novel

The Past in the Present – 24 December 2000 – 6.55PM

Soul Destruction - Diary of a London Call Girl

I managed to get rid of Lorna. She went to her place then she’s going to score before the party tonight. I’m back in my hotel suite alone. I’ve got the syringe that I’m not sure is Lorna’s or mine in my hand. My belt is wrapped around my arm just above the elbow. A thick vein is bulging. I push in the needle. I pull back the plunger. The blood swirls up to meet the liquid in the barrel. I push in and deliver half the hit.

I’m being careful. Although I still want to die, I’ve decided I can’t do it. I can’t leave my sisters and my brother without me. I can’t be that selfish. I don’t see the point in living. What can life hold for a hooker who can’t work? It’s not about the money. It’s about doing something I’m good at, the only thing I’m good at, the only thing I know. It makes me feel like shit but it’s also my reason for being. It’s who I am. If I’m not a call girl, what the fuck am I? Who the fuck am I? Some twenty-five year old abused child who can’t deal with life.

I lie on the bed. The room feels like it’s getting lower. My eyelids are closing. I open them again, but they fall once more. I can see the babysitters. They’re standing around me. I’m in the bath. The bath in the house we lived in when my dad was still there. He’s gone though. He left a few months ago. That’s when mum started leaving me with these people. She didn’t know they were paedophiles. I know she didn’t. She wouldn’t have reacted like she did when she eventually found out what they’d done.

“I want to go to my room,” I tell them.

There’s four or five or six of them. All men apart from one woman. She holds out a towel. She picks me up out the bath. I’m standing naked in front of them. She lays the towel on the floor. She lays me on it.

“Stop! Stop!” I’m sobbing. I need the rest of my hit. I feel like I’m seven years old again. I don’t want to see this. I don’t want to watch another rerun of this fucking memory. I can feel their hands on me. The evil cunts! I want them off me. I want to kill them. When they get out of jail, maybe I will kill them. Unless some other inmates kill them while they’re in there. I want their throats slit. And hers. She wasn’t there often. But she was kind to me when she was. As an adult, I can see she was their accomplice. But at the time, I thought she cared for me. The fucking bitch. What an idiot. I thought she liked me. I thought she was a good person.

I pick up the syringe from the bedside table. I know I shouldn’t take the hit yet. I’ve too much heroin in my system already. This could be dangerous. But what else can I do? I can’t watch this anymore. Eyes open, eyes closed, it doesn’t make a difference. It’s all I can see. Me lying on that towel. I’m really small. They look really big. No one was looking after me. Someone should have been looking after me.

Holding the syringe upright, I flick out the air bubbles. I put the belt back into place around my arm. I slip the needle into the vein on the inside of my elbow. I pull back. The blood flows through to the pink mixture in the barrel. I push in hard.

Friendly Warning – 24 December 2000 – 2PM

Soul Destruction - Diary of a London Call Girl

Me and Lorna have been at the beach, drinking vodka, since this morning. We’ve positioned ourselves a few feet away from the sea. I like it here. I like being with my new friend, even if she didn’t care to call an ambulance for me. I understand why. She’s being lovely looking after me today. As well as treating me to breakfast, she bought me a sandwich for lunch. I rarely eat once a day, let alone twice. I’m surprised she eats so much, being as thin as she is. But I do have a suspicion she doesn’t keep it all down.

I’m trying to listen more carefully to what she says. I find it hard to listen to anyone fully. I always have other thoughts swimming in my head. They don’t stop when people are talking to me. If anything, they get louder, fighting for my attention. I’ve already upset Lorna by getting some of what she’s told me wrong. I don’t want to do it again. She worked in the brothel for two months, I remind myself. She had a termination at sixteen, I repeat in my head. I don’t know where I got two years in the brothel and the termination at seventeen from. I’d find it offensive too if someone wasn’t listening to me properly.

I’ve been looking out for Mickey, but he’s not here. I wonder if I will get to see him again. Although I’m happy here, I can’t wait to leave. I can’t stop thinking about getting back to my hotel suite. When I get back, I can take the hit I stashed in my toiletry bag this morning. Because Lorna doesn’t know I have it, I’ll need to get rid of her for a while so I can take it. Not knowing whether the syringe is dirty isn’t going to stop me. I can’t hold out until Lorna scores tonight. I need my fix too badly to wait. I’ll be getting myself checked out at a clinic either way. So it doesn’t really make a difference whatever I do.

I’m not going to overdose again. I’ve made a decision. My thoughts aren’t facts. That’s what Dr Fielding says. Just because I think I want to die, it doesn’t mean I do. I think that’s what she means. I’m going to take the hit in two goes to be safe. After nearly overdosing on the shot last night, and being that they are the same strength – which they would be having been drawn up from the same mixture – I need to be careful.

Lorna throws back her head, taking a swig from the bottle of coke that we premixed with vodka. “I think I’ll need a sleep before the party tonight.”

“Me too. I might go back to the hotel in a bit.” I hope she doesn’t want to come with me.

“Wait here.” Lorna staggers towards the sea. She looks as drunk as I feel.

