Unity by Michael Arditti Read Free Book Online Page A

groups in London: the sort that tar us all with the same brush? She’s become so much less responsive (if this embarrasses you, skip to the end of the paragraph or, possibly, the page). It’s as though making love were a gift for her to bestow on me rather than something for us to share. She said, knowing full well that she was being unjust, that it was the only reason I wanted her to come to Munich. I explained that, without her, I felt like a child away from home. You and I (that’s ‘you’ Michael, not ‘you’ Fliss) can keep up our relationship on paper. We can swap ideas and impressions, although it takes an extra effort – and costs a fortune in stamps! But, with her, I need something more tangible. Of course, she totally misunderstood and said that I wanted her for her body and you for your mind. Thank God, I ditched the analogy of Wolfram and his cocaine.
    To make matters worse, she was having her period. Count yourself lucky that all you have to worry about is a stubbly cheek. Now I know why my mother’s ‘headaches’ were so violent. Fliss’s are even worse. After three years, I’m an expert. The pattern’s always the same. The first day, she grows listless and lumpish as if there were a great weight bearing down on her. She withdraws further and further into herself. Then, when the bleeding starts, she becomes wildly exhilarated, as if she’d defeated Nature for another month – and so successfully that she needs no one else. Suffice it to say, sex is not on the cards. When I told her that I wasn’t squeamish, she looked at me as though I’d stepped out of the Stone Age. Perhaps you’re doing the same now. Stupid, isn’t it, to let your happiness be so dependent on another person? If that’s not one of Nature’s design faults, I don’t know what is. At Cambridge, Fliss and I used to feel sorry for you, forever the odd one out – don’t take offence, it was compassion not pity. Now, I think that it ought to be the other way round. You’re the lucky one. Your life isn’t at the mercy of someone else’s nervous system. But then there are compensations. Did you know that, when she’s aroused, her labia form a perfect heart?
    ‘Back to Unity , please!’ I hear you implore. I wonder if that’s the first time the word ‘labia’ has penetrated your sacred halls. Or is it also the Latin for tongue? Are generations of boys desperately trying to commit it to memory with no idea of the pleasures that lie in store? ‘ Unity ! Unity !’ Very well. Everything is proceeding according to plan. I’ve handed in the outline and the producers have been formulating budgets. You’ll be pleased to hear that the hunt has been called off. The cost of thirty stunt extras would have been prohibitive. I thought that Wolfram would hit the roof, but he remained unusually calm. Having inserted a scene where Unity goes to a dance with her pet snake draped around her neck (I haven’t dared break the news to Fliss), he has decided to begin with one where she traps mice and feeds them to it live.
    I’m currently working on a rough draft, which has to be in byChristmas. Then, after more script-conferences (i.e. more rewrites), I’ve a deadline of the first of April for the master draft which we take to Cannes, where (great excitement) The Magic Mountain has been chosen for the main competition. There, we hawk the script to actors as well as trying to raise any extra finance and land foreign distribution deals. And yes, you did read that right. It is ‘we’. Yours truly is no humble hack chained to his desk but a fully accredited member of the production team. Then it’s back to Munich for a final fine-tuning (at least in theory), leaving us with a shooting script by June. All things being equal, the cameras should be ready to roll at the end of July.
    The plan is for a ten to twelve week shoot, including a fortnight or so in England, although most of the English interiors will be recreated here in the studio,