Passacaglia (the rewrite)

Chapter 4

Bolero

We're sitting in the balcony and the autumn flies attack our plates like the Luftwaffe over London town. Only the mojito pitcher stands unmolested, like a great, sweaty St. Paul's. I haven't touched my fajita and the mojitos might as well be piss for all the rum Theo's put in them. Silhouetted against the setting sun, Fran's miming Alejandro for the troupe of thirty-something queens he calls his Nearest and Dearest, while Gabby, their undisputed doyen, regales me with stories of his sexual exploits in Marrakech.

"Skin as dark as night and an arse like a ripe plum!" he cries, spraying me with spittle.

He lights a cigarillo and I notice the skin on his nose is peeling from sunburn.

Frankly, I'm here for the free booze, so I take the rum bottle and pour until my glass is two parts rum and one mojito. Now I take a sip of my newly-invigorated drink and feel a delicious kick to the taste buds. Much better.

"He squealed with pleasure," Gabby simpers, fussing with his perm, "But the poor bugger was so terrified of getting caught. Now, I don't speak a lick of French, mind, but he kept shouting something about getting arrested." He shrugs, puffing on the cigarillo lodged between perfectly manicured fingers.

"He wouldn't happen to have shouted something along the lines of arretez-vous, would he?"

"Yes!" he coughs, waving a finger in my face. "Yes, that was it!"

"I believe he was asking you to stop, Gabby." Checkmate, you prehistoric bitch.

He goes pale and, for the first time this afternoon, speechless. He raises the cigarillo to his lips, and stares at me with that stupid expression for some time, but then slowly regains his slimy smirk.

"So very clever, aren't you, dear?" He turns his back on me and speaks with his partner Derek instead. Good riddance.

The one new fellow - thick-armed, turtleneck-clad, and deathly reticent for this gaggle of hens - watches me from across the table, unaware that I'm looking straight at through my Ray-Bans. His face is somewhat familiar, but I'm too drunk to care where from, so I light a cigarette and sip from the bastardised mojito. I think I've tapped into something. I close my eyes and sniff at my wrist; the Gucci has cooled considerably, but hints of pepper and sandalwood persist, so I hold the glass under my nostrils too and find the sum heavenly. Rum, lime and peppermint tease amber, ginger and spice from the eau de toilette. Oh, and the tobacco! It's olfactory Elysium and I can only smile at this smallest, but most engrossing, of pleasures.

"What've you been saying to Gabby?"

He's ruined it. I'm not sure when he stopped performing, but Fran is at my side now, sweating and wheezing as he refills his glass.

"Nothing."

I drink faster.

"Good, these, aren't they?"

"Delicious, Frannie, my compliments."

I raise my glass and clink the mouth of his.

"It's so nice to have everyone here," he says, wiping his brow with the back of his hand as he surveys the table. "Even you, Cruella."

"Don't let me keep you from your audience," I reply, smacking his arm away before he ruins my hair with his sweaty paw.

"Shall I do another number? Ooh, I think I will!"

He glugs the mojito, curtsies and then waddles back off to the head of the table. Theo's eye is on me are on me again. I raise my sunglasses to smile at him, but his expression sours, and he goes back to nodding at Gabby. Oh, as if. With a wide yawn, I swat at a fly and then nurse my drink. I think I'll a move for Rebecca's party once I've drained this one. Which reminds me, I'm low on soiree staples, so I do hope Anis and his magic trench coat make an appearance.

Turtleneck has left his seat and I feel him towering at my side now.

"Is this seat taken?" he asks, in a soft-spoken tone that belies his massive build.

"All yours," I say, forcing an amiable grin in his general direction.

He sits and hastily lights a cigarette.

"So I hear you're a fan of the symphony?" he says, fingering his goatee, and I note the white hairs fighting for dominance on his wide chin.

I remember him now, he's a Greater Metro Phil first violin, part of the injection of new blood the ailing orchestra received last year.

