www.lawrencegray.net

 As far as Nick could work out, Sheetal was part of a group of Indian financiers who flew between Dubai and Hong Kong, shuffling suitcases of money, bonds, and legal documents around, and salting some away into South African bank accounts for their retirement. So it was his duty to make sure that some of that money was salted away with his bank.

 At least that was the excuse he made for buying himself a suit to match Sheetal’s and join him and the guys in Hotel China’s “Red Bar” staring at the beautiful young models. A friend of Sheetal’s was launching a “Talent Agency” and had hired the Red Bar for an evening of glamour and banal speeches for the benefit of the press. Here were supposed film producers, guys who worked in television in some obscure capacity, and some of Hong Kong’s magazine editors desperate for free copy. Oblivious to the desperately low level audience, the girls danced before them, writhing to the thudding beat.

 Sheetal had opened up a whole new world for Nick, and he felt a sense of purpose beyond ogling under-aged girls jerking about beneath ultra-violet strobe lights. He was there to bond with a major client!

 “They’ll be on their back in a room in Shenzhen within a week,” said Sheetal, gold cufflinks, Jasper Conran Shirt, a suit from Sam The Taylor. “On their back in Shenzhen,” was a reference to the habit of girls getting so-called assignments on the mainland only to find that they had their passports taken away by their “managers” for safe keeping, and then increasing amounts of pressure upon them to sleep with some prominent Chinese clients who supposedly had pull in the mainland’s burgeoning media.

 Sheetal was a connoisseur of models. He had a string of model girlfriends; all of them thinking he would make them rich and famous. The most glamorous thing they did was adorn various “business meetings” while he claimed to arrange photographers and producers who would join their table and ogle them, supposedly auditioning them for parts in movies or advertisement shoots.

 “You can do an awful lot of favours for people without getting anything in return in Hong Kong,” said Sheetal, “Everyone tells you, you have to give a little, build up trust, but don’t believe a word.”

 Whatever Sheetal was, he had a lot of money in the investment funds that Nick ran and was a connoisseur of feminine exploitation. His world was a masculine one with the women firmly there for decoration and bedroom services. Nick quite enjoyed it all.

 Since moving to Hong Kong Nick’s world was expanding but into areas that his wife, Karen, could not move in. He had not realised just how unisex the UK was, how he had met friends and their wives and that their wives could be your friend and even be the prime friend in the relationship. But here, he never went out with couples. The only guy he knew who now regularly went out as a couple was Colin and that was only to watch his wife being shagged by eighteen strangers. Apparently Discovery Bay was notorious for its wife-swapping scene.

 After a few more glasses of whisky, Nick was in full flight, complaining that sex in Hong Kong was all imagined and that everyone was ogling and no-one was touching. This thesis would have been accepted if Sheetal had not snapped his finger and sat a young girl on Nick’s lap.

 “He needs female attention!”

 And Jaz, as she was called, began sticking her tongue in Nick’s ear.

 “But,” he remonstrated, “Will she give me a blow job?”

 “Give him a blow job, Jaz.”

 “Tell him to go fuck himself.” 

“He probably will. But he’d rather you helped him.”

 Jaz, whose perfume was a mix of soy sauce, vodka, coconut oil and Giorgio, and whose physique was tidily sheathed in a pleasantly clingy frock, stood up and yawned.

 “You’re far too boring,” she said, and walked off.

 “There you go,” said Nick. “My point.”

 “She’ll e-mail you later,” said Sheetal, raising his eyebrows. “Trust me.”

 Nick grinned, took another swig of whisky and found the thought very exciting. He imagined himself, one day in the not too distant future, clicking his fingers and commanding girls to sit on his lap. Through a haze of whisky, hot perfume, Thai chicken, and throaty Indian laughter, how he wished he had the easy charisma of a man like Sheetal, how he wished he could be Indian and so free with regards to pleasure. They made no apology for masculine delight in pretty girls and getting drunk and showing off. As it was, he could barely hail a taxi without thinking it an ostentatious demonstration of a lack of taste. He even had to leave Sheetal in the bar, for he had to work the next day, had to be back to stop Karen worrying, had to collapse exhausted into bed, and could barely keep awake any longer. Sheetal appeared to be as fresh as the moment he had arrived.

