Vertigo of Love: A Short Story

There’s a rainstorm, outside. I can hear the volley of drops as they pelt against the windowpane.

There’s a rainstorm inside. Thunder and downpour play on his speakers. All the curtains drawn, his vast flat in the dark. Shadowy and cold and sumptuous with its velvet sofa and wolf hide throws.

There’s a rainstorm in my heart. Lightening beneath my navel. Between my thighs. A tingling in my nerves. He holds me in his powerful arms. The scent on his skin. I press my back into him. I feel him harden.

…

I met Charles through a mutual friend, Sandrine, who invited me over to her apartment near the beautiful grounds of the legislative building. I know little about liquor, so I brought a bouquet of flowers – a vase of vibrant violas.

Sandrine opened the door. I heard the wine-soaked laughter of her friends having a blast. She took the vase. She kissed me thrice on my cheeks. My parka in her hand, she introduced me to the little crowd happily huddled in her sitting room.

“Rosie.”

“Eugene.”

“Josephine.”

“And where’s Sacré Charlemagne?!”

“Charles stepped out for a cig.” Rosie explains.

“Ah. I’ll introduce you to Charles when he comes in. What would you like to drink?

…

“I mean you could write a book about it.”

“It’s already been done!”

“Ah, bon?”

“One! One of the birds.”

“Two, actually.”

“Which ones?”

“The parrot.”

“Yes! By Julian Barnes.”

“Flaubert’s Parrot.”

“And Mozart’s Starling by one Lyanda Lynn Haupt.”

“Ah.”

“So, who’s going to write about the third avian aficionado?”

“It would make a wonderful trilogy Flaubert’s Parrot, Mozart’s Starling, Picasso’s Owl.”

“Who’d write the last one?”

“I call Sir John Richardson for Picasso’s Owl.”

“Naturally.”

“Obvious!”

“Obvious is alright.”

“You have to know how to write with your cock to write about Picasso. Also, you kinda have to be alive.”

“Living or dead. It doesn’t matter.”

“Viril et vivant.”

“Sacré Charlemagne, you should write it!”

A cackle of laughter.

“He can write with his cock alright!”

“I would love to pen prose on Picasso. Sadly, I have too much time.”

“As witty as Wilde, as macho as Mussolini.”

“Damn you.”

“It’s no put down, Charles! Every woman adores a Fascist.”

“The boot in the face, the brute, brute heart of a brute like you.”

“Oh girls, don’t quote Plath’s ‘Daddy’.’

‘Why not, Charles?!’

‘I think it’s one of the most exquisite expressions of psychosexual fixation.” Rosie says.

“Mmm… psychosexual.” Sandrine moans.

“Careful. Sandrine’s salon might devolve into something smutty. I’m kidding. Darling! The look of terror on her face. Oh, you’re sweet.” Charles says to me in his booming baritone. His posh public-school prosody, all hauteur and humor. He takes a sip of his Bordeaux. He winks at me.

I stop breathing.

…

Charles came for me the way God rushes for the soul. I need you, I want you, I must have you to be whole. I found him… distracting. And I mean the word in the original sense. To be distracted; to be made mad. Yeah. He was – is – maddening. Something satanic about him. His darkness. His sardonic baritone drawl. His sumptuous way of dress: midnight blue velvet suit, Gucci scarf. Dark velvet trousers. Olive green windowpane tweed suit. His long, strong legs clad in the obligatory burgundy corduroys of the well-heeled. Well out of my league.

Public-school educated. Charles went on to read History of Art at Oxford. Then completed his Master’s at the Courtauld Institute of Art. A brief stint as a journalist. If you call being flown out to exotic locales around the world and penning witty Waughesque words about this luxury hotel or that three-star Michelin restaurant journalism.

He moved to Canada when he landed a job as the Director of a major art gallery. Charles curated a show featuring an exciting new painter, Eugene Bluth. Eugene is married to Sandrine, a graduate student pursuing her doctorate degree in Art History. The three get along like a house on fire.

I quickly learnt that Charles or Sacré Charlemagne as he is called by his closest friends has slept with Rosie and Josephine. At the same time. Actually, Charles has a bit of a rep. A rake? I took a mental step back.

…

Sandrine and I had met at a lecture on Schubert. I know nothing about the science of music. But the poetry? Who with a human soul can hear the strings of sorrow in Schubert and not shudder at its sweet sadness? It was Sunday. Six of us in the classroom with its oak-paneled walls and low lighting. The lecturer, a professor of Musicology, excited us with anecdotes about his days in Vienna. Handouts of the scores. All Greek to me. I watched Sandrine with her deutsche-bright hair and her clean puritanical face free of make-up and her clear intelligent blue eyes read the piece. He played “Piano Trio No. 2 in E-flat major.”

