Greta May

SHE was glancing at the night's TV listings in the Standard when she became aware of the man staring at her. Studying her. It's something that just isn't done. Not on the tube. It's so intimate. While your body's rubbing against other bodies the last thing you want to do is make eye contact. She looked away. There was a movie with Jack Black, Channel 4, nine o'clock. Shame about the commercials. She'd microwave something during the breaks. Drink a glass of wine. Or two.
She glanced up. He was looking still. He smiled. Good teeth. She frowned. If she'd been in a pub she would have liked his brown eyes and broad shoulders. She looked down, then back up again, instinctively, as if against her will. He was writing something in a notebook.
He tore out the page and gave it to her as the train slowed at Gloucester Road.
"My stop," he said, and squeezed through the sliding doors before they closed.
His name was Richard. His number was 05557 757 777. She wondered how he managed to get so many sevens. Was it lucky? For him? For her?
She screwed up the piece of paper and let it drop to the floor among the fast-food bags and abandoned newspapers. She'd grown to despise the tube in the two years she'd worked in the shop. A shop assistant. How did it happen? Why? Two years at drama school. Two on the boards. Two in a shop. And another birthday in June. She didn't even bother to read the trades anymore. Twenty-six. That's almost thirty. She'd be looking at comfy slippers next.
She picked up the piece of paper again. Richard. 05557 757 777. Black jacket. Blue shirt. Dark jeans. Media: television, advertising, e-commerce.
The train pulled in at Hammersmith. As she stumbled along behind two girls in grey veils she thought about the crowd at Gloucester Road. Well-heeled. Closer to the action. London was a chessboard. Blacks and voids.
As soon as she got home she spread the slip of paper flat on the kitchen counter. She called the number. She let it ring twice. Then hung up.
It was ridiculous to call a total stranger. Then, it was ridiculous not to. What did she have to lose? She lit a cigarette and poured a glass of wine. The first drag and the first sip are the best. Life's like that. An unfulfilled promise. She'd played at the Royal Court in Sloane Square when she was nineteen. She was Polly in The Raw Edge, a pilot for a soap that had never got made. There had been hundreds of girls up for it. But she'd got the part. At twenty she could play fifteen. They liked that. She looked like the girl next door who gets raped and murdered.
She lifted the receiver and phoned again. Her sister.
"Alison. It's me."
They talked: Alison's child. Alison's partner. Alison's stiff joints; she was learning to be a yoga teacher. Alison was about to hang up. Then remembered.
"How's things with you?"
"A man gave me his telephone number on the tube."
"How exciting."
"I know." Greta paused.
"Well?"
"Nothing. He was a stranger."
"What was he like?"
"Mmm. Tall, dark, nice accent."
"Lucky devil."
They talked some more. Said goodbye.
She finished her wine and started to pour a second glass, stopping herself and adding just a touch. She had decided to make the call while Alison was going on about her aches and pains and was bracing herself to actually do it. What would she say? What if she got an answer-phone? No problem. She'd hang up.
There was no answer phone. He answered.
"It's me."
"I knew you'd call."
"How?"
"Nothing ventured¦" He trailed off. "Come over."
"What for?"
"I could say a plate of spaghetti."
"Why don't you then?"
"Okay. A plate of spaghetti." She knew he was smiling. He gave her the address.
"Do you need to write it down?"
"I have a trained memory," she told him.
"I'll put the water on."
She replaced the receiver. This was insanity. He was an axe murderer. A madman. American Psycho!
It wasn't her that went through to the bathroom and took a shower. Shaved her legs. Perfumed her parts. It wasn't Greta May. It was someone like Greta May, a mirror image that stared from the mirror as she slid into black underwear. She cleaned her teeth. Lit a cigarette. Smiled at the absurdity of it. Of everything. She put on a black dress, looked down at her breasts, and took it off again. She tried blue jeans and a shirt. Good hips, she thought, took off the jeans and put on a skirt instead. Clothes help you find the character. Then, when you're up there, out there, you're no longer you, but then you are, even more so. Yes, they really were someone else's eyes peering back as she did her mascara. Someone who didn't work in the shoe department in a big store. She removed the skirt, slid back into the black dress, then swivelled round just quickly enough to catch a glimpse of Polly in The Raw Edge.
