Rhino What You Did Last Summer Read online

  I’m like, ‘Casino? You’re already getting in the mood for Vegas, then.’

  He goes, ‘I’m after watching it eight times, amn’t I, Buckets?’

  ‘Eight times?’ I go.

  He’s there, ‘You wouldn’t exist out here if it wasn’t for me. Without me, personally, every motherfucker would have a piece of your Jew ass.’

  ‘Maybe you should make this the last time you watch it?’ I go, suddenly sounding like what I actually am, which is his father. ‘Ro, I’ve got something I want to talk to you about. Don’t worry, it’s not bad. It’s more… focked up. The thing is, you know Erika?’

  He’s there, ‘Er, yeah.’

  ‘Of course you do – you really like her, don’t you?’

  He’s there, ‘I love Erika,’ and there’s me forgetting how well they hit it off.

  ‘Actually, that’s probably going to make this a lot easier,’ I go. ‘The thing is, it turns out she’s kind of your auntie?’

  ‘Me auntie?’

  ‘And it’s his fault, in case you’re trying to work it out – your focking hero.’

  ‘Me grandda?’

  ‘Exactly. He had a fling with her mother in the – whatever – old days. So the way it’s set up now, she’s, like, my sister?’

  His reaction, I have to say, takes me by total surprise. ‘That’s great,’ he goes, genuinely delighted.

  I’m there, ‘I mean, I know it’s embarrassing – we’re some family, aren’t we?’

  ‘It’s great,’ he goes. ‘Here, get off the line, Rosser – I want to ring her.’

  Talk about a conversation stopper. ‘You ever read any Philip Roth?’

  It’s, like, where the fock does Trevion dig up these birds for me?

  ‘American Pastoral?’ she goes. ‘Zuckerman Unbound? Any of those?’

  ‘No,’ I go, not having a bog what she’s talking about, but at the same time trying to look intelligent? Talking to birds is a bit like doing the oral Irish.

  She’s there, ‘So who have you read?’ actually wanting me to name books.

  What I should say is, ‘None – I’m still sexually active,’ but I don’t. Instead, I end up subtly changing the subject. ‘Aisha,’ I go, taking a whack of my appletini. ‘That’s a nice name – I presume it’s after, like, the country?’

  Birds named after countries always have chips on their shoulders. Birds named after months of the year have huge bazambas. Birds named after colours never wax their bikini lines.

  ‘Country?’ she goes. ‘No, it’s, like, the Stevie Wonder song? “Isn’t She Lovely”?’

  I shrug. In fairness, she is lovely, despite the attitude she’s giving me. She actually looks a bit like Abbie Cornish.

  We’re in, like, Lola’s in West Hollywood, this bor where they do, like, a hundred different martinis. Mine are all going straight to my head and I know deep down that I shouldn’t be drinking them so fast.

  Hindsight, blahdy blahdy blah.

  Aisha asks me if I’ll mind her bag – which is something I hate, by the way – because she’s just spotted Maniche, who’s supposed to be her sister’s sobriety coach. Off she focks and, whatever, the two of them end up having what would have to be described as a heated exchange up at the bar which lasts, like, an hour?

  Of course, bored off my tits – and this is going to sound bad? – I end up having a root through her Bottega Veneta knot clutch, looking for johnnies, if I’m being honest, because she’s already mentioned that she has a kid and I don’t want to end up paying vagimoney to a third bird for the rest of my actual life.

  There’s the usual shit in there – lotions, potions and mixed emotions. Then a picture of a little baby – presumably Coco, as in the daughter she’s been banging on about? She looks about Honor’s age. I wonder has she got any English yet?

  But there’s no zepps, roysh, although I do manage to find a packet of what are called Milktests. If you’ve never heard of them before, roysh, they’re basically little breathalysers to tell birds who’ve had a few Bartons when it’s safe to, like, breastfeed again?

  I whip one out, open the little plastic package that it comes in, then give it a blow. The little strip changes colour and I check it against the code that comes with the instructions. It looks like Cardamom Yellow to me, which means I shouldn’t breastfeed for, like, eight hours.

  So what happens next is there’s a crew at the next table, three or four dudes – jocks, roysh, but still sound – and they’re all giving it, ‘Hey, what’s that thing you’ve got there?’

