The Unbreakable Trilogy

And towering over all my thoughts Gustav Levi, watching me, always watching me, and not just watching but touching me whenever I think about him, touching me secretly, under my skirt, or presenting me with a silk negligee, asking me to slip it on in the privacy of his house, let it drift down over my body, only for him to lift it right up, find my secret place, and lick me there until I shudder, owning me as he touches and licks and hooks me in with his fingers.

The estate agent throws his papers onto the passenger seat and buckles himself in, starts the engine, takes a call on his mobile.

I wait politely on the doorstep to see him off. The lady of the manor.

When is Gustav going to take me properly, no holds barred? When is he going to take me to bed or lose me forever, as they say in Top Gun? Arms, legs entwined like a normal couple as we move frantically together by candlelight. Is it ever going to happen, or is this always going to be an infernal game? Is he always going to circle me, hackles raised like a wolf, claws primed, but never pouncing? Does he really want me? When is he going to stop treating me like a cheap tart and kiss me?

When am I going to kiss him?

I watch the estate agent crank the car into gear and wave as he bumps and lurches with difficulty along the muddy, pot-holed drive leading back to the coast road. They refused to put tarmac down to make this track easier to negotiate, because they wanted to deter visitors. That’s why visitors rarely came to the house. Even burglars couldn’t be bothered.

I start walking in the opposite direction from where he’s gone, sending up little stones and sprays of still rainwater from under my feet. My phone is silent in my pocket. I texted Gustav as I left Paddington this morning to say I would not be at the gallery because I’d been called down to Devon to wrap up the sale of the house. He hasn’t replied.

I fear he’s angry with me. It’s two days since the private view and he expects me to be resident in his house. The key is here, on my wrist, on the bracelet I can’t get off. Presumably if he’s angry enough he’ll call the deal off, even though the exhibition has been mounted. Always that threat hanging over me like the sword of Damocles. He’s perfectly capable of ripping down all those pictures if I don’t do as he asks. I envisage the gallery space adorned with my work the other night, the throngs of visitors, the fat cheques, the bright publicity, the glossy new clothes, Gustav Levi standing proudly in the shadows, architect of my commercial success.

Then I see a great hand from the sky coming down and snatching it away, feet stamping on it, me out on the streets in my horrible old clothes, the magic spell punctured, little match girl going from door to door with my portfolio.

Fine. I won’t let that happen. So what is it that he’s asking? What will he want me to do once I’m in the house? How can I ever repay him for the exhibition, for the party, for enabling the sale of a quarter of my pictures in the space of an evening? Does he expect me to repay him for the two portrait commissions that came in yesterday morning, along with all the glowing magazine reviews? Do I have to express my gratitude for everything he does, and if so, how? With my mouth? My tongue? My hands? My pussy?

I bunch my fists as I walk. Where did that word come from? That’s Gustav’s fault. It’s what he does to me. He’s made me this way. Obsessed. He makes everything zero in on that one small, closed, wet part of me.

And I’ve earned those commissions. It’s my talent, my work, that they’re commissioning. Not his. He’s given me the platform. I’ve given him the blow-job. I allow myself a wee snigger.

What more is to come? Just a little light petting from time to time? Another thought stabs at me. Perhaps this goes much deeper, whatever happened in his past. Perhaps he’s impotent or something? Is that what went wrong with his marriage? Did his wife mock him for his inability to perform, parade her lovers and her loving in front of him? Am I here to pander to what little he can manage? Is there a great rage in him as a result, which will rear up and hurt me if I don’t please him? Am I to cure him of some awful affliction?

Is that my task, like the miller’s daughter, am I to spin gold out of piles of straw before the exhibition sells out? There’s always a time limit in fairy tales. Will he stamp his foot right through into the bowel of the earth like Rumpelstiltskin if I don’t?

I rush off in the direction I’ve always gone, striding as quickly as I can, almost running through the scrubby rough grass, over the toe-stubbing boulders, the tripping roots. I want to run until I’m out of breath. I want to stop these whirling, confusing thoughts.

I’m high up on the cliff, the sea pounding the rocks below, and here’s the little gate leading down to the beach. Another selling point the sales particulars will have trumpeted. The beach down there happens to be a little private cove belonging to the house. The perfect site for picnics, regattas, fishing, smugglers’ caves, pirates. Games of cricket. Murder mystery weekends.

