How To Lose Weight And Alienate People. Ollie Quain

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СКАЧАТЬ on his set. This does not bother him in the slightest; he’s thrilled to be part of the environment. For me this would be like meeting someone for a drink at Shoreditch House who enjoyed full membership all year round, whilst you were still waiting for your application to be processed and approved. Which I am. Small acorns have grown into large oaks since I’ve been on their sodding waiting list. Roughly, twice a year I get to the top and am offered a contract, but I can’t afford the fee because I will have just spent/be planning to spend an eye-watering amount of euros at the Ibiza opening/closing parties. So, I go back to the bottom.

      ‘Are you hyped for Saturday night, then?’ asks Luke, as he puts his knife and fork together and pushes his plate away. He hasn’t eaten all his potatoes.

      ‘That depends on what we’re doing.’

      ‘We’re celebrating your birthday.’

      ‘Yeah, I know. But how?’

      ‘It’s a surprise,’ says Luke, then he winks at Monday. ‘Isn’t it, little mate?’

      Monday blinks at him and kneads the carpet with his two pristinely white front paws.

      ‘A surprise …’ I repeat.

      ‘Yeah, a surprise!’

      ‘Putting an inflection on the end of the word doesn’t make it sound more appealing.’

      ‘Everyone likes surprises,’ Luke argues.

      Not me. I don’t even put my MP3 player on ‘shuffle’. In fact, I like surprises even less than birthdays. Combined? No, thanks.

      ‘I’d prefer to know where we are going, Luke.’

      His face crumples slightly but he pulls it back. ‘And the award for most ungrateful reaction to the news that someone has gone to the trouble of organising a nice treat goes to … Vivian Ward! Jesus, you can be such a witch sometimes. You’ll have a great time, I promise, not that you deserve it,’ he says, and pulls off his T-shirt over his head. ‘Now, I suggest you make some amends by getting your kit off.’

      ‘Why is that?’

      ‘Because I want to have some of that really bad nookie we’re so good at.’ He reaches into his pocket, fishes out a condom and Frisbees it into my lap.

      ‘Ok-aaaaay.’ I pick up the sealed plastic pouch faux-wearily and shove the trunk with my foot to get the leftover potatoes out of my line of vision. One of them has a large blob of mayonnaise next to it. ‘But please, let’s make sure it is a whole different level of unsatisfactory this time. Dull, perfunctory humping only. Do you mind if we have the TV on in the background?’

      ‘Nope, we’ll switch it on when we’ve finished … then we’ve got something to look forward to,’ says Luke, dexterously unbuckling his belt and jeans with his left hand. With the right he throws his T-shirt towards the doorway where it drops on Monday’s head, making him look like a furry-legged ghost. ‘Sorry, little mate, this is not for your eyes.’

      I wriggle out of my skinny-leg trousers, which are almost identical to the ones that arrived today, and lie back on the sofa. ‘Let’s press on. Try to keep it under five minutes, yeah? Then we can actually enjoy what’s left of the evening.’

      ‘Got it.’ His jeans come off.

      And then so are we. No awkwardness, no hesitation, no more admittedly fairly laboured sarcastic build-up, which I am well aware is only funny if you are us, just no-holds-barred, relentless shagging accompanied by some slightly feral grabbing, licking, sucking, biting and maybe a bit of light (non-scab forming) scratching. This is certainly not the Calvin Klein approved, black-and-white lurve-making that goes on in advertisement for Eternity. It’s full-on fucking; the purely-for-pleasure stuff my mother would warn me against as a child. Corinthians Chapter 6 Verse 18; Flee fornication. Every sin that a man doeth is without the body; but he that committeth fornication sinneth against his own body. There is no gentle whispering or delicate contemplation, just ecstatic yowling and frenzied gulps for breath. It’s been like this since the moment I met Luke; one knock-out session after another. The sort you might want to record for posterity … so on occasion, we have. When I watch the footage back, I am always amused – and rather impressed – by the assorted surfaces we manage to utilise.

      Tonight, we end up on the new island unit in the kitchen, possibly the most uncomfortable material in the flat – no, Europe – but Luke likes it. Probably so he can give me a knowing smile whenever Adele is using it to assemble one of her authentic ethnic dishes, as if to say, We both know it’s not just cumin seeds that have been pummelled up there … It’s good. Really good … and when it’s over, we stay sprawled on the granite, the endorphins that are pelting round our bodies easing the pain in Luke’s spine and my cruciate ligaments. That’s when I look across at him – his unkempt hair in an (entirely unintentionally) sexy mess – and at that very moment I think about what a nice addition he is to my life right now.

      Then I look over to the fridge and stare at the photograph stuck to the refrigerator of Adele and James grinning manically as they cradle an orphaned baby orang-utan in the Bornean rainforest. It reminds me that I must must must remember to remove her stone-coloured Max Mara tank top from its dry-cleaning cellophane, unpin the yellow ticket from the care label and replace it in her wardrobe. Ditto her LnA white V-neck tee. And grey Equipment shirt. (Adele’s closet is a haven of high-quality basics that I like to borrow – without asking – on a regular basis.) I also need to sweep up the fag butts on the patio, buy some Pantene shampoo and conditioner to put in the shower so she doesn’t think I’ve been caning her Aveda Colour Conserve, and then I need t—

      ‘Vivian?’

      ‘Mmmm?’ I twist to face Luke. ‘Christ!’ His eyes are one centimetre away from mine. ‘You gave me a shock.’

      ‘Sorry.’ He pulls back a little awkwardly. ‘I was figuring out whether I should talk to you about something. Something quite … serious.’

      ‘Serious? Like what? You’ve acquired an STD …’

      ‘Ha! No, nothing like that.’

      ‘You’ve got a wife back home in Australia and she drives a “yoot”…’ I smile.

      ‘I don’t.’

      ‘You’ve been to prison?’

      ‘Would that be a turn-on?’

      ‘Possibly, if it was an act of selflessness that got you sent down – like Wentworth Miller in Prison Break. But if it was manslaught—’

      He interrupts me. ‘What are your feelings about reproduction?’

      ‘Reprod …’ I tail off.

      ‘… uction. Reproduction.’ He visibly relaxes as he says the word a second time and stares directly at me.

      I tense and look away. ‘The heavy wooden French furniture, you mean?’

      ‘Not that, Vivian. Human reproduction, as in the creation of another being. It’s something that I’ve been meaning to get your thoughts on for a while,’ he says, as if he were casually requesting my opinion on which actor has been the most convincing James Bond. ‘Well, not a СКАЧАТЬ