  So I end up telling them and immediately, roysh, it’s like I’m a God to these goys, in other words the biggest legend who ever lived? They ask me to come and join them, which I do, and of course then it’s like, game on.

  I throw the box of Milktests in the middle of the table and we order, like, a round of shots. They’re all drinking Sambuca, so of course I end up going with that.

  We knock our drinks back, as in skull them, then one of the dudes – he’s a ringer for Zac Efron but it’s not him? – blows a Tangerine, which is seriously impressive, in anyone’s money. Don’t feed for twelve hours! I’m second with a Pale Orange and the other three are all on Brilliant Saffron.

  Of course, I love a focking challenge. I’m the guy who did the entire Alexander College Debs Committee – going through the cord, as we used to call it.

  I order a tequila sunrise and also a baby Guinness, which gets a round of applause from the table. Even Zac Efron’s giving me big-time respect. Straight down the Jeff Beck. Blow. Roars from, like, everyone. Cherry. Don’t feed for sixteen hours!

  The rest of them drop out. It’s obvious this is, like, a two-horse race.

  Zac Efron ups the ante. A gin rickey, then an Alabama slammer, which is, like, rocket fuel. I shake my head. No way. He knocks them back, one after the other, pulls a face like he might vom, but holds them down. Blows a Brilliant Vermilion. Do not feed for twenty-four hours!

  I have to high-five him. No focking debates. Then I’m thinking that even though I’m in, like, another country, this is just like being back in Special Ks with the guys.

  ‘I’ll see you your gin rickey and your Alabama slammer,’ I go, ‘and I’ll raise you… a zombie.’

  There’s suddenly what would have to be described as a collective intake of breath.

  ‘You’ll die!’ Zac Efron goes. And he might be right. If I was a bird, my breast milk would already be, like, eighty-five per cent proof. The drinks arrive. My back teeth are focking floating. I grab the gin rickey – throw it down. I grab the Alabama slammer – throw it in on top of it. Then the zombie – get it into you, Cynthia.

  Quick blow. Black! One of the goys is just, like, staring at the instructions. ‘Oh my God!’ he goes. ‘Please consult your physician!’

  Everyone just, like, cheers. Even Zac Efron makes, like, a sign with his hands as if to say, I’m out, dude, and the rest of them are going, ‘Legend! Legend! Legend!’

  I literally haven’t experienced hero-worship like it since that day two months ago in Andorra.

  All of a sudden, I happen to look up and who’s standing over the table only Aisha, with a face on her like squashed cantaloupe. She snatches her bag, gathers up what’s left of the Milktests and storms off.

  The goys are all going, ‘Man! You’re in trouble,’ and in normal circumstances I’d be like, ‘Fock her – plenty more, blahdy blahdy blah,’ but I actually fancy a shot at the title tonight.

  See, birds with ‘tudes have always done it for me?

  So I say goodbye to the goys, then I chase after her. She’s outside, trying to hail a Jo. ‘One thing I’ll never get tired of hearing,’ I go, flicking my thumb in the direction of the bor, ‘the applause of the crowd.’

  She’s not a happy plant-eating, burrowing mammal. ‘There I am,’ she goes, ‘trying to talk sense into Maniche about her drinking, then I come back to find my date…’

  She can’t even finish her sentence. But she obviously wants me, roys
h, because when a Jo finally pulls up, she gets in and leaves the door open for me.

  It’s only when I get in the back beside her that I realize how absolutely stupid drunk I am. And I say that just to let you know that anything that happened after that wasn’t my basic fault?

  We go to her gaff. Don’t know where. Remember very little about it.

  I do remember her yabbering away to the childminder in the kitchen, mostly about shite, while I was in the living room, like a good groundsman, testing the firmness of the sofa, the likely burn-factor of the corpet and – being a details man – the tensile strength of the coffee table.

  It might have been all the waiting around, but I had a bat in my chinos that could make Barry Bonds look like a Little Leaguer.

  In she eventually comes, after letting out the childminder. Kicks off her Cesare Paciotti’s and flicks off the light.

  Of course, I’m straight out of my seat and all over her like an oil spill. She tastes of apple and boysenberry.

  I’m actually unbuttoning my fly when she’s suddenly there, ‘Stop it! Wait!’ and pushes me back onto the sofa.