I stay lying on my Betty Boop towel. I watch her sway along the shoreline. The sun’s bright in my eyes. I put on my Ray-Bans. She’s talking to someone. They walk into the sea together. It’s a man. She’s holding his arm, probably for balance. I think he looks like Mickey. I’m not sure. They’re not that near. I can’t see clearly enough.

I’m feeling dizzy but I stand up. I want to know if it’s him. I still can’t tell. Should I go over and see? No, I’ll embarrass myself. Mickey didn’t turn up to see me here last time. He’s not interested in me. I can’t have him reject me a third time. And I’m drunk. It’s best I stay here. I sit back down on my towel.

Lorna and the man walk to the shore. It is Mickey. He’s looking over at me. I wave. He waves back at me. I don’t have much make up on today. In fact, after going into the sea a few times, and covering myself in oil, I probably don’t have any make up on. I change position, lying on my stomach with my head in the direction of the promenade. I’m not looking at him now. I don’t want him to see me. Not today. Not the day after I tried to kill myself. Not drunk. And not with no make up on.

After a while, with my face buried in the towel, I hear Lorna say, “How do you know Mickey?”

I sit up. She’s standing in front of me, shielding my body from the sun. “I met him the other day…here.”

“He’s no good.” She rests her hands on her hips. “Stay away from him.”

Avoidance – 24 December 2000 – 10.40AM

Soul Destruction - Diary of a London Call Girl

On a side street not far from the beach, me and Lorna are having breakfast. I’m not in a talkative mood. I’m feeling guilty. It was a selfish act I committed. Even though I failed, someone like me shouldn’t think about that, let alone do it.

However useless I feel, Milly needs me after what she’s been through. I was a mother to her for most of her life. I should be there for her now. I might only be her older sister but she needs more than that from me. So do Enda and Susie. They’re all used to getting more than that from me. I was a better mother to them when I was seven years old than I have been recently. How did I do it back then? Where did I find the strength? I need to get that part of me back.

I pick at my toast. I feel full up. I’ve managed to eat two fried eggs and that’s good for me. That’s a day’s worth of food. More than a day’s worth really. Most days I don’t eat this much. Not that I want to be as thin as I am, I’m just not hungry.

Lorna’s a strange type of heroin addict – not that I know many. Like me, Shelley didn’t eat much either. But Lorna’s been shovelling her fry up into her mouth as if the waitress is about to return and whisk her plate back to the kitchen. Two fried eggs, two rashers of bacon, two sausages, fried tomatoes, mushrooms, baked beans, chips and toast. I feel sick watching her.

“How are you feeling? Lorna speaks with her mouth full.

“Okay.” I nibble a slice of toast. I don’t want to talk about me. “What was it like working in a brothel?” I ask. That’s one kind of working I’ve never done. I went from streetwalker at fifteen to call girl within a two-year period and without stopping off at any other level in between.

“I don’t know really. I only did it for a couple of months.” Lorna talks to the table. It looks like she’s directing her words to a dirty napkin.

I thought she said she worked there for a couple of years the other night. I take a sip of tea. “Is it safer? Were you ever raped?”

“I’ll be back in minute.” Lorna slides across the bench. She walks to the other side of the cafe, towards the toilets.

She’s as thin as I am. I don’t know if other people can tell that we’re junkies. Perhaps only other junkies can tell that. Lorna doesn’t look clean. She looks dirty. I wonder if I look as much of a dirty junky as she does. I shower every day and put make up on. I try to hide it. But my skin gives it away, to other junkies I’m sure – the spots all over my face and the red marks on my arms where the abscesses were lanced.

I consider what to do with the other hit when I get back to the Radisson. Part of me knows I’m going to end up taking the shot. The needle might be used, but then again, it might not. I could have used Lorna’s syringe last night. Who am I fooling? I know I’m going to take the hit. The more I think about it, the more I know it. There’s no way I can dispose of heroin anywhere else other than my veins. Whatever I do, I’ll need to get tested at a clinic anyway.

I think of the times I’ve waited three months for an HIV test after being raped. All those times. When I was a streetwalker, being raped was a regular occurrence. It’s only happened a handful of times since I’ve been a call girl. There’s never any point in reporting it to the police. On the streets, you don’t know who’s raped you. And as a call girl, the police would never take a hooker’s word over the word of a barrister, a premier league footballer, a film director or any other client. It’s a harsh fact but it’s the truth.

It’s a miracle I don’t already have HIV, even before I started working. But then I guess paedophiles are less likely to have it. The sick fucks. At least they’re in jail. At least I got justice. It wasn’t as much as I wanted, but it was more than Shelley got. Her stepdad wasn’t convicted. If I catch something now, it’ll be my own fault. Using Lorna’s needle was my choice, my action. Maybe I could throw out the other syringe when I get back to the hotel. Maybe not.

“Sorry I was so long. I’m constipated from the gear. Do you get that?” Lorna sits back down on the bench opposite me. Her breath smells of vomit.

I pick up my mug of tea. “Yes, I do,” I reply. Then I pick up our previous conversation. “So is it safer working in a brothel?”

“I told you, I don’t know. I only worked there for two months.”

“The other night, you said you worked there for two years.”

“No, I didn’t. You don’t listen properly.” Lorna shuffles across the bench. She stands up. “Are you done? I need a drink. Let’s get some vodka on the way to the beach.”