CHAPTER THREE: ON THE ROAD For characters in Story: check Biographies

#1


Falling off to sleep and then waking up again, disappearing into cigarette smoke, and out again. Eyes fighting the light, as it broke through the trees, the nameless buildings, the glare of cars as they swerved to their offices on the Périphérique, all I could feel was tiredness, and a desire to sink into this luxurious black leather seat, and sleep.

Someone was talking in the front seat. Flicking his wrist out the window, letting the cigarette ash, blow away into the green fields that were beginning to take up the canvas. The canvas that was my life. A splash of energetic color here, a drool of black tar there, and light busting through, cutting through, blinding through.

"Coffee?"

"Eh?"

Jacqui was reaching up out of the crowd. Jumping out. Her two arms coming down. And the words kept coming out......

"Coffee?"

"Eh - What?"

A bald smiling head turned briefly, and twinkled.

" You was really out. Dead to the world."

" So Goethe and I take you for a ride!"

A bare neck, and eyes in a mirror, took the conversation making sense of words that fell wrongly.

" We took your baggage, from the hotel, paid your bill - said we were old friends"

The face smiled.

"Well, we are - aren't we ?........."

The car drove off the freeway into a garage, slowing to a stop outside a store and restuarant. I wanted to fall back into the leather seat, but a door was opened -

"John, a cup of coffee and we'll tell you"

The same crucifix hanging loose on her chest. Her breasts almost visible. Eva, with the spiky blond hair - now in jeans a black belt, and a leather jacket hanging loose.

Somehow I got to that cup of coffee and sat down. A sticky bun was stuck in my hand.

" Sugar - helps!"

The bald bearded Goethe smiled again.

" Eat - it's good for you"

As I was getting the last of the stickiness out of my fingers, licking the white icing, reaching a neutral level of existence, where sleep and the go of the day, interact, and somehow chemically reason starts to pump in - Eva started up

" We take you to the chateau, - its a long drive - not that you'd notice - sleep - we'll talk away - you must trust us - think of us as friendly souls - you will be our hostage"

Something about her smile, though cheerful, and innocent had a twist to it. But I was in no mood for fighting this change in plans and any way needed something out of my control.

Collecting myself in the bathroom, taking a quick shave, letting the electric massage thoughts - I tried to put the morning or afternoon in sync - but the missing hours I still couldn't place - this was not new - it had happened before - but this time there wasn't the booze or the pills - annoying how the mind slips - I was at the club and then nothing - couldn't place one step after another - until now - tracing my steps back to Goethe and Eva, leaning against the dusty old black Mercedes, waiting to take me away to where?




#2


Marine could not help herself. Jean's smooth chest beckoned her. She had to let her hands slide down his firm taut muscles. Open her lips and mouth biting at the odd hairs pushing out between his red nipples, - he smelt so good! She had never felt so horny, every move of her skin against his, making her head rush, and every sinew of her being shiver with pleasure.

What a long night it had been, from his first plunge of tongue, filling her with a hunger that she could not stop. How he had held her back, then pushed her forward, exploring each moment of ecstacy. He seemed to knew her every moment - when to stop - when to begin again. His torture was delicious. Now he was sleeping, and all she could do was to let her tongue follow the folds of his chest. Oh how she was spinning reeling rolling down hill sliding with a glee - he tasted so good. She wanted this body of firm pleasure, to rise again and take her. She had to have him to share her hunger. She put her lips, her tongue to work. He would soon hear her siren. Feel her siren.

Joe was sitting in a bar, looking at the Louvre, watching groups of kids being chaperoned in long lines through the bold archways that led to the inner courtyard of pyramids. How she remembered her first trip to Paris, her parents, - he - a professor of French Literature at the University, and her mother a sculptor who did a bit of graphic design to pay for the cabin the house the trips to foriegn lands.

How she was fascinated by the style and elegance of the women that seemed to know how to dress how to talk how to be feminine but also strongly determined to be themselves. How intelligent and together they seemed compared to her friends in school. How Celi looked so vulgar when she returned home. How it took weeks to talk again to her best friend.

How Joe had loved to loose herself in the sculptures, the halls of paintings, as her parents debated the meaning of this or that. It was here in the Louvre that she had her first real kiss. One day climbing a long series of steps. Stone, cold and forever they went on. her parents disappearing into the distance. And that boy - grabbed her hand, pulled her behind a balustrade, looked straight in her eyes, tried to say a word but nothing came, so she pecked him with a kiss, full on his lips. He stunned still could not say, so she pecked again, and again, till she felt herself pressed against a dropping hand of a greek warrior, and his soft hair, in her eyes, as he bit into her neck. Next she heard the call of her mother, echoing across the marble floor. And off she ran.

"Phone calls since six, this morning"

Her sidekick manager, Clive, slid his frizzled self, into the chair opposite.

"Un café Large - Grand"

A man in a white apron who had been hovering had somewhere to go, how she hated these men who hovered. One day she would take a gun and go hunting for hovering men!

" You never tell me ! Never !"

She could hear the echos of her feet as she ran across the marble floors. The scornful looks of kings and madonnas. And the lad who could not speak. Wanting to say something as she ran.

" Vanity Fair, Vogue, Elle, they all have been calling. Then the Times, even the Enquirer" The hovering man with the white apron returned. Joe took her gun and shot a clean hole through his head. One less hovering man! Clive took one gulp of the coffee

The hovering man was ordered back to his bar, and his beloved expresso machine

" So - show me the photos ! "



#3


I came to for a second or two, to see a policeman leaning through the front window, with a big grin on his face. Goethe handed him some money, and Eva leaned over, her scent leaving me deep inside her, as she strapped a seat belt over my numb body.