  ‘Let’s take our time,’ she goes. From somewhere she produces a box of matches and she walks around the room, lighting all these candles, which she has every-focking-where. ‘Let’s get the mood right,’ she goes.

  I crack on that I’m cool with it. She’s obviously one of these I Have Needs Too freaks.

  There must be, like, thirty or forty candles in the room and it takes a good ten minutes for her to light them all. But she does it without once taking her eyes off me and I have to say, roysh, it’s seriously, I don’t know, erotic looking at her boat race in the flickering light.

  She crawls over to me on her hands and knees, a dirty big smile on her face. Then she hits me with it from out of nowhere.

  ‘Do you like Satan?’ she goes.

  I’m like, ‘Er… I’m pretty sure I misheard that. Lot of drink on board…’

  ‘What do you think of Satan?’ she goes again.

  The last time I was asked a question like that was at Honor’s christening, but that was cool because it was in, like, a church? But here I’m suddenly shitting myself and I can tell you, I’m sobering up fast.

  ‘I’m not really sure I believe in messing around with that shit,’ I end up going.

  She’s there, ‘You’ll give it a try, though – right?’

  I’m there, ‘Errr,’ trying to think.

  ‘Come on,’ she goes. ‘You’ll love it. I promise.’

  I’m there, ‘But your daughter’s in the next room.’

  ‘She loves Satan.’

  I try not to look too shocked, roysh, because inside my mind I’m suddenly planning my escape. ‘Em, okay,’ I go, playing it LL. ‘I’ll give it an old lash, then.’

  Her eyes light up. ‘Really?’

  ‘As I always say, don’t knock it until you’ve tried it.’

  ‘Great,’ she goes. Then she gets to her feet. ‘I’ll, em, go and get things started,’ and she turns and heads for, like, the kitchen, presumably to get, I don’t know, a crucifix or some shit?

  The second she turns around, roysh, I’m up off the sofa like I don’t know what and I pretty much launch myself at her. Now I’ve tackled some of the toughest in the business. Even Jerry Flannery will tell you that he’s got, like, a permanent click in his hip from the time I held him up five metres from the line in a friendly years ago. But Aisha is surprisingly strong. I mean, yeah, she goes to ground pretty easily, as you’d expect, but she fights me back and manages to kick me full in the stomach, winding me for a few seconds.

  She gets up, roysh, and tries to run, but I quickly ankle-tap her – the wily old pro – and she hits the deck again. Then it takes every bit of strength I have to drag her, biting and gouging, to this little cupboard beneath the stairs. I literally throw her in there and turn the key in the door.

  She’s going ballistic – and that’s not an exaggeration? – calling me all sorts of names, some of which even I’ve never been called before.

  ‘Well, what are you, then?’ I’m going. ‘You’re a freak is what you are!’

  ‘Let me out of here!’ she’s going, banging on the inside of the door.

  I get out of there as fast as my legs can carry me. And it’s maybe an hour later, when I’m back in the hotel, fixing myself a nightcap from the minibor, that I think about Coco, that poor little baby left alone in that actual house.

  Because that’s me. I’m an actual softie. I think about going back. Deep down, though, I know it’s too dangerous. How long is that door going to hold her anyway? I decide that there’s nothing else for it. When in doubt…

  Trevion answers, sounding majorly cranky. It is four o’clock in the morning.

  I’m there, ‘Where the fock are you pulling these birds from?’

  He’s like, ‘What?’ obviously still only waking up.

  I’m there, ‘As in Aisha. I don’t care who you owe favours to – I’m not dating any more lunatics.’

  He’s there, ‘What are you talking about?’

  ‘That bird – she’s into, like, devil worship.’

  He’s there, ‘Hey, slow down, Elmo. What are you talking about?’

  I’m like, ‘She kept banging on about Satan.’

  ‘Satan?’ he goes.

  I’m there, ‘Satan! She kept saying how she loved Satan.’

  ‘Satan?’ he goes. ‘Are you sure she didn’t mean seitan?’

  I’m like, ‘Satan – exactly.’

  ‘No,’ he goes, ‘I mean seitan. With an ei.’

  I’m there, ‘Dude, Satan is Satan – no matter how you spin it.’

  ‘Seitan,’ he goes, ‘is a kind of food.’

