I try to avoid revealing that I'm a model. It's like informing someone you're a prodigy, when you can only play Twinkle Twinkle Little Star. Or, more realistically, a simplified version of Canon In D. I'm five foot nine. My build can charitably be described as 'slight'. I've given up fighting my slouch; when I'm at a table, my shoulders bend and my arms dangle uselessly. In fact, I can make myself go completely limp.
The truth is I don't belong on runways or magazine covers. I'm not completely unattractive; I have a set of perfect teeth. Though I've never had braces, at least five women have commented on how straight they are. I feel powerful when I'm biting into a tough steak or a particularly robust baguette, like I'm finally realising my potential. I brush them carefully, every night; one by one by one. Still, I'm really more of an actor. Last Monday I was a seasoned golfer. I wore a polo shirt and a blue cap, squinting in the afternoon sun, but maintaining an air of intense concentration. I did it to prove that Vitamin C capsules make you healthy and sportive. And tomorrow I will be a trustworthy insurance agent with a leather briefcase, smiling with my eyes. My photograph, on the back of buses, will remind you that you're covered. Always.
I've begun to understand that beauty terrifies people. My lack of it, my earnest eyes, those teeth, soothe and reassure. If every taxi driver looked like me, you'd never be afraid to enter a cab. I'm the caring father determined to save up for his sprightly children - a girl and boy - you'll want to emulate. These shorts, blinding lights, perspiration forming on my upper lip, secretly trickling past my ears, are nothing like my real life. I live in a studio apartment that smells, almost nauseatingly, like a car. It's about half a mile from where I grew up. The windows are permanently clouded with dust and grime; some days I trace the alphabets of my name, with a burnt-out cigarette. I tell people I can't afford a television, but it's mainly because I dislike recognising myself, even if no one else does.
It's not a bad job. I sympathise with my friend Joe. He's a boy I went to school with; we played football after hours, muddying our ivory shoes. We high-fived a lot and never saw each other cry. His face was doughy, the sort that mothers pinch and roll between their fawning hands. By twenty-five, he'd thinned out, with narrowed, staring eyes, and a moustachioed sneer that strangers wanted to punch. When we both joined the agency, they decided to make him the token pervert. He started out as an unctuous figure offering frightened schoolgirls candy, urging them to enter narrow, pastel-coloured elevators, smiling gleefully. Now he's moved on to portraying anonymous rapists in crime dramas. People know him: his face resides in their subconscious, mocking and threatening, and they instinctively retreat. He laments this as we drink together at midnight, idly bouncing beer cans off my door.
The truth is I don't belong on runways or magazine covers. I'm not completely unattractive; I have a set of perfect teeth. Though I've never had braces, at least five women have commented on how straight they are. I feel powerful when I'm biting into a tough steak or a particularly robust baguette, like I'm finally realising my potential. I brush them carefully, every night; one by one by one. Still, I'm really more of an actor. Last Monday I was a seasoned golfer. I wore a polo shirt and a blue cap, squinting in the afternoon sun, but maintaining an air of intense concentration. I did it to prove that Vitamin C capsules make you healthy and sportive. And tomorrow I will be a trustworthy insurance agent with a leather briefcase, smiling with my eyes. My photograph, on the back of buses, will remind you that you're covered. Always.
I've begun to understand that beauty terrifies people. My lack of it, my earnest eyes, those teeth, soothe and reassure. If every taxi driver looked like me, you'd never be afraid to enter a cab. I'm the caring father determined to save up for his sprightly children - a girl and boy - you'll want to emulate. These shorts, blinding lights, perspiration forming on my upper lip, secretly trickling past my ears, are nothing like my real life. I live in a studio apartment that smells, almost nauseatingly, like a car. It's about half a mile from where I grew up. The windows are permanently clouded with dust and grime; some days I trace the alphabets of my name, with a burnt-out cigarette. I tell people I can't afford a television, but it's mainly because I dislike recognising myself, even if no one else does.
It's not a bad job. I sympathise with my friend Joe. He's a boy I went to school with; we played football after hours, muddying our ivory shoes. We high-fived a lot and never saw each other cry. His face was doughy, the sort that mothers pinch and roll between their fawning hands. By twenty-five, he'd thinned out, with narrowed, staring eyes, and a moustachioed sneer that strangers wanted to punch. When we both joined the agency, they decided to make him the token pervert. He started out as an unctuous figure offering frightened schoolgirls candy, urging them to enter narrow, pastel-coloured elevators, smiling gleefully. Now he's moved on to portraying anonymous rapists in crime dramas. People know him: his face resides in their subconscious, mocking and threatening, and they instinctively retreat. He laments this as we drink together at midnight, idly bouncing beer cans off my door.
