Model Guy (49 page)

 
We walk on a bit as Guy
points out some of his favourite stalls, smiling and speaking in authentic sounding
Catalan to the owners.

 
"Are you hungry?"
he says after a while.

 
"Starving."

 
"There's a great
tapas bar just round here."

 
"Brilliant."

 
"Where's Lauren?
Is she coming?"

 
"She's shopping across
the other side of the Ramblas. We're meeting later back at the hotel."

 
"Oh, OK. I was hoping
I might see her again."

 
"Well, she's a bit
cross with you."

 
"Really?"

 
I laugh.

 
"You know, what with
the whole 2cool thing?"

 
"Ah, that."

 
"Don't worry, I've
forgiven you."

 
"Have you?"

 
"Yeah. I think so.
I mean it would be different if it had got serious, if I had been arrested or prosecuted.
Oh, fuck, when I think of all the things that could have happened to me."

 
"Actually they wouldn't
really. If I'd thought you could have been at real risk of conviction or anything,
I'd have come back."

 
"Thank you."
We stroll on a bit. "So you just let me sweat a bit."

 
"I can only apologise,
Charlie. It was a cowardly act."

 
Guy's formal phrase could
be just Guy or it could be a way of avoiding the fact that he really does feel guilty.
I let him think about it for a moment as we walk, passing a cheese stall where a
spectacularly toothless woman in a headscarf is gossiping indignantly with the owner.

 
"Oh, don't worry
about it," I say at last. "It was pretty horrible at the time but in fact
all that happened to me in the end was that I grew up a bit. The end of my charmed
life."

 
"How ironic given
that that's what we hired you for," smiles Guy. "Here we are. Look it's
only half past one so the Spanish haven't even started lunch yet." We take
a seat each at the bar of a tapas bar in the middle of the market. The counter in
front of us is packed with dishes and plates: there are golden crusted tortillas
on a display and various stews with fish, beans and great boney chunks of meat.
Guy orders us both a glass of Cava. "Try the tomato and courgette tortilla,"
he says, so I nod at the woman looking expectantly over the counter at us.

 
"I have to say I
think I was most pissed off when you rang on my dad's mobile and then hung up when
I answered."

 
"Oh, that. God that
was a bit of a shock, I must say. Sorry, I panicked but I just couldn't think of
anything else to do but hang up."

 
"Why were you ringing
him?"

 
"I wanted some advice,
wanted to know how to get out of this. Of all the people we'd roped in to 2cool
he seemed the most sensible. You look surprised? Well, perhaps not in his private
life but in business he's a very savvy operator, actually. I thought he might be
able to help."

 
"He lied to me."

 
"He thought it was
for the best, Charlie. It was agony for him but he thought that if he could just
hang on the police would find nothing to charge you with, 2cool would be wound up
and you'd be safely free from it all."

 
I think about this. The
tortilla arrives and I'm distracted for a moment by the rich sweetness of the tomatoes,
courgettes and peppers. All my senses seem to be heightened today.

 
"Are you still speaking
to each other?" asks Guy, sticking his fork in to his own potato and onion
tortilla.

 
"Yes, oh, yes. He
is my dad after all."

 
"Bet you're glad
he wasn't there that night, then."

 
"Yeah, mind you,
everyone got out safely in the end."

 
"Yes, I heard,"
says Guy, intrigued. "Something went wrong with the camera, is that right?"

 
I smile and roll my eyes.

 
"Nora's camera. She,
um..." I laugh.

 
"What?" says
Guy. "What was it?"

 
"She forgot to put
any film in."

 
I turn and look at Guy.
He bursts out laughing and within seconds we can hardly sit on our stools, tears
running down our cheeks. Even some of the Spanish stop their shouting and smoking
to look over at us.

 
"You're joking,"
says Guy, wiping his eyes with a very old, dirty hanky.

 
"Yeah, the bloke
at the picture desk on the paper showed her how it all worked and gave her the film
cartridge but she was so over excited that night that she forgot to put it in the
camera."

 
"But they still had
the story."

 
"I know but according
to Piers who has spoken to her they didn't dare run it without the proof of the
photographs. Can you imagine the risk? Nora's word against the great and good from
politics, the City, the arts and everywhere else. The law. They'd have shredded
her."

 
"I'd love to have
seen her face."

 
"Glad I didn't. I
hope I never see her again."

 
"That I did feel
very guilty about - I mean when Piers told me what she was doing to you - writing
about you without telling you and things."

 
"And then the final
insult at the party. God I was ill for days after."

 
"What was it in the
end?"

 
"Some kind of drug
she'd begged or nicked from some dealer there. A double dose the doctors said. She
wanted to come and help but then, once she was in and had some stuff, she suddenly
got so terrified that I'd try and stop her filing her precious story or screw it
up for her in some way that she...she poisoned me. Risked my life. Can you believe
it?"

 
Guy thinks about it and
then nods slowly.

 
"Yeah, yeah, in a
way I can."

 
"She didn't even
have to really - I couldn't stop her sending her story to the paper, even if I'd
really wanted to but she was just so desperate not to let anything get in the way."
I find myself reliving that evening for a moment before I pull myself out of it.
"I knew that wine tasted weird."

 
We finish our tortilla.

 
"Have some fish,"
says Guy, getting up from his bar stool. "Look, come over here and choose what
you want. It's so fresh! It was still swimming in the sea just a few hours ago."

 
We choose a fillet of
salmon for him and some sword fish for me. Guy orders them again in his effortless
Catalan and in the meanwhile we chew on fresh bread, ragged with tomato and garlic
and drizzled with olive oil.

