If you’re thinking of gifts for the coming season, Celia’s Room is now fully revised and has a brand-new cover, making it a brilliant gift for that special person in your life. If you enjoy this excerpt, you can get the full book here in either print or ebook.

We locate the party—no-one knows the exact address—from its noise, a confused mist of sound drifting down from the sky. An electric buzzer dangles free on a wire dropped from the roof, clipped to a nail on the doorframe by a clothes peg. Thirty seconds after we press it, the street door creaks open, no sign of a soul, just a rope attached to the latch, jiggling frenetically, disappearing up into the darkness of the stairwell. We enter and climb steeply in single file. Five floors up, we come out onto a terrace lit with red and blue bulbs strung between a television aerial and a clothesline. A row of scraggly cactuses line one parapet. The roof is full of people despite the chill January air. White light blazes from a doorway, beyond which are more people. The scene is anarchic and ebullient.

I’m sitting on a wooden crate, a can of beer in my hand, warm. People press and flow around me, talking, squealing, roaring, whispering, gesticulating. Smoke packs the air in dense layers. My head swims. I suck more beer into my throat to ease the rawness. Françoise who is, could only be, French—all in black: black leggings, a black, hip-hugging tunic, electric black hair that sprays in every direction around her, but violet eyes—suddenly sits in my lap and murmurs into my ear in throaty Spanish:

“‘Ullo. Are you a friend of Narcissus? And ‘ow did you come to know ‘im?”

Her eyes sparkle as if she is suggesting that I could only ‘ave come to know ‘im by one route.

“In a bar.” I say.

“Ah, yes. Naturally, bien sûr.”

She winks, giving the impression she knows of a kind of bar I don’t, one where more than just drinking goes on. Her weight crushes my thigh, though she seems so petit. But I don’t say anything, drinking more beer instead, finding that tonight, this is the answer to most of the unmanageable situations I’m getting into.

“He is sexy, don’t you find ‘im?”

I go blank. I don’t know her. I don’t feel able to confide in her. How can I say out loud I find another man sexy?

“No.” I frown. But I do. I do find him sexy, though I don’t like men. I know I don’t. Admitting I’m a homosexual would only prove my father right. Is that me? Maybe that is me. This party feels oppressive. Blood beats through my temples in time to the house rhythms. I push Françoise off and shakily stand up. My thigh is killing me where her bones seemed to anaesthetise the muscle. I stagger out of the doorway onto the terrace, searching for fresh air which I consume in great gulps, leaning over the parapet and staring down at the street—tiny—five floors below.

Hands grip my shoulders, push me forward. I tense, rear back. Struggle.

“DON’T JUMP!”

It is Felipe. Laughing his head off through his thick frames.

“It’s just it’s my turn to clean the stairs tomorrow. I’d be hours washing the blood from the street.”

“You live here?”

“At the moment.”

Mentally I go through the three people I’ve met, their three large rooms I have found myself in at different times tonight, and can’t place Felipe in any one of them: not with Juanjo, professional slob, his hundred and twenty kilos permanently installed in a sagging armchair beside his gin bottle; or with Edu, Françoise’s Australian boyfriend, doing his MBA up in the expensive part of town, who even speaks a bit of grudging Catalan. (This here, for me is a strange country, Foreignland, where Castilian, not Catalan, is the lingua franca); definitely not with Marta, installation artist, whose girlfriend Sabrina, English, très chic-lez; girlhood summers spent on the Costa Brava, etcetera, wrenched me to my unsteady feet at one stage and pulled me around the room to The Sacados:

¡Belizzimo! ¡Oh Belizzimo!

¡Vamos! ¡Vamos! ¡Vamos!

¡Venga! ¡Aaii! ¡Venga, chica!

Oh, venga amigo,

Vamos al amor,

Al ritmo, ¡al ritmo de la noche!

Felipe reads my thoughts:

“No. My room is the sofa in the living room.” He giggles. “I’m looking for a place.”

Felipe has a face that reminds me in some way of Munch’s The Scream. It starts off strong around his eyes—those chunky glasses—with firm cheek bones, but then seems to eddy down randomly towards his weak chin metres below, finally petering out in a wispy goatee. He is incredibly pale, paler even than I am, a complexion making you think of diluted, blue-blood aristocracy. A few freckles force a small rebellion of colour on the pallid skin. His lips, however, are full and sensuous, almost scarlet. He smiles at me.

“So, Petit Miró, why have you come to Barcelona?”

The alcohol’s spinning dance dissipates my concentration.

“I want to paint… I want to study…”

“Aren’t you studying?”

“After the summer… I’ll be doing Agricultural Engineering. I wanted to study Fine Arts… Dad… He wants me to get my degree, then go back and help him on the land. I hate it.”

“Can’t you change?”

“He’s paying.”

“Well, Miró, doing what you want in life isn’t about doing the right course at university. You decide what you want and take the first step in that direction. Let fate take care of the rest.”

“But he won’t let me! I don’t know what to do…”

“How can he stop you, Miró? He’s down in Tarragona and you’re in Barcelona. He doesn’t even have to know…”

“But I don’t have the money. I need paints, I need a studio…”

I swear that was the first time I thought of Dad’s money being used for any other purpose than on farming classes.

“Well you’ve only got one life. You have to decide how you’ll live it. Your Dad’s had his chance already. He doesn’t own you.”

Felipe is looking out over the city rooftops. Close by is the straight, octagonal tower of the Església del Pi, looming so close I think I could reach out and touch it.