A taxi stopped as she was about to enter the tube and she stepped in the back. She despised London taxi drivers. But she loved their cabs. It was like returning to the womb. You were coddled. Luxuriated. You learned how to love yourself, your reflection opaque and vaguely surreal in the dark glass, red and amber streaks of light crossing the sky. She imagined dying and being carried to her funeral in the back of a taxi. Nirvana on the radio.
He lived in a red brick building divided into five flats. His bell was the bottom one. She stood there on the threshold, her finger hovering before the shiny brass button. This really was madness. The taxi had gone. The street was silent. She marched off back the way she had come and only slowed her pace when she reached the newsagents on the corner. She studied the magazines. She flicked through the pages of The Stage and put it back in the rack. If she hurried she'd get home in time to see the movie on Channel 4.
She lit a cigarette and blew a long stream of smoke into the sky. The night was clear. Full of stars. She had every intention of going home and watching the film, but found herself crushing the cigarette below her heel, cleaning her teeth with her tongue, and setting out again for the red brick building.
She took a deep breath and hit the bell. The door buzzed open almost immediately. She heard his voice. "Come in. It was hollow. Like an echo. She heard the sound of her shoes tapping over the black and white tiles in the hall. There was a table piled with letters, a gilt mirror reflecting someone from the past.
Richard stood in the doorway to his flat. He was wearing jogging pants, a polo shirt. Bare feet. It's very familiar. Bare feet.
As she stepped into the hall he pushed the door just hard enough for it to catch. They stood motionless in the half-light. He leaned towards her, placing his two palms flat on the wall, her head trapped in the space between them. He wasn't smiling. He just stared. And she stared back. He had dark eyes. Jet black hair. She wondered if he would ever be cast as a leading man.
The slap stung her cheek. Loud in the silence. It was hard. Not so hard as to bruise, but hard enough for her teeth to cut the inside of her mouth. She tasted blood. She slapped him back, just as hard. Her breath caught in her throat. She would have screamed, but his lips were on her mouth, sucking at her and she responded to his kiss. His hands slid down the wall, across her back, over her bottom. He pulled up her dress and ripped the side of her knickers. They fell to her feet. She remembered reading in Cosmo that women got wet when they were excited. It had never happened to her. Never. But it did now.
She could feel a dampness inside her. She felt that dampness grow liquid and leak from her, wetting her thighs. The feeling was¦luxurious. The sound of the word ran through her mind as he turned her round and pulled her down on the floor. He entered her in one swift movement. The cheek where he'd hit her was pressed against the coarse floor covering. Her breath came in short gasps. She could feel his breath, hot against her ear. He rammed deep inside her, harder and harder, and when he came the warm feeling in her stomach filled her whole body and that feeling was¦Luxurious.
Now that he'd finished she imagined he was going to open the door and toss her back out again. He turned her over and did something she had not been expecting. He kissed her cheek. He then lifted her awkwardly into his arms and carried her through to the bathroom. He didn't say anything. He turned on the taps, filled the big bath and added blue crystals to the flow. She was reaching for the zip on her black dress automatically, her fingers doing the thinking for her. He turned off the taps and she stepped into the foaming blue water.
He was about to go, but leaned back through the door: "What kind of pizza do you like?" he asked.
"What about the spaghetti?"
"Takes too long."
"Spinach with an egg."
"Anything else?" he asked her.
"Yes, you can get this week's Stage at the newsagents."
"You're an actress?" She nodded. "I thought so. What's your name?"
"Greta May."
"Nice one."
He closed the door and she held her breath as she sunk for a moment beneath the dark blue water. Luxurious.

© 2007 Clifford Thurlow

Greta May was adapted as a 10-minute short film which was audience selected at the Savannah Film Festival and nominated best short at the Marbella Film Festival. It can be seen for free on YouTube at http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_rEPzG50GPw