The Bedroom Secrets of the Master Chefs (28 page)

. . . but inside Foy’s office was Shannon, sitting on the desk, looking at him, unbuttoning her blouse. — I’ve been remiss, Brian, I’ve let Danny inspect me but I haven’t given you your turn . . .

— Stop!

He pulled up the duvet and looked at his tentpole erection. Why did it look so robust and taut when the rest of him was so weak, flabby and stricken? He took long deep breaths as he tried to compose himself. He heard Joyce turning in, then Caroline using the bathroom before going to bed.

No black marks . . . no black marks . . .

The minutes dragged and tugged and sleep still wouldn’t come. Images of naked Japanese girls kept intruding into his thoughts.

Muff . . .

He remembered the pamphlet’s advice: make a snack, even if you’re not hungry. The only thing to do was to get up and reheat the Scotch broth. His stomach was full, but he forced more down. However, when he returned to his bedroom, he still found sleep as elusive as ever. He attempted some more prayer but his heart thudded in his chest as he realised his prick was stiffening again.

I mustn’t touch it . . . but they want it, Lucy, Shannon . . . the Jap girls. They want to be fucked but why don’t they want to go with
me
. . . what’s wrong with them? But in here, in my head, I can
make them
want me, but it’s wrong, it’s fucking wrong, it’s evil, Shannon’s my friend, Lucy’s a nice girl . . . Muffy’s a computer icon . . . the Japanese lassies are actresses, playing a role . . . I wonder if the director ever . . . no . . .

He threw aside the duvet and rose again, fetching an old tie from his wardrobe, using it to bind his right hand to the post of his pine bed. And then he put his left hand outside of the bedcover and silently prayed for strength.

The next morning Brian Kibby sat at his desk, miserable, rubbing at a red bracelet of an indentation circling his wrist. He’d tied it far too tight and had cut off the circulation.

That was so stupid and dangerous . . . I could have lost my hand!

Danny Skinner appeared in the open-plan office, emerging from the connecting door to the staircase and the mezzanine floor. As was commensurate with his duties, Skinner was going over the rota for the approaching summer holiday period. He couldn’t remember how many pints he’d had last night, but Kibby’s sweaty, heavy breathing and hunched silence told him that it must have been quite a few. — You’re offski in a couple of weeks then, Brian? he breezily enquired.

— Aye, Kibby said meekly, fighting hard to stop his jaw going into a spasm.

— So where’s it you’re off tae then? Somewhere exotic?

— No sure yet, Kibby mumbled. In fact, he knew that he was going to another
Star Trek
convention, this time in Birmingham, but he didn’t want his workmates, especially Skinner, knowing his business. He was enough of a figure of fun, he thought, as his trembling hand grasped the Volvic bottle, raising it to a set of dry, cracked lips. Ian hadn’t called, hadn’t even returned the messages he’d left on his mobile. He’d not seen him in ages, since Newcastle, in fact. He was certain that he’d run into him at the Birmingham Convention, and they could pick up where they left off.

But in the here and now Brian Kibby felt absolutely terrible. That was the worse thing about this disease, the cruelty of the periods of remission, where you grasped at hope, then this . . .

They were running more tests at the hospital. They kept plugging the same lines: various unidentified and known diseases, psychosomatic depressive illness, a mystery virus. The insinuation of denial (he was a closet drunk), however veiled, never quite left the agenda, but to his mind it was all nonsense, because they were still as clueless now as they were when it all started.

He had been researching obsessively on the Internet, checking out everything from alternative medicines and obscure religious cults to alien possession, in an attempt to gain some insight into his condition. As he sat furtively at his desk, a pounding in his ears, his hands shaking, he heard Skinner’s throaty voice bellow across the office in a loud mockney accent: — I’M ORF TO IBEEFA AGAIN THIS SUMMAH EHND OIM AVIN IT LAWWRRGGG!! And as Kibby turned, he saw Skinner was staring right back at him as he spoke, as if in threat. He clicked off the Internet Explorer quickly, and dragged up an inspection file.

That lunchtime, Kibby made one of his customary visits to
the National Library on George IV Bridge. In his personal attempt to explain the inexplicable, he continued his researches during his breaks in a compulsive, aberrant paranoia.