 Nick staggered onto the streets and tipped Chow, the Concierge one hundred dollars, for ordering him a taxi. A sure sign that he was drunk. The lights of the city rushed past the window of his taxi home; unblinking signs hung above the street, and the traffic weaving in and out of itself, without a horn heard despite the taxi driver’s complaints of the mainland arrivals and their primitive reliance upon the horn.

 “They hit their horn instead their brake!” said the driver.

 Nick smiled the fixed smile of those not quite willing to engage in deep conversation but unwilling to be rude enough to cut it off. And the driver prattled on about the mainlanders and their idiocy and the end of Hong Kong and how the Beijing bandits were raping the place and handing over the whole thing to big business men who pillaged and raped like the Japanese, who were as bad as the Communists.

 “We’re all communist now,” muttered Nick, still overawed by the flashiness of the city with its towering blocks of light poking holes in the black hazy sky.

 Nick felt fragile and wondered if instead of trying to live this high life, he should start a family. Perhaps their vow to start a family in Hong Kong was not the right idea. Here he would be a bachelor. This was the place for bachelors. Everyone was a bachelor, even the married ones. And yet, here was the conundrum, the family ruled! It was a business, the family... His mind could not cope with the complexities of these thoughts so he simplified and tried to think of what he needed to do in order to re-establish the relationship he once had with Karen.

 Though he felt he had a pretty good one, he just did not see her anymore. If he was not working late, he was drinking late. He should give up drink. He should give up Jim, Colin, the whole programme, and Sheetal, especially Sheetal because he wanted to be like him. He wanted to be that big personality, that big enigma, that big wealthy, booming, snapper of fingers, knower of people, schmoozer, life loving, iron livered character. But for the life of him, he could not recall anything about the man other than he was Indian and liked to flash a roll of five hundred dollar bills when paying. How can anyone pay cash in this day and age? This is the age of credit! Rich people do not need to pay anything! And yet Sheetal dealt only in cash, which made Nick a little suspicious of him.

 As he sobered up, the image of the roll of five hundred dollar bills became ridiculous in his mind. Sheetal was not that cool! He sat back in the taxi, eyes closed, and contemplated yet another self-hating tirade. His life in Hong Kong was one of endless pointless conversations with himself and with others. And then there was the airconditioning and the restaurants; and the taxis and the lifts. Monotonous and different and not what he had hoped for, and yet there was all this potential, this dream of flesh, but it was all part of another world that was not quite what he imagined life should be. Now, after such high hopes, he was full of loathing and misery. The boom and bust of alcohol always left him saying never again, until the next opportunity.

 When he arrived home he was annoyed to find Karen in bed. It was not that late. Why did she have to go to bed early when it was him that had to get up early? He tried to talk to her, bursting loudly into the bedroom saying, “Oh I didn’t think you would be home yet. Weren’t you er, out doing something with er, Amanda and all those?” 

Karen roused herself. She had been dreaming. It was three in the morning. Who was this man?

 “I’m the Stalker,” whispered Nick, as he slipped his hand under the duvet they had taken to using in conjunction with the air conditioner. Their maid found it all very strange that Karen insisted on the duvet when in this heat a single sheet should suffice but with the air conditioner on it was far too cold. And with it off, far too hot no matter whether one had a sheet or a duvet. And then Nick was hotter than her and so slept outside the duvet with the airconditioner at full blast.

 “You stink,” muttered Karen.

 “Well thank you,” said Nick. 

“What have you been drinking?”

 “Whisky. I’ve been with Indians. Mainlanders and Japanese for Brandy. Beer for Westerners. Orange juice for Hong Kongers and Whisky for Indians.”

 “You’ve got the whole of Hong Kong society worked out haven’t you?”

 “Completely.”

 Nick quickly pulled off his clothes, brushed his teeth and slipped into the bed. He had been considering either entertaining a long heart to heart with Karen about life, their relationship, a new direction, either that or fuck her silly. He might even have attempted anal, since it was everywhere on the Internet nowadays, and he still had the sensation of Jaz’s fifteen year old tongue in his ear urging him to perform, but somehow the whole situation plummeted into darkness and Karen, on hearing the sudden snoring, returned to her fitful dreams of Temples, Monks, and criminals stealing everything from her, stripping her naked in the process. Later on in the night she wake thinking she was being ravaged by a monkey but no such luck. 

