It’s boiling already, and sweat is running down my chest and pooling underneath my bra. I dump the holdall under the driver’s seat and check it’s not visible from all angles. Then I walk back into town, taking a different route by mistake and ending up by the sea. After a couple of hours whiling away the time at a café where a coffee seems to cost five euros, Amir finally texts. Hi bbz, I’m steaming off of last nite, you missed a proper big one! Will be at the Oceania club from 3 to get on it again, meet me their 4 a drink and I’ll sort you out! :）
His reply almost makes me rethink. I cannot engage with a grown-up who seems not to possess the ability to use basic English, even in text. It’s just bad manners, and on top of that, it implies a level of ignorance that you might forgive in a teenager but is appalling in an adult. You can only blame a poor education for so much. My secondary school was hardly Hogwarts but I still took the time to learn the difference between their and there. I doubt Amir did even that. Not for the first time, I wonder what he does to earn so much money, I doubt it’s entirely kosher, but who am I to lecture on morality? I consider using my little rental, and decide to stick with Amir’s offer. I’ll just have to be stern, shut down all offers of alcohol, and leave as soon as I get the car keys. Ugh. I resent having to rely on a man （and worse, a man who wears wrap-around shades） for help in a matter that really should be done by me and me alone, but I have to be realistic. And Amir won’t be getting anything good from this interaction. If it all goes to plan, he’ll be none the wiser. If it goes tits up, he’ll be in a world of trouble. This cheers me up a little, and I drain my coffee.
I arrive at the Oceania club just before 3 p.m. The place is enormous, a palace of vacuous frivolity. I assume it’s mainly one big bar, but souped up, on steroids. The driveway is littered with sports cars in lurid colours, each being dealt with by harassed-looking valets in white jackets. A Rolls Royce parked haphazardly in front of the entrance displays the number plate ‘BO55 BO1’。 I wait at reception while a girl with a tan which the sun would reject outright as being beyond its powers speaks on the phone in estuary English. Eventually she turns her attention on me. I imagine she’s unimpressed by my brown hair, sans extensions, and my flat sandals. I’m wearing red lipstick, which I always wear when I feel like I need a shield of sorts, but apart from that, I look fairly plain. I like plain. I have a somewhat beautiful face and I don’t feel arrogant saying it. Women always backpedal when they slip up and admit they think they’re attractive, a lifetime of being told by men not to be ‘up ourselves’。 Be as beautiful as possible but make sure it seems effortless and, crucially, never acknowledge it. Run away from any man who says that you’re beautiful but you don’t know it. The same men want you to be constantly up for sex but never take charge of your own enjoyment. I am pretty nice looking. Not tall, but slim and in proportion. Dark hair, symmetrical features, a nice full mouth without being too pouty. I like looking at my reflection but I’m not obsessed with it. I know my appearance helps me out in life but I’m not my mother, too reliant on her beauty and left to flounder when it’s not enough. My look is probably incredibly disappointing to the men in Marbella compared to the peacocks you see around here. Coco Chanel supposedly once said that you should take off one accessory before you leave the house. These girls would scratch old Coco’s eyes out with their acrylic nails before they did that. I tell Miss Tan that I’m meeting Amir, and her face changes. Clearly, he’s a valued customer, as I’m whisked through marble hallways and past a library bar stuffed with fake books and objects which look old but I’m willing to bet are bulk-bought from a supplier who churns out this crap for those wanting to look authentic but care nothing for true provenance.
We emerge outside, into the blinding sun and what looks like a theme park for adults. There are several linking pools, each with a bar in the middle, where people have swum up and are enjoying cocktails underneath straw parasols. House music blares and waiters walk briskly between loungers, topping up drinks. Some people have whole beds, laid out under canopies, where several people lie around smoking and chatting. Nobody is sporting anything more than swimwear, apart from me and I have no intention of joining them. I spy an actual belly chain of all things. Jewellery for the waist, for when you run out of places to flaunt your diamonds. Coco Chanel would die.
‘Mr Amir is not here yet, please relax and have a drink.’ I’m almost pushed down onto a large white lounger, where I am conspicuous only in my solitude. I order a tonic water, in the hope that Amir will think I’m ‘already on it’， and wait. My new friend is only forty-five minutes late, time I spend watching the bronzed girls rolling down their already tiny bikinis to get more sun, and staring at the men with their shaved chests and mini bum bags preening and showing off – mainly it seems, to each other.