Midday rolled along and the desire became too strong. I had to call her. And so I did. But it wasn’t her who answered, it was a man’s voice at the other end of the line. Before I had time to say hello, the voice named an inner-city address and promptly hung up. I quickly wrote down the address and decided that this mysterious quest was too intriguing to ignore. I found myself a map and I set out to find this place and whatever it housed within.

After considerable hunting, I found the house that matched the address. It was a glamourous terrace at the end of a dead end road. It had a black wrought-iron fence surrounding it, and large cherry blossom trees in the front garden. I followed the path to the front door and knocked three times. A slim, tall eurasian girl answered and invited me in. She led me through the house to an intimate sitting room the first floor. The light was dim, and the furniture looked antique, with old fashioned coffee tables, persian rugs and a glamourous chandelier. She asked me to sit, and told me I would be seen to shortly.

It was highly strange, but wonderfully exciting. I had no idea where I was, but I felt that I deserved to be there. And what had all this to do with Beat? Why had she left me this number??

After a few minutes, the eurasian girl returned with a glass of red wine, and an auspicious smile. “Desiree will see you now.” So I got up and followed her again, this time into a room which looked as much like an office as it did an Arabian opium den. A woman was sitting behind a large Victorian style gilded desk. As much as I could see of her outfit, she wore a tight fitting crimson blazer, with a gold locket, and large gold hoop earrings. Her black, curly hair was pulled up loosely and her make up was sophisticated for a lady of her age, which I assumed was mid-40′s. She smiled as I entered the room, and motioned for me to sit in the chair opposite her. Who was this lady? Was she a madam? I really hoped I hadn’t wondered into a brothel again.

“So nice of you to visit us, Mr. Milton Leigh.” She spoke with a raspy voice that suggested she was a smoker, “My name is Desiree Porteini, and I am the regional president of a highly elite organisation, of which we wish you to be a member.”

I naturally had about a million questions running though my head. But before I could voice a single one, three people I recognised walked into the room. The first one was Beat, the second was the possibly-gay ex-editor of Ralph that I met that day in the pub, and the last one was crazy Michelle, the psychopath who trashed my apartment. This was getting stranger and stranger.

“I believe you’re recently acquainted with Beatrice, perhaps you remember Michelle? And this is my personal assistant, Elias.”

I stood up and shook the gentleman’s hand. My mind was racing, and things seemed to be getting stranger and stranger. Still I found it hard to find the words to voice my queries.

Desiree went on, “Beatrice, Michelle, Elias and myself are all members of the same organisation, one that has branches worldwide, and one that seeks the specific talents and skills that you possess. You see, we have been watching you, and testing you to assess your level of aptitude for our agency, and I am pleased to be able to offer you a position.”

“Brilliant” I said, “but what exactly is this “organisation” you speak of?”

Desiree grinned at me, the way a parent grins at a naive child asking foolish questions.

“Our agency specialises in the formulation and implementation of desire….”

Oh dear. It is a brothel.

“But before you leap to any hasty conclusions, our members are not procured for any solicitous purposes. Our clients usually hire our members on behalf of another person in order to achieve a specific goal.”

“And by ‘goal’ what exactly do you mean?”

“Well, often we get requests from people who know someone that they think seems somewhat jaded with love. He or she may have lost interest in meeting people or perhaps they find themselves rarely attracted to potential suitors.  We conduct a private evaluation of the ‘loveless’ individual, and then deploy into the field a member of our organisation who we feel is best suited to charm and captivate them. Throughout the courtship, we restore hope in the ‘loveless’ and give them the opportunity to experience ‘love’ as they never have before. And by ‘love’, I don’t necessarily mean physically, but spiritually, emotionally – something real and passionate that they can remember and treasure forever.”

“But don’t they know it’s all formulated?”

“That’s the thing, because we’re hired through a third party, the ‘loveless’ assumes it is all as authentic as love should be.”

“That’s ludicrous. You can’t tell me that you can just make other people fall in love  100% of the time with a selected member of your agency…there has to be an infinite number of variables in these sort of occasions!”

“Well of course. Sometimes it takes longer than others, but it always happens. No one yet has been able to resist the temptation of something as precious and pure as love. You should know, what with all the girls who have fallen for you after one brief encounter.”

“Alright, people hire your people to make other people fall in love with them. But surely your client base is not exclusively concerned friends looking out for their “loveless” buddies who are unlucky when it comes to dating…”

“You’re quite right. On occasion, we do have clients who may desire our services for more disingenuous purposes. A concerned father, unhappy with his daughter’s choice in marriage, may seek a man to charm her and open up her eyes to a world of men she never imagined. Perhaps a jilted wife want’s to get back at her husband by making him fall in love with another woman, only to see him eventually abandoned by this new found love in the most unfortunate of circumstances. All those married politicians that we see having salacious affairs, or celebrities that find themselves publicly humiliated for cheating on partners or having dalliances with escorts – all these usually involve a member of our organisation. Like I said, we have branches all over the world, and have been around for decades…do you know of the Profumo affiar? Christine Keeler was one of ours.”