Scanning the newspapers on microfiche, something came to his attention. He noticed a feature on a woman named Mary McClintock, who had lived with seventeen cats in a minging caravan outside of Tranent until the authorities had intervened and stuck her in a sheltered housing complex. Mary referred to herself as a ‘white witch’ and was considered by some to be an expert on spells. This was all the encouragement Kibby needed and he was moved to obtain a contact number through a girl Shannon knew who worked for the Scotsman Publications in Holyrood.

After work, he set out to Tranent, catching an Eastern Scottish bus from St Andrew’s Square. He found the sheltered housing complex easy enough. Mary McClintock was grossly overweight but her eyes were sparkling and busy, seeming ill-fitting for her heavy, slothful body and pudding head. She wore what appeared to Kibby to be several layers of clothing and yet still seemed to shiver, although it was so hot in the complex that he’d had to remove his jacket and was still sweating uncomfortably.

Mary sat him down and listened to him explain his condition. — It sounds to me like you’ve been cursed, she said in earnest.

Kibby almost wanted to snort his contempt at her, but he held back. After all, nothing else had come close to explaining it. — But how can I be cursed? he entreated. — How . . . that’s silly . . .

— If it’s that silly then you’ll want tae hear nae mair fae me, she said, her head wavering imperiously.

— I can pay, if that’s what you want, Kibby wailed miserably.

Mary looked at him in some outrage. —
Of course
you’ll have to pay, and it’s no money I’m wanting either, son, that’s nae guid tae me at ma age, she explained, her mouth taking on a lecherous twist.

Kibby had seemed to suddenly grow very cold indeed. — What . . . eh . . . I . . .

— You say ye were thin before ye got ill . . .

— Aye . . .

— All prick and ribs, I’ll wager. Would I be right in saying that?

— What . . .? Kibby gasped, his hands gripping the armrests of the chair.

— Dae ye have a nice cock, son? A nice thick cock? Cause that’s what I want up me, Mary said, matter-of-factly. — Then I’ll give ye a detailed consultation.

Kibby stood up, made for the door. — I think, eh, I’ve come to the ehm wrong place, obviously. I’m sorry, he said, exiting in panicky haste from the flat.

As he got into the lobby he heard her voice following him, — You’re a dirty one, ah kin tell!

He pushed through the exit door, desperate to leave the rain-soaked streets of Tranent as soon as was humanly possible.

She’s a nutcase! She’s probably senile!

The rain was teeming down outside as he crushed into a busy bus shelter. A bus stopped soon after but he was too wrecked and nerve-shorn to jostle through the packed bodies to get on to it. He dejectedly trudged out into the cascading wet and flagged down a taxi instead, which took a longer time than he thought to pass the bus, enabling him to board it and get back to Edinburgh.

When he got home he had his tea and sat in wretched silence watching television as Joyce told him about her day. It was terrible. He was miserable, jittery, his head pounding in an ache, the source of which seemed to alternate between each temple, and he could hardly breathe. His nerves were like piano wire. Once he felt rested enough he’d go upstairs to
Harvest Moon
. But it was so dangerous . . .

Muffy . . . I want to fuck her so badly . . . no no no, but at least she’s not real like Lucy and . . . and that horrible old crone today . . . it’s no fair . . . please, no . . .

But a little TV would be nice, a little TV in total silence. But that simple pleasure . . . why can’t she be quiet? Why can’t she ever stop talking?

And Joyce continued, her words drilling through his skull, becoming another source of torment to his weary soul.

— . . . just some record tokens for Caroline’s birthday. I saw a lovely sweater that would have looked great on her, but she likes to buy her own clothes, she can be a proper madam when you try to get her something to wear . . . what do you think, Brian?

— Aye . . .

— . . . or maybe book tokens rather than record tokens. She’s enough CDs anyway and books will be far more useful to her in her studies . . . your father always liked books. What do you think then, Brian, book tokens or record tokens, what do you
really
think?

— I don’t care! Let me watch the telly in peace! Please! Kibby shouted.

Joyce buckled, looking at him like the last solitary puppy of the litter, left in a pet-store window. Kibby’s heart sank as he saw the distress in his mother’s eyes.

The silent impasse was broken by a shattering buzz, which almost caused Brian Kibby to jump out off his skin. Joyce also reacted with a start. Then, glad of the break, she quickly got to her feet to answer the door. When she came back, she had a sweatshirted, parka-clad figure with her. It was Ian.