"A fan? I'm probably the one subscriber under the age of forty," I scoff and he starts wringing his wrists like a woman. "What are you doing with this sorry bunch, then?"

He grins and refills his glass with the pitcher's watery dregs.

"My Malcolm partner" -he stops and snorts- "I mean my partner, Malcolm, he's a friend of Gabby's." He's breathing heavily and beads of perspiration form at his temples.

"Oh, how unfortunate for you both," I grimace, swirling my drink - doubly so, if this Malcolm is one of Gabby's boys.

He makes this nervous shriek-laugh and then falls silent.

"So you play with the notorious Jackie Klose?" It's is a given, but I can't think of anything else to say, and he's just sitting there with that nervous disposition.

"Yes, do you?" His eyes light up. "Not Jackie, play, I mean?"

"I can play some scales on the old klavier, but that's about it."

"Oh? That's interesting."

"How so?"

"Well, amongst all the white heads in the audience, there's only ever a handful of people your age, and they're all musos. My Malcolm, he's about your age, in fact it's uncanny how alike you... Anyway, he works the foyer bar at Symphony Hall, that's how we met..." He blushes, sips from his drink, and then places it on the table with a jerky slam. "...Where is my mind? The point I was trying to make is that he plays the guitar and writes his own lyrics, but I doubt he's ever stepped foot into Symphony Hall."

"My apologies for the lost generation," I smile, checking my watch. I have to go spruce up. "It seems I'm late for an engagement, mon cher."

"Henry," he says, offering his hand.

"Oh, I'm-"

"Serge," he grins.

Attempting a spot of friendliness, I pat him on the back, and instantly his muscles tense beneath my palm. Is there anything so pathetic as a meek giant? Here's a barrel-chested brute with fists so large he could crush my head between thumb and forefinger, and yet he cowers, constantly on the verge of hyperventilation. What a complete waste of flesh and anima this meek giant is. Nauseated, I down my drink, slur my farewells and go back inside.

"Oh, Serge!" Gabby calls, squeezing his fat paunch through the balcony door.

"Yes?"

"Our mutual friend's called about the pipes again, text you the deets?"

"Please do," I sigh. The deets, indeed.

"Excellent," he grins hungrily, almost a caricature of himself.

Chapter 5

Ego sum abbas Cucaniensis

"They're so fake, you know? The whole lot of them. I have a half a mind to smack that Lusine bitch for the looks she keeps giving me!" Rebecca shouts over the music.

"Dude, Lusine's arse has its own postcode," Melissa mutters, texting away on her massive-screened phone with one hand and passing me the spliff with the other. Her hair's dyed a gaudy shade of violet that makes my eyes hurt, even in this dim light.

Rebecca giggles "You get what I mean, though, right, Serge?"

Caught off-guard, I blurt the first and only thing I recall, "So fake."

"I know, right?"

She freshens my cup from a tall, pricey-looking bottle of vodka, and I glimpse Sarah in the distance, gliding in our direction with a blond, bespectacled fellow.

"Is that Sarah?" I remark, pointing behind Melissa.

The girls' residual queen bee complex compels them both to pivot. I leave them there and - don't mind if I do - take the spliff with me as I duck out through the backdoor. The bass is pounding at full-throttle in the garden, while a couple of lasers throw coloured light about haphazardly. DJ Codeine - Lusine's older brother, Constantine - hops about behind the deck with his hippy girlfriend Alma, who has foregone her bra this evening to great effect. But no one else dances, they all just sit there chatting, or stare blankly at the pool. I've half a mind to spike the punch with some horse ketamine, Lord knows maybe then they'll start doing something.

