Irvine Welsh - The Sex Lives of Siamese Twins

It gets worse. As Sorenson’s warbling commentary fades out, two talking heads appear onscreen, both of them candidates for the forthcoming congressional elections. Ben Thorpe and Joel Quist are the archetypal worst-case Democrat and Republican. Thorpe is a well-meaning but ineffectual, flatulent-mouthed, carpetbagging Ivy League asshole, while Quist is a rabid, fascist, sanctimonious, Bible-bashing prick, schooled in spewing out populist soundbites. It’s hard to work out which one I hate the most. They are debating gun control and Thorpe’s defending my bravery, while Quist, agreeing, then says, — Though I’d like to ask that young lady, if she knew then what she knows now, would she do the same?

— Oh my God. . I hear myself say out loud. What the fuck. . I didn’t know they were pedophiles. . the guy was shooting a fucking gun!

— Well, that’s an interesting thought, simpers Ms. Botox, so firmly embedded in Quist’s corner that he has to be fucking her, — what would Lucy Brennan, the so-called Julia Tuttle Causeway heroine, think right now ?

About what?What difference. . fuck. .

And I realize that Lena Sorenson’s soft voice is still droning on in my ear, though I can’t make out what she’s saying. I’m just so fucking livid at being dragged into all this bullshit. I’m responding with automatic “mmm’s” and “yeah’s.” I can’t talk to this maneuvering bitch. I need to think, so I put the phone down. I sit watching the other features, these Siamese twins again, and then I rise, drying myself properly and putting on a tee and some shorts.

A few moments later the intercom goes and I’m ready to bawl out this next stalking creep, probably that photographer asshole, but it’s Sorenson! Her voice is rendered metallic and scratchy by the device. — I jumped in the car and got here as soon as I could!

I don’t even recall agreeing to her coming here, but there’s nothing to do but buzz her in.

I open the front door to hear her slowly climbing the stairs. Sorenson, even smaller than I remember, swings into the corridor and waddles toward me. I move into the apartment, leaving the door ajar. She raps the door with her knuckles as she enters, looking around my tiny space in a slightly disparaging way. Then she says, — You’re gonna be under siege for a spell. Come over to my house, have some dinner. I feel so responsible, giving them that phone video. .

She’s right, that creep whose camera I busted wasn’t a straggler, he was the fucking vanguard. I need to get out of here and I’m fucked if I can think of any reason not to accept. I pull on some gym shoes and we get downstairs. Stepping outside, all I hear are insect clicks exploding around me like gunfire, and shouts. — LUCY! LUCY!

They’re all back! And the van for the TV news, fuck knows what channel, is already here! Sorenson did bring serious heat, and those politician assholes have turned it right back up! I want to double back to the apartment, but some bastards have sneaked round and positioned themselves between us and the front door. — Just wait a darn minute. . Sorenson protests feebly, sounding all schoolmarm under stress, as I see the rancid fuck whose camera I trashed, firing off a Kalashnikov round on a substitute device, with a zoom lens attached. At least there’s one asshole who knows not to get too close. — Ignore them, Lucy, Sorenson says, wide-eyed with fear, grabbing my hand, pushing through toward her car. The rest aren’t so shy; a buffed, tanned faggot of a reporter sticks his mike in my face and asks me, now that I know the story of McCandless and Ryan Balbosa and Timothy Winter, the two pedophiles, would I do the same thing again?

I know I should shut my fucking mouth and follow the scared, furtive Sorenson to her car. Instead, in my rage at this violation by the preppy asshole, I stand my ground and shoot my mouth off. — Of course I would. Whatever the circumstances, nobody has the right to start shooting people!

— But you did martial arts at a high competitive level, and taught self-defense classes for women, this sincere fag lisps. — Are you saying that women have the right to self-defense, but male victims of sexual violence, like Mr. McCandless, do not?

A crumpling of silent thunder in my ears. I’m stunned. I can’t manage a retort. As I hear Lena Sorenson’s urgent voice in the background, I can only look fearfully and penitently, my face racked with weakness and doubt, as it’s beamed into all those American homes.

Then I feel Lena Sorenson’s grip on my arm tighten, as she leads me to her car. — Please leave us alone, she says, softly but quite forcefully. I climb inside, but the squalid asshole is still pointing his camera at me, shooting in through the passenger window, glee etched on his fat chops. I turn away. — Goddamnit!

Sorenson starts the engine and pulls off, dispersing the photographers who flutter away, pigeonlike for a few feet, then resume their feeding frenzy. She turns on to Alton, then floors it and we tear north. — It’s okay, Lucy, she gurgles, — this story surely can’t have much more legs. Her tone falls ruefully. — If only I hadn’t given them that stupid video clip!

A text comes in on my phone. Valerie.

I saw the news. Lie low. There will be heat .

No fucking shit, tinker tailor soldier!

I feel my teeth rattling together as we shoot past the green hand of the Holocaust Museum, and I look back to see if we’re being pursued. It’s hard to tell; a lot of traffic is ripping by both ways. I get control of myself by venting my anger. — You put yourself on the line and save some motherfucker’s ass and you get treated like a fucking criminal! What kind of a fucking country is this? Is this America? Is this what we’ve become? It’s a fucking freak show!

Sorenson lets me get it off my chest, gently touching my shoulder as she keeps driving.

— I’m sorry, I say, feeling better, — Just had to get that out.

— I know. Don’t worry about it. It must be so stressful.

We drive up to Lena Sorenson’s place on 46th. I try to get Valerie but it goes straight to the ol’ girl’s voicemail. I text her.

You weren’t wrong. Give me a call.

Chez Sorenson is a nice, big detached Spanish colonial house with a pool, which is too small for serious swimming, not that I could conceive of the Sorenson cruise ship docking in that particular berth. Terracotta tiles snake through the home, all the walls whitewashed in gallery emulsion. This shows off numerous paintings and sleek but functional furniture.

She has a rack of CDs and most of them are okay, but there are two Tracy Chapman albums in the collection. A bitch got one Chapman album, that fucker with “Fast Car” on it, you gotta see it as a red flag. She got two Chapman albums, that one plus another, then run for the fucking hills! Too late for that now: I slump back into a leather chair and feel myself being lowered into its guts as I look around the room. My first thought is: no wonder Sorenson spends so much time in Starbucks; decoratively speaking, it’s a home away from home. The best feature, apart from the kickass 70-inch flatscreen TV, is the huge stone fireplace, with two metal buckets, one full of coal, the other logs, and a group of fire irons, including an ax, presumably to pretend-chop the already splintered logs. Fake-assed bitch. She makes some coffee (which I never drink) and tells me that she has an outbuilding which functions as her sort-of-an-artist’s studio. Despite my expressing interest to the point of fascination, she doesn’t offer to show me inside.

The kitchen, however, is a state-of-the-art chamber of self-abuse; the cupboards and big Sub-Zero full of what I call antifood: cookies, candy bars, TV dinners, ice cream, chips, and more soda than you have ever seen. Lena has been cooking up a feast of sugar, salt, fat, and carbs. But nobody, bar her, is eating. — Bakery goods. They are my one weakness, she says, cramming a strawberry-filled donut (450 cal easy) into her face.