He’s here to talk about Birmingham.

—
Listen, Joyce said, — I’m just going to pop down the street to see Elspeth and her new baby. I’ll leave you lads to catch up.

— Great, Kibby said, flashing his mother a look of apology at his outburst. — And, Mum, I think the book token is a great idea.

— Right, son, Joyce said, flushed with love. The laddie was ill and she did go on. Never mind, Ian was here and he would cheer the boy up.

Ian and Brian stiffly and tensely looked at each other until they heard the living-room door close followed by the front one slamming shut.

— Ian . . . I . . . Kibby began. Ian waved him down. — Listen to me, Brian, please just listen to what I’ve got to say.

He was so insistent and grave that Brian Kibby could only nod in response.

— Growing up, around here, in a city like this . . . in a place like Scotland . . . it’s not easy for the likes of us.

Kibby thought about his years of lonely isolation at school. Being ignored, shunned or, worse than that, ridiculed and picked on. He nodded in slow agreement.

— It makes it hard to admit things about ourselves. When I saw you down in Newcastle, leaving with that sleazy guy . . . then when I got to the hotel, you were all beat up the next morning . . .

Kibby tried to speak but no words would come from his dry throat.

— . . . I thought, why does Brian have to go with somebody like that? Some dirty animal who doesn’t respect him and slaps him around?

Kibby felt an arresting shiver. His teeth began to chatter. — But . . . I . . .

— . . . when there’s somebody close to him who loves him, who always has . . . Ian moved forward in his seat and Kibby felt the blood drain from his face. — . . . that’s right, Brian, I’ve been doing so much thinking, so much agonising . . . I love you, Brian . . . there, I’ve said it, Ian spat, and looked up at the ceiling. — The heavens haven’t opened, I’ve not been struck by a bolt of lightning. I’ve always loved you. I never knew that you were like me . . . you always went on about girls like Lucy . . . God, every time you mentioned that bitch’s name was a nail in my heart . . . if only you could have told me! There was no need for this elaborate smokescreen, this living a lie!

— No! You’re wrong! Kibby squawked. — There was –

— No, Brian, no more deceit. Can’t you see? For years we were called ‘poofs’or ‘queers’at school by the likes of McGrillen and we’d done nothing! What can they do to us now? What can they do or say that they haven’t already? We can get a flat together –

— No! Kibby screamed.

— You think I worry about your disease? We’ll find a way. I’ll look after you! Ian implored.

— You’re mad! I’m not gay! I’m not!

— This is classic denial! Ian upturned his palms and shook his head. From Kibby’s point of view, his Adam’s apple bobbled monstrously like an alien was about to burst out of his throat. — I know that your mum’s into all that Church stuff and that some elements of Christianity are anti-gay but the Bible provides a lot of contradictory evidence . . .

All Kibby could do was to look his excited friend in the eye and say evenly, — Look, I don’t want to be with you . . . in that way . . .

Ian felt the wind being punched out of his sails. He sat for a second, feeling utterly dejected. Then he looked Kibby up and down witheringly as the bitterness of rejection flooded through him. — So you don’t fancy me, eh? Who the fucking hell do you think you are?
You
don’t fancy
me
? He sprung angrily to his feet and pointed at the mirror above the mantelpiece. — Take a look in that sometime, lardarse. Look in that and see what you are! I was doing you a favour! I’ll see myself out, he pouted in acrimony, then turned on his heels as a shocked and shattered Kibby heard first one, then a second door slam shut.

Shannon’s tied back her hair. It makes her look severe, but not unattractive. I ask her if she fancies a drink after work. She tells me that she’s got an inspection report but that she’ll meet me in the Café Royal about five thirty. I’ve decided that I’m going
to tell her that I think my old man might be an American chef, living in California.

It’s almost six by the time she gets in, and instead of sliding into the booth beside me, she positions herself in a chair opposite. She’s making no effort to remove her jacket. — What are you drinking? I nervously offer.

— Nothing. I’m off home. Alone. It’s over between us, Danny, she says, with that detached but intense, stoical look dumpers always put on. I’m getting used to it.

While I nod in understanding, I can still feel the rancorous bile of rejection burning up my chest and guts, like a cheap, harsh spirit.