‘Pretty as a picture,’ said an amphibious voice behind us. It was Gerald, older and dirtier than ever, his fingers brown with nicotine, the ever-present beret at a crazy angle.

‘Gerald, darling,’ said Stephen, extending a fingertip, ‘how lovely to see you.’

‘Like the Wicked Carabosse, always turning up where I’m not wanted.’

‘Wonderful show,’ I said, for want of any better remark.

‘Yes,’ hissed Gerald. ‘Wonderful. So much one could tell if one wanted to.’

‘Oh Gerald,’ said Stephen, ‘you always dish the dirt on everyone.’

‘Take your boyfriend,’ he said, gesturing towards Mervyn and scattering cigarette ash over the carpet. ‘Templeton’s new discovery. Oh, he snaps them up and cleans them up, doesn’t he? And look at the lovely playmate. Our very own platinum blonde. Miss Maxine Trent. Well, they look quite lovely together, don’t they? Quite convincing. But scratch the surface …’ He wiggled his little finger, which had a horribly long and dirty nail.

Templeton was frowning in our direction.

‘Oops, she’s seen me,’ said Gerald. ‘And any minute now one of his delightful henchmen will come over and tell me that there’s a taxi waiting for me at the door. I don’t fit in here, you see, with all the ladies and the diamonds and the stink of respectability. But he daren’t throw me out. One little shake from me and the whole house of cards comes tumbling down.’

‘Mr Gerald, sir …’

It was Don, Templeton’s ‘secretary’.

‘Don’t tell me, angel face. My carriage awaits.’

‘Sir.’

Gerald poked Don in the chest. ‘You’re looking good, Don. Almost as good as when you posed for me. Remember those photos?’

Don’s eyes flickered over to Templeton.

‘Don’t worry, ladies,’ shouted Gerald; the room hushed. ‘I won’t cause a scene. The wicked fairy is leaving the party.’ He shuffled towards the door, passing Mervyn. ‘Hey, Sleeping Beauty,’ he said, ‘watch out. Just one little prick and poof! All this disappears.’

He cackled as he was escorted to the door.

09

Everyone is dying.

Jonathan says that he’s a trendsetter and they’re all copying him. First of all, I notice that Andy, my steroid dealer at the gym, hasn’t been around for a couple of weeks, I assume he’s on holiday until someone tells me that he was found dead in bed by his boyfriend. They went out the night before, took cocaine, ecstasy and GHB, came home and had sex and Andy never woke up. It’s funny going to the gym now. He’s just … not around any more. Oh well. That’s one way to give up steroids.

Then there’s Hadley He’s been getting thinner in the face, and much redder, for months, and everyone sort of knows that he’s got cancer, although nobody knows of what. Now he’s in hospital – private, of course – and he’s had secondary tumours removed from his neck, but the main cancer is in his lungs and it’s inoperable. Nobody is saying ‘HIV-related’ but we’re all thinking it.

Jonathan wants me to go with him to visit Hadley, ‘because I want a witness to make sure that the bitch is really going to die,’ he says, but I think it’s because he’s terrified of going into a hospital on his own. Since his near-fatal Valium-and-red-wine cocktail, Jonathan has been jittery, erratic and even less reliable than usual. ‘When I came out of hospital,’ he says, ‘I thought that maybe life was a wonderful gift and I should start taking more care of myself. Then I thought about how fragile life is, and that maybe I should just live every day as if it was my last. And then I just decided to stop thinking about it at all.’