Yet I don’t have one memory of playing on that beach with them or even sitting or walking there. Not a single sandy sandwich. Not one can of Coke or Mars Bar or apple carried down there in a wicker basket or plastic shopping bag. Not a rug on the sand, or arm bands, not a cold dip in the choppy sea, no-one shrieking with laughter and cold, rushing back over the pebbles to be rubbed briskly dry with a towel.

It was only ever me, or me with Polly on those rare occasions when she visited and the two of us came down here, swimming, smoking, even sleeping in the summer. Once I was a teenager old enough to go off on my own they didn’t care. When Polly was here they’d stand and watch where we went, but when I was alone once I was out of sight I was out of mind. I could have drowned, been dashed against the rocks, and they would never have known.

I hesitate by the gate. There’s a shrill, driving rain now, shrouding the house behind its own veil of mist. I could go down to the beach, but there’s no point. I don’t need to hide any more. In any case I’m not that tomboy scruff any more. I’ve changed. I’m worrying about my clothes. I’m wearing some designer jeans and a white silk blouse nicked from Polly’s rail, my caramel tweed jacket and blue scarf, and the expensive brown boots that appeared in that attic room in Gustav’s house. I feel smart. I’m accustomed to feeling smart these days. I’ve brushed my hair into some sort of discipline and plaited it. Even the estate agent looked impressed.

Well, I’m a woman of means now, aren’t I? There’s the money that came to me when they died, mountains of it, how they would jump up and down gibbering like, well, Rumpelstiltskin if they realised how ignorant they’d been in isolating themselves, isolating me, and not making a proper will. And now there’s the house.

Instead of scrambling down the path I lean over the gate and take a few shots of the Jurassic stone arch, the amputated limb separated from the cliffs by the relentless sea. It stands huge, craggy and alone, perfectly shaped, but it will always be a doorway to nowhere. I’ve taken endless pictures of the same scene from different angles, including from right underneath it when the tide is out, but it’s going to be part of a new project I’m assembling. To symbolise my escape. Doors and windows both locked and unlocked. Open, or jammed shut.

Then I march on. If I have the energy this will take me to the other end of the village, and round to the pub, and the estate agent. Then back to the station and home. Yes, home. To London. To Gustav, if he’ll still have me.

A shortcut will also take me through the field where Jake’s caravan is. I can see it now, parked up in a slightly different place, away from the cliffs and sensibly in the shelter of a hedge.

I could avoid it and retrace my steps but that means going back past the house. I start walking, towards the caravan. No harm in saying hi, is there, if he sees me?

The caravan is even more rusty than I remember, but there are new curtains at the windows. Sprigged, small pink flowers. Girlie. Christ, already he’s come over all domesticated. I get closer, and take a picture of the door. It’s a door into what is really a glorified tin can, but it’s a door nevertheless and once that door represented safety and warmth and fun. For a while.

I can hear music playing inside, and raise my hand to knock, but then a sound stops me. A girl’s voice, a laugh, followed by a squeal. Hands slapping on the big window at the front of the caravan. Of course. What was I thinking? I’m not the only one who’s changed. Jake has company.

I walk round to the window and peer through the curtains. And I see them on the pull-down bed, on the old faded duvet. They must have been in a rush to get down to it, because that’s how Jake always is. His jeans and boxers are halfway down, just enough to free his buttocks before thrusting hard into the girl whose legs, also half clothed, are wrapped around his hips. Chipped stiletto shoes dangle off her feet which are neatly crossed, bouncing up each time he thrusts into her.

I remember the feel of that bottom. Smooth, hairless, the muscles bunching inside like fists. It always felt like an onslaught or a fight. A challenge, to see how hard and how fast he could do it once he’d learned how, sometimes waiting for me to come, more often shouting out as he came first, his hands roving briefly over me, down my sides, over my bottom, prising me open, no finesse but who cared about that? Always I was on my back just like this girl is.

