Iain Banks - Dead Air

‘I know. Should I start mentioning you? Crediting you? Enrol you in the Crapital Live! BUPA scheme?’

‘I told you; a regular cheque would suffice.’

‘Fuck off.’

He sighed. ‘Anyway.’

‘Anyway, don’t fucking sit here feeling sorry for yourself; get-’

‘I’m not feeling sorry for myself.’

‘Neither you should. You’ve got a good, satisfying, successful career, you’ve helped raise a smart, beautiful daughter, and you’re the lucky friend of at least one really great dead famous person; me. I mean, what more can you ask for?’

‘More sex?’

‘Would have been nice. Look, get out there and start socialising. Meet some women. Come out with me. We’ll go clubbing. ’

‘Yeah, maybe.’

‘No, not maybe; definitely. Let’s do it.’

‘Call me. Persuade me when I’m sober and not morose.’

‘Are you morose now?’

‘A little. I do love my job, but sometimes I think it’s just electronic wallpaper and what’s the point in it all? And Nikki is totally brilliant but then I think she’s probably going to get hurt by some worthless bastard… I mean, I know it’s caveman stuff, but I don’t even like to think of her having sex.’

‘You don’t? Shit, I do.’

‘Oh, Ken,’ Craig said, shaking his head. ‘Even for you…’

‘Sorry, sorry,’ I said, sincerely.

The doorbell chimed.

‘Good,’ Craig said. ‘Now get tae fuck out of my house, you vemonous-’

‘Vemonous?’

‘-you venomous cake of shite that you are.’

‘Okey-dokey,’ I said, jumping up and slapping him on one knee. ‘Same time next week?’

‘Probably. Safe journey back to the gin palace.’

On the doorstep, I stopped, clicked my fingers and said, ‘Oh; I didn’t mention.’

‘What?’ Craig said warily.

‘About my torrid homosexual affair with Lachlan Murdoch.’

‘Uh-huh?’

‘Yeah, and funnily enough I’ve started writing for one of his dad’s tabloids, too.’

Craig closed his eyes. ‘Let’s just get it over with, okay?’ he sighed.

‘Just thought you should know; I’ve got a column in the Son.’

‘Oh, fuck.’

‘See ya!’

‘Yeah, try telling that on the fucking radio, Mr Funny.’

‘That was just for you, baby. Til next week.’

‘Yeah, yeah…’

When I first kissed Celia, on the night of the storm, that was as far as it went. It was a fabulous kiss, with her warm, taut body against mine and her soft mouth and hard little tongue flickering inside my mouth like a tiny flame of moist muscle, but that was all. She wouldn’t even give me her address or phone number or mobile or anything. At the time, of course, I still didn’t know who her husband was, just that he sounded somewhat on the psycho side (which, goodness knows, should have been enough). I worried that, despite all the solemnity a few moments earlier, she was kidding me on, that this was all just a bizarrely serious tease. But she would be in touch, she said. Now she had to get back to the party, for soon a car would be coming for her to take her away.

Another long, unbearably sexy kiss, when she let me run my hands all over her, then she slipped inside the bedroom. I stood there in the wind and rain, hard-on like a giant redwood, waiting for a decent interval and wishing, for once, that I smoked, because now felt like the right sort of time to do just that. Then – via the mega-bathroom again, to dry my face and comb my hair – I went back down to the party.

Celia had already left.

Nothing, for weeks. Life went on, all the usual nonsense happened (dental appointments, run-ins with management, a couple of boozy, flirtatious lunches with the lovely Amy, a gig in Brighton with Ed, which ended in some chilly dawn skinny dipping with a couple of girls from Argentina). Jo and I went out to parties and films, got loved up and went clubbing, had good, fun sex every now and again, and I decided that Celia was just one of those never-quite things; a little oasis of high-grade strangeness, charm and drama in an existence not normally all that short of them in the first place. Anyway, the woman was a gangster’s moll. Worse; his wife, for God’s sake. Edge work and risk-taking and all that crap was all very well, and I hadn’t been entirely lying when I’d told her I didn’t give a fuck, but I wasn’t actually suicidal. Life was too short not to seize the day but she’d been right about behaviour that might shorten that life, dramatically.

Then, one overcast Wednesday in mid-May, over a month later, a courier arrived with a slim, padded envelope, immediately after I’d finished the show. The envelope was light, so light it felt empty. There was a grey plastic hotel key card inside. I was in the corridor from the studio to our office at the time; I looked inside the envelope but there was nothing else in there; I tipped it up and tapped it but still nada. I looked back down the corridor as I walked, in case I’d missed something else inside falling out. Nothing there, either. The key card didn’t say what room it was for, or what hotel. They never do. I put it in my pocket and inspected the envelope, looking for a sender’s name, wondering if I could trace it back to whomever had sent it.

My mobile sounded as soon as I switched it back on. The phone’s display said Anonymous.

‘Hello?’ I answered.

‘Is that Kenneth?’ said a female voice.

‘Ken Nott, yes.’

‘May we talk?’

‘Yes,’ I said. I stopped by the office door. Inside, I could hear Phil and Andi, his assistant, talking and laughing. ‘Who is this?’

‘We met on the roof, about five weeks ago, do you remember? Please don’t say my name, but do you remember me?’

‘Ah. Well, ah, yes. Yes, of course I do. How are you?’

‘Do you still… I am not sure what to say. Wish to proceed? This is very unromantic, I am sorry.’

‘Ah,’ I said, staring at the carpet beneath my feet. ‘I found out who, ah, who your other half is.’

‘So you do not. I see. I’m sorry. I have been stupid. Please dispose of-’

‘Well, no, hold on.’

‘You received what I sent?’

‘Size of a credit card? Nothing else?’

‘That’s right.’

‘Yes. Where is it for?’

‘The Dorchester. Six zero seven. It’s just that… I would have liked to have seen you again.’

I don’t know. It was just something about the way she said it. I swallowed and asked, ‘You there now?’

‘Yes.’

I glanced at my watch. ‘I have a few things to tidy up here. Half an hour?’

‘We have all afternoon, until about six.’

‘So, I’ll see you.’

‘Two things.’

‘What?’

‘You must not leave any mark on me. Nothing.’

‘Of course, I understand.’

‘Also…’

‘What?’

‘Just this time, would you be silent?’

‘Silent?’

‘Completely. From when you arrive to when you go.’

‘That’s a little weird.’

‘It is a private… superstition, you would probably say. I know it makes no sense to you. But I would like you to indulge me in this.’

‘Hold on,’ I said, nearly laughing, ‘is this place bugged?’

‘No.’ I could hear her smile. A pause. ‘Will you do this for me? Just this one time?’

‘What if I say no?’

‘Then I will not have been indulged, and because of that, if we go ahead, I will believe that this will end badly for us. I do not know what you will believe, Kenneth.’

I thought about this. ‘All right.’

‘Half an hour, then. I will wait for you.’

‘See you soon.’

‘Yes.’

The phone clicked off.

At the Dorchester, number 607 was a suite. I hesitated at the door. I was sweating. Mostly this was because I had walked from Capital Live!. The stuff I thought I might have to tidy up had proved utterly trivial or just entirely fit for putting off until tomorrow or later, and so I’d made my excuses – the following day’s show was pretty much prepared already – and left. I’d walked the streets under the low grey sky. It was warm and the air felt thick and humid for May.