***

 An e-mail arrived on Nick’s computer. Jaz sent him a little smiley and message saying: “Whenever you’re free for lunch…” He wondered what she meant? Probably she was fishing for free lunch. She was how old? Fifteen? Eighteen? She was ripe for it, no doubt. It could only be a come-on for there was nothing else possible.

 Should he take up the offer from Jaz? He imagined her youthful and fertile and despite aspirations towards being a model, she would soon find those easily transformed into being a beautiful decoration on his arm and a handsome mother for children that she would not need to care for because here there would be nannies to deal with all that. And so he would lead the high life, the bachelor life but not quite, the attached life but not quite, the best of both worlds, it would be hoped.

 Jaz was used to being a decoration at the lunch table. At least Nick assumed she was. And when she walked into the restaurant, she was immediately recognised by the Ms Tze, the hotel’s day manager, who also instinctively knew whose table she would be sitting at. The lone businessman was obviously the man a lone Indian girl with exquisite breasts would be dining with. Ms. Tze made a note to herself to extract the long overdue tea money from the girl, just so that everyone knew their place in the scheme of things at Hotel China.

 “If,” Nick asked Jaz, “There had been a lone Chinese guy at one of these tables, do you think the waiter would have brought you to him?”

 “What?”

 “I’m just remarking on how it seemed obvious to the waiter that you were with me.”

 “Did it?”

 “Yes.”

 “Fuck’em I say.”

 Jaz grabbed the menu and began wading through it. The Hotel China’s French restaurant had a first class wine list, so it said on the web site Nick checked before booking a table.

 He went with the lunchtime special but Jaz wanted to pick over the buffet for as much vegetarian stuff that she could eat.

 “Meat ruins your colon.”

 “So, Jaz, Jasmine, tell me about yourself?”

 Jaz grinned. She was dressed down today, in a standard jeans and T-shirt ensemble, with her long black hair swept back behind her rather red ears. She was still attractive though in a girly, teenagery way. He felt like he was her father as he spoke to her.

 “Are you in the media?” she asked him back.

 “No, finance.”

 “Pity. I’m trying to get work modelling you know. Sheetal is a big pig. He promises me everything and never delivers you know. But he’s sweet some times and throws great parties. Everyone dresses up Bollywood style. You should come.”

 “I’ve become a bit alarmed by the prospect of parties in Hong Kong.”

 “It’s not one of those parties! No way. We dance. Do you dance?”

 “I don’t think I do.”

 “You don’t think you do? Don’t be silly. You do or you don’t and if you don’t you should.”

 “You could teach me.”

“I don’t know whether I want to do that. You look a bit of a commitment to me.”

“In what way?”

 “A bit stuffy. Not like Sheetal. Sheetal is a mover.”

 “Maybe you should have gone to lunch with him.”

 “Sheetal is a shit. He told me to go to lunch with you. Thinks you’ll see it as a favour from him. He’s obviously trying to screw you for something.”

 “Why do you do this for Sheetal then?”

 “He’s my father’s brother’s son, so we’re like brother sister almost, only he wants to get in my pants all the time. What a sicko! He’s like some fucking peasant raping his daughters in some Punjabi village somewhere. Yaar, the man is a pervert.”

 With that settled they ate and drank red wine, which Jaz thought was, “Really great stuff!”

 “This restaurant rocks!” she added, “Service is five star and look at the way everything is just perfect in proportion to everything else. Man, this is some restaurant.”

 “Have you been here before?”

 “Why d’you say that?”

 “I thought the manger woman recognised you that’s all and now you’re talking as if you’ve never set foot in the place.”

 “Oh fucking hell, you’re like a policeman. Look, are we going to do this?”

 “Do what?”

 “Hell, look, I get a hundred percent discount bringing people here you know.”

 “You’ve lost me.”

 “I push lots of people here that’s all and you’ll be back. So let’s move on to the next stage. Have you booked a room or do you want me to do it?”

 Nick took a pause to run through what he thought was happening.

 “Hey, you asked me here didn’t you? And it wasn’t to question me about the prospects of property prices since the interest rate hike?”

 “I guess not.”

 “And, it was not to be just friends! I mean, we will never have that much in common. I can never just hang out with you can I now?”