She’s kicking those stilettos off now, bringing her legs down, unhooking her knees and ankles, wriggling like a little fish from under him, and I wish I could tear myself away but I can’t move now. She must be a gymnast or an acrobat because she spins in the air like a cat and although she’s tiny she’s strong enough to push Jake down onto his back. He lifts his hands, waggles them in playful surrender. He hated that with me. He hated me being on top when I tried it. He didn’t like me looking like a cowgirl as he put it, but this one, she’s pushing him down easily, poking one red talon into his chest as if she’s just pressing the button on a jukebox.

I step back so they don’t see me, but not before I’ve managed to take some shots of the shoes dangling lifelessly from her bare feet, her long red fingernails digging into his flesh. Her one red talon overpowering him. I’m a peeping Thomasina.

I can’t help it. I know these shots will amuse me later, when I can get my camera out on the train. I sidle back to the window, and then I realise why he’s letting her sit on top. Because her tits are tiny. They curve up in the air like dough rising in a cake tin, like those childish breasts of those Parisian prostitutes in Gustav’s gallery, each topped with a raspberry.

She leans back so they jiggle pertly in the air. Jake’s hands rest loosely on her hips, and she does all the work, head thrown back, yes, definitely a dancer or something nimble like that, eyes closed, red painted lips hanging open like a porn star.

I move away, leave them to it. He’s over me, as I’m so over him. He deserves to have fun. I leave him with his new girlfriend riding him like a cowgirl in the rainy afternoon and walk on across the muddy field into town.

Now everything’s wrapped up. I’m a wealthy young woman. After the final meeting I shake hands with the estate agent and head towards the station.

‘Well, if it isn’t Annie Leibovitz herself, gracing us with her presence.’

Jake emerges from the newspaper office just as I’m passing. He’s dressed for an assignment. The same leather jacket, packed satchel bag slung round him, notepad and recorder in his hand. No wonder they were in such a hurry to get on with it, earlier on in the caravan.

‘Hi to you too, Jake. Why do you say that?’

I press up against the window of the estate agent to get away from him.

He waves the local newspaper at me. ‘You’re the flavour of the month. Didn’t you know?’

There’s a short piece in the review section raving about the exhibition and a photograph of me at the private view, standing next to the Venetian picture, my head leaning back against the wall, my eyes shining flirtatiously at the camera even though I have no memory of the picture being taken.

‘You’re all over the press. A packed party for your debut exhibition at the Levi Gallery, I gather. What or who did you have to do to get that gig?’

I shake my head. Whatever I say will come out wrong. Especially the truth.

‘Look, I’d be happy for you too, if you got a break in journalism, Jake. Why can’t you just be happy for me? And why is it of such interest to everyone down here, anyway?’

He shakes open the paper and shows me the series of photographs which are part of the exhibition. ‘Because we’re in it! Or at least the cliffs and the beach and the village are. So it’s our story, too.’

‘And I’ve put you on the map.’ I turn and carry on walking towards the station.

‘Five minutes, Serena. For old times’ sake. Surely you’re not too high and mighty to give me five minutes?’ He holds out his recorder like a microphone. ‘How about an interview? Now that you’re a sleb? Local girl makes good. For me, Rena? For the village. Get a few more grockles to spend some money down here, at least.’

‘I don’t owe this place anything.’

‘Swallow your bitterness and think of the commercial gain. You could sell these prints as tasteful postcards. It would be good for everyone. Come on. In here. Over your favourite chocolate icing cream bun.’

He holds open the door of the cafe. The smell of the coffee and the icing sugar is too much to resist. I shrug and push into the cafe in front of him, and we play at being interviewer and interviewee.

‘Are you going to say anything about us in the piece? Any personal titbits?’ I ask him, when we’ve exhausted a very short list of questions and answers. ‘I mean, everyone knows that we were, you know, an item, but my love life is of no interest to anyone nationally.’

Jake pushes back the beanie hat he’s wearing. He’s cut his hair and it’s much too short. It makes him look rough, and mean. Takes away what remained of his cuteness. I’m ashamed of myself for thinking it, for being the high and mighty cow he obviously sees, but I honestly can’t recognise the clear-eyed, eager teenager he used to be.

‘Hmm. What do you think, Serena? Should I give them all the lowdown on our sex life? How we popped each other’s cherries in my caravan? How once I’d popped your cherry, you were like a bitch on heat? How you liked trying it on top?’

