Confessions from a Health Farm. Timothy Lea

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СКАЧАТЬ She certainly knows how to arrange her sitters. CLICK! I have only just stopped blinking when she burrows into the furs beside me and snuggles close.

      ‘Now, where were we?’ she says. I don’t think she really expects an answer because her hands dive deep down below where my legs become one big happy family and start drawing themselves up and up and – ooooooh!

      ‘The massage is the medium,’ she murmurs.

      ‘Definitively!’ I agree with her.

      The camera clicks and I wonder whether to tell her that she has forgotten to turn it off. I don’t give it a lot of thought because Wanda Zonker has ways of taking your mind off things.

      ‘Is that nice?’ she says.

      ‘Fantastic,’ I say. ‘Do you want me to do it to you?’

      ‘You can’t do it to me,’ she says.

      ‘I know. I mean, something like it.’

      ‘All right. Gently now … gently. Use your fingers like the tip of an artist’s brush … aaaaaargh! That’s better.’

      All the time she is talking her own fingers are doing a spot of hampton courting and I feel that I must express my gratitude in practical terms.

      ‘Aaaah,’ she sighs. ‘That’s heaven. I can see you’re becoming less inhibited already.’

      I don’t say anything because Mum always told me it was rude to speak with your mouth full.

       CHAPTER 2

      ‘Centre spread of Woman Now!’ says Sid sourly. ‘All right for some, I suppose.’

      ‘I believe they did a lot of retouching,’ I say.

      ‘They’d have to, wouldn’t they?’ sneers Sid.

      ‘On the body hues,’ I say. ‘Come on, Sidney. There’s no need to be like that. Just because I was the first British Mr November in the magazine’s history. I had no idea they were going to use the pictures.’

      ‘I can’t see why they did it,’ moans Sid, looking me up and down. ‘There must be hundreds of blokes with better physiques than you. Blokes who have whittled themselves down to a tight knot of whipcord muscle. Blokes like me for instance.’

      ‘I think you may have whittled a bit too far,’ I say. ‘Wanda told me that she daren’t use you in case your dongler got obscured by one of the staple holes.’

      Well, I don’t want to boast but I have never seen Sid in such a state before. He is practically begging me to ring up birds he has not seen for ten years to prove that there is nothing wrong with his equipment. Of course, I made the whole thing up so I just sit back and enjoy myself. It goes to show how some blokes are always worried that another bastard has got a beauty that plays Land Of Hope And Glory while it submerges. I say ‘another’ but I reckon that we are all a bit like that. I know I am. The trouble is that you never see the opposition on the rampage, do you? You don’t know what you’re up against – or rather, what the bird you fancy is, was or has been up against. You see a bit of the placid flaccid when you’re in the changing room at the baths but – unless you lead a very exciting private life – it is not often that a male nasty in full flight skims past your peepholes.

      I know they say in all those books that size does not matter but if I don’t believe it, what chance have you got of convincing a bird? The books have got to say that, haven’t they? I mean, you can’t spell out the brutal facts too bluntly, can you? Some blokes might decide to knot themselves. It seems obvious to me that a whopperchopper is going to turn a bird on like a good pair of top bollocks do a bloke. Anyway, the point is that Sid is reeling on the ropes and things don’t get any better for him when he sees my fan mail. Really! Some of those letters! Talk about ‘come up and see me sometime’. It is more like ‘drop ’em and cop this!’ No finesse at all.

      ‘I am slim, blonde and very adventurous and I would like to make love to you until the cows come home.’ Some of the ones from women don’t mince the monosyllables either.

      ‘Blooming nutcases!’ snorts Sid. ‘Nobody in their right mind would want to be mixed up in anything like that.’

      ‘Just wait till I’ve finished signing these photos,’ I say. ‘Oh dear, I wish I had a shorter name sometimes.’ I raise my hand to my mouth. ‘Sorry! I shouldn’t have said that.’

      ‘Said what?’

      ‘About being short.’

      Sid turns scarlet. ‘Will you belt up! There’s nothing wrong with me, I tell you.’

      Honestly, it is like taking candy from a kid.

      Soon after I have been asked if I will stand as a Liberal candidate, Sid leaps round to Scraggs Lane with his face wreathed in smiles.

      ‘It’s settled!’ he says. ‘Wanda has come to an arrangement with Sir Henry. She’s been after his seat for a long time.’

      This does not come as a complete surprise to me. She did a few funny things when I was with her. Nice but – well – funny.

      ‘I’m very happy for them,’ I say.

      ‘Long Hall,’ says Sid gazing into the distance.

      ‘Was it?’ I say. ‘I suppose she wanted time to be certain.’

      ‘What are you blathering about!?’ says Sid, unpleasantly. ‘I’m talking about Long Hall, Sir Henry’s country seat. We’re going to turn it into Beauty Manor. Don’t you remember anything you’re told?’

      ‘It all comes flooding back, now,’ I say. ‘I’ve been so busy with the modelling that I haven’t had time to keep up. By the way, Sid. When do I get paid for all this?’

      Sid waves his hands in the air as if trying to dry them quickly.

      ‘I don’t know. You’ll have to ask Wanda.’

      ‘But she told me to talk to you about it.’

      Sidney closes his eyes. ‘Look, Timmo. We’ve got a lot on our minds at the moment. This health farm thing could be very big. It needs constant attention. You’ll get your money. I’ve never let you down yet, have I?’

      ‘You’ve never not let me down, Sid. The last time I asked you for some cash you owed me you said “leave it to me, Timmo”. That’s what I’ve been doing all my bleeding life, leaving you money!’

      This kind of argument makes less impression on Sid than a caterpillar stamping on reinforced concrete but at least it ensures that he takes me with him and Wanda when they go down to Long Hall.

      I am quite partial to the country, once you can get to it, and I have a nice game with Wanda seeing who is the first person to spot a cow – it takes us forty miles, and then it is hanging up in the window of a butchers. Sidney is a rotten sport and will not play. I think СКАЧАТЬ