‘Not bad, Byron,’ Charlie said to me.
‘Thanks,’ I said.
Then we stood in silence and waited for the next customers to emerge from the guest change room, which, unlike ours, is a five-star joint. If I know Charlie, we’d be moving on to routine three, maybe followed up by a five. I poured myself a glass of water. My throat was sore from the screaming.
* * *
It was on a night like this that Victoria found me; she was doing freelance photography for a magazine at the time. Or at least, this is what she was paid to do. As far as I could tell, she spent the best part of the evening spying on me, following me around, peering around corners, trying to catch me with her lens. She had an intensely nervous energy about her. Her camera swayed around her neck, bouncing off her chest. A lock of curly brown hair kept popping out from behind her right ear; she’d tuck it back, only to have it pop out a second later. She’d scratch her forearms, the back of her neck; clumsily make some adjustment to her camera. On her hands she wore purple gloves.
As she followed me around, I felt like an endangered animal trying to hide from a tracker. Something about her scared me and I really wasn’t in the mood for talking to a stranger. I’d take all my smoke breaks down the dark alleyway that runs behind the toilets; drop my butts in the drain. During the praise routines I’d try not to make eye contact, and when the end of the evening came, I changed fast, snuck out the back past the garbage in the chained-up courtyard and into the parking lot. Assuming that she’d gone home, and feeling overwhelmed with relief, I rolled myself a fat joint in my car. I shared it with one of the chefs, behind a metal dumpster out of eyeshot.
‘I’m going to lock up,’ he said to me after squashing the roach.
‘OK.’
‘I’m going back in though. So you off into the parking lot?’
‘Ja.’
I stepped into the dusty lot, alone. I was so stoned that my head was vibrating and my eyes stung. I really wanted to go home.
But then there she was, standing alone in the centre of the lot, lit up by the motion detector light. She had her hands behind her back, her hair tucked behind her ears. She looked like a big child.
‘Hey,’ she said.
She raised one of her hands and stepped toward me, then interlaced her fingers and took a step back. Then she held her hands against her chest. Her movements were graceful, I was fascinated by her, but for some reason still wanted to escape. I raised my hand, then looked down at my feet.
‘I’m sorry,’ she said, and started coming closer. She paused five metres away. I looked behind me. The back entrance was locked and there was nowhere for me to go. I was so stoned.
‘I just wanted to. You know. I’m sorry. I just – ’
‘What?’ I said.
‘Can I speak to you for a moment?’
‘OK.’
She walked right up to me and stopped an inch short of my private space. The parking lot was empty, the sky was dark and there was no moon. I looked back down at her and decided that I’d just walk away, but then froze and looked up again. She held her hips to the side, her right foot twirled in the sand. Her body had some strange tension in it, like an elastic twirled around itself. A green blouse, which exposed her upper chest and shoulders, clung sensuously and obediently to her body, revealing an inch of transparent bra strap on her left shoulder. She was fiddling with her fingers again. Her nerves were making me nervous. Or maybe I was making her nervous. All I knew was that the sooner the whole thing ended, the better. Just as I was about to burst past her, she stuck out her hand, and took the final step that closed the gap between us. I looked down at her takkies: black with white toes. Then she stuck out her purple gloved hand, and the material felt smooth on my fingertips and I calmed down for a moment as I held it.
‘Victoria,’ she said.
‘Byron.’
‘Nice to meet you, Byron.’
‘Ja.’
As she started speaking I became transfixed by her wide mouth, home to her wide teeth. Her teeth looked unnaturally white, and her lips unnaturally thin. All her features were angular and chiselled.
‘Are you all right?’ she asked me.
‘Yeah, yeah,’ I said.
I realised I was zoning out.
‘I wanted to ask you something,’ she said.
‘What?’
‘Umm. Well, I’m a photographer, as you can see. But I also am doing art photography. I’m working on a project at the moment. And you would be perfect.’
‘For what?’
‘It’s all about people out of. Well. I can explain another time. Would you mind me photographing you wearing the skins?’
‘When?’
‘You can come to my house. I have a room there. I’ll call you. Can I have your number?’
I couldn’t think of anything to say, and so I gave it to her. Sure enough, the next morning I was awoken by the sound of my phone vibrating on the floor. At first I didn’t know what it was and lay staring at the ceiling for several seconds. I’ve never stuck anything on my walls and so the whiteness of the room shocks me each morning as I wake up, especially if I forget to close the curtains. I leant over and watched my phone move across the chipped floor as it vibrated. I was still hung over and hazy and she wanted me there later that afternoon. More from an inability to think of an excuse than through genuine desire, I agreed to go.
She lived on High Level Road in Sea Point in an old double-storey building. The property was surrounded by a green security fence and I couldn’t remember what number she’d told me to buzz. But someone had left the security gate ajar and so I walked straight up the short path to the lower balcony. She lived on the lower level, I remembered her telling me that. The floor beneath my feet was painted red and was stained dark from all the feet that had passed over it. A thick fern in a pot was thriving like a pubic bush in frigid panties. I got the feeling the sun seldom shone where I stood.
I tried to peer through the stained glass panes in the centre of the first door. But they were grooved and dented and I could see nothing. So I plucked up some courage and rang the bell, hoping it would be her who answered. It was. Her eyes were big, her hair was tied back. I felt like a child who’d stumbled across a strange house in the middle of the woods.
‘Come in,’ she said, and opened the door.
There was a brief one-two, should we, shouldn’t we, a step forward, a step back. She broke the situation by kissing me on the cheek. The entrance way was painted yellow and there was hardly enough space for us both to stand comfortably. Above my head was a stained glass light, and the whole house smelt of clean linen.
‘We’ll be using that one.’ She pointed at a closed door to my immediate left. ‘Just go change quick.’
‘OK.’
I walked through her yellow, shoebox-shaped lounge and into her bathroom. I shut the door behind me and sat down on the toilet. I got undressed and