‘How you still prefer the missionary position?’

We glare at each other across the chipped Formica table. A few people turn and look at us arguing over the condiments. Over the crumbs of cream bun left on the plate.

What do they see? In headline terms? Handsome, rough-hewn local hack seen arguing with red-head city girl.

‘Still? What do you mean, still? We’re history, remember?’

A week is a very short time in the search for fame and fortune.

‘I saw you. An hour ago. In the caravan with your new tart!’

We gape at each other. The tea urns behind the counter hiss and steam. The small audience props their chins on their hands, turned fully round now to listen.

‘I know the window is extremely grubby, but if you were watching closely, Folkes, you’d have seen that it wasn’t the missionary position after all. She’s very nimble, that one. Very flexible. When she rides me like that I come in seconds. I don’t know what it is, special internal muscles, a technique learned in a Chinese massage parlour, whatever, but she’s always gagging for it, she’s brilliant at making me come. She’s a sexy little thing. So much better than you!’

He jabs his biro at me like a dart, tips his chair forward on its front legs, and I slap him across the face. The silence in the cafe is equally sharp.

‘My God. There’s fire in that belly of yours. You’re not jealous, are you?’ He tips backwards, holding his sore cheek. I can tell he’s trying hard not to yelp with the pain. ‘You’re the one who ran out on me, remember? You’re the one who grew too big for her boots.’

‘I’m the one who dumped you, yes. But that doesn’t mean you can go around saying foul things about me. It’s offensive. You hit a nerve. All that intimate stuff about what I was like in bed!’ I clasp my hands together and shake my head to calm myself down. ‘I shouldn’t have hit you, and I’m sorry. But I’m not jealous. Get that into your head once and for all. I’m happy for you, Jake. You’re a great guy, and she’s a lucky girl. You and me, we’re over. So let’s leave our sex life out of it, OK?’

‘Says the woman who’s been creeping round spying on people!’

‘Write what you like about me! Kiss and tell! There’s no such thing as bad publicity, and sex sells, doesn’t it, however kinky or sad? You know that better than anyone!’ I fire it all back at him, then lay my hands flat on the table between us. Lower my voice. ‘I’ll just have to trust you.’

‘That could be interesting.’ He sticks the biro behind his ear and uses the movement as an excuse to touch his red cheek. ‘There’s always another tack. I could tell my own story, how I rescued you from your abusive parents? How the first time I saw you you were twelve years old, cowering outside the pub, in the rain, while they sat in there drinking like fishes?’

‘Fish.’

‘Or the time I found you sleeping on the beach, covered in bruises?’

I sigh and hold my hands up in exasperation. ‘Perfect! A shameful stick to beat the new talent on the block. Why would you do that?’

‘It’s what they want these days. Misery memoirs. It’ll add to your mystique, Serena. They’ll sit up and take even more notice. And if you want to be really pretentious about it, it’ll explain why so many of your pictures show the archetypal light and shade. Mostly shade.’

‘You have a point, actually, but you haven’t seen the half of them. The ones I took in Venice and Paris, they’re really dark.’ I narrow my eyes at him. Try a different tack. ‘But you are right. You know me better than anyone, Jake. You know what lies behind those photographs. What drives me. I’m trying so hard not to be bitter and poisonous. I had no-one except you and your family to teach me how to be the opposite of them. So you also know how ambitious I am to fly above all that. You did help me, and you did rescue me, but when fate stepped in and took those bastards away, the world turned a little more, and I decided to get off. Please don’t waste your life being angry with me.’

I push my chair back after my little speech. It’s late. It’s getting dark outside. Jake remains slumped in his chair, sweeping his recorder and his other things across the table and into his bag.

‘Show’s over,’ he growls.

The other punters resume their drinking and gossiping.

I step out into the cold street, into the shrill column of air where the sea breeze and the wind from the moors always clash. I’ve been rude and abrasive to my first and only love, but I feel strangely liberated as well. Jake’s a big boy. He can take it.

I wrap my blue scarf more closely around my neck and square up my shoulders to move on.

A leather-clad arm blocks my path.

‘I didn’t mean that. About you being no good at it.’

‘At what? Photography?’