“Well, why the date with Beatrice? And the disaster with Michelle here?”

“It was part of the evaluation. Beatrice was an example of the seduction and courtship process, to prove to you that no one, not even you, is exempt from our strategies. Elias got information about your general person, and Michelle was a frightening example of what becomes a rare possibility in this line of work…when the ‘loveless’ discovers they’re being played. It doesn’t happen often, but it does happen. Fortunately the money well makes up for it.”

“What sort of money are we talking here?”

Desiree grabs a pink slip of paper and writes something down. She holds it up, Elias walks over to her, takes the paper and hands it to me. My jaw drops.

“So, when can I start?”

Regardless of this, I decided to meet up with this female as she requested – and as I arrived at the venue, I looked around, walked up to the bar and I saw her standing there. She looked nothing like how she appeared last time in the tunnel. Her hair was fluffy and big, and it bounced off her brow like pink fairy floss. She was wearing a gold satin dress that tucked in at the waist and made her legs suggest they were ensured for a large sum. Her eyelashes were long and her face shone radiantly like the moon in a starless sky. I was very glad I turned up for that date.

We began talking, and conversation was easy – either we had a lot to say, or a lot of coronas, either way, it was rolling around wonderfully. Turns out her name is Beatrice, but she prefers ‘Beat’ (however bizzare that may sound…) She is a serial university drop out, having tried four different ones in the last two years. She claims to not have vocational ambitions and just wants to fly an ebony kite in every country in the world. She is saving up to achieve that goal currently through “dancing” at various “clubs” in the city. For something as potentially date-wrecking as the admition of being a stripper is, she was surprisingly un-coy about it. In fact she related her sordid tales about seedy old business men and their strange propositions with great vigor and ebullience.

A few hours into the date, she requested I excuse her for a moment, which I kindly did. And I waited at the bar for her for about 15 minutes, until she turns up again with a New York Yankee’s baseball cap full of jellybeans. When I asked where she procurred these sweet treats, she told me that she found an otter made of styrofoam under the staircase that preceeded the bathrooms. As she picked up this bizarre discovery, a short, asian girl runs out of the ladies sobbing “The SLIMEBAG, I never want to LOOK at THIS AGAIN!” and she hurls the yankees cap inadvertently at Beat. Beat shakes the otter, hears a rattle, pulls it apart and empties the contents into the hat.

Of course I didn’t believe a word of her story, but I enjoy how it amused me.

We spent the rest of the night just frolicking around the city. At one stage, she crept into a bakery that opened late, and stole two brownies from the display cabinet.

They were the most magnificent brownies I had ever tasted.

And she told me stories of all the places that she’s been, and the people that she’s met. I couldn’t tell what was true and what wasn’t, but I adored it all. She was like a Lewis Carroll book wrapped up in one divine, outrageous package.

Just as I was about to ask her back to my place she runs off, into the photobooth. Seconds later, she re-emerges, with a strip of four photographs, and on the back, her number scrawled in purple ink. She kisses me quickly, on tip-toes, and then runs off, into the night.

Behold, a deity stronger than I; who coming, shall rule over me.”

Today I was playing pool down the pub at midday, I know the owner so I can play for free. Suddenly this suave, suit-wearing cad strolls in, reaking of expensive aftershave, and peering through a pair of designer glasses. He ever-so-cooly requests in on my one player pool tournament, and being the amiable gentleman that I am, I kindly allow it. We get to talking, and turns out he used to work as the editor of Ralph magazine! Then he went on to say how he is now branching out and has a new magazine in the works, aimed at a female audience, designed and produced by men….

I told him I was looking for a job, how I’d done a bit of writing here and there, and that I read a lot of magazines. Next thing I know it, he is giving me his card and telling me to call him tomorrow to arrange my position.

[I really hope he didn't think I was gay, and by "position" he meant something totally un-job-related.]

So, here I am, on the road to journalistic glory with an attractive, possibly homosexual editor and a new avant garde ladies publication.

This is certainly going to be interesting.

Eve.

