop. So he pulls out of me, takes the condom off, ties it, drops it to the side of the bed, and holds me while I cry. He cannot fix me, he knows that, but he is the only one who knows.

  He alone knows what happened to me that night in that hotel room.

  Four

  SNOW

  He gets out of bed and, standing over me, regards my naked, trembling body. What he is thinking I don’t know, but with a sigh he walks away after a while, and comes back with a cream blanket. He covers me with it and, moving to the other side of the bed, props himself up on three pillows and lights a cigarette.

  We don’t talk while he smokes.

  Under the blanket my body gradually warms. I start to feel safe and peaceful again. We have a strange relationship, Lenny and I. But then again I don’t know what normal is. My parents had a strange love–hate relationship too. My father loved my mother and she despised him. I don’t despise Lenny. I … am grateful to him. I don’t think of the future. Lenny is forty-two. When he found me I was nineteen. I am now twenty.

  He kills the cigarette and turns to me. ‘You all right?’

  ‘Yeah,’ I say softly.

  ‘Want me to stay the night?’

  ‘No,’ I mumble.

  ‘I’ll call you tomorrow, OK?’

  ‘OK.’

  ‘Do you need any money?’

  ‘No.’

  He reaches for his pants and takes a wad of notes out and puts it on the bedside cabinet. ‘Here. Go buy yourself something nice to wear tomorrow.’

  I don’t say anything, not even thank you.

  He vaults out of the bed, gets dressed quickly, then comes over to my curled body. He kisses my hair. ‘I’ll see myself out. Goodnight, Snow.’

  ‘Goodnight, Lenny,’ I whisper.

  After the door closes behind him I stay still a few minutes longer. My limbs feel heavy and lethargic, but I know from experience that sleep will never come while I have that dirty, sticky feeling between my legs. I force myself to my feet and into the bathroom. I run the shower and stand under the warm cascade.

  Water is good. Water cleans.

  I shampoo my hair even though I washed it earlier in the evening, and soap every inch of my body. I realize that I am sadder tonight than usual. Is it the loss of Saumur? Or is it the loss of Shane? I let the water wash away the sadness bleeding out. I only have to do what has proven to work for a year now. Just hold on for tonight. It is always better in the morning light. I have come so far.

  I can be like the reindeer moss. Its patience is legendary. Its survival skills are second to none. You can keep it in the dark, freeze it, dry it to a crisp, but it won’t give up and die. It simply lies dormant waiting for better conditions. That day will come when conditions will improve for me. Until then I will wait patiently.

  By the time I switch off the shower and get out, my fingers are so wrinkled they are like little prunes. I dry myself quickly and, wrapping another towel around my head, I dress in striped pink and yellow cotton pajamas.

  I hook up the hair dryer and direct it at my hair before I pad barefoot through my darkened living room. I see my purse lying exactly where I left it. I open it and take out the phone Lenny gave me. It is exactly the same as the one I handed over to him, but when I switch it on it has only one number keyed into it. His.

  I feel that strange sense of hopelessness and anxiety try to seep into my body again. But before the feeling can swamp me I put on Vivaldi’s Four Seasons and return to my bedroom. I find, screw back the cap of the lubricant and put it away. Using a tissue I pick up the used condom and flush it down the toilet.

  Then I go back into the bedroom and sweep the wad of money into the drawer. I shut it with a click, straighten and look around the spotless room. I can still smell the stench of our coupling and Lenny’s cigarette. After cleaning out the ashtrays and returning them to their proper places I open some windows.

  Cool night air blows in as I stand at the window and look out at the night scene below. A foraging fox trots along the wall that separates my building from the next. It is carrying something in its mouth, probably from the rubbish bins. The woman living in the ground floor flat is always complaining about foxes getting into her bins and the foul smell of the excrement they leave behind.