 
"But in fact it was
lucky for everyone else," I explain. "Rumour went round the place in no
time that someone had ODed and died. They shot out of there like rats out of a trap.
The photographer the Post had positioned outside, by the front door, was away for
five minutes getting a cup of tea or having a pee. When he came back the place was
empty. Only picture they got was the ambulance taking me away."

 
"Shame."

 
"Piers says,"
I take a deep breath. Might as well tell him. "Piers told me afterwards when
he came to see me in hospital that Nora wanted to the write the story around me
- after all they had the pictures of me. The story was going to be that I was so
upset about the whole 2cool thing that I had taken an overdose."

 
"You're kidding."

 
"She told Piers that
it would be good for me really. Win me the sympathy vote."

 
"I was going to say
how evil of her, but I'm not sure that it is."

 
"No, Piers told me
his - and your theory - about her. I was already drugged and he was wearing a gas
mask - oh, don't ask - but it made sense to me. I honestly think she never really
understood why I'd be upset."

 
"You're probably
right," he says. "She didn't actually want to hurt you, it just didn't
register with her that you'd be upset and angry. The more I got to know about her
the more I realised that she just uses people to amuse her. Even if you never spoke
to her again, which I'm sure you wouldn't, she wouldn't care that much, I'm afraid."

 
"Yeah, I'm sure you're
right and yet..." Why has this suddenly come to me now? "When I was out
of it in the hospital the next day, semi-conscious, delirious - it was before Lauren
had got back and heard from my dad what had happened - I'm sure Nora came to see
me. I'm sure I saw her face looking at me and saying something and then kissing
my forehead." I try and remember more, taking myself back to that hospital
bed, but it doesn't come to me. The doctors warned me that I might have memory loss
and even hallucinations. "I don't know."

 
"Perhaps, you did,
you know, touch her. Connect with her."

 
"I wonder."
We watch the staff at work for a while, dishing out food, reaching over each other,
shouting orders, banging out coffee dregs, joking and gossiping with the regulars
who stand at one end of the bar smoking and glasses of drinking beer. "I suppose
having parents like that must screw you up. Was it true about her father and her
mother, do you think?"

 
"Was what true?"

 
I tell him what Piers
told me. He thinks for a moment.

 
"I heard about her
father because a friend of mine is a doctor in New York. Piers is half right, I
think. Her dad did have a habit of touching up his patients which was a trifle unfortunate
but he was, well could have been, a great doctor. He was very bright, had huge potential
but I suppose it was a kind of undirected, undisciplined intelligence. He couldn't
put it to any positive use. Bit like Nora. You sometimes need a sheep dog for intellect
- you know, round it up and point it in the right direction."

 
I smile but it's just
so fucking sad. For both of them.

 
"So you've made it
up with Lauren, then?" he asks.

 
For a second I panic that
Lauren's not with me. Perhaps, I dreamed that too. Perhaps we're still not speaking.

 
"Yes," I tell
him. "My dad got her mobile number from my phone and rang her in France where
she was staying with a friend. Told her what had happened. In fact, by the time
she'd got back I was out of hospital and I'd been given the all clear by the doctors."

 
"So you managed to
sort things out between you?"

 
"Yes. She and Sarah,
the friend that she was staying with, had done a lot of talking about us and our
relationship and all the things that have happened over the last few months so I
think that helped."

 
I don't tell him all the
details about the meeting that Lauren and I had at the flat when she got back. I
can hardly bear to think about it now, in case I've dreamt it or in case by going
over it yet again in my mind I'll somehow undo it.

 
It was early evening,
the last rays of the sun were filtering in through the windows and it was still
quite warm. My mum who had been fussing round had just left, well finally been ejected
by me. Oh, I was really grateful to her. She had brought round a shepherd’s pie
- if chicken soup is Jewish penicillin, shepherd’s pie must be Barnet’s Neurofen,
I suppose. But I didn't want her there when Lauren got back and I think she understood
that.

 
So I sat with the telly
on, not taking anything in, rehearsing what I wanted to say to Lauren, trying out
phrases, thinking of an apology that would really convey how sorry I felt, explaining
why I'd done the stupid things I'd done but also setting out what I wanted from
our relationship if it continued and trying to test these terms to see if they sounded
reasonable.

 
For some reason I didn't
hear her key in the front door and so one minute I was just watching telly, thinking
about her, praying that she would come back, would be willing to see me and the
next minute she was there, standing in the doorway of the living room. I got up
slowly and faced her. She was tanned, beautifully dressed as always, but her eyes
looked like she'd been crying quite a bit and not sleeping much.

 
She looked at me for a
moment in silence and then muttered something about putting her bag in the bedroom.
I nodded and stayed put. She was back moments later, saying something.

 
"Sorry?" I whispered.

 
"I was going to have
a glass of wine, would you - ?"

 
"Yes, oh, yes please.
There's some in the fridge. Are you hungry? My mum brought a shepherd’s pie, you
could microwave it -" I was gabbling.

 
"Erm, no, thanks.
I'm not hungry."

 
"Sit down, I'll get
the wine."

 
She came into the room
to let me pass and I went out into the kitchen, trying to work out from what I had
seen so far whether she simply wanted to discuss arrangements for splitting up and
moving out or whether something more positive was possible.

 
I came back with the wine
and she asked: "So, how are you?"

 
"I'm okay, thanks.
The doctors checked me out and they think I'm fine. No brain damage," I added,
goofily.