Precious Things (26 page)

Today was their last day, and the magazine had all the shots that were needed. She and Jack found themselves in the hotel lobby, just the two of them, alone, after everyone else had gone upstairs to pack and catch some rest. It was five hours before the whole team was to fly out on the last flight to LaGuardia and she had a meeting with Richard the next day, then on to the next assignment. The bazaar was only a few streets away and Ulrika was itching to visit it. The whole troupe had been breathing each other's air for days now, and Ulrika couldn't bear the thought of missing out on one true experience of her own. She wanted to catch a glimpse of the city on her own terms, without all the chaperones. But when she mentioned it to Jack, he somehow persuaded her to head up to his room instead.

‘Stay here. I'll show you something you won't forget in a hurry,' he said, flashing a wolfish grin. In the elevator she eyed him boldly, and he reached for her waist as soon as the doors slid shut. Despite Jack's cool exterior, his breath came fast and uneven and Ulrika shivered, aware of the effect she was having on him.

When they reached the top floor and the doors opened, they paused for a few seconds. And then their hands were all over each other as they tumbled in through the door of his much larger suite. Jack's fitted shirt was already unbuttoned to his navel, revealing a smooth tanned chest and a small amount of downy blond hair between the shirt's wide lapels. He undid the last few buttons and peeled off his skintight jeans, jumping on the bed.
We really are doing this
, she thought.
It isn't all one-sided: he wants me, too
.

Ulrika slowly lifted her dress above her head and undid the white crocheted bikini she was wearing underneath. Jack settled himself back, naked, against the woven bedhead, hands clasped behind his head. He watched her intently as she moved over to straddle his hips, her long hair brushing against his face. ‘That's right, baby. Give it to me,' he said, running a finger down the centre of her chest. After the excruciating sexual tension of the shoot, a sense of elation stole over her now as she bent down to kiss him, brushing her tiny breasts against his chest with a teasing smile. She felt empowered, beautiful. Even if she wasn't quite sure what to
do
with him now she'd found herself in his bed. Her boldness wavered for a moment, but Jack took charge. It was said he always did.

‘I could eat you whole, you know,' he teased, flipping her over then placing her forearm between his full, wide lips. ‘You're like a little bird. Let me crunch your bones to make my bread.' He pretended to maul her, acting like a wild dog. She felt claimed. Was he like this with all his other women? Jack clawed his way up her body, all tan and sinew covering milk-white limbs. Ulrika arched her hips towards him, feeling that she was pretending. Allowing small moans to escape her, she continued feigning pleasure, giving him what she thought he wanted.

Until Jack took her nipple between his teeth, and bit.

If Jack was surprised by the small smear of blood that stained the bedsheets, he didn't say. Just raised an eyebrow and offered her a fat joint of leaf laced with a pinch of hashish, which the fashion assistant had somehow managed to acquire. Jack drifted off to sleep, but Ulrika
felt strangely wired and awake, only mildly affected by the marijuana, her breast still aching. She slipped off the bed to retrieve her Kenzo prairie dress from the floor, pulling the dusky blue voile over her head and smoothing its creases with her hands. ‘You
are
Kenzo, darling,' the diminutive Japanese designer had told her generously after she'd finished walking in his show. It had come to be one of her favourites – she wore it all the time.

Draping a carpet bag over her shoulder, Ulrika studied herself in the roomy apartment's full-length mirror. The dress fell loosely over her small chest, its voluminous arms riding high above her long thin wrists. Pulling the bodice into place just beneath her ribcage, she rubbed at the centrepiece of thickly clustered beads and sequins resting just beneath her bee-sting breasts, and remembered how she'd first come across it. She'd gotten it from an old gypsy lady, but the whole experience had been so odd, so unsettling . . .

Ulrika had found the decorated piece one day on Portobello Road during the weekend market, rummaging through a pile of tat stacked high on a wobbly trestle table. Her eye had been drawn by its dark glitter, and she had picked it up to admire it, seeing how the beads flickered and gleamed even in the weak morning light. Trying to work out what it was – a large fabric brooch? A collar? – she turned to catch the woman's eye and ask its price, but seconds later the old woman was jabbering at her, clutching at her sleeve.

‘Daughter, is it you?' she cried. Ulrika thought she must be joking and laughed nervously, before realising the woman was serious, tears in her eyes. ‘I – I'm sorry,' Ulrika stammered, backing away. The old woman's companion – a weathered man in his forties or fifties – put out his hand to restrain her. Ulrika recognised him from the evening news; he was a reporter for the BBC. The tall stern fellow put down his notepad with its scratchy shorthand symbols for a moment and bent to pat the old woman on the arm and pour her a cup of tea from his thermos. Ulrika hovered a moment just to see they were all right, and then placed the strangely alluring collar back on the table. She turned to leave, but the old woman shot out a gnarled hand, grabbing her shoulder this time.

‘Keep it. You keep it. You remind me of her,' she told Ulrika, thrusting the piece into her hands, the tears sliding down her face. Ulrika didn't quite know what to say. ‘I give to you.'

‘Thank you,' Ulrika said after a moment, squeezing the old lady's shaking hand. ‘If you're sure.'