  As if it has felt my gaze, it suddenly turns and looks at me. Its eyes are shining brightly, and I am suddenly struck by its wild beauty. It lives and dies in dirt, but it is full of intelligence and the joy of its own creation. It doesn’t compare its existence with other creatures, bemoan its foxiness, or try to be like another. It is simply content to be a fox. It is free.

  That is more than I am.

  I watch it until it disappears then I turn away and look at my alarm clock. It is nearly four in the morning. I should really get some sleep.

  I switch off the light and lie on my bed staring at the ceiling.

  Even though I try to keep my mind blank, a face floats into my head. Such beautiful eyes. So blue and so bright. I liked him as well. Something delightfully cheeky and cocky about him. I imagine him to be fun and sexy. I circle my wrist the way he did. He had such massive, strong hands. When he held my wrist I actually didn’t want him to let go. I stroke my skin the way he did silkily, as if he was already making love to me.

  ‘Shane,’ I whisper into the darkness.

  He was gorgeous, but I will never see him again. I feel a ribbon of sadness curl around my heart and I take a deep breath. No, I shouldn’t allow myself to get silly. He was not just gorgeous. He was too gorgeous. Too young. Too carefree.

  It’s not a lost opportunity. He just wanted to have some fun. You can’t trust a man you find in a strip-dancing club. Anyway, I am too mangled and broken for him. He wouldn’t have the patience to put up with my drama. In the end he would shatter my heart. I try to convince myself that it is a very good thing that his number is gone. A blessing in disguise that I will never see those beautiful blue eyes again.

  For almost an hour I try to fall asleep. But sleep refuses to come.

  Maybe I should take a pill. I go into the bathroom and take one of my little pills. After a while I feel relaxed and floaty. Nothing matters anymore. I no longer feel sad that I will never again see Shane, or Saumur, or the magical fireflies.

  Five

  SNOW

  When I wake up, the sun is filtering in through the gap I left in the curtains. I sit up and hug my knees. What shall I do today? Last month, for the first time since Lenny installed me in this apartment, I woke up and thought, I have nothing to do. I need a job. I need to meet new people.

  But Lenny doesn’t like me to meet people. He says I am a bad judge of character. ‘Look what happened to you the last time you made a friend,’ he points out.

  But, more and more, I feel I am fading away within these walls.

  After I have brushed my teeth and dressed, I sit in the kitchen and have a bowl of cereal. The apartment is so still I can hear the sound of my teeth crunching the flakes of corn.

  The letter flap clatters and I leave my bowl and run to the front door. I pick up three envelopes from the floor. A bill, a menu/leaflet from a local Chinese takeaway, and a letter from one of the boutiques where Lenny has opened an account for me.

  The letter I am waiting for did not arrive.

  With a heavy heart I put the bill aside for Lenny to give to his secretary, and I open the le
tter from the boutique. There is a sale this weekend and they are writing to invite me to arrive an hour earlier and join the champagne pre-sale party. I throw the invitation away with the leaflet.

  Then I sit down to finish the rest of my solitary breakfast.

  When I have washed the bowl and spoon and put away the breakfast things, I walk over to the drawer that I swept the money into last night. I take out the wad and count it. Two hundred pounds. Wow! My tears must have moved him.

  He is not usually so generous with cash. He prefers to open accounts for me in different shops that he pays for at the end of the month. I don’t know what limits I have in those stores but I haven’t yet come across one, even though once, in a state of deep depression, I unthinkingly picked up a dress worth three thousand. However, my credit card has only a two hundred and fifty pound limit.

  I keep aside forty pounds. The rest I neatly arrange so that all the heads face upwards. Then I get down to the side of the mattress and gently unpick the slash I have sewn up. I add the new notes to the growing brick of money. It makes me happy to see it. I have more than half of what I need. Quickly, I sew it back up so it is almost impossible to tell that my mattress is my piggy bank.

  Afterwards, I do what I do every day.

  I set about thoroughly cleaning the apartment. I vacuum, I brush, I wipe, I wash, I shine and finally I walk around plumping and smoothing the cushions on the sofas so that there is not a single wrinkle in any of them.