 “No.”

 “So?”

 “I’m a little confused.”

 “I’ll spell it out. You pay for a room. You buy me a present, or cash, if it’s easier…”

 “Er…”

 “Sheetal said you were a virgin. Look, three thousand dollars right, as a little present. We have a bit of fun. A couple of hours. Dancing lessons.”

 “I suppose that’s fine then. OK.”

 It was a not so much that he had made a decision but rather stumbled into one. And prostitutes are discreet and have no come back with the wife. He could see the sense in all this. And she was not a prostitute; she was a relative of Sheetal, with a liking for presents and older men.

 He booked a room for the night, thinking it too uncool to try getting a special afternoon rate, though they would have obliged, so Jaz told him. And they would take cash so that it did not show on his credit card bill. He suddenly became worried.

 “Don’t worry. Just invite your wife for a romantic evening. Spring a surprise on her.”

 Jaz had it all worked out and as soon as they entered their room she had a lot more worked out, immediately giving him a big tongue laden kiss before heading to the bathroom.

 “Now, you get ready. Hide your wallet if you really are paranoid.”

 “I never thought of that.”

 “Well, there are girls you cannot trust.”

 “You are a prostitute aren’t you?”

 “Fuck off! I’m a model and I do a bit of escort duty on the side. Sheetal is subsidising you. Promised me a car.”

 “Oh, that’s different then.”

 “But knowing you guys you’ll be trying out some sleazy hole just for the extra buzz of slumming it and you’ll end up having the shit kicked out of you.”

 She emerged from the bathroom in her g-string and heels.

 “You like?”

 She gave a wiggle and paraded before Nick.

 “For some reason keeping the shoes on does wonders for guys.”

 And Nick had to agree.

 “Now, before we settle down, I want you not to use your fingers. You can touch my breasts, but no where below the waist.”

 “Why?”

 “I don’t know where they’ve been and they have finger nails and I don’t want you to be grabbing me where I can’t fend you off. Now wash your dick, or do you want me to do it?”

 The moment was turning more into a medical inspection than the prelude to some passionate sex. Nick quickly went to the bathroom and took his clothes off, brushed his teeth, and showered and re-emerged still dripping to find her sat on the bed thumbing through one of the shopping catalogues left out for tourists.

 “Shall we get started?”

 Nick tried to get started but nothing was happening and then Jaz took matters into her own hand and began giving a noisy blowjob. It was the noise rather than any sensation that aroused him. He kept trying to think erotic thoughts, how young she was, how beautiful, sexy, and well stacked. She was a little goddess, a little walking karma sutra who he would be, any minute now, fucking in all manner of ways. He thought he would do the full porn film menu.

 This was working for him and she could tell and fell back on the bed, lifting one leg up placing it around the back of her neck.

 “I bet you can’t do that,” she said.

 He was on her instantly, one leg in one hand, another leg in the other, grinding away and all through his mind raced images of him as a heroic warrior, galloping across the planes of America with Custer, or on camel-back taking Aqaba with Lawrence of Arabia. His boyhood dreams of being a great warrior, a great man, somehow rescuing the world, fighting evil, creating Empires, saving the planet, rushed into his mind.

 He did not know why he thought about such things. He also thought them stupid. But somehow they were there in the head of the fourteen-year-old boy he once was when he had no idea that any hero fucked anything at all. Women hung on the arms, decoratively, adoringly, but somehow sex was not in the equation at least not the sleazy, oily, sweaty, drippy thing that he knew it to be.

 And Jaz was dripping. She was squirming like a prehensile squid and gasping as if he had taken her breath away. Maybe he had? And it bothered him that the world was led by men without limit who spent time screwing girls like this in between unspeakable callous acts of cruelty, or even speakable ones seeing the big picture, making the sacrificial decision: ten percent casualties are expected and it is a price we have to pay, they would say, then watch the video of someone having their head sawn off, and get in a quick fuck with a gullible young girl, or perhaps knowing and manipulative, who knows… There was no comfort in this, no sentiment, no loving hearth and home and Horlicks…

 Now for the big one, he thought, now the big pornographic taboo and he removed his dick from the accommodating vagina, well greased, hard as a nails, throbbing and ready to explode at the mere thought of sticking it in her arse hole…”Do the bitch,” he muttered to himself, “Do the fucking bitch…” and as he worked it half in, he exploded and near fainted.

