Chapter 2 - Alli

10

At about the time Ken and I started working in Wembley Colin, an associate I’d known through the building trade, took over two nightclubs in Soho. He asked me whether I’d like to run them for him. I’d been thinking of moving away from Ken, and this seemed to be the ideal opportunity to branch into my own domains. I phoned Yusuf, a Pakistani I’d met while trying to drum up business for the company. He ran a health shop in Cricklewood, and I first entered his shop offering expert monthly accounting. He’d laughed and said there was nothing I could teach a Pakistani about creative accounting, and countered by offering his skills to invest my money in his shop and the under-counter trading that he managed. He and I become close friends; he had the contacts to make the joints a success, and, more importantly he possessed a tongue so skilled in bullshit that I could see money flowing into the future plans which littered my head. We’ll be equal partners, I told him, and I could hear him flicking through his numbers. He needed a few days to think it over, he said, phone around and check out the scene. I knew he wouldn’t refuse. Two days later he accepted, and then I accepted, and I took Azurra to inspect the new additions to my business empire; one of them was near Soho Square, a long corridor with a stage the size of a large table used for Jazz sessions; the other, larger, spreading to two floors being used as a meeting place for fetishists, on those nights when it was not performing as a glorified brothel, was a mile up Oxford Street in a small road lined with clothes’ designer’s studios. Upon reflection that was the reason I accepted, my dick stirred by the mannequins who paraded through the street, their lean bones crying out to be fucked.

-Wow! Azurra exclaimed as Colin showed us around. This is going to be great. Can I be a bartender? Can I?

-You can be whatever you want, I replied. That was the reply I made as we lay together the first night of our marriage. We lay silent, not touching, separated, me by the fear that she would rebuff me, and her, well, that she will answer herself. I lay listening to the sounds of the party downstairs, trying to fade them out, have just Azurra’s breathing hold me. That summer I spent chasing her, following her through the London streets, chasing that shadow which never fully revealed itself to me, driven on by the light that rose in the depths of her eyes whenever I stood in front of her. Yet, on this night, which, as I climbed the stairs to what, my cousins had confidently told me - go to work on that babe, they winked - would be the best of my life, I was like a board. Even the Elder whispered that this night would lay the foundations for the future; how you play, he told me, will shape the mistress into clay, play her right, play her like I have done with mine, look for the struts and pull them tight, tune them true to the feel, the nail, the lip. I walked past the advice. I wanted this woman, had wanted to enter her so completely that I was willing to take on her skin and look out through her eyes. This was the woman who’d watered my lust, had greened herself into my heart until all that could be heard in my pulse was the song of her, the breath of a nightingale unforced by the thorn. Yet, breathing with her rhythm, rising with her rise, falling with her fall I could not move. She hardly breathed, I was suffocating. The day’s length was heavy on me, and I knew the weight on her pressed greater. I felt tired. I knew she was as tired as I was. The day had been long. And the sight of her weeping as she left her father’s house left me depressed. Nothing I said on the journey back seemed to console her. Her sister tried to comfort her, but even that failed. I knew she was close to her father; I saw that every time I went back to her house; it was obvious she was his favourite, his words, his eyes painting her, building her into the woman I could not keep away from. I had taken that picture, had seen her step out from it. I thought my eyes contained the light to allow her to continue growing. Yet here we were, silent, unmoving. Between was the echo of her father, the shadow of his voice. When I made to touch her arm, sliding my hand slowly to her side, she flinched. I ached. I waited. My cock stretched, arced painful. I lay silent waiting for her breathing to lighten. Then I told her:

-Let’s get out of here. We can climb down from this window.

-You’re mad, she whispered moving slightly into the trench created by my body. They’ll see us. They expect us to stay here all night.

-And they’ll check the sheets for blood in the morning, I laughed.

-No!

I sensed her stiffen and said, I’m joking. But we need to get away from this noise. I need some silence.

-Go to sleep then.

-I can’t, and I need to show you something.

-I’ve seen dicks before, she retorted.

I said nothing.

-I’m sorry, she whispered then turned her head towards me her eyes bright coals. Your father frightens me, she said. He’s not like mine.

I knew what she meant. They were not from the same tree. I knew problems lay ahead but I pushed the thought aside. Will you come with me? I whispered.

Her hand gripped mine. You won’t let him hurt me? Promise! I want to grow with you but I need my own space. I don’t want him colouring my space. Promise! Her voice was urgent and I knew my father’s public mask had not deceived her.

I snaked my arms around her waist. I was going to show you Rochester castle, I said losing myself in her perfume. That’s where I wanted to take you. The most beautiful building you can imagine, especially at night, and especially tonight. It’s full moon, I explained and she moved closer. My arms will be like its walls, I continued warming to my theme, warming to her heat. The space within is all yours. I’ll try to keep the weathers away, keep you dry. You can be whatever you want and I’ll keep you within me.

Keep me, she said swooping to kiss me. Show me the castle.

We dressed and slipped from the house. I remembered the glow in her eyes that night and that same glow was there now as we stood with Colin surveying this new kingdom whose gates he was now opening.

-Can I? She looked from me to him and back. That same light, yet much more intense, sparked in those moments after we lay panting, having explored every crevice, licked every orifice and penetrated all of the twenty-one erogenous centres. I looked from her to Colin.

-You can do whatever you want, he assured her, laughing at her excitement. All I want is to stay in Portsmouth, receive my weekly cheques from Indy, and, generally, just stay out of the way. You two do whatever you think fit.

Colin was an engineer by trade, had made some serious money in the building trade, and now lived on Hayling Island in a house that looked across the bay, its garden touching the beach, and connecting him with the rest of England. His recently acquired wife, a golden haired woman in her forties, cared for his needs and he seldom had to step outside his house. But here he was, the lure of money bright on his stooped shoulders, his white head spun gold by the lights. He’d acquired, well to be accurate he’d been sold, the venture into the nightclub business as a sure-fire return. Just put in the proper management and the right publicity, they told him, and he could look forward to expanding his ailing building projects, those architectures he himself had designed and now stood unfinished monuments – he was eager to cap the buildings, to open new plans, follow new lines. The clubs would be the road leading to the end of his dreaming.

-Look after them, Indy. Appoint new staff, keep the same sods if you must. But, he looked me in the eye, make these buggers pay. You run them, fill them. Call me every week. Tell me how good they’re doing.

So Azurra and I found ourselves the willing curators, for that was the only word to describe our position, of two nightclubs.

After work we drove from her office to Soho Square where, it seemed, after endlessly circling the park, we eventually pulled into a parking space, and then walked hand in hand to the first, Coolie Brown's. We’d inspect the bar, go down into the cellar, check the stock and the state of the kitchens and then accompanied by the manager, a Polish man that Yusuf had appointed, go to the other and make sure everything was in readiness for the night ahead.

We always stayed at the larger, Little John's, where I stood at the door, welcomed the guests while she served behind the bar, held court among the bottles; I had never seen her so happy, her face radiant as she chatted and filled and refilled the punters’ glasses. Even at the door I could hear her cockney voice chiding the men who tried to chat her up - I knew she would never be unfaithful. She was the charm that kept them coming back to the bar, kept the till busy and Colin happy. It was her infectious laugh, the easy manner that drew the men to her, the way she moved, those ‘dog’ eyes that kept the tills ticking over.

We enjoyed ourselves, the tiredness as we drove home in the early morning quickly shed at the prospect of the next evening. We slept deep, bodies curled about and walled within each other. The noise of the day was left at the door.