The Haunting Hanged Man

Reality is even harsher once the cameras stop rolling

She waited for John at the usual spot, a dark corner in the City of Light. The ancient streetlamp’s dull yellow glow softened the effects of a decade’s bad choices. This location wasn’t selected by chance.

As she rechecked the time, a shadow approached with a hesitant gait she’d witnessed from many before. Trying to glean her identity while guarding his own, the phantom eventually mumbled a question.

“Marie?” John asked in a casual tone undermined by an uncertain quiver.

“Yes,” she said. A white lie that would be true for the night.

Of course, “John” was also a lie, a label with the ring of a name. Dropping the definite article let her pretend they were friends. Lately, all of her friends were called John.

“I’m Andy,” he said.

“Enchanté,” she replied, defusing the tension with an empty yet reassuring grin. “I’m just down the street,” a nod indicated the way and clipped the need for further introductions.

Her outfit was tidy and uncommon for the trade: Burberry, but as weathered as she. Bought fresh off the rack for far different occasions, it felt like a skin she’d shed long ago. John(s) liked it, though. It allowed them to pretend, too.

Trailing behind, he broke the silence. They always do. Perhaps it’s nerves or part of the social delusion.

“You really do look just like your profile.”

“They don’t call it reality TV for nothing,” she wryly observed, dragging a fag to steel herself for the encounter.

They were referencing the ad that had brought them together. It featured a screencap of her brief, ill-fated fame. The clip was embarrassing, yet good for business.

“Right,” he said.

“It looked like something from the telly, but I couldn’t place the show. Were you a model? A presenter?”

She chortled out some smoke while thinking to herself such flattery and 200 Euros would get him everywhere.

“Or maybe a real housewife from…somewhere?” he ventured.

“Let’s just say that my kitchen was a nightmare, and some asshole showed up to fix it.”

“Ahhhh… got it. A waitress?”

“No, I owned the place.”

“Did you get it turned around?” he asked, instantly regretting the question.

It’s surprising how great pain can arise from small talk. His ridiculous query revived her life’s greatest failure — a notable achievement among fierce competition. Still, she never liked acknowledging it aloud. Instead, she converted the wince to an ironic smirk — you know many Michelin restaurateurs turning tricks on the side?

“What was he like?” asked John/Andy as she turned and continued away.

The subject was clear despite an ambiguous pronoun. It was a question she constantly fielded. They all wanted to know about the show’s celebrity: a world-famous chef, or chef who had become world famous for a sharp tongue rather than anything achieved with a knife.

She stopped for a moment without turning to face him.

“Handsy,” she replied, curtly and honestly, preferring not to pad the man’s undeserved legend. “My place is just around here.”

Her flat was behind and below a dingy Russian resto at the end of a quiet side street. Consuming Cossack cuisine in this gastronomic Mecca is insane, yet enough nostalgic ex-pats and low-level gangsters turn up to make the criminal front seem legit.

Among the undeclared funds laundered by her landlord/dealer was the cash rent for her shithole apartment. When late…or short…or needing a hit, she’d had to trade favors for credit.

“Watch your head,” she warned as they entered her cavern, greeted by a wave of stale smoke and live mold.

She tossed off the trench and dropped her unfinished clope to a sizzling death in the sink.

“Make yourself comfortable,” she offered by rote, more pleasantry than a real possibility.

John placed his jacket atop hers, unable to find a suitable spot…or any uncluttered surface.

With a bare bulb’s sparse light quickly consumed by the room, it took his eyes a moment to adjust. As they did, he noticed the only decoration in the place — a lone picture on the opposite wall.

“That’s… interesting,” he said. “Did you paint it?”

Oil on wood in a chipped basic frame, it portrayed a hanged man dangling from a barren tree lit by an unseen moon. The palette was as somber as the scene it depicted: muted blues, charcoal grays, and pitch black. She called it, “Le Pendu”.

“No.”

“Did you buy it?!”

“No. It was there when I moved in.”

“And… you left it up?” he stated quizzically rather than asked.

The answer was obvious. The motivation was not.

She couldn’t conjure a good lie. She also couldn’t share the truth.