 “Oh fuck!” he said, “Fuck!”

 He lay face down on the bed and could see himself from high up. Lying there, slightly too fat, not quite the most photogenic of postures, with one arm on the beautiful and ravaged Jaz. He was Genghiz Khan indulging in his favourite pass time of fucking the wives of his foes before beheading them.

 Then Nick returned to being nice Nick, the family man who lost the family dream, the slightly sad man, the slightly pathetic man restoring his vitality fucking young whores.

 “Yaar,” said Jaz, “You really needed that. Fuck. You been eating lots of dairy produce or something?”

 Jaz was laughing as she tried to mop up the semen that he managed to spray over her and over the bed.

 “Jesus, man, what have you been eating lately? Buckets of yoghurt?”

 ***

 Rushing in late in the afternoon, Nick did not know whether to feel that he had let the side down, or to just stick his face in everyone else’s and say: “Fuck off you slimy shit. I can have you any time I like!” He rather liked the feeling of power surging through his veins, even if at the same time the e-mails and phone messages from his boss asking where the fuck he was, worried him. What excuse would he make? He decided none and acted as if nothing had happened, or as much as he could act.

 Sheetal phoned.

 “You scallywag. You’re one of the big boys now.”

 “Fuck off!”

 “Hey, is that how you repay me?”

 “I don’t need your charity.”

 “Maybe not any more, but you have to admit you would never have even contemplated it if I hadn’t pushed you a little.”

 “And why did you do that?”

 “Because, now you are a man.”

 “Fuck off!”

 Sheetal laughed.

 “Don’t think I’m going to pay you back.”

 “I would not dream of such a thing. You’re family now. And if you fuck around with Jaz and any harm comes to her...”

 “You sound like a pimp.”

 “Hey, man, come on. Lighten up. She’s a nice girl isn’t she? You look after her and she’ll look after you. That’s all I’m saying. She wants to keep her independence while she tries t work up a career of some sort.”

 “And this is your way of putting her through school?”

 “You’re the one fucking her. You did fuck her?”

 “I would have thought she’d have shown you the video by now.”

 “Come on, we’re not that close. I just put a good word in for you.”

 “And bought her a car.”

 “Fuck, did she say that? I never promised her anything.”

 “Just told her I was a push over.”

 “Yeah, well, I said you were a nice guy who needed smartening up. You’re playing in the big boys playground now so you’ve got be cool. Right?”

 “Is that what this is?”

 “That’s right. You’re on the dark side. This is how men are. This isn’t some cosy English suburb. Here you are out there, fighting and fucking, and having a great time until some cunt takes you down and destroys you.”

 “Then what?”

 “You’re finished man. Just hope you’ve enough money to pay for a retirement home and a little maid from Thailand. Thai girls are so accommodating towards the elderly and deranged.”

 “Better not let anyone take me down then!”

 “That’s right. That’s why we hunt in packs and watch each others’ backs, know what I mean? There’s no law when you operate outside of all borders, in between states, with bank accounts all over the place and nobody to pay tax to. We’re on our own and I’ve yet to work out the downside of this. It’s the way everything should be. It’s the way everything will be. We’re the future, man! No race. No state. No law. No tax. That’s for the peasants, man.”

 That was for the peasants! Of course! Nick had every sympathy for the peasants, essentially being one himself, but there were always peasants no matter what.

 The phone rang again. It was Nick’s boss shouting that he had asked for him to attend a meeting in his office an hour ago and he still had not arrived and he was at a loss to see why he should have all the inconvenience this was causing.  Nick thought how he should respond, whether this was a fuck you I’m not taking this shit, moment, or a simple apology would suffice. He was still a wage slave, still a peasant, but maybe he was only half a peasant.

 ***

 Karen thought it very odd when Nick phoned her and told her to get to Hotel China where he had booked a room for them that night. He made sure there were flowers and champagne in the room when she arrived ahead of him. He also booked in a spa treatment just to make sure she would have no suspicions.

 “It was all very pleasant,” said Karen, but she did not know what the occasion was.

 “I just thought you needed a treat,” said Nick. “I thought you seemed upset.”