The smell of barbecuing makes my mouth water as I scour the crowd for Anis, who usually makes an entrance at midnight to ply his overpriced wares, but I'm surrounded by insignificants, punctuated by the odd acquaintance. I happen upon Muller, straw-coloured hair plastered to his forehead beneath a Yankees cap, playing beer pong with the Finnish exchange student. She's a hot little number, with long legs, shapely hips and high cheekbones, but I can never remember her name. I stop to watch them for a while and then a couple of wrist-slicing Creative Writing queers feign interest in the game too. The pimply one with the muffin-top is staring at me in that dead-eyed way that their kind does. I glare at him and the impudent bugger raises his fist to his mouth, making a gesture for fellatio. His friends start to laugh. The Finn only has eyes for Muller. I'm over this. I head back to the pool, where I finally sight Anis in his ratty, off-white trench coat. He's closing a deal with a pair of boys who can't be more than freshers.

"Brother!" he exclaims, spreading his arms.

I hold my breath, let him embrace me briefly, then pull back and resume breathing.

"I see someone's still a handsome devil, ah?" he grins, baring newly-gilded front teeth. He pinches my cheek and I smack his hand away.

"And I smell that someone's still an unwashed wank-rag."          

"Ayo! Fuck up, you fancy bastard," he cackles, his eyes wide as saucers. "So what can I do for you, brother? I got this crazy new Acid from my friend up North, make you forget your mother, this one."

"The prospect is tempting, but not today, mon cher. I'm not in the right state of mind."

"Ah, want to lepak then, is it? Hash? Xanax? Special K?"

"Motherfuck, Anis, how many pockets has that thing got?"

He chuckles and then licks his lips. I notice his foot tapping impatiently.

"Coke?" I decide.

"Can, can. Got coke money?" His voice goes down that customary octave it does when he's discussing business.

"For a quarter, my pongy friend." I lean in and slip the cash into one of his pockets.

He shakes my hand, depositing the plastic baggie in my palm, et voila. He promptly buzzes off, saving me the protracted goodbye this time, and I'm left to ponder where I can find an empty corner.

"Babe!" Sarah calls, and before I know it, she's running towards me, dragging her bemused arm candy along too. She embraces me and plants kisses on both my cheeks. "This is Sigurd, he's from Stockholm," she says, and he puts an arm around her waist.

I know her too well to take this as a random introduction to a friend. She means to make me jealous, but I mean seriously, him? He's a bit taller, certainly bigger than me, but his face is plainer than the backside of a shovel. There's no beauty to be found there, and I know Sarah, because that shared aesthetic gluttony was the main reason our thing lasted for as long as it did.

"Bonne chance," I smile as I take Sigurd's outstretched hand. "I was about to go snort this," I inform them, patting my front pocket, "Care to join?"

He looks altogether miffed, but as expected, Sarah's more than game.

"Let's!" she titters, and we, that is Sigurd and I, follow her to the rear of the pool house.

A leaky water pump has killed off the surrounding grass, and the mud squelches beneath our shoes as we try to find the door. Addio, crimson suede loafers. The inside stinks of damp and the lamps don't work. As my eyes adjust to the moonlit darkness, all I see are stacks of plastic stools, and each with an inexplicable hole in the middle. I wipe the dust off a windowsill with my sleeve, and with Sarah holding her phone above for light, cut lines with my (defunct) American Express card.

Sigurd silently, and rather reluctantly, takes the rolled-up note from my hand. He snorts a line, his face contorts, and I save the day by pushing him away before he sneezes all the coke away.

"Close one," Sarah breathes.

She takes two lines and leans against the wall beside me, while Sigurd goes into a full-blown sneezing fit somewhere in the dark.

I snort the three remaining lines and it's been so long that I savour even the chalky bitterness snaking down the back of my throat. Sarah uses her finger to rub the remainder into her gums, and in this least romantic of circumstances, she then pushes me against the window and starts to kiss me. I don't stop her. Sarah's lips are like down pillows, and she smells exquisite, traces of a jasmine-infused perfume melding with the scent of coconut in her hair. I push my tongue into her mouth and feel at the familiar curves beneath her dress, bite her neck and she twitches as she reaches into my trousers. Her hands are cold, but so very soft, and I've missed them!

The door slams. Sigurd's gone. I'd actually forgotten he was even here. I pull my shirt over my head, ravenous for her touch. She stops and grins.

"What?" I ask her.