In part, she left it as a reminder of this road’s likely end. A daily warning to escape the dark path. In part, removal didn’t feel possible. She wasn’t even sure it was a painting. Sometimes, she was certain it was a malignant manifestation feeding on her lurid deeds. Like Dorian’s portrait, every sin committed in this iniquitous den added a bit more detail. Unlike Mr. Gray’s shame, her penance was displayed in plain sight.

Speaking this aloud would have dampened the mood, and John hadn’t yet paid her fee. So, she simply shrugged.

“The bed’s in the back. Careful, the new mattress doesn’t quite fit the frame.”

This was an understatement. In a skint state, she’d bought a single mattress to put atop a queen-sized platform. The treacherous mismatch could render the love nest a death trap if one weren’t suitably careful. Still, it was good salesmanship to emphasize the bedding’s fresh nature rather than the fate of its bug-ridden predecessor.

Taking his cue, John picked a path down the dark hallway, proving nothing kills a lonely man’s libido. When she heard the bed creak, she retrieved a quick bump from her purse before following him to the chamber.

The act was predictably unremarkable. They weren’t paying her enough to care. In some ways, they were paying her not to. Still, she tapped into the coke buzz to muster some enthusiasm — bad online reviews were a killer in this biz.

She tuned out the scene as best she could, struggling to escape the sensory assault. His skin smelled of cheap booze mixed with notes of desperation and a healthy splash of knock-off cologne. It mingled with the synthetic scent of freshly unsheathed condoms and acrid hints of borscht wafting down from the kitchen. Bursts of hot breath kept time to light panting but were off-beat with a muffled balalaika.

Mercifully, her mind unmoored from her body. Unfortunately, it remained in the apartment. She blocked out John’s grunts and her detached moans but couldn’t ignore the bristling sound of a spectral brush touching up Le Pendu.

Seeking distraction, she thought through her to-do list: pay the rent, get some smokes, prepare for her son’s visit. The latter mainly meant replacing expired milk from his last stay, suspending the ad, and flipping the mattress from “business” to “personal”.

John’s pace was peaking and her encouraging sounds climbed an octave — it would all be over soon. Dripping sweat hit her face, bringing her back to reality…and reminding her to add “fix leaky shower” to the list.

After one final thrust and a spasmodic shudder, he collapsed — mindful not to roll off the mattress. She squirmed from beneath, nimbly keeping the rubber in place. Offering no pillow talk, she at least disguised her disgust.

“You can clean up in the bathroom,” she said, “be careful — the wiring’s fucked and I’m fresh out of candles.”

That was a lie, but she wasn’t about to waste wax or give him a reason to linger.

Slipping on a kimono, she swiped the cash from the bureau and went back to the kitchen, looking to trade sex-filled air for a lungful of smoke.

Passing the painting, she glimpsed a glistening vulture circling the scene she’d never noted before. Her perpetually frayed nerves rattled further.

A cigarette would have helped, but the pack was empty. Fuck! Gotta tend to that list. She considered fishing the previous butt from its watery grave but settled for slugging back last night’s leftover wine — drowned fruit fly garnish and all.

When that failed to numb the edge, she fingered the cash — a paper totem that justified all. Her accounting skills couldn’t keep the business afloat but this math was simple: €100 for rent, €50 for “recreation”, and €50 to buy the kid something nice.

Buttoning his shirt, John re-entered the room.

“That was lovely,” he said with a smirk.

Lovely? Like she, he was a Brit — making the King’s English mother tongue, yet vocabulary wasn’t his strength.

“Yes,” she reflexively fibbed, straining to mimic a smile.

He leaned in for bises, a sweet local gesture rendered absurd by the indelicate circumstances. Soft pecks were too personal for a transactional connection and too genteel following that grotesque simulacrum of intimacy. She offered a cheek but bit her lip instead of pursing, enduring one final invasion.

While still close, he whispered directly in her ear.

“Thank you, Muriel,” and felt her instantly stiffen.

There it was. A tell. He knew who she was all along. Was it a slip to use her real name, or did he want her to be aware?

She should have known. Another ghoulish flesh-tourist aroused by defiling the body of a soul already broken. He wasn’t the first. He wouldn’t be the last. A pseudo-star fucker who’d immediately brag to the boys and then whack off while re-watching YouTube. She really should get residuals.

He let go and stepped back, seemingly proud of his play.

“I hope we can do this again.”

“Me too,” she said.

One final lie among many.