Kylie
Daan is standing in the room demanding I make a list for him too. “Keep things fair!” he is shouting, which is out of character. He’s normally supremely confident and would not demand, or even acknowledge, the need for an even playing field, happy to play all odds, even if the odds are stacked against him, which in all honestly, they rarely are. Tall, handsome, rich, male—normally all the odds are in his favor.
But of course, that was him before he knew about Mark. Now he has discovered he doesn’t know me, it’s fair to assume I don’t know him. That he is other.
“Get on with the fucking list!” His mass and blondness swell and fill the room, he’s pulsing with vitality and irritation. I am reminded of how it is to be with him when people are late, and he feels they undervalue his time. Normally generous and charming he becomes irate and struggles to hide his annoyance. Except, he is not in the room. He has gone again, and I can’t be sure he was ever here. Was it just my imagination?
Am I hallucinating? Lack of food, dehydration?
The room sways, puckers as though it is being folded away like a concertina fan. One moment voluminous, the next cramped. Have I been drugged again? Something in the chicken sandwich or the water. What can I trust? What do I know? My head is pounding, pulsing with pain. But then, so does my hand, my ribs, my shoulder.
The list. The list. What is it like being married to Daan? What does it mean? Upgraded body consciousness, so intense and regular workouts. Trying to turn back time, or at least the effects of it on my body and face. Not because he asks me to or because he is younger than me, but because he thinks I am beautiful and he tells me so all the time. I like basking in his praise. I want that to last as long as possible. Expensive restaurants. Well-cut, beautiful clothes. A feeling that there will never be anything that he can’t tackle, that he can’t win. Cleaners, a concierge, a personal coach, staff to cater for dinner parties. Dinner parties! Jo Malone candles. It strikes me that the list seems to be mostly about the things he can buy, but he is not that at all. I focus.
A sense of humor that is like mine. Dry, sharp. We spar intellectually. Freedom. Time. A big but autonomous family who are in equal parts frighteningly competitive and successful. They demand nothing of me beyond glossy hair and straight teeth so that I fit in, other than that they come free of all obligation including love or hate. Rooftop terraces. Champagne and cocktails. Lots of phone sex. Text sex. Anticipated sex.
The memory is simultaneously urgent and yet distant. I can’t imagine desire right now. Lust. I know it was there, a force to be reckoned with or capitulated to, but I can’t feel the breathless pressure of it anymore. The list. The list. What else is on his list?
A willingness to hear the plot of a novel I enjoyed but, like Mark, an unwillingness to read the damn novel. A sense that when I’m with him everything is possible.
It is not possible to leave the room. I am not beautiful, right now, bruised and fetid.
I am in hell. He is the devil.