"So tan, babe, I love you like this."

She licks at my chest, then my stomach, and works her way downward, leaving a cold trail of moisture that sends chills up my spine.

"Well, what're you waiting for?" she whispers once she's past my navel.

I pull my shorts down.

"What, indeed," I croak.

She wraps her lips around me and her warmth becomes mine.

Chapter 6

Fantasque

The second noise complaint comes at around three, by which time a bunch of us have locked ourselves in Rebecca's bedroom - sans the annoying bitch herself, of course - to snort some shitty coke Connie Nazarian managed to score. I keep staring at the sinister pink ceramic cat resting atop the television. It's a piggy bank I think, and it stares back at me like it thinks it fucking knows something. It's giving me rancid vibes and I want to throw out the window. Ugh!

Once every nose in the room is powdered, Connie suggests we loot what provisions we can find and head to the Concordia Stadium construction site, which is apparently sick as at this time of night. Coked up as we all are, it sounds like a smashing idea, so Sarah, Melissa and I raid the kitchen, while he and Alma bring the van around. I find a gigantic plastic rubbish bag and Sarah throws whatever we can find in it. This amounts to four pecan pie-scented candles, two bottles of dessert wine and a packet of salted peanuts. Eager to contribute, Melissa unearths a family-size can of tuna, for which I tell her we'll need a can opener, but she tells me to trust her and chucks it into the bag anyway.

We pile into Connie and Alma's van and take off, with the music so loud that there's no need for conversation. At the corner of the street, Sarah spots Muller and the Finn, who've apparently gotten lost, so we take them along too, adding a dime bag and a half-bottle of Jack Daniel to our hoard. No sooner have their bums touched vinyl, than they start a sloppy snog session in the backseat. Alma waves an arm outside the window to the beat of the music, and in blissful tones, warns Connie to stick to the suburbs, lest we be stopped by traffic cops. The track segues into a trance remix of something I've heard before, Melissa and Sarah very loudly start to sing along: No one's gonna take my soul away / I'm living like Jim Morrison. Oh, shut up.

Though my watch testifies it took all of twenty minutes, the journey felt interminable, and I'm actually gladdened by the sight of the chain-link fence. Alma throws what I recognise as Rebecca's Power Puff Girls comforter over the top, and Muller gives us each a leg up, before joining us himself. He's not much of a talker, well not tonight anyway, since his lips are securely locked onto the Finn's the whole way up the concrete bleachers. Soile, that's what he said she was called at some point.

Meanwhile, I assure Sarah that I've performed a thorough spider inspection of the area. She believes me, and we lie head-to-head on a bleacher. Construction stopped here before they got round to finishing the roof, so I occupy myself by playing a game of stellar connect-the-dots. Sarah keeps asking if I can make this or that constellation out. I say no a couple of times, but then give up and say yes just to shut her up. I'd forgotten how frustratingly loquacious she can be when she's off her face.

Melissa has requisitioned Soile's dime bag and is silently rolling spliffs on the row above us. Last summer, Melissa bought a pack of cigarettes in Langkawi with so gruesome a warning picture that it scared her into quitting them altogether. Only ganja, dude! What she didn't foresee was that she would start going through joints like jelly beans, her body quenching its nicotine thirst from what little tobacco was rolled into them. Luckily for us, she's had the fastest fingers this side of Kingston ever since.

Melissa distributes the fatties now, one for each "couple" and, citing roller's privilege, one to herself. I ignite mine, pass the lighter up to Sarah, and tune in to the vast stillness around us. The gentle autumn breeze, the echo of the cicadas' song rising and mingling... With Soile's moans of pleasure. I look towards the direction of the sound and see her slowly writhing in Muller's lap, about a half-dozen rows above us, with his Kiss baseball cap bobbing on her head. He catches me looking, but he isn't angry. Far from it, he grins proudly and then shifts her to block me out of view.

"Dude." Melissa whispers, and she points me to Sarah's stomach with her eyes.

