alone.
‘I’m in here!’ I said nervously from the bedroom, as I realized I had failed to get dressed further more than slipping on one of Michael’s T’s. Feeling an emotional wreck, I had needed to be close to him and comfort myself with his smell.
Bounding in the door, Michael pounced on the bed and started mauling me like a puppy. ‘How’s my little heart-breaker? Did she miss me?’ His mood was more effervescent than I was used to.
Brushing his slobber off my face, I wrestled him off me and sat up straight in the bed. Like a disapproving wife I demanded, ‘Where have you been?’ But he just laughed in my face.
‘You look so cute when you’re angry,’ he teased, throwing me one of his winning get-out-of-jail smiles. ‘I bumped into an ole friend on the street. I brought him back for a line … I hope you don’t mind?’ And with that he rebounded out the door back to his ‘friend’ in the living room.
Did he say a
line?
I thought. What does he mean? He’s brought him back to do a line? Of coke? He never mentioned anything to me before about doing drugs.
Unsure how to handle the situation, I sat at the end of the bed trying to gather my wits. Act cool, I told myself. I didn’t have to be forced into anything I wasn’t happy with. After a five-minute pep talk, and two failed attempts to get in contact with Maddie, I rummaged through Michael’s bags, which lay strewn across the bedroom floor and by now had vomited clothes everywhere. Pilfering a clean pair of combat shorts to complete my walk of shame, I checked my appearance in the
en suite
loo’s antique gilt-edged mirror. It had a tiny crack at the bottom left-hand corner, but I did my best to ignore that.
Legs still shiny from the cocoa butter – check. Hair tossed seductively – check. A smear of clear lip gloss – check. I felt good to go.
I was no Kate Moss by any stretch of the imagination, but what I was most worried about was that Michael might be turning into my own real life Pete Doherty.
With an air of confidence I ventured out into the living room doing my best too-cool-for-school rock chick impression.
‘Hey,’ I said as I casually ruffled my hair in the direction of our new friend, who was resting on the floor and hanging over the coffee table that was reflecting Michael. I followed it up with ‘What’s the story?’ But my provocative entrance was ignored.
In my attempt to make eye contact with Michael’s companion I had at first missed what he was doing. Right enough, he was talking about coke, well, I could only presume it was cocaine: he had it piled high in a giant mound in the centre of the table and had already started to chalk up tube lines of the stuff for himself and … ‘Austin,’ exclaimed Michael. He pointed at the guy without looking up.
I positioned myself on the couch after kissing Michael on the back of the neck, and now ‘Austin’ decided to make eye contact with me. In a far from enthusiastic tone he muttered ‘Olright?’ I didn’t exactly feel endeared to the geezer.
Like Michael he had the look of someone creative, with his army-surplus scuzz-duds. He was Robert De Niro in
Taxi Driver
meets Ewan McGregor in
Trainspotting
. And while he pretentiously kept his high-fashion aviators on, I could tell the guy wasn’t just any sham from his Breitling aviation watch. I recognized it from an ad in
Vanity Fair
, endorsed by John Travolta. Very money indeed.
He may have been cute, and I might not have been so bothered if Maddie had been with me to help defuse the situation, but how dare he come into my little fantasy world and disrupt my fun? I had been waiting to meet Michael all my life. I hadn’t waited twenty-nine years to spend an afternoon looking at ‘Austin’ snort coke up his nose.
Concentrating on the job in hand, Michael spent a good five minutes perfecting his queue of white powder, and then nudged me with his elbow to ask, ‘Are you in, beautiful?’
Momentarily, I was stressed
‘I’m in here!’ I said nervously from the bedroom, as I realized I had failed to get dressed further more than slipping on one of Michael’s T’s. Feeling an emotional wreck, I had needed to be close to him and comfort myself with his smell.
Bounding in the door, Michael pounced on the bed and started mauling me like a puppy. ‘How’s my little heart-breaker? Did she miss me?’ His mood was more effervescent than I was used to.
Brushing his slobber off my face, I wrestled him off me and sat up straight in the bed. Like a disapproving wife I demanded, ‘Where have you been?’ But he just laughed in my face.
‘You look so cute when you’re angry,’ he teased, throwing me one of his winning get-out-of-jail smiles. ‘I bumped into an ole friend on the street. I brought him back for a line … I hope you don’t mind?’ And with that he rebounded out the door back to his ‘friend’ in the living room.
Did he say a
line?
I thought. What does he mean? He’s brought him back to do a line? Of coke? He never mentioned anything to me before about doing drugs.
Unsure how to handle the situation, I sat at the end of the bed trying to gather my wits. Act cool, I told myself. I didn’t have to be forced into anything I wasn’t happy with. After a five-minute pep talk, and two failed attempts to get in contact with Maddie, I rummaged through Michael’s bags, which lay strewn across the bedroom floor and by now had vomited clothes everywhere. Pilfering a clean pair of combat shorts to complete my walk of shame, I checked my appearance in the
en suite
loo’s antique gilt-edged mirror. It had a tiny crack at the bottom left-hand corner, but I did my best to ignore that.
Legs still shiny from the cocoa butter – check. Hair tossed seductively – check. A smear of clear lip gloss – check. I felt good to go.
I was no Kate Moss by any stretch of the imagination, but what I was most worried about was that Michael might be turning into my own real life Pete Doherty.
With an air of confidence I ventured out into the living room doing my best too-cool-for-school rock chick impression.
‘Hey,’ I said as I casually ruffled my hair in the direction of our new friend, who was resting on the floor and hanging over the coffee table that was reflecting Michael. I followed it up with ‘What’s the story?’ But my provocative entrance was ignored.
In my attempt to make eye contact with Michael’s companion I had at first missed what he was doing. Right enough, he was talking about coke, well, I could only presume it was cocaine: he had it piled high in a giant mound in the centre of the table and had already started to chalk up tube lines of the stuff for himself and … ‘Austin,’ exclaimed Michael. He pointed at the guy without looking up.
I positioned myself on the couch after kissing Michael on the back of the neck, and now ‘Austin’ decided to make eye contact with me. In a far from enthusiastic tone he muttered ‘Olright?’ I didn’t exactly feel endeared to the geezer.
Like Michael he had the look of someone creative, with his army-surplus scuzz-duds. He was Robert De Niro in
Taxi Driver
meets Ewan McGregor in
Trainspotting
. And while he pretentiously kept his high-fashion aviators on, I could tell the guy wasn’t just any sham from his Breitling aviation watch. I recognized it from an ad in
Vanity Fair
, endorsed by John Travolta. Very money indeed.
He may have been cute, and I might not have been so bothered if Maddie had been with me to help defuse the situation, but how dare he come into my little fantasy world and disrupt my fun? I had been waiting to meet Michael all my life. I hadn’t waited twenty-nine years to spend an afternoon looking at ‘Austin’ snort coke up his nose.
Concentrating on the job in hand, Michael spent a good five minutes perfecting his queue of white powder, and then nudged me with his elbow to ask, ‘Are you in, beautiful?’
Momentarily, I was stressed
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