London Fields by Martin Amis

later, he grew fond and wistful, and called her at three o'clock in the morning from the Black Cross. She read out a poem she'd written him. Keith went round there anyway. A month after that he opened his tabloid and saw a piece entitled STOLEN HOURS WITH TV'S RICK. There was a picture of Analiese, in her frock, savouring the scent of a municipal bloom. There was another picture of Analiese, without the flower, and without the frock (and cut off at the knee). There was also a picture of a puzzled Rick Purist: he did indeed look a bit like Keith. Here in cold print Keith learned that he was 'very romantic' and 'a fantastic lover' who was, moreover, 'built for love'. Rick Purist denied it all. Rick's wife Traci was standing by him. Words could not describe the elation Keith felt. He bought thirty copies of the newspaper and was about to shower the Black Cross with them. But just in time he realized that this would be an inappropriate response to a really singular slice of luck. Powerfully eroticized all the same, Keith called in on Analiese that very week. She knew by now, to her cost and embarrassment (or to the cost and embarrassment of the tabloid's editors), that Keith was not Rick Purist. But she forgot and forgave, and invented new fictions for him: Keith as fly-by-night, as man with no name, a crossword of aliases, a Proteus and Pimpernel. Keith didn't get it; but he certainly liked it. Never before had his unreliability and heartless neglect been seized on and celebrated as the core of his appeal.
    Obviously there were little complications: obviously. Sometimes, when he stumbled into her bedsit in the small hours, Analiese was not alone. An adoring baldy or four-eyes – some wally, wimp, nerd or narna – might be sleeping on the chair, or on the floor, like a dog, in which case Keith would speed them into the night with a taunt and (whoops!) a kick in the arse, pick himself up off the floor and join Analiese in the sofabed with her warmth and her breasts and her laughter. On other occasions he surprised her in bed with famous people. This didn't happen very often (Keith didn't go round there very often), and the famous people were no longer very famous; but it did happen. A classical musician, some terrified poet: these were the kind of celebrities, and non-tabloid readers, to whom Analiese was now reduced. No hard feelings. Fair was fair. Keith would take a few swigs of whatever was available, crack a few jokes, and be on his way, usually to Trish Shirt's. Once he surprised her in bed with Rick Purist. Analiese was making amends (she later explained) for the disruption she had brought to Rick's marriage. On came the bedside lamp: Keith and Rick looked quite alike. Keith stared. He'd seen Rick on the telly! It was one of the strangest moments in Keith's strange life. He soon hopped it. . . That night seemed to sum it all up, really. She lived out in Slough now, did Analiese; and Keith was a busy man.
    And Debbee? Little Debbee? Well, Debbee was special. Dark, rounded, pouting, everything circular, ovoid, Debbee was 'special'. Debbee was special because Keith had been sleeping with her since she was twelve years old. On the other hand, so had several other people. All completely kosher and Bristol-fashion because she'd had her tubes done and you just gave cash gifts of seventy-five quid to her mum, who wasn't bad either. Keith was very straight with Debbee Kensit. Respect. Consideration. Nothing dirty. Natural love. You got a ghostly feeling as you separated from her, on the small bed, in the small room, its walls fadedly rendering the lost sprites and dwarfs and maidens of childhood; and the white smell of very young flesh. Plump and prim (and fat-legged) on the man-made lower sheet lay little Debbee. And shockingly naked: untasselled, ungimmicked, unschool-uniformed. Such extras were to be found, plentifully enough, in her top drawer; but Debbee was always naked for her Keith, as nature intended. She wouldn't suggest