"The French sometimes they are as efficient as we Germans"

She leaned closer, digging her eyes into mine.

"Still a little out, aren't we!"

A word came to my mouth, but I swallowed myself into sleep. What ever it was - it certainly knocked you out.

" Hungry?"

Again it was her eyes, her scent, digging into me. The same hand around the chest, unbuckling the seatbelt. And Goethe's firm hand pulling me out of the backseat, into the fresh fumes of trucks in a parking lot.

"We eat"

A restuarant-hotel sign pinged under a cloudy sky. We walked rag-tag through the bar, where men smoked drank made jokes, to a large dining room, with long tables, with many a trucker, carpenter, and the odd couple eating with vibrato. A stern large woman handed me a menu I pointed and sunk the contents of a pitcher of wine. Reality and reasoning were tuning in. The food smelt and looked good. Breaking bread, and stuffing the salami, beetroot, cheese into my mouth, I found we were all attacking the food with the same ravenous energy. Hand to mouth, food to stomach. Nothing got in the way. Each of us swang into our entrees, eying each other like wolves over prey. After two more pitchers of wine, we came to a comfortable stop. Words still hesitated. The lingering pleasures of taste, the sensations of succulence, floating round teeth, the sucking of tongue of gums, still caught us. As the juice of the lamb, lingered, Eva leaned over. She was digging again. One word came out after the other, with quiet precision. She knew the effect.

" You were wild, last night"

She leaned a little further, let her crucifix hang loose, swinging.

" I couldn't stop you"

And pulling her sweater down,

" Look how you marked me"

Goethe was lifting the pitcher to ask for more wine

Bite marks were clearly visible

There was laughter behind, a group of men were eying her, but quickly turned to their meal, made a joke about tourists, and a cheese tray with the serious woman snuck in and we all sat back, Goethe offering cigarettes.

Afterwards we walked up the steep hill into the old town of Saint-Flour, along the narrow streets to a large church. Eva took a candle, lit it. Goethe wandered off under the high vaulting. I looked up to see a black Christ looking down. His medieval features, seemed modern, and he eye'd me not only with sympathy, but with scorn . For what I had committed? For something I had done in those missing hours? What secret did Eva and Goethe hold over me?

In the car, I fell off to sleep again, Eva tugging at the seatbelt, strapping me in. She and Goethe began to talk. Another language. Something was being arranged.




#4

Marine only had moments to pull the satin sheet over herself as Clive and Joe strode into the studio. She was alone and exhausted. Her lover Jean had stepped out to get some croissants and a bottle of champagne to celebrate the night kissing the morning. And now half awake, half in dream she was being pressured to sign a contract as a model. Joe had given her so much in the last twenty four hours - what could she loose! So she signed!

Part of Clive's charm was that he was able to second guess Joe. Perhaps it was this that annoyed her. To have a manager who was so indespensable - was dangerous, and not good business sense. He was now full of himself, and knew the power he had. She had to find someone to take his place. But for now, he stayed.

Jean was just coming out of the brasserie, as he was stopped in his tracks. A cheerful smiling man, smartly dressed in an off-green blazer, with an unusual silk-lace shirt, put out his hand.

"Bonjour!"

"Bonjour!"

The sun was smiling along the canal. The barge owners busy with hanging out washing to dry and watering flowers.

" Jean, right?"

Americans are so persistent. A heavily scented arm stretched around his shoulder.

" Sit down for a moment. A coffee? Café, monsieur....."

He hated this, .... when another man had the better of him.

" Je suis - Pardon me - I am Joe's business manager - Clive's the name and you are lucky - so lucky....."

Jean thought for a moment of Cherise, and the walks they had in hills above his father's vineyard. How she had placed her hand on his chest and told him to follow his dreams.

" First take this ....."

Jean opened a packet full of crisp 500 franc notes. He could not stop laughing. It was so American. So much like the movies.

" Sign this "

It was a contract to work only for Joe, and back dated to the previous day.

With movie finesse he signed. When the big cat comes, don't delay.

Clive and Jean returned to Joe's Paris studio-apartment to crack the champagne bottle and celebrate. Jean leaned down to slip a kiss to Marine, as Joe, with cup of coffee in hand joined them.

Joe loved these moments, when creative inspiration and great business sense came together. On the plane coming over Clive and her had discussed the possibilities of a virtual fashion show that would assemble the best models from around the world, and some of her new vital designs. Clive had worked hard to get the technical expertise, and the computer whizz in place.

She had formed alliances with manufacturers on the cutting edge of fashion. Where concept, design, and fabrication could be created from one source by companies existing in three continents. Her show would break bounderies of fashion. Marine and Jean, would be cornerstones in her project. They were going to be the unknowing innocents transformed by her. Reality and virtuality would be played one against the other.

The door of the studio apartment banged open. A nosy reporter, with a tv camerawoman alongside, pointed an obnoxious microphone in her direction.

"Joe......The National Enquirer ....What's your response? Plans for Paris?"

The camera moved, swinging through the room, steadying itself on Marine, still wrapped in satin. Her body examined in minute detail by millions having their coffee, or working out on their exercise machines.

Jean picked up a full glass of champagne and threw it in the direction of the roving eye.

Clive spoke in abnormally understated tones, as the unwelcome reporter made a hasty retreat.

"Get what you need! We're moving location"






END OF CHAPTER THREE


Read CHAPTER FOUR

© Giles Denmark/Giles Mitchell 1996. Worldwide Copyright.