I turned back into the room, and there was Madonna, stripped to her pants, the briefest thong. There was something unpleasant about her mouth. She was angry; I had pushed her away. Nobody pushed Madonna away. Her nostrils were slightly flared, sulky.
‘You see? I told you not to answer it.’ She came towards me, golden-brown, nimble as a spider with her two bobbing breasts.
‘This is not a good idea,’ I said, feebly. ‘You’re a beautiful girl, but I — Alexandra —’
‘Wasn’t she always unfaithful to you?’
‘No. Not always. Oh. Oh. Oh that’s so nice. Please don’t, I mustn’t…
For the next five hours I didn’t think of Alexandra. I’m ashamed to admit it, but it’s true. I shot the bolt on the door to upstairs, I shot the bolt on the door to memory. I sealed the decision with a lot more whisky. We took some coke that Madonna had in her bag; she said it would make sex even better. Perhaps she was right, for it was wonderful. I hadn’t been with a woman with a body like that since too long ago for me to remember (I couldn’t bear to, for the woman was Alex, Alex before we both grew old). She knew exactly how to make an old man happy; she knew exactly how to make any man happy.
I was laughably happy, with the whisky as well, and as we floated together on the golden river I realised how I missed excess; I couldn’t remember when I’d last got drunk, I’d been leading a life of awful moderation, seeing things grimly as they were; drink gave me the wisdom to know all this; I explained it to Madonna, who laughed a lot, she laughed a lot, we laughed a lot, we drank some more, we were suddenly silent.
‘Let’s use,’ she said. ‘Do you want to use? If we live together, we can use a lot. Let’s take some more coke and use.’
We took some more coke. We switched on the machines. She had brought her own goggles, earphones, dreamsoles. We were naked but covered with machinery. ‘Let’s go to Chile,’ she said. ‘I’ve never been to Chile. I’ve got it in my bag. They say it’s fantastic.’
We materialised in virtual space. She made herself slightly smaller than me, slightly smaller than she was in fact. I made myself younger, but she complained, so I gave myself grey hair again. We decided to start in Santiago.
The telephone rang; I ignored it. It rang and rang. I didn’t care. I was going to Santiago with Madonna, it was summer in the middle of the last century, there was snow on the Andes above the city, fruit on Santa Lucia’s vines, warm wine shining in cafe windows. Our figures walked down the street hand-in-hand, I had escaped into a different world where no one was in pain or lonely. The phone stopped. It started again.
‘Shall I go and switch it off?’ Madonna mouthed, for we were listening to Andean music that was being played in a little bar, poignant flutes and shimmering strings; in a moment we would go inside.
It was my decision, but I said nothing, and she went and switched the telephone off.
I had made my decision by saying nothing. Now time began to have no meaning; it happens when you use a lot, especially when you’re using with someone else; we wandered around Santiago for hours, it was magical, perfect in every detail, the posters on the walls, exquisitely shabby, peeling in delicate sunfaded colours, the shadows of the houses, which actually moved as the programmed sun moved in the sky — everything was there which had ever been there, except, of course, that the doors didn’t open to most of the private houses, so we could only go into cafes or churches, and the churches seemed lifeless, I don’t know why.
‘But we don’t need other people, do we?’ said Madonna, and on screen a small Madonna kissed me. ‘That’s what I like, not knowing anyone. So we can escape. We can really be free.’
(Had I thought the same thing, a lifetime ago? I didn’t know; it didn’t matter; the coke and the whisky said here and now, the Globesweep game said there and then…)
I had fallen asleep. I dimly remember Madonna pushing me into bed, a glimpse of her face looking hard in the lamplight, but she curled beside me, and we slept like the dead, the punishing sleep of the used-up user, a dark tunnel in which phones rang and rang forever in the echoing distance.
I was woken up by a woman screaming. Before I could remember anything a shrieking harridan was upon me, dragging open curtains, dragging off bedclothes. Becky was there. Becky was crying.
‘What are you doing?’ my daughter yelled. ‘You disgusting, disgraceful, immoral old man. I’ve had Alexandra on the phone. She’s been trying to reach you since yesterday. She sounded dreadful. I was sorry for her. And here you are with this —’Words failed her. ‘This tramp. This dirty creature.’
Only one thing in the room was reaclass="underline" Becky, hanging on to the edge of my bed, Becky, her round face blotchy with crying, reaching out her hand to touch her grandpa. Becky, frightened by us grown-up people.
I tried to sit up. I was a hundred years old. ‘I’m ill,’ I said, and lay down again. Madonna was dressing, swiftly, silently. Susy was throwing open windows as if the place had had the plague. Suddenly she turned on Madonna and grabbed her by the shoulders. Madonna was taller and stronger than her. Susy shook her like a rat. Becky stopped snuffling and screamed, an acute high sound of extreme terror. Susy let go and picked up her daughter.
Madonna was gathering her things. She ignored Susy and spoke to me. Susy carried Becky out into the garden.
‘You’ll feel bad today. We did a lot of coke. I’ve left some ketamine in the bathroom. Take plenty. By teatime you’ll feel fine. I’m flying to New York at six this evening. Meet me at five at Heathrow airport. Come away with me. We’ll never come back.’
Unmadeup, Madonna looked girlish and lovely. It was real, last night had really happened. Her kiss was sweeter for not being scented. She looked at me as though she loved me and left, a slim figure but curved like a dancer, the wonder of that youthful body — and she was prepared to grow heavy for me. She would let her belly grow big for me.
Yet something was wrong. I saw Alex’s face. White and tired, and those scruffy gym-shoes.
I lay in bed not listening to Susy, who had run back inside when she heard the door close, furious to miss the chance of battle. As a girl she had been sweet and slow –
I turned my head and the whole world rolled, and a terrible anxiety gripped my stomach. I spoke quickly to stifle it.
‘I might be going away for a bit. To think things out, you know…’
‘With Madonna, or with Alexandra?’
I didn’t answer. I couldn’t answer.
‘What shall I say to Alexandra? I’ll say you’ve gone away for a while, but you’ll almost certainly be back, you’re planning to be back before she dies, you’re only going for a holiday… that was the line you spun to us.’
I lay there wincing at the light. ‘Go away please, I have to get dressed.’
I didn’t want Susy to see me naked. But perhaps she already had.
The Special K worked in a curious way. It wiped out the headache with a suffocating ice-pack that turned your whole brain to hard-trodden snow. It didn’t hurt, but it was dead. Like that, I functioned, got dressed, cleaned up. Like that I began to pack my bags. Like that I picked up the phone to ring Paris. The phone lines sang with frozen wind. She spoke to me from the bottom of an iceberg, vastly diminished, a tiny doll.