Rupert Thomson - The Insult

Loots stood up. ‘I’ll get it.’

I waited until he was sitting down again. ‘One thing occurs to me.’

‘What’s that?’ Loots said.

‘Suppose he doesn’t want to be found?’

‘Well, maybe he doesn’t, but we don’t know that, do we?’ Loots poked at his pickled cabbage with a fork. ‘For all we know, he could be in some kind of trouble …’

Gregory leaned back in his chair.

‘About this Nina,’ he said. ‘What do you mean, it’s a fantasy for her?’

The Relax Motel, early December.

One of Nina’s favourites, the Relax. It had a green neon sign with the name of the motel on it. The first two letters didn’t work: all you could see from the motorway was the word LAX flashing on and off. A few years back, in the forecourt, they had built a swimming-pool. On the black metal fence that surrounded it was a sign that said, GUESTS ONLY. The pool was empty. According to Nina it was always empty, even in the summer; she said the only time it had water in it was when it rained. The place was run by an old woman who had rheumatism. Some days she couldn’t use her hands at all. She couldn’t hold a pen. You had to write out your own bill.

Our room had cheap wood-panelling and cone-shaped orange lampshades, and if you put a coin in the box on the wall, the whole bed started shaking. Nina was lying on her side, one hand under her head, the other in between her thighs. The knot on the blindfold had come loose; it had fallen from her eyes. The curtains drawn behind her. The lights in the room switched off. Like people in the suburbs.

I heard a car pull up down below. A door opened, then another. Two voices arguing. Nina reached for a cigarette and lit it. It began to rain.

I followed the faint light that filtered from the car-park into our room. I noticed how it chose parts of her body, made different arcs out of her shoulder, her hip, her calf, her heel. She looked as though she’d been drawn in mercury.

‘I miss you.’

She turned to look at me. ‘What?’

‘When you’re not there. I miss you.’

‘You’re with me now,’ she said, ‘right next to me …’

‘Am I?’ I rolled on to my back. ‘Am I really?’

‘I told you before. That’s not what we’re about.’

‘What are we about? Tell me again.’

‘This,’ she said, and took my hand and brought it to her breast. I knew it so well already, that curve up to her nipple, and the nipple itself, no bigger than a medal, and pale, but not too pale, the skin there soft and glossy. I watched the side of my thumb as it moved in the gentle, semi-circular patterns I had learned from her.

‘I’ve been lying to you,’ I said.

Her nipple stiffened as I spoke.

‘It’s not lying, exactly. It’s just something I haven’t told you.’ My thumb still moving.

‘I’m not blind.’ I paused, wanting to be clear. ‘Well, I am in the daytime, but not at night. At night I can see.’

She sat up, backed away and leaned against the headboard, staring at me. ‘Why are you telling me this?’ she said.

‘It’s true. The white stick, the dark glasses — I don’t really need them at night. I just carry them around in case I’m out late and it gets light.’.

She laughed, but the laugh cut out suddenly, as if someone had turned the volume on her down to zero.

‘You’re the only person I’ve told,’ I said. ‘Since I left the clinic, I mean. You mustn’t tell anyone else either. Nobody knows —’

‘Stop it, Martin.’

‘What’s wrong? Don’t you believe me?’

She didn’t say anything.

‘It’s just between the two of us,’ I said. ‘It’ll be like talking a language no one understands. It’ll be our secret —’

Suddenly she was pushing both her hands along my thighs.

I looked at her. ‘What are you doing?’

‘I want you to fuck me.’

‘What?’

‘Fuck me.’

What I’d said, had it excited her? Had she understood me after all? I reached out for her. I kissed her neck, her chin. Her mouth. It took a long time because we’d already done it twice. There was a place she had to get to, though; she wouldn’t let me rest till she was there. It was cold in the room and yet the sweat was running down my face. My hand slid across her rib-cage like an ice-cube on a mirror. When we’d finished, the sheets were damp and there was someone banging on the wall. Nina just banged back.

‘Probably those people who were arguing,’ I said.

‘Pricks,’ she said.

She walked into the bathroom and shut the door. I heard the toilet flush. The bed softened suddenly, drew me deep into itself. I closed my eyes.

Outside, the wind took a handful of rain and flung it against the window.

Nina had told me she’d be at the Kosminsky by one, but I knew she wouldn’t turn up before two at the earliest. After she finished work she often had a drink with Candy, who was a dancer at the bar. At two-thirty she still hadn’t arrived. She hadn’t called either. I wondered if she’d got tired and gone straight home. I rang her house. Eight seconds of machine-gun fire, then a beep. She’d been getting some weird phone-calls recently, she’d told me. Men just breathing.

I opened my window and looked out. It was zero degrees, the middle of December. Orange light was bouncing off the low cloud-cover; it hung over the grey buildings in an eerie, artificial dome. I watched the late-night traffic moving past the station, the whisper of car tyres in the slush. The people who sold cheap fur coats and sheepskin gloves had left a long time ago. The fast-food stand on the corner was still open, though: pizza, hot dogs, soft drinks, cigarettes. On an impulse I picked up the phone and asked Victor to call me a taxi. Then I put on a hat and coat and left the room.

The car was outside when I reached the street.

I got in. ‘The Elite. It’s a club.’

The driver said he knew it.

I sat hunched over in the back, chewing my bottom lip. It was strange she hadn’t called. Though I hadn’t seen her for almost a week, I’d spoken to her several times. I’d told her about Sprankel and the black paint, and she’d seemed intrigued. We’d arranged for her to come and see my room. She laughed when I said she’d better bring some matches or a torch.

‘So what’s happening at the Elite tonight?’

The last time Victor called me a taxi, the driver didn’t open his mouth once. I’d been hoping for the same man.

‘My girlfriend works there,’ I said.

‘What’s that?’

‘My girlfriend. She works there.’

The driver nodded. ‘I was up for a job there once. Didn’t get it, though.’

My head ached. I wasn’t in the mood for this. If he said something else, I’d lodge a complaint. For talking? Sure. Why not?

But he didn’t. Not for five minutes, anyway.

Then he said, ‘There’s some nice girls working at that place. Real nice.’

I leaned forwards. ‘What’s your name?’

‘Maximilian. People call me Millie.’

‘I don’t mean to be rude, Millie,’ I said, ‘but would you just shut the fuck up and drive?’

Millie giggled. ‘Anything you say, chief.’

I pressed the backs of my fingers against the cool pane of the window. Nina not showing, it seemed like part of the pattern. That night in the Relax Motel, when I was half-asleep, I’d had an idea. It was a missing persons poster. At the top it said, HAVE YOU SEEN THIS MAN? Underneath there was a big blank space. In fact, most of the poster was blank. There was one line along the bottom: THE INVISIBLE MAN IS MISSING. WHEN HE’S NOT INVISIBLE, HE’S ONE METRE SIXTY-TWO WITH RED HAIR AND A SCAR ON HIS CHIN. I told Loots about it when I saw him next. He thought it was brilliant. He had some posters and leaflets printed, and we spent two nights distributing them in police-stations, at tram-stops, outside shops. Then someone from the radio had picked up on our campaign and broadcasted a series of appeals.