  I suddenly feel my entire body freeze. It’s one of those moments when you know you’ve focked up? You’re just waiting to find out how.

  I’m there, ‘A food? What kind of food exactly?’

  ‘Jesus, it’s wheat gluten. Cooked. What the fuck does it matter? Vegetarians eat it. Full of protein. Your wife had it at her party…’

  I’m thinking… Actually, I don’t know what I’m thinking. Oh fock definitely figures in the shuffle. ‘No, no, no,’ I go, ‘she said she worshipped Satan.’

  ‘Lot of girls do,’ he goes. ‘Especially if they want to keep the weight off.’

  ‘She said she’d introduced all of her friends to it.’

  ‘So?’

  ‘She said it’d be Satan for breakfast, lunch and dinner if she had her way.’

  ‘Are you done already?’

  I’m there, ‘Er, yeah,’ at the same time thinking, Oh, fock!

  ‘By the way, I need to talk to you,’ he goes. ‘You and Fyon Hoola.’

  ‘Look, I don’t want to be in the same room as that woman. What’s it about anyway?’

  ‘It’s about fucking MTV, that’s what. They want to meet you both. Tomorrow night. Chateau Marmont. Eight o’clock. You fucking be there, you hear me?’

  I’m there, ‘Er, okay.’

  ‘Now let me get some sleep here.’

  I’m like, ‘Er, just before you go, Trevion. Back to the whole Aisha thing. Satan, blah blah blah. To cut a long story short, I locked her in a focking cupboard.’

  He’s there, ‘You what?’

  He does laugh, in fairness to him. Eventually.

  ‘Which probably is out of order, looking back now. Is there any chance you’d swing by and let her out?’

  I’ve honestly never heard her so down in the actual dumps. She says she’s okay, but I’ve known her long enough to know when she’s putting on, like, a brave face, even when it’s over the phone.

  ‘And how’s he?’ I go – not that I give a fock? Except that he is sharing a house with my wife and daughter.

  She’s there, ‘Quiet. He hasn’t got dressed for, like, three days.’

  I’m like, ‘Are you saying he hasn’t even been to work?’

  ‘Bob told him to take a couple of weeks off. He needs r
est, Ross, but he’s spending the entire time just reading. Constantly.’

  I tell her that doesn’t sound good, though she doesn’t need me to point that out. ‘Why don’t you come and stay in my suite?’ I go. ‘And that’s not me trying to get in there. It’d be separate beds.’

  The thing is, roysh, I actually mean it?

  ‘I really, really appreciate that,’ she goes. ‘But I can’t just walk out on him, Ross. I think he’s really unwell.’

  ‘I’m just saying, the offer’s there.’

  She tells me that I’m – oh my God – so an amazing person and I’m actually feeling pretty good about myself until she mentions Erika.

  ‘Ross,’ she goes, ‘can I say something to you? And please don’t take this the wrong way because it has been, like, so great having you here? But… I really miss my best friend.’

  I’m there, ‘Give her time. I’m sure she’ll ring you when she gets her shit together.’

  ‘You know, I almost rang her today?’ she goes. ‘As in, I actually called up her number and hit dial? But then I changed my mind before she could answer.’

  ‘I, er, wouldn’t advise you make a habit of that. Like I said, she’s pretty pissed off with you, for whatever reason.’

  She sounds like she’s out and about, by the way. I ask her where she is and she says she’s in the cor, on the way to Emmy’s.

  I’m there, ‘Emmy?’

  ‘Yeah,’ she goes. ‘Oh my God, she’s being so weird at the moment?’

  I’m like, ‘Weird, as in?’

  She’s there, ‘Weird, as in she still hasn’t given me my dress. She’s not even returning my calls.’

  I’m like, ‘I, er, better go – I’m meeting Harvey for lunch.’

  She goes, ‘Oh my God, is it true that you and your mum are meeting some guy from, like, MTV tonight?’

  I’m there, ‘Er, yeah. I’m not exactly sure what it’s about.’

  ‘Oh my God, whatever it is, I would so love to be in it, Ross.’

  I tell her I’ll give her a shout later and tell her what it’s about.

  Harvey’s sitting outside Café Midi with a couple of Tapioca Pearl milk teas. ‘You certainly enjoyed yourself at the fund-raiser,’ I go. ‘What was his name?’