The Homeless Millionaire

Wishes rarely come true. Wishes for specific dreams to come true happen next to never. But I got my wish that night.

When I came awake, my chest was all sticky from the juice my dick squirted over it during the night. I must've had one hell of an erection, because my dick had managed to worm its way up under the waistband of my briefs.

I wouldn't have minded all that if I had remembered just a single scene from the dream I had about Fiona. But I couldn't. I couldn't recall a single image. I just knew that I'd dreamed a lot about her. I knew that I'd had a really good time, and couldn't remember anything from it or about it. It was infuriating.

I was boiling with anger when I showered, partly because I couldn't remember a thing from that dream and partly because I had to shower before drinking a couple of coffees and inhaling a few cigarettes. I made up for it the moment I got out of the bathroom, but I still felt angry.

Of course I knew anger is bad for decision-making, except for occasions when someone was about to kick your balls, literally or metaphorically. But I was normal and guided by emotions as much as the next guy—people who were guided entirely by reason were classified as psychopaths.

By the time I finished my fourth cigarette, I was very determined to not call Fiona at all, not even if it would result in a mind-blowing blow job and a commission worth thousands of bucks. I was going to show my mind and my dick who was the boss.

There was another call I had to make—to my parents—and anger was actually a good primer for doing that. So, bearing another smoking cigarette, I left my room and descended the staircase feeling rather like one of those brave, insouciant guys who nonchalantly step forward to face death after shooting their cuffs.

The family castle was guarded by Josh. I was shocked to hear him answer the phone. He was supposed to be back at his college, for fuck's sake!

He said:

"Hello?"

If I hadn't been so angry, I'd have hung up. But I didn't. I said:

"What the fuck are you doing there?"

It was the right thing to say, because it struck him speechless. Feeling confident after this successful first strike, I added:

"Aren't you supposed to be learning something? Daddy is spending a fortune so that you do, you know."

I could almost hear the machinery between his ears whirring as he tried to come up with a comeback. Eventually, he said:

"Aren't you supposed to be learning something, too? I mean I've been hearing a lot during the past year what a hotshot you are, getting to study at that place in Montreal."

"That's different. I paid my own way. You didn't. You're a still a slave to Daddy's money."

"Fuck you. I got a scholarship."

"It doesn't even pay half the expenses, and you know it."

"Fuck you."

"The only reason I won't say fuck you or tell you to go fuck yourself is because you're already fucked, Josh," I told him. "I feel obliged to show mercy. You're my brother, after all."

He slammed the receiver down so hard it almost broke my eardrum. Hissing and rubbing my earhole (as if it would help) I hung up, and went back upstairs. Once there, I reviewed my conversation with Josh and concluded I managed to kick his balls real good and it made me very happy, because if there ever was someone whose balls needed kicking, it was my brother Josh. They were just too big in proportion to his brain. That was why he was so good at American football.

American football was football for morons. I got hooked on classic football—what North Americans called soccer—when I was living in London. Everyone I met there was a football fan, and after a while I saw why.

Football was a unique sport. It combined intelligence and physical skill and individuality to a degree unattainable in any other team sport. To be running at full speed down the pitch, stroking the ball in front of you just right, not too close or not too far lest a defender intercepted it, to spot a teammate at the other end of the pitch with a split-second glance in spite of all the other players crowding your field of vision, and then to deliver the ball right in front of his feet with a precise kick, all the time weaving and dodging the enemy players—it bordered on magic.

And the magic really exploded when a ball kicked right at the goalkeeper swirled away from his hands at the last moment, and thumped into the net behind him. I knew how it was done in the technical sense: the ball was kicked off-centre, making it spin and curve in its flight. But like all magic, it was very difficult to do. Especially when it was done while running and avoiding all those guys who wanted to kill you as long as it was done within the rules of the game.

In other words, I had no respect at all for Josh's success as an American football player. I had little respect for North American sports, actually. They always seemed to involve wearing a helmet and holding a piece of wood.

I had no respect for Josh, whatsoever. I had no respect for my father and my mother even though I really owed them some, if only for giving birth to me and taking care of me while I grew up and all that shit.

Worst of all, I had no respect for myself.

I was just a random combination of non-random genes, meaning I was half my my mother (whom I despised, really) and half my father (whom I hated for being like myself). I hated my mother for being cutting and cruel but I was that way too, in a way. I hated my father for being a liar and an appeaser, but I was like him in that way as well.

There was just no fucking way you could escape basic biological rules. Whatever you thought about yourself, you were just an animal. An animal that fortunately or unfortunately, had learned how to really think.

It was a given everyone would abuse that capability. It was part of every animal nature to abuse its capabilities. Humans were programmed to abuse their capability for thought. They'd already thought of a couple of ways to make their own species extinct. No doubt, as time passed, they'd think of more.

I went around for a couple of stupid circles like that before I finally came to the conclusion that if I wasn't calling Fiona, I'd better meet someone I could fuck in the very nearest future. It was only two o'clock in the afternoon when I came to this conclusion, and it was a Monday. It was hardly the ideal time to meet a girl I could fuck.

I thought about calling mobile lip Jane of course, but she was sure to be at work—she was a working girl—and anyway, in the meantime, she was bound to have formed a close acquaintance with at least a couple of new cocks. That was the thing about girls that were good in bed and liked it. They had no shortage of admirers.

I didn't want to be one of many. I wanted to be the only one. Wasn't that everyone's dream?

After I'd circled my flat an infinite amount of times, I drew a portrait of Fiona. It turned out well. It turned out so well it made my heart ache. I wanted to make love to her. She was the ultimate woman.

I smoked several unproductive cigarettes and then, taking advantage of the fact that Tony still hadn't returned home, I went downstairs and called Fiona.

I was fully expecting that the phone would be answered by a Filipino

maid, and was totally thrown off my stride when I heard Fiona say:

"Hello?"

I didn't know what to say, so I was honest. I said:

"It's Michael. I just finished drawing your portrait."

She was silent. I could understand that. If I were in her shoes, I'd be silent, too. Eventually I said:

"I'm sorry. You know, about the party. I had to leave. It really wasn't my fault Jane's boyfriend puked on your patio."

"Yes, I know," she said with that aristocratic drawl that forgives all human foibles without forgetting any. "It was his choice."

After another short silence, I said:

"Chaz—my agent—also told me you wanted to get in touch with me."

It was the wrong thing to say. There was ice in her voice when she said:

"Yes. Well, I was curious about what happened to you, and also my Dad was interested in talking to you about a couple of picture to decorate his office."

"Oh really? Well, I'd be only too glad–"

"That's history," Fiona said. "He's given the job to Ludo. You met Ludo, I mean Jeff, at my party, didn't you?"

"I did."

"I'm sorry," Fiona said. "He was available, and you weren't."

"Of course," I said. "I understand."

There was a short but very uncomfortable silence. Then I said:

"I've had to move house in the meantime. All that stuff about finding a new place and then actually moving there took up all of my headspace. Especially since I couldn't really afford it, but I liked it so much I just had to take it. I'm sorry."

This last remark was intended to make Fiona offer me a new commission to make me some money. But instead, she said:

"Where are you living now?"

"On Fulton Avenue."

"I don't know where that is," she said. "Is that some kind of a track through the woods?"

I laughed.

"You could call it that," I said. "I can show you if you like."

The silence that followed was frosty. When she spoke again, she said:

"That would be nice, when it gets warm again. Anyway, I've got to go now. Nice to hear that you're still alive."

"Thank you," I said automatically.

"Goodbye."

"Goodbye."

And that was it.