 Nick was on dangerous ground and quickly changed the subject by popping the champagne and telling her that they would have a good evening. He was feeling pretty good about Hong Kong now. He had come to terms with it and thought through what the purpose of the place was. He was going to be rich, going to be someone, going to use all the opportunities and contacts to make them a real fortune and to hell with everything else. The look on that concierge’s face when he brought in Karen was priceless. That man, he thought, was jealous! He like that.

 “Obviously, and I think we’ve been touching on this for a while now, but skirting about it: you want a baby.”

 The penny dropped for Karen. She was being seduced into conceiving a baby for Nick. She was almost flattered. And yes, it was the great big elephant that had been in the room for a long time. She also felt that maybe, perhaps, and all manner of uncertainties considered, there was a deep need for a family in their relationship. And yet…

 “I never ever intended to be the little wife,” she blurted out, trying to recall what great career she felt she was giving up following Nick to Hong Kong.

 “Then be my whore!”

 This was a new one on her. Nick had never used that word before and she did not quite know where it came from or what he meant. Unless he just wanted more sex and was going to fling open the door to reveal Colin and his wife and half a dozen others in leather jock straps. There some kind of private joke between Nick and Colin about the use of bolt cutters. She did not like to ask for an explanation.

 “I never wanted to be a wife. That’s all I know. I just married but somehow never really wanted to be a wife. And certainly not a mother.”

 “What does that mean?”

 “I don’t know.”

 And she did not know. She did not want to be a wife, did not want to be a mother, and took no pleasure in manicures and massages and shopping with the girls. Nothing satisfied her and all the time this madness was stalking her, killing whatever it lay its hand on. And out came the tirade. The hatred of everything, the nonsense of being in Hong Kong, the horror of being in the suburbs, and how everyone had brainwashed her, or she had brainwashed herself, or it was her hormones, her genes, her mental instability… She had great ambitions to be… something… a leader… an artist… something… but always something distracted her from her true authentic purpose.

 “Well,” said Nick, “First, we finish the champagne. Then I do you good and proper. And then we find a doctor who will give you a prescription of prozac.”

 “Do me?”

 “Yeah. I’ve decided that I’m just going to fuck you. That’s all. I’m going to throw you on the bed and do you. Because that is all you are fit for. A good fucking. That’s what I’ve paid good money for. And I’m fucking you because that’s what you’re good at.”

 “I think I’d rather watch television.”

 “Oh come on, go with me on this!”

 “You’re trying to get me pregnant. You think that will solve everything?”

 “No. I’m going to cum in your fucking mouth, bitch!”

 Much against Karen’s better judgement, this worked for her. She did not like it, but it excited her and disgusted her, all at the same time. And who this Nick was she did not have a clue, though she wished he had not tried to bend her leg around the back of her head. What the fuck he thought he was trying to do then, she did not know. He had obviously been watching far too much Internet porn. Even so, she found her self thrashing about on the bed and choking as he forced himself into her mouth and on coming up for air she was overwhelmed by the most intense excitement that she had ever felt.

 They lay in the room afterwards flipping TV channels and tucking into room service and the world for both of them, was one.

 “Was that better than prozac?”

 “I don’t know, I’ve never tried prozac.”

 “Is this something we can keep up?”

 “I don’t know.”

 “It requires a whole different way of thinking. It really does. For the first time in my life I saw it all. I saw what was needed if we are to be anything as a couple.”

 “And this was it?”

 “This is just part of it. But it requires you to accept things.”

 “Me to just go along with whatever? Like a dutiful wife?”

 “Like a dutiful wife but an independent operator who is also my dutiful wife. I accept you and what you do, you accept me and what I do, and we watch each others back. We hunt as a team.” 

Karen wanted to hunt. She could understand that idea; hunting as team. She liked that. That was new.

 Nick tucked into a chicken leg and thought how chicken legs taste really good especially after fucking two women in a row in the same bed. What a clever man he was. Suburban Nick was dead. Nick the killer, the man with an eye for the main chance was alive.

 They could hear screams and yells coming from one of the rooms.

 “Go on! Do her!” Karen yelled out and giggled.

 “Yeah,” yelled Nick, “Fuck ‘em all!”

 His mobile rang. It was Sheetal. He had a problem he needed sorting out.

 

THE END