I recall sort of blacking out. Aesthetic rapture, falling into a sea, a reverie. I lifted my eyes. Sandrine watched me rapt by Schubert. She smiled at me. I smiled back. After the lecture we wandered round the bookstore. I was flipping through a heavy tome about Marie Laurencin. I watched the light fall through the atrium hitting the leaves of potted shrubs and the carpeted floor. I turned around. There was Sandrine watching me. A book about El Greco in her hands. We smiled at each other.

Pleasantries, hellos, and full names exchanged. Seated in the café of the bookstore. Talking about music. We found we had similar tastes.

“You love ‘Luctus Mariae’ by Łukaszewski too?!”

“Oh, yeah. Talk about athletic listening.”

“Athletic listening?”

“Mm-hm. Like the opposite of easy listening. Had to splash some cold water on my face to cool the nerves. I was faint the first time I listened to it in its entirety.”

“Ha, ha, ha! Well, listening to it in its entirety is surely the only way to enjoy ‘Luctus Mariae.’”

“Agreed!”

…

“I’m an artist.”

“I love artists. I try to spend as much time as possible around them.”

Charles, brandy in hand. His mouth close to my ears.

Sandrine looks at me and smiles knowingly. She turns to Josephine. Both girls seated on the sofa talking. I lean back against the wall. It’s been a thing for three weeks now: Saturdays at Sandrine’s. A sort of salon. We bring gifts and ply her home with expensive drink and gourmet food and scintillating, stimulating conversation. That afternoon, after a feast of blinis, crème fraiche, and smoked salmon, we all lay down, some of us stretched out on the sofa, some of us backs flat against the floor as “Luctus Mariae” by Łukaszewski wafted through from the speakers to the ceiling. The winter sun bright and stringent. Charles’ eyes on me. A tight wet need between my legs.

“Why are sorrowful songs the sweetest?”

“There is no such thing as happy music.”

“The Ballroom Blitz.”

We all laughed out loud.

“It is a song about violence.”

“Cheerful violence.”

“A crowd throwing things on stage.”

“Shh! This part.” Charles snapped. His small blue eyes. His sexy jawline lifted. His eyes close.

And I thought there as I watched his tall, strong, strapping body, like a tiger at rest, laying on the Persian rug his legs crossed at the ankles, that there was nothing in the world I wouldn’t do if he asked me to.

My eyes traveled the length of him. His pale, large feet, his long, strong legs clad in burgundy corduroys, his black mock turtleneck. His beautiful handsome jawline, his piercing blue eyes watching me. He grins, wolfish and knowing. I look up at the ceiling, then I shut my eyes.

…

“You’re the last man on earth who calls on the phone.”

“I’m clumsy with my thumbs.”

“No, you’re not.”

“No, I’m not. I can’t quite craft a pithy text.”

“Yes, you can.”

“Well. I wanted to hear your voice.”

The memory of his scent. A fresh, dominant cologne. Fitting for his broad-shouldered six-foot four frame. His beautiful clothes. His cutting elegance and gravitas. Perfectly coiffured chestnut hair. The way he says things. Those hyper-posh bon mots and plum put-downs.

“Darling, you there?”

“Yeah.”

“Talk to me, darling. Let me hear you. I want to imagine all the sounds you make.”

“Charles, why did you call?”

“Call me Charlemagne.”

“I thought the whole idea of a moniker was to shorten things. Considered Chuck?”

“I have. But it rhymes so well with Cock… people get ideas.”

“My God, Charles, you are phallus obsessed.”

“Not at all.”

“No? You work the topic of your cock into every conversation.”

“Do I bring it up?”

“Well, no.”

“It’s the girls. They used to call me Cocky Chuck until I had them know my moniker from my school days was Charlemagne.”

“Cocky Chuck. Goodness. Why did they call you that?”

He laughs. Deep, baritone laugh.

“I’d like to show you.”

“What?!”

“I’d like to show you. Alas, there’s a method to these things.”

“What things?”

“Have dinner with me at the Hotel Hauerbach.”

“No.”

“What?”

“You heard me.”

…

Rain sounds. My apartment. Naked on my lavender pink duvet. The sweet warmth of my bed. I think about Charles and how I long to give him head. But I don’t dare. Instead I keep my distance. He seems turned on by my resistance. And that should be a red flag. What happens after he has had me in the bag? After a few thrusts, grunts, a cry, and release will he pat me on the bum and take his leave with ease? Terrified of being hurt. I could never give Charles what he wants.

…

“I finally have you alone.”

“We’re not alone. Sandrine’s right – where did Sandrine go?”

“It’s alright, darling. She took a different route to walk Bowles. He likes to play in that park.”

“I came to walk Sandrine’s dog with her. We are not alone.”

“Why so hostile?”

“I’m not being hostile.”

“Are you angry?”

“No.”

“Ah. Lovely weather, this. Clear skies.”

“It’s fucking cold.”

“Ha, ha, ha! Alas it is Winter. Darling, have you considered that we have a thing or two in common. We could acquaint…”

“I don’t have anything in common with you, Charles.”