At first she didn't want to keep it – the whole experience had been so odd – but later, when her fingers roamed over the silk backing, the dangling ribbons and its shimmering beads, she fell in love with it. Which was why she'd brought it on this trip. And why, in an unexpected moment, she'd added it to her favourite dress, as a kind of frontispiece. She'd pulled it from her bag of tricks along with a needle and thread and sewed it on one day, while the others had been out scouting for locations. She'd felt so pleased when she saw the result. It made an odd pairing, the designer dress with the beaded antique piece trailing its ribbons at each side, but she liked the contrast. It reminded her of Richard's fascination with her. Strange, yet beautiful.

She watched Jack's naked sleeping form, spread out like a star across the king-sized bed, sheets tangled at his feet. The hard knots of muscle in his shoulders rose and fell with each breath, his right pectoral muscle larger than his left from carrying the weighty Leica and its tripod. Padding from the room, Ulrika stooped in the hall to buckle the silver leather sandals jangling loosely at her feet. When she straightened up, the blood rushed from her head and left her, momentarily, light-headed.

Two well-groomed young men on the reception desk stared at her impassively as she swept through the lobby and out of the heavy, stained-glass doors. Ulrika wondered if they were under instructions not to let her leave. But then she told herself she was just being paranoid. No one stopped her as she strode out into the street, a crudely drawn map clutched in her hand.

When she arrived at the busy marketplace, Ulrika was arrested by the sheer vastness of the covered stalls and buildings. The scene shimmered and wavered before her in the intense heat, seemingly hovering out of time and place. Ulrika forgot, for a moment, where she was – transported into another world at the edge of her imagination. Strange music blared from tinny, unseen speakers, further invoking the sense that magic was afoot. For a moment she stopped short, in awe, like a child on her first trip to a carnival. Then, with a sharp intake of breath, she plunged in. The bazaar swallowed her up in its dark maw.

Just inside the entrance, mere steps from the plain light of day, Ulrika watched her skin change colour with the light filtering in through deep red cloth. Despite the soaring heat, it felt shadowy and mystical in here – a bizarre underworld where sights and sounds and smells all melded into one large living, moving organism. Tearing her eyes away from the psychedelic shades of a parasol stall, Ulrika grasped for the crisp wad of notes in her purse, feeling the hard edges of her passport and travel documents. She exchanged the notes with a harried-looking vendor for sweet apple tea and ventured a smile, mouthing the words, ‘
Tesekkür ederim
.' The tall skinny boy served her wordlessly, eyes on stalks as he looked her up and down. He couldn't be much more than fifteen.

Ulrika turned her back on him to scan the bazaar and lifted the gilded cup to her lips. Where to begin? Sweet sellers bustled behind their wares, woven baskets layered with cut nougat and pistachio-studded rose jellies. Nuts roasted and glazed with honey and sesame beckoned, as well as bird's nest thatches sitting densely upon treacle pastries. The thick scent of sweetness and spices made her breath catch in her throat. She was suddenly overwhelmed with hunger but ignored it out of long habit. Glass and wrought-metal chandeliers hung from an open area with a vaulted roof. Sunlight struggled to stream in through the latticed brickwork, catching dust motes in its deep golden rays. The long-chained lamps swung slightly from the ceiling, mesmerising her with their small, circling perambulations.

Using the delicate brass spoon to dissolve the last few sugar crystals, Ulrika felt momentarily energised and drained her cup. The flavour was extraordinary; surely she hadn't tasted anything like it before in her life, so redolent of the heat and summer fruit. Abandoning the empty cup on its saucer to an upturned crate nearby, she wandered past a kebab seller roasting spicy meat on a spit, and delved further into the mass of stalls.

The words of a poem, long ago memorised then forgotten, found their way into her thoughts:
‘We must not look at goblin men, we must not buy their fruits . . .'
How did it go? That's right, she remembered now:
‘Their offers should not charm us, their evil gifts would harm us . . .'

Ulrika found herself in a different part of the market now, where scarves and long shapeless dresses were sold. Men with thick black beards trailed their wives behind them in drab, concealing clothes. As florid bursts of colour and the glint of metallic threads caught her eye, she took one turn, then another, following dreamily from one display to the next.

And then something shifted. The colours of the bazaar turned saturated and strange, her vision blurred. Eyes turned to watch her. The forceful touts took on a nightmarish quality. Accosting her repeatedly, they thrust their wares in her face. Ulrika shrank back. The music grew louder and more insistent in her ears. It led her through the winding walkways. One minute she imagined herself as a dancing dervish; the next, a rodent following hopelessly at the tune's heels. She turned left and then right, losing track of where she'd been. Faster and faster, until she was completely lost in the bazaar's sprawling geography.

And then she realised, faintly, she was the only woman anywhere with her head still exposed. She looked about for any sort of clothing now, head wildly swivelling back and forth. But it was all butchers carving up carcasses, and raw meat on display. Flopping a slab of blue-veined flesh on a counter, one wore an apron covered in bloody symbols she tried to read, containing strange portents . . . All around her seemed death and despair.

Just then her stomach heaved, leaving Ulrika breathless and nauseous. She held out a hand to steady herself against a stone wall, ready to pass out in the boiling heat. Her throat was gluey and raw. Despite her floor-length dress, she felt naked, crawling in her own skin, and finally understood the sheerness of its voile. Thumbing the beads and diamantes at her bodice, she gasped as a loose diamante bit sharply into her skin, catching under a nail.

Panicked now, Ulrika inched her way along a dimly lit path, struggling to find her bearings in the subterranean marketplace.
What was she thinking, coming here?
She felt dangerously alone.