There's a spider, ever so tiny, crawling up her abdomen. I put a finger to my lips, so Melissa won't raise the alarm and then ever so gently swat it away.

Sarah jerks.

"What was that? I felt something, oh my God, oh my God, I felt something!" she cries.

"Must've been a spider," I say, struggling to keep a straight face.

"Oh my God, Serge, you promised!" she cries, jumping to her feet and shaking about furiously.

She flicks her hair up and smacks Melissa in the face, causing the latter to drop her joint. Melissa gets on her knees and starts feeling the ground for it.

"Sarah! He's kidding, chill out, dude," she says.

"No, no, no, oh my God, I can feel it crawling on my skin, I can feel it!"

"Dude, tell her!"

"It was a joke Sarah," I say, holding her arms still, "Evidently in bad taste. I'm sorry."

"Oh my God, you are such a dick, Serge."She breaks from my grip and sits next to Melissa with her arms folded, twitching all the while.

"Chill, dude, chill," Melissa says, reigniting the joint.

Chapter 7

Intermezzo interrotto

I wake to the sounds of vintage cartoons and the distant drone of a vacuum cleaner. No sooner do I open my eyes than I see that fugly cat leering at me again - Rebecca's room. The curtains are drawn. I haven't an inkling what time it is and I can't really feel my left arm. I find Sarah's drooling all over it in her sleep, while Melissa's purple mane is on my right. My head's pounding, the minutest tilt of it torture, so painful my eyes could water. Could, should, but I'm so dehydrated, so much that my tongue is fused to the roof of my mouth. I lift the quilt and find we're all naked. Marvellous. Gently, I ease my arm from under Sarah's head and peer at my watch. It's nearly five. I slowly climb over the foot of the bed and stagger towards a bottle of beer I spy next to the television, half-expecting the mirage to melt away before I've reached it.

"What time is it, dude?" Melissa yawns.

"Five," I reply, once the beer has liberated my tongue.

"AM?"

"PM."

I fail to recall where I left my clothes. Hell, I fail to recall how I managed to get back over that chain-link fence last night, let alone into Rebecca's bed with these two. It's one big blank.

"Shit, I've missed my quiz," she murmurs, squinting at my derriere as though her schedule were printed there.

"Where's my shirt?" I ask, struggling to put my briefs on without falling over.

"How should I know?" She takes a half-smoked spliff from the ashtray beside her.

I open Rebecca's closet in the hopes of finding something passably unisex. I settle for a sky-blue tracksuit jacket with Dat Ass inscribed in rhinestones on the back.

"Do you reckon she'd mind?" I ask.

She exhales the smoke she's been holding in and rolls her eyes. "She has like three outfits she can still squeeze into, dude." She offers the spliff roach-first. "I doubt she'll miss it."

I take it from her fingers. Two puffs and the battle ceases to rage in my head, the third quenches my nicotine jive, and with the fourth I'm downright spiffy.

"Take care of her, will you?" I say, wiping the drool off Sarah's cheek.

"Did you see the look on her face last night? I swear, the girl thinks your cock's the cure for cancer," she says and then breaks into a raspy chuckle. "Speaking of, dude, I love what you've done with the lawn. Trezz chic and ooh la la. Do that yourself, or?"

I pass back the spliff and stare at the television. Elmer Fudd is on another futile search for wabbits. The cat's still staring.

"Seriously though, shit or get off the toilet Serge-icle. She pretty much smacked the eyebrows off Rebecca the other day for even suggesting that you were bent. I was just like dude."

I look at Sarah again, sleeping peacefully in a mess of golden curls. Briefly, I envision waking up next to such a confection every morning. Sunshine releasing sweet scent from her every crevice, silky breath and simpering whispers, mischief. Surely it wouldn't be half-bad, but how long before one's teeth start rot?

"I have to go to work," I say.

Melissa said her piece, she doesn't care anymore. She lights the spliff back up and plays with Sarah's curls. In typical fashion, when I've got my gear and I'm out the door, she calls after me and asks, "Dude, you still got that tuna?"