  The doorbell rings and I look out of the peephole and see the girl from the local florist holding a large bunch of long-stemmed red roses. I open the door and thank her for the flowers. I close the door and I put my nose to them. There is no scent. I take them into the kitchen and remove the wrapping.

  There is no card. Cards are not necessary.

  I get a bouquet every time Lenny fucks me.

  I put them in water and carry the vase to the coffee table in the living room. They are not what I would have chosen, but they brighten up the place. Later I will pop by the florist on my way back from lunch and get myself a fragrant mix of gardenia, honeysuckle and sweet pea.

  I glance at the clock. It is lunchtime. So I get into my jeans and a gray sweatshirt with a hood and go out into the bright sunshine. Usually I buy myself a sandwich and go down to the park and eat it on one of the benches. But today I feel more lost and homesick than I normally do, so I walk the down the road, and turn into a little side road.

  At the end of it is a small Indian restaurant. I open the nondescript door and enter it. It is a small place with grand ideas borrowed from India before colonial times. Checkerboard black and inky blue floor tiles, fans hanging from a dark-lacquered oak ceiling, an aged brass bar in one corner, cut-glass wall lamps, hunting trophies from the days of the Majarajahs and bitter chocolate, leather love booths and banquettes.

  Muted classical Indian music is playing in the background. The smell of cardamom, spices and curry fill the air and I breathe in the familiar scent. The restaurant is deserted. It almost always is at lunchtime. I used to worry that the business was going to go bust, but Raja, the solitary waiter they have working during the lunch shift, assured me that they get very busy at night.

  Raja pops his head up from whatever he was doing below the bar, and smiles broadly at me. ‘Hello,’ he calls cheerfully.

  I smile back and take a seat in my usual corner.

  ‘How are you today?’ Raja asks when he brings my bottle of mineral water, a basket of poppadoms, and a silver container with condiments and pickles.

  ‘I’m fine, thank you. How are things?’ I say.

  He nods. ‘Very good. Busy tonight. We have a big birthday party.’

  ‘Oh! That’s good.’

  ‘Yes, the boss is very happy.’

  I smile.

  He holds on to the menu in his hand. ‘Same as usual?’ he asks.

  ‘I think so.’

  ‘OK. Two minutes and I will bring your food,’ he says as he walks away.

  I go into the women’s toilet and wash my hands. When I return to my table, I break a piece of poppadom and, after spooning a tiny amount of sweet mango chutney on it, place it on my tongue. And as it does every time that I do this, the scent and taste take me back in time.

  I think of our cook, her wrinkled, cinnamon hand holding out a freshly fried poppadom. But back home we called them appalam. They were hot and, because they were fried in new oil, they did not have any aftertaste. I chew the poppadom slowly. But something is different today. I can’t ignore the aftertaste.

  It is the beautiful man from last night.

  I can’t stop thinking about him, and he has infected me with a sense of restlessness and dissatisfaction. I suppose it is to be expected. I lead such an uneventful and dull life, meeting him was like touching a live wire. He invigorated my entire system. And that voice—deep, sexy, cheeky.

  I start thinking about him.

  He was different from everybody else at the club. Tall with broad shoulders, he alone wore a scruffy T-shirt, worn jeans, and the cockiest grin I’ve ever seen. A man like him did not need any adornment. He stood alone at the bar. How strange that no dancers tried to accost him. Perhaps it was because he is poor. But he owns a chateau in France so that can’t be it. Perhaps he exaggerated. Maybe it’s just a run-down farmhouse. Even so I would have liked to have seen the fireflies.

  I take a sip of mineral water.

  I should stop thinking of him. He is gone. I have no way of contacting him, and he has no way of contacting me. I lean back with that feeling I cannot shake no matter how many times I have tried since last night: I have lost something irreplaceable. Which is madness, really. Of course I haven’t lost anything important. That was lost a year ago.

