The Liar

Cartwright was Garbo's salary, the National Gallery, he was cellophane: he was the tender trap, the blank unholy surprise of it all and the bright golden haze on the meadow: he was honey-honey, sugar-sugar, chirpy chirpy cheep-cheep and his baby-love: the voice of the turtle could be heard in the land, there were angels dining at the Ritz and a nightingale sang in Berkeley Square.

Adrian had managed to coax Cartwright into an amusing half-hour in the House lavs two terms previously, but he had never doubted he could get the trousers down: that wasn't it. He wanted something more from him than the few spasms of pleasure that the limited activities of rubbing and licking and heaving and pushing could offer.

He wasn't sure what the thing was that he yearned for, but one thing he did know. It was less acceptable to love, to ache for eternal companionship, than it was to bounce and slurp and gasp behind the fives courts. Love was Adrian's guilty secret, sex his public pride.

He closed the changing-room door and fanned himself with the lavender gloves. It had been a close thing. Too close. The greater the lengths he went to to be liked, the more enemies he gathered on the way. If he fell, Bennett-Jones and others would be there to kick him.. One thing was for certain, the Queer Pose was running dry and a new one was going to have to be dreamt up or there would be Trouble.

A gang of fags was mobbing about by the noticeboards. They fell silent as he approached. He patted one of them on the head.

'Pretty children,' he sighed, digging into his waistcoat pocket and pulling out a handful of change. 'Tonight you shall eat.'

Scattering the coins at their feet, he moved on.

Mad, he said to himself as he approached his study door. I think I must be mad.

Tom was there, in a yoga position, biting his toe-nails and listening to Aqualung. Adrian sank into a chair and removed his hat.

'Tom,' he said, 'you are looking at a crushed violet, a spent egg, a squeezed tube.'

'I'm looking at a git,' said Tom. 'What's with the coat?'

'You're right,' said Adrian, 'I am stupid today. And every day. Stupid, stupid, stupid. Horrid, horrid, horrid. Morbid, morbid, morbid. Torrid, torpid, turbid. Everying in my life ends in id. Get it?'

'Get what?'

'Id. It's Freud. You know.'

'Oh. Right. Yeah. Id.'

'Idealistic idiot, idiosyncratic idler. Everything begins in id as well.'

'Everything begins with 'I', you mean. Which is ego,' said Tom, placing an ankle behind his ear, 'not id.'

'Well of course it's very easy to be clever. If you could just help me out of this coat, I'm beginning to sweat.'

'Sorry,' said Tom. 'I'm stuck.'

'Are you serious?'

'No.'

Adrian fought his way out of his costume and into his uniform while Tom reverted to a half-lotus and recounted his day.

'Went into town and bought a couple of LPs this afternoon.'

'Don't tell me,' said Adrian, 'let me guess . . . Parsifal and Lark Ascending}'

'Atom Heart Mother and Salty Dog.'

'Close.'

Tom lit a cigarette.

'You know what pisses me off about this place?'

'The cuisine? The distressingly plain uniforms?'

'I bumped into Rosengard in the High Street and he asked me why I wasn't watching the match. I mean what?'

'You should've asked him why he wasn't.'

'I said I was just on my way.'

'Rebel.'

'I like to keep my nose clean.'

'Well, ' I'm just on my way' isn't a very stylish handkerchief, is it? You could have said that the match was too exciting and that your nervous system simply couldn't bear any more suspense.'

'Well I didn't. I came back here, had a wank and finished that book.'

'The Naked Lunch?'

'Yeah.'

'What did you reckon?'

'Crap.'