“Why so sure?”

“You say poar instead of power.”

“Surely you can’t hold that against me. Je suis comme je suis.”

“Yeah. Charles, please don’t!” 

His body close to mine

“Then tell me.”

“I am telling you.”

“Tell me to stop. That you don’t feel, that you never felt, and will never feel these taut strings of desire between your body and mine.” He whispers.

A brutal wind hisses about my ear. The snow, cold and powder-dry, like Saharan sand.

The fur ruff of his parka around his face making him appear regal and leonine. His eyes, hawk-sharp, pierce into mine. And I open my mouth to lie.

“I don’t know what you mean. What taut strings between you and I?”

…

Charles’ boisterous laugh. Brandy-soaked. Josephine and some new girl, Daphne, by his side. His deep voice recounting those tongue-in-cheek tales about his Etonian days. Daphne’s hand on his long, strong, muscular thigh. The stinging behind my eyes. The need to cry.

…

“Are you alright?”

“Yeah.”

Sandrine closes the door to her bedroom.

I’m seated on her bed which is made but messy with beautiful clothes and jaunty coats strewn on the silver-grey sheets. She sits beside me.

Tears. My cheeks wet.

“What’s the matter, ma chérie?”

“Everything.”

“Everything starts with one thing. What’s the one thing?”

“Charles.”

“Ah.”

“I think I love him.”

“Why, that’s wonderful! I know he loves you.”

“No, he doesn’t! No, it’s not!”

“Why do say that?”

“He just wants to use me. It’s just sex.”

“Charles is really popular. And very, very handsome, you know.”

“I know.”

“He’s sexy and many girls want to bed him. But he doesn’t use and dump women. He’s… he’s a… Sacré Charlemagne is a gentleman. If he told you he wants you, he means it.”

“But what does he want me for?”

“He wouldn’t fully know, and neither can you. Love is like a wave to the soul. A violent wave of emotion. You and Charles are like two bodies bobbing in the sea. Or like two bodies falling through air subject to gravity. You can’t control the ocean. You can’t control the forces of Nature. You can’t control Love. Let go.”

“I feel dizzy.”

“That’s good. It’s the Vertigo of Love.”

Knock

Knock.

“Who is it?” Sandrine shouts at the door.

I wipe my tears with the sheer sleeve of my pearly-white lace blouse.

“It’s Charles!”

Sandrine looks at me. I nod. She turns to the door.

“Come in, Charles.”

The sound of merriment, boozy and bruyant, wafts through as he walks in. He shuts the door behind him.

Charles, tall, strapping.

“Is everything alright?”

Sandrine smiles.

“Yes. I’ll leave you two alone.” She stands up.

She walks toward the door. She places her hand on the handle. She turns and looks at us.

“The Soul is heavy. It falls like an anvil. But in the sea of love it floats like a drunken boat. Don’t try to halt Nature, instead submit to her rapture. Two souls beneath the shadow of a heavy wave. To survive desire, learn to be a slave.”

Her enigmatic smile. The door clicks closed.

“What the bloody hell was that all about?”

“Hello, Charles.”

“Darling, I’ll take my leave shortly. I wanted only to know, are you alright? You looked rather queer.”

“I’m alright.”

“Ah, good. Good. Yah… Well, I’ll take my leave.”

“Wait.”

“Do you need anything? A paracetamol or… I hear hot water bottles are a help.”

“Ha, ha, ha! Charles, I’m not… I don’t need any of that. I’m fine.”

“Good.” He smiles. “Well… I shan’t take any more of your time.”

“Charles?”

“Yes?”

“Stay.”

…

On my back. My legs on his broad shoulders. His heavy grunts and deep thrusts. This is what surrender looks like: I open up my heart, he tears me apart. Our bodies glistening with sweat. His powerful chest rising and falling. On our backs, we both stare up at the ceiling.

“Did I hurt you?”

“No, Charles. It was…”

“What? My darling, why are you laughing?”

“You’re a bastard. No one’s ever fucked me like that.”

“And no one ever will. Except me, of course.”

“You’re a gentleman in the streets, a caveman in the sheets.”

“Well, civilization takes its toll.”

“Mmm… I love how you say things. Can you recite some English poetry?”

“What? Darling, I’m post-coital and drowsy. I’d much rather sleep with your svelte and lissome body in my arms.”

“Okay. Will you teach me Latin?”

“What?”

“You’re fluent!”

“I speak it well enough.”

“Teach me things! Teach me one word.”

“Irrumatio.”

“Oh? What does that mean?”

“Loyalty to the Crown.”

“Ah... What? Why are you laughing, Charles?”

“Mm, darling… you’re sweet.”

“Charles?”

“Yes?”

“Let’s do it again.”

Outside, the sound of rain. His mouth on my mouth. The tip of his tongue. My emotions like lightening: sinister and strong. I feel the full force of him. I scream in bed. The world whirls. And I sense it spin in my head.