OK … – Patrick sighs – She’s got thick ankles
— Thick ankles? Jesus! Dump her!
— And the drug thing, her drug history, it’s a problem
— The fact she hasn’t ever done drugs?
— Exactly – Patrick goes quiet and pensive. Then he goes on – But that’s not it, that’s not the real problem. I do really like her, you know … I mean … – To fill the gap in his thoughts Patrick steps down from the bench, and goes to an overfull Soho Square rubbish bin; after carefully balancing his empty sushi tray on top of the enormous pile of rubbish he returns and sits back on the bench and says – Even though we’ve got less in common, or not as much as some … I like her … precisely because sh … sh …
— Sh?
— Because she’s different. Smart. Cultured – Seizing the theme, Patrick runs with it – Really. She’s amazing. She knows all about art, and politics, and history, it’s incredibly refreshing – Examining the tan mark where his forearm meets his rolled-up white shirtsleeve, he says – Maybe I’m just too used to Soho ladettes smoking rollups and farting, do you think that could be it? – Patrick looks over at Joe; Joe nods, says:
— So it’s the hooters then?
Patrick:
— No, I like them big, and I love the arse
— So what the FUCK?
— I know, I know … – Patrick sighs – I knowwww – Feeling the heat now, he unbuttons another one of the buttons on his expensive white shirt and then he slumps back to let the sun run its fingers through his chest hair. After a few seconds, feeling properly relaxed for the first time this lunchtime, Patrick admits – Actually I think I know what it is
— ?????
— Yes. I think – Struggling to be honest – I think I just … like … girls to be … shorter, poorer, younger, and stupider than me
— She’s certainly shorter than you
— Ta, Joe
— And – Joe says – She’s a lot younger, isn’t that enough? Not enough dimorphism?
Patrick stalls, does not reply. For a moment the college friends are united in quietness, experiencing each other’s post-lunch metabolic low. Patrick is thinking about perhaps saying something else. Right now Patrick thinks he would like to confess to Joe that what he really needs is for Rebecca to be more submissive, because he’s now realised he needs something sexually very submissive in women, something more than Rebecca has so far given him. Then Patrick decides he can’t be arsed to talk about relationship stuff anymore. Instead Patrick looks idly and languidly at a beautiful girl in lowslung jeans and silver navel ring, as she swings her hips through the Square towards Oxford Street. For a full minute Patrick watches the girl’s walk. Then he swerves to take in another chick just behind that one. Then he looks back at the first one. And her friend.
Stuck by lust to his bench, Patrick regards his own reaction to the girls, the parade of girls. Mostly he loves this, the constant catwalk of London, the fugue of female beauty, the sweet repetition with minor variation. But at this moment he also resents the power, he resents these girls’ power and fame and the way they get in clubs for free, like members of some manufactured boy band … like unwarranted celebrities with no real talent …
— Dying for a smoke
— What?
Joe pats his pocket, rueful:
— Need a cig …
— So … smoke one?
— Can’t, man
— Given up?
Still rueful:
— Boracic
Silence, traffic-thrum, Patrick’s hand reaches for his own pocket:
— You want to borrow some cash?
— Nah – Joe surveys the Square, as if looking for a different benefactor – I already owe you enough – Joe’s face is wide, sad, honest, wry – Anyway. I start some temping job tomorrow
— Shipbrokers?
— Shipbrokers …
This sadly spoken word some kind of signal, Patrick checks his watch and says:
— OK. Better get going … Got the lawyers round
— Going over the contracts for the club?
— Yep, some hitch with the survey
— … what’s it like being more successful than me?
Patrick replies:
— I’m not
Joe replies:
— Haddaway and shite
Now the two of them are up. Now the two of them are up, out the Square, and walking over the road towards Greek Street. Halfway across they come to a stop. Barring their way is a builder’s lorry making beeping noises as it reverses. Using the moment Patrick looks down Greek Street at yet another building site: at the place where a building is going up behind a vast theatre curtain of plastic. Watching the moving girders and big yellow machines and men in red plastic hats carrying lengths of scaffolding, Patrick says:
— I remember when all this used to be fields
— Yeah?
— When I first lived in London there was … a meadow here, with sheep … and fallow deer …
Joe, nodding:
— God yeah, and there was, like, a little stream down there, and that’s where there used to be that shepherd with his long clay pipe, right?
— Yep. And that – Patrick gestures, vaguely – That Starbucks coffee house, that used to be a little glade with crab-apple trees, and we used to make cowslip bells. Right next to that van, remember?
— Seems like yesterday
The lorry circumvented, the two friends cross the road and pace more briskly, until they come to the junction where they part. Jabbing his friend’s arm Joe says goodbye and good luck and then angles away and then jogs down the street towards Charing Cross. Watching his friend go, Patrick thinks about his friend’s drug habit for a second and then Patrick turns and walks, and sees, strolling towards him, a very pretty blonde girl, a beautiful blonde girl who gives him the usual feelings of resentment and sad yearning and powerlessness and why don’t I ever get girlfriends like that … until Patrick realises it’s Rebecca. His girlfriend.
— So he pinned you to the wall and said what?
Out-staring the prosecutor Rebecca says nothing; then she looks frankly and somehow bravely above his head and says:
— Kiss me properly you …
— Yes?
— Kiss me properly … you …
Rebecca stops. The judge’s eyebrows go up. In the witness box Rebecca shrugs: a shrug that says she doesn’t want to say any more. With an inscrutable glance at the defence lawyer the judge leans towards Rebecca; and says:
— Miss Jessel, I am aware this might be rather painful – The judge does an avuncular smile – But we have to have the exact wording as far as it is possible. It might well be very important, it might not, but that’s rather for the jury to decide – Again the smile – So if you could tell us just as much as you can?
The smile turns into a nod at the prosecutor. Alan Gregory nods back at the judge,