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Susie winced as the porn star’s thick New Jersey accent broke the fantasy. ‘Ready now,’ she instructed, and he slipped in.
‘Alfie?’
The assistant was bent over the camera, staring through the lens.
‘Susie, turn your face a little more three-quarters to the camera. Roberto, look slightly more down towards Susie, your right hand should be further down her ankle below the black tie, right foot pointing out towards the camera. Ah Kum, in the pink, can you arch your back a little more. Excellent! Okay, now everyone hold position!’
The following silence was shattered by the distinctive sound of Susie’s ringtone – the theme to Star Wars.
‘What the—’ she cried out from the set. Muriel ran over and checked the phone.
‘It’s Felix,’ she told Susie as the phone kept ringing.
‘Ignore it and switch the bloody thing off,’ she retorted tensely, trying to get herself back into character and position. ‘How are we now?’
‘Well, the back fan needs to come up, as does your left leg,’ Alfie instructed from behind the camera, then swung around to Muriel. ‘Muriel?’
The design assistant ran back to the set and hurriedly made a series of minute adjustments. By this time Susie could feel beads of sweat forming under the hot lights and white body paint.
‘Okay, let’s shoot!’ she ordered, cursing both Felix and the fact she’d forgotten to turn her phone off.
There was the rattle of the camera shutter as Susie strained to hold herself still on the car bonnet, trying to relax her torso and hands so that the position appeared natural.
‘Do you want any from other angles?’ Alfie asked.
‘Not if you think it’s an exact copy.’
‘Looking good. What do you think, Muriel?’ Alfie asked.
Muriel walked over and peered through the lens. ‘Beautiful, Susie, absolutely stunning.’
‘Take another few for good luck, then let’s call it a wrap,’ Susie instructed from behind her mask, her legs aching from being held up in the air. ‘Think you can keep it up, Roberto?’
The two younger female extras broke into giggles, while Alfie grinned.
‘The wood is fine. It’s the face that’s real itchy,’ Roberto growled back, muffled behind the mask.
But the shutter was already clicking away furiously. Half an hour later they had over a hundred shots ready for editing.
*
Felix collected his double espresso and carrot cake, then made his way to a table by the large windows that boasted a clear view of the warehouse building. He had deliberately chosen this Starbucks because of its location – the studio he’d rented for Susie was across the road. He settled back into the leather booth and stared up at the floor he knew she was on at that very moment, in the middle of creating her photo from her staged recreation. What was it of, and whom had she used as her extras? He knew there must be a man involved, and probably penetration. The idea both appalled and excited him. The blinds were pulled down on the large windows of the studio, because of the lighting, he imagined. What world had she created behind them, ornate, fervent, profane and profound? Her image-making was alchemy; he needed to be part of it.
He would give anything to see her in action, in the sway of her vision ordering her team, the characters within the frame, around like pawns. In the thrall of her power. To be part of that… I could be more to her, he reminded himself. I could make her dependent on me, make her need me. He was interrupted by the buzz of his mobile. It was Chloe, wanting to know where he was; there were clients waiting at the gallery.
*
Latisha sat in the big old vinyl armchair she called her thinking chair, finishing the last of four glazed doughnuts, the cardboard container perched precariously on the armrest. She had the yellow paint and the aged paper out in front of her, turning one sheet between her cracked fingernails. Why would Gabriel Bandini have a trunk-load of blank old paper stashed under his bed like it were ten-dollar bills? And what about the old paintbrushes, the toy lead soldiers and that strange light cabinet?
She glanced across at the altar she’d set up in the fireplace. In the centre stood a statuette of Jesus on the cross, with his bleeding heart painted vividly on his plaster chest, beads of blood cascading from his crown of thorns. Taped onto his outstretched arms were a couple of old black and white photographs of her mother and grandmother, Malcolm X, Angela Davies and the man she thought might have been her father. At the bottom of the cross was a strip of passport-kiosk snaps of her and Maxine, taken the night of the opening. Both women were smiling at the camera. There was also a lump of clay she’d taken from Maxine’s studio as a memento. Maxine would have known what the paper meant, Latisha thought to herself, and she was sure Felix Baum and Susie Thomas could both tell her straight away.
The television was on with the sound down; an afternoon soap playing out bathos, all waving arms and crying women, but Latisha wasn’t paying attention. As her jaws moved slowly up and down on the last of the sugared dough, she was remembering, remembering word for word some of what Maxine had told her about Susie.
‘Loving someone who filled a room wasn’t easy. If she was an element, it was fire, you know, consuming all the air around her. She didn’t do it intentionally; that was her, burning up, consumed by the need to create – more than that, be successful with it, 24/7. It was never-ending. There wasn’t any space for my work. I mean, she paid lip service, paid for me to have my own studio, but even then I always felt like everything was on her terms. She’s so fucking talented… ’ And here Latisha would wince; she hated it when Maxine used cuss words, yet knew better than to correct her. ‘ …and famous with it. It’s a terrible thing, being caught between really loving someone and having to fight for your own identity. Over there in the UK, I was never going to be anything other than Susie Thomas’s girlfriend. History was not going to be kind. And you know, I’m talented too, right? I was doomed if I stayed, but who knows? Maybe I’ve doomed myself by leaving. I miss her like I miss my own soul, but at least now the work is flowing. Being in New York has liberated me. Nobody cares what class I’m from here, even what I’ve done before; all they care about is what I have to offer right now and whether they can sell it. Total Darwinism! I love it. It feels so honest after London. Seriously, though, Latisha, if you had any idea how famous she is, you’d think I was a total idiot for leaving.’
Latisha wiped her mouth and then reached for her pipe, lit it and inhaled. Her thinking stick was how she liked to describe it; smoke curling through her brain woke her up and the best plans, she now told herself, are hatched slowly.
As she reached down for the note she’d found pushed through her letter box from the artist she found her heart racing. Henry, the car mechanic downstairs, had told her a redheaded woman had come asking after Maxine and had wanted to talk to her. It disturbed her that Susie had found out where she was living. It felt dangerous, being on someone else’s map. She was used to being below the radar. From now on she would have to be careful.
