Page 33 of (Not) The One
I halt the thought right there before it spirals. We might not have been hanging out at the Fortnum Club, black tie and canapes, but it’s not like he didn’t enjoy himself in that odd little bedroom that would’ve looked at home in a museum.
You’re so tight. You feel like velvet. Every inch of you.
His hand on my breast and his wicked whispers in my ear.
I might not be Giselle, but I wouldn’t swap that night for anything.
8
James
If I wereto arrange a show, using the last week as the central topic, I would entitle itMy Life: The Shitshow.
Ordinarily at this time of the year, business slows. The big spenders have their minds on Mustique, Monaco, Morocco, and any number of foreign climates, the artists themselves recovering from their big day, or evening as the case usually is, at the all-important show. There have been months of pre and post parties, exhibitions attended, much schmoozing, and the shaking of many hands. The preceding months can be exhausting time but also very lucrative, but by August, things are supposed to be winding down.
Art dealers will tell you they’re in the business for the love of art. That they want to nurture new talent and allow it to flourish, to help cultivate and develop it. This, in my experience, is bullshit. Art dealers are mere commodities brokers for the super-rich, and the super-rich aren’t interested in the talent of an artist or the aesthetic value of how the piece will look on their office or their dining room wall. They’re interested in the money aspect. The value of art as an investment.
In a lot of ways, what I do is no different to how a financier works, the focus on the deal and providing assurance and estimates for accrued value looking forward.
It’s not about the art. Not these days.
In essence, this is also how I make my money. My gallery may facilitate the transaction between creator and investor—for a heavy commission, of course—but I also invest in art. Buying today what I know I can sell at a considerable markup tomorrow. And why shouldn’t I? I represent new artists. Finance their work. Provide them with studios and support. I court them, talk shop—themes and concepts, the all-important process, composition andoeuvre. Blah, blah, fucking blah.
I appreciate art, both aesthetically and financially, but apparently, I don’t have an artistic soul. Some would argue—particularly those who either don’t want to sell out to the man, the man being me, or who would give a limb to have me represent them but don’t have what it takes—that I don’t have a soul at all.
To those in my cadre, I’m somewhat of a trinity. The god, a benevolent ruler, the father, the nurturer, and the holy fucking ghost that will rain down such terror should you should it be required. But I’m not all bad. I’ve been known to encourage and fund rehab stints. I spend a considerable amount of time talking individual personalities up when they’re feeling down and talking them down when they’re feeling manic, often preventing them from destroying months of work when the monster under the bed—fear—shows its head.
Which is whereMy Life: The Shitshowkicks in.
On a Tuesday. The Monday-est Tuesday ever where I’d spent much of the evening reasoning with a high-strung twentysomething from Iceland who, if he possessed no talent, wouldn’t be preparing for an exhibition in London in a few short months. That I had every confidence in him—confidence enough for us both. So imagine my surprise the following week when I found he’d defected to one of my rivals.
The fucking ingrate.
Worse, I can’t seem to bring myself to become truly angry about it. Am I losing my edge? I don’t think so. I may be losing my mind, however. Losing my mind over a girl with messy blonde hair and long pale legs. A girl called Miranda.
My concentration is entirely shot, my mind on those decidedly un-fucking brief Batman briefs and the girl wearing them, my thoughts occupied by snapshots of that evening and what could have been if I hadn’t returned home to care for an elderly mutt, then been roped into a call to remind a client in Tokyo that there were consequences for reneging on a deal. A multi-million-pound deal.
Because when I went back to the house later that morning and she wasn’t there, the effect was like a bucket of cold water to the head.And crotch.I fully intended on watching the house for her return when Marjorie reappeared later the same day.
As a consequence, I’ve been a bastard to deal with since, and at a time my staff should be breathing a sigh of relief and looking forward to a break in the madness. So far this week, I’ve bawled out my exhibition manager for failing to elicit the whereabouts of a crate coming in from New York, misplaced by the staff of Heathrow Airport—if it is indeed lost, heads will roll as the artist is already suffering pangs of regret for commercialising his form of street art. I may have also implied the gallery receptionist is a halfwit for not preparing a set of customs declarations in time and also reduced one of the gallery assistants to tears for splashing a little coffee on the floor.Anyone who insists on being referred to as Minty deserves a good bollocking now and again. She’s not a mouthwash, for fuck’s sake, not that Araminta is much of an improvement.
‘Trust fund babies,’ I find myself muttering as I hammer away on my laptop, then hit send. I spread my fingers out on the smooth surface of my Jugendstil desk following the grain in the wood, almost as though the action might ground me as my mind begins to drift again.
The muscles in my abs tense with the memory of her fingers sliding down my chest. Her soft moan plays on a loop in my memory, along with the hitch of her breath as I’d spread her legs. And my God, the taste of her. The way she’d rocked against me. The sound of her fevered cries. It drove me wild, and the fact that I can’t work out how to see her again is making me a nightmare to be around.
Like I care what other people think.
If they have an issue, they can call Maryam in HR.
But there’s an idea, I decide as I pick up my phone. I’m not calling Maryam. I can’t think how she’d help my predicament.
‘Hey, Dad. How are you?’
‘Just the same as I was when you called me at the weekend,’ my father replies mildly.
‘Calling twice in one week is once too much.’ I recite this into the phone slowly as though I’m noting it in my diary. ‘Right. Got it. Good to know.’
‘Ha. Very good,’ he blusters. ‘Anymore and I’ll think I’m heading for God’s waiting room. I have no intentions to pop my clogs just yet—I’ve too much to do.’