Jake plants himself in front of me. He looks down at the ground and shuffles in the kind of kicked-dog way he has when he’s saying sorry. ‘Sex. I was lashing out just then. Seeing you down here again so soon has thrown me, I guess. You’ve obviously moved on with your new life, your career and all, but I’m not quite there yet. I feel as if we’ve only just said goodbye. Anyway, just want you to know I didn’t mean it about you being selfish in bed.’

I stop and button on my new blue leather gloves. ‘This apology sounds good. I’m listening.’

He looks up sheepishly. ‘I should have told you, bigged you up more at the time, but you were, you are, red hot. Despite the efforts of your family to crush you, you were like those flowers that come up again and again, even on a rock.’

I shake the hair out of my eyes and laugh. ‘Never had you down as a poet, Jake.’

‘Just hear me out!’ He coughs awkwardly, still scuffing boyishly at the kerb. ‘I won’t get the chance to say this again. But you blossomed, Serena, and now you have the body of a goddess. Every inch of you. You were dynamite in the sack. I’ll never forget that, and I’ll never forget you.’ Jake looks up, takes my face in his big hands. Thank God already the gesture feels platonic. ‘Some lucky geezer is going to find that out about you very, very soon.’

Once again I’m on the train. He’s not seeing me off this time. He’s got an article to file. An ex-girlfriend to eulogise. A new girl to get back to, keeping his caravan warm.

And I’ve got a patron to please. He was proud of me at the private view. I know that much. I saw it in his eyes, in the way he introduced me, walked around the room showing off my work, watched me as I stood against the wall remembering that night in the Venetian convent. I’ll tell him all about that when we’re alone together. Every detail. Maybe I’ll even take him back there to Venice, and show him.

When I get back to London he might tell me what he wants. And I’ll do it, whatever it is. I’m desperate to get back to him. He has something he needs to get out of his system, maybe the ex-wife, maybe something else nasty that’s lurking in his woodshed.

The train gets underway, the rumbling tug vibrating through the seat as it pulls us out of the station, out into the countryside, it thrums up my legs, right up into me, making me vibrate in time. I’ll move in tomorrow. I’ll get my stuff, and use this key. And then I’ll set out to please him. How will I do that?

How about I arrange myself on my bed up there in the attic, ask him to bring me up a glass of water or a candle, let him find me stretched out on the bed, the white negligee half on, half off, perhaps pretending to be asleep but my arms stretched wide in welcome, legs a little open too.

He’ll come into the room hesitantly because he’ll be unable to leave. He’ll stand at the end of the bed, breathing heavily as he looks at me. He’ll come closer, and sit beside me on the bed. I’ll feel the mattress give under him. My chest will rise and fall with my breathing; will I be able to conceal the fact that my heart is hammering? My breasts will rise and fall, too. He’ll stretch out a hand and run it over my contours. I’ll be able to feel the electricity in the millimetres dividing us.

The palm of his hand might brush the points poking sharply through the silk, and they will stiffen eagerly. I’ll resist the temptation to smile, or lick my lips. I’ll be the Sleeping Beauty. But inside I’ll be melting.

I watch the countryside rush past, glance at my passengers. One or two are looking at me, but could that be because I’m looking smart today? Lashed by the sea wind and rain, bright eyed from the fresh air, but focused totally on what lies ahead of me in London?

What will Gustav do then? Will he rise and step quietly from the room, leaving me fuming with frustration? Or will he notice the dampness, close his hands over the swell of my breasts, shift nearer on the bed, a tiny fleck of saliva in the corner of his mouth, his face flushed with desire, pulse pummelling in his neck?

In the train I cross my legs, trapping my hand inside my thighs. My newspaper is open on my knee. Another review of my show. Under it I start to lift my skirt, slide my hand underneath as I plot and plan how to bring about Gustav Levi’s downfall.

I will yawn and arch my back, let my arm drop over the bed, push my breasts up higher to be seen. Will he be able to tell that even in pretend sleep I’m aching to be touched?

Shift the tempo of my fantasy. How about if he was already on the bed with me, running his hands down my back, turning me towards him. What if I flipped up, like Jake’s girl in the caravan, surprised him with my agility, pushed him down and straddled him?