  At that moment the door opens and I look up at the intrusion. I have begun to think of this deserted restaurant at lunchtime almost as my own personal space. The door pushes farther in and I freeze with shock.

  Impossible! How can it be? What the hell is he doing here?

  Inside my body, my hearts starts dancing like a wild thing.

  In the daylight Shane’s eyes are so bright they are sparkling blue jewels in his face. His mouth is full and sensual, his jaw classically chiseled, and his hair thick and glossy. My eyes pour down his body. He is carrying a motorbike helmet and wearing a blue T-shirt and faded black jeans low on his lean hips. I guess he is what they mean when they say someone is rocking muscles.

  I have two seconds before he sees me.

  Six

  SHANE

  I spot her straightaway. She is tucked up in one of the dark brown booths and staring at me with saucer eyes. Her hair is up in a ponytail and her face is devoid of any make-up. She looks even more vulnerable and childlike than she did last night. There is something in her eyes, something that hides and feeds on her.

  I know I shouldn’t be here.

  She’s broken. I can see that a mile off. Injured people cling. They are needy. I’m not the kind of guy she needs. Someone like me, I take what I want and I walk. I’ve never looked back. Never promised anyone anything. My way or no way. But she poses a challenge. A threat. And a promise. And I cannot walk away from her. This is just something I have to do.

  I go up to her table and sit opposite her.

  ‘What are you doing here?’ she gasps.

  I grin. ‘Having lunch with you?’

  ‘How did you know I’d be here?’ Her voice is breathy. It gets under my skin. Everything about this woman gets under my skin.

  ‘I paid someone to follow you last night, Snow.’

  She inhales sharply. ‘Why?’

  ‘Because I promised you a trip to Saumur and I didn’t know how else to contact you.’

  It’s amazing the effect my words have on her. Saumur and the fireflies shimmer like a magical promise on her lovely face.

  ‘If you had me followed then you must know that I’m with some—’

  I place my finger on her lips to silence the rest of her word
s. She could have moved back, but she didn’t. Her lips are so warm and soft, it sends my dick rigid against the zipper of my jeans. Jesus. I have it bad for her. Her eyes close, but they hold closed for a second longer than it takes to blink. Why, she’s savoring my touch. I stare at her. Her eyes open. The green is a few shades darker.

  She blushes.

  And suddenly I know: she is a sexual innocent.

  She must be the most sexually unaware woman I’ve ever met. She’s with Lenny, and it is clear that in exchange for the use of her body he is giving her some kind of protection, or perhaps it is some kind of a financial arrangement, but it is clear that she has never been touched by a real man. I think about her screaming my name while my cock is deep inside her and immediately my cock, already straining uncomfortably, starts throbbing painfully.

  I clear my throat. ‘Do you still want to see the fireflies?’

  She takes a deep and shuddering breath.

  SNOW

  I shouldn’t involve him in my mess. I know how cold and wicked Lenny can be, but my head nods and he removes his finger.

  ‘Would you like to go on Friday night? I’ll bring you back by Sunday.’

  ‘I … I can’t do it at the weekends.’ In spite of myself, my voice becomes sad. ‘Actually, I can’t leave the country at any time. He … er … expects me to be around all the time.’

  There is a slight tightening of his jaw, but his eyes are expressionless. ‘Lenny is busy this weekend.’

  My jaw sags. ‘You know Lenny?’ I breathe, taken by surprise.

  ‘It’s a small world, Snow.’

  ‘Then you must know what he is.’

  ‘Yeah, I know what he is,’ he says, but he appears unimpressed.

  I lean forward. ‘He’s a gangster. He’s killed men before,’ I say fiercely.

  There is no change in his voice. ‘I know.’

  I drop back to the chocolate chair back. ‘Are you not afraid of him?’

  He shakes his head slowly, never taking his dirty, cocky, arrogant gaze off me.

  I stare deep into his eyes. The flecks inside them are almost violet. I feel transfixed by them. as if he has a strange power over me. ‘Who are you?’ I whisper.