“I don’t know whether that helps. If you want to paint, you just have to…”

But the tower erupts into bells, deafening, drowning his words. We look at each other, amazed. My fingertips on the wet parapet register vibrations through mortar and brick. A deep double note—bong-bing… and again… bong-bing… four times—marks the hour; then another, heavier bell strikes out: one… two… three…

Felipe and I continue to stare at each other. His eyes seem huge, appear to expand like whirlpools, molten ripples spreading out. We have given up any attempt to speak over the din. It is as if we are frozen together in a fairy tale world, trapped inside one of those tiny plastic bubble paperweights where snow continually falls onto a painted plastic castle… ten… eleven… twelve… As the booms fade away—before I can react—Felipe leans over and kisses me. His tongue, this frenetic slug, struggles to force its way in between my teeth, and his hands grasp greedily at my body. I pull back, horrified, wiping lips against the back of my hand, trying to rub his saliva from my mouth. He gives a kind of spasm, upset and embarrassed, steps back and smiles, sheepish.

“Sorry. You’re very beautiful, you know, Miró.”

I don’t know what to say, shrug.

“Don’t think so. It’s okay.” Because I can see he is getting really nervous, feels like a fool. “It’s just, I don’t think I’m into that.”

“Are you moLESTing notre petit peintre, Felipe? I saw it ALL.”

Felipe’s face is instantly, violently awash with blood. He giggles through his blush as Narcissus plants himself between us.

“You can’t blame a boy for trying… I want… have to…”

And, haggard, stricken, he is gone, pushing through people, disappearing inside. Narcissus’ sharp eyes regard me. I am worried about Felipe, didn’t mean to offend him. I sense that Narcissus reads everything going through my mind.

“Don’t worry about HIM. He is used to rejection. Or he SHOULD be by now.”

His laugh is almost nasty. “Our little Miró, only just arrived here and already you are BREAKING HEARTS.”

I don’t think this is true, but it does make me feel guilty.

“Can I have some beer?”

He hands me his can and I drink, the cool wash of alcohol blotting out any other consideration. His hard, shiny eyes are studying me. He appears as much in control as ever, unaffected by alcohol or drugs. Álvaro is nowhere in sight.

“I think it is TIME you went. You are looking very IMBIBED. I will walk you home.”

I protest that isn’t necessary. In fact, I was wanting to stay longer, but my head is ringing and I feel myself lurch as I leave the protection of the parapet. I let him steer me through the people, his firm hands on my shoulders, until we are descending the dark, narrow stairs. I have to hold onto the wall on either side to avoid tumbling headfirst down.

In the street again, we walk away from the Ramblas and the bus that should take me back to my cousin’s house. He simply says:

“We will pass by my studio. I want to show you something.”

On the way, he gets me to talk about myself, describing everything: my village, my hopes, the fight with my father that finally brought me here, my frustration at having to study farming instead of art. We finally stop at a shopfront roller door. He bends down, unlocks it and screeches the door high enough for us both to duck under. It rattles down again behind us. The space is pitch black. Not even a sliver of light comes in under the door, but I can feel that the space is crowded, dim shapes piled high. I don’t move, waiting for him to find a switch. Instead he says:

“Give me your hand.”

I raise it and, fumbling, mine connects with his. It is warm and firm, grips my fingers strongly. He pulls me through a labyrinth of bulky obstacles. I duck when he tells me to, and stumble behind him, scraping my shin once on some outcropping object. We come to what feels like a division in the space and he brushes a hand up and down the wall until there is a quiet click. Light from a weak yellow bulb throws tall shadows onto dusty furniture stacked up almost to the ceiling.

“What do you THINK?”

I don’t know what I’m supposed to be looking at. I cast my eyes over the tables, chairs, benches, restaurant fridges, dressers and kitchen sinks and give a kind of non-committal “Mmmm”.

“All this is my FUTURE! Look at this—everything I NEED: why here there are the complete furnishings for my enTIRE business.”

“Your business?”

“My RESTaurant. WHAT you can see beFORE your EYES, this is worth MILlions of peSEtas. Okay, maybe some of it needs to be cleaned a little… look at this DUST, it is disgusting, but you give all this one thorough once-over and you will find it is as good as if you bought it new from the shop. This is what you call SHARP investment!

His eyes have taken on an almost maniacal gleam. He sounds like a prophet as he preaches the incredible worth of what I can see only as junk. His eyes widen and he brings his face within a few inches of mine. I try to look credibly sober.

“But DO you KNOW the best thing?”

I inhale an almost electric, exciting odour from him. The tiny hairs in his sideburns and scarce goatee seem to crackle with elation. He smiles deep into my eyes. I feel weak.

“The BEST thing is that all this…”

His arm shoots out and planes through space.

“…all THIS, was absolutely FREE. ALL collected from the street. You CATaLANS… You CATalans are so WASTEful. I have stored a fortune here in the perfectly good objects you have THROWN onto the STREET.”

I take a deep breath. My head is spinning wildly and I have the beginnings of a shattering headache. Narcissus’ breath enters my nostrils. Does he really smell of cinnamon, or is this some creation of my own mind, a fanciful idea of how Caribbean people should smell? I sway.

Then, for the second time in my life (not counting my father), for the second time that night, a man kisses me. Narcissus’ lips, soft and full, invite me to keep pressing my own against them. Our kiss, lasts… a long time.

“AAAHH! I have been wanting to do that ever since I laid EYES on you, Petit Miró.”

I am confused. Does this mean I am gay… or is it, could it be a phase… Yet for once, I throw my convoluting mental acrobatics into the air as he walks me through a doorway where I see a bed with a mattress and bedclothes. He turns to me and I feel overwhelmed, grab onto his body to anchor myself with both hands as his arms enclose me tight.

(Chapter Joaquim IV, p. 41)

Celia’s Room is now fully revised and has a brand-new cover, making a brilliant gift for that special person in your life. So if you enjoyed this excerpt, get the full book here in either print or ebook.