I was making my way back through Central station tunnel after meeting Alistair for several midday beverages, and before my eyes there sat a radiantly beautiful young woman slouched against the tunnel wall. A cup rested before her, and unlike most of the seedy urchins of Central tunnel, she was looking up into a melancholy underground sky. She wore a tattered crimson skirt and around her neck hung a collection of cheap scarves and tatty jewellery. I reached down into my pocket and rustled up a decent amount of change, and as I walked  by her, I tossed it into her cup. As soon as I heard the splash of liquid I realised that I’d just thrown money into her coffee mug.

BOJANGLES
[the supposedly homeless girl]

What the FUCK is your issue, pretty boy?

EVE
Oh, I’m so sorry, I thought you…

BO
You thought I was a BEGGAR! Just because I’m sitting here,
that doesn’t make me a bloody homeless person! I don’t want your pocket change.
(throws the money back at me)

EVE
Well, why don’t you go and drink somewhere a bit less filthy so
that people don’t mistake you for a street urchin?

BO
You don’t know me, I don’t have to sit anywhere else but here.
You owe me another coffee, you dickhead.

EVE
Here’s some change then.
(hands the money back to her – it’s still dripping with coffee)

BO
(she takes the change, and wipes it on her skirt)
You piece of shit.

EVE
You sure have a fine mouth for a lady.

BO
Why don’t you do something about it then?

EVE
Something like what? This…

Alright, so my action at this point could have been construed in some circles as inappropriately invasive, but I just couldn’t help myself.
I pinned her back against the wall and I kissed her.
Well, she was asking for it.

BO
(breathless and in shock)
Who the hell are you?

EVE
Who the hell would you like me to be?

BO
My date Friday night?
9pm, Bar Broadway.
I’ll see you then.

And after saying that, she runs off.

So now it looks like I’ve got myself a Friday night engagement with someone I originally supposed to be homeless. Lucky I’m not an ugly, dirty old man. If that was the case I probably would have ended up with a gaol term as opposed to a date.

Eve.

What rot.

Eve.

So this evening it has been arranged for him to be taken to one of Australia’s most revered psychic’s.

I once knew (and by this I also mean in the Biblical sense) a young Spanish beauty, who makes her way reading tarot cards at various stalls and festivals around the country. I have kept in contact with her, and we meet up every now and again when she is in town, she reads my cards, I show her my collection of ‘wands’, and so on. Anyway, she called me up not long ago, and was telling me about this women she was touring with called Romola, who is amazing – clairvoyant, clairaudient, clairsentient, clairdanes, all the impressive stuff… and she suggested I get a reading done when Romola is in town this week. It doesn’t really interest me in getting a serious reading, where the possibilities that I will get any sex out of it are slim to none. But my dad is well into all that and I thought it would be a brilliant gift. So I am nicking mum’s car and taking him to Romola’s tonight so that he may know his future.

I hope she tells him that I’ll find a proper job. He’s been on my back about that for months.

Eve.

Eve.

We’re out on the town again tonight – looking for answers, although we’ll probably have to wade through a submerged city to find them. That’s alright, my friend Alistair always says that the prettiest girls come out in the rain. He is a strange character, very charming and affable, he is convinced that he’ll be the one to introduce me to the love of my life. I still remain adamant that it will never be possible. Women are so precious but, for me, they also symbolise the deterioration of everything pure and beautiful. In their youth, they blossom and shine like flowers, raising gracefully and gloriously up into the rays of a vibrant sun, but slowly the world has his vicious way with them and they shrivel and die like the most common of vegetables. Of course, this happens to all of us, but for one who worships the aesthetic beauty of the female as much as myself, it becomes all the more painful. I can scarcely lay my eyes on a modern day photograph of Bardot without weeping.

Alistair insists that this is just a phase, and that, perhaps as I mature, I can look for something deeper in a woman, something less physical, something immortal. But until that day, I guess my love will have to remain satisfied with my sad old parents, my dear old cats and every perfect image of Brigitte Bardot (before she got all old and racist.)

Eve.

Jemima is staying at my house tonight. Her roomate is having an important date and so she asked Jem to piss off for the evening. I’m not going to sleep with Jemima, if that’s what you’re wondering. I never have, in fact. I tried once, but she told me I was too scrawny to have sex with her, and that was that.

We played Guess Who before – but our own version of Guess Who where we ask personal questions about the characters, and then eliminate people due to our own assumptions, so, as opposed to “do you wear glasses?” we ask “are you currently divorced?”, “do you use online dating sites?”, “have you ever been an alcoholic?”… in most cases we both end up with the same person.

Here she is now, Jemima wants her voice heard…

hallo BLOG GOERS. why on EARTH do you spend your precious hours reading about this man’s life? go buy a Mills & Boon novel, those are probably more descriptive, and the leading men are better built..

Thank you, Jemima. Such a sweet girl, yet foolish enough to allow herself to be photographed by wayward camera men whilst drunk and clubbing…