Trust (London Love #5)

In a bed. In solitude.

Wank when I wanted to. Eat whatever shit took my fancy.

The room seemed to agree with me, a soft hum from the air conditioning easing the silence.

I played a part for a living, and it was doing my head in. Whoever The Dieter was, he wasn’t me. He didn’t exist. I was this messed-up kid from the countryside who should’ve gone to uni and got an education. By now I should have been sitting in a shiny office, project-managing some building site. That had been my dream. To be an architect. Or maybe a vet.

My face crinkled. I knew because it hurt, but it didn’t stop me laughing out loud into the darkness, a madman.

I wasn’t mad. I was slowly getting there, though, and in a way, I was proud of myself for finally taking control. If I could have this, three days in this small prison of sanity, then I could perhaps make that photoshoot with my head intact.

I shouted out into the room. No idea what, but the air-con hummed in support.

I was going mad, wasn’t I?

I rolled over, grasping at the oversized throw that had been neatly draped over the bed. Tucked it around my shoulders.

I hadn’t even taken my shoes off.

***

It must have been a few hours later when I woke up in a panic, my heart racing, as usual. I never knew where I was or what I was doing, with that enormous fear constantly threatening to overwhelm me.

Breaths. Deep breaths.

It had started a while back, the panic thing. The claustrophobia. I couldn’t stand closed doors, yet I craved enclosure. Safety.

Just the word made me hyperventilate.

Oh, fuck off, brain.

I tried to roll over but ended up even more tangled in the throw, kicking my feet, trying to get out of the stranglehold around my hips.

I was a terrible sleeper. Kicked and tossed and turned. I had been known to sleepwalk and talked excessively in my sleep to the point of waking myself up several times per night. Hence all the security. The Dieter, sleepwalking around whatever strange inner-city hotel corridor that our tour had deposited us in, stumbling into a hotel lobby wearing only a jock strap in the middle of the night? Hysteria had swept through management after that little incident.

They had spoken of getting a sleep therapist for me, to ‘help me look more refreshed’. Fuck that. I was overworked and stressed out. The solution would have been to give me some time off, and they all knew it. Unfortunately, I was a cash cow, and if the Blitz machine had been a massive money spinner, who knew what riches they would reap from Dieter the solo artist slash actor slash author slash let’s find another project that The Dieter can put his name to?

I could barely write a coherent shopping list, but what did it matter? I now had a team of ghostwriters on my payroll to produce some kind of award-winning masterpiece of contemporary fiction. No input from me needed.

I laughed out into the darkness, in tune with my rumbling stomach.

Had I asked for food? I thought I had, but none had materialised.

I wasn’t an idiot. Most of the time, I was surrounded by so many people that just uttering the first letter of that word would produce an instant platter of edibles.

Here, I was on my own.

I silently cheered at that fact. But it also meant I had to do things for myself. Like get myself…fed.

Reuben. The doorman. Ha! I had his number. I managed to get myself untangled and sat up, scrabbling around for a light switch. My phone was at 33%, and I needed to somehow sort that too. I grinned. My backpack held a treasure trove of essentials, but first things first. I found the crumpled piece of paper and stabbed the digits into my phone like the proper functioning human being I hoped I was underneath everything else.

Reuben was a nice bloke. Perhaps not supermodel-handsome, but he was decent. Human. Not many people in my life felt human.

“Hello?” he answered. I smiled.

“Hey. It’s me.”

“All right, mate?” His voice…then a sigh. “Who’s this?”