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  She lay there feeling sorry for herself, trying to piece together why she was naked, dying of thirst, with a full face of make-up and a head that felt as though it had been dropped on the floor.

  She could hear Oliver clattering about in the kitchen. She tried to call out to ask him to get her a drink but her throat was so dry she could hardly get any sound out – a papery, barely audible croak was all she managed. Then the memory hit her – the train, him, his face slowly moving towards hers. Her eyelids snapped open instantly and every muscle in her body went rigid.

  ‘Morning, Pol,’ said Oliver pushing the door open with his foot. He was wearing a pair of boxers with a gaping fly, and holding two cups of tea.

  She lay perfectly still, a Kung-Fu grip on the edges of the duvet.

  ‘You OK?’ he asked cocking his head back.

  She released the duvet. ‘Fine,’ she said. A nerve under her left eye twitched incessantly, as if it was trying to give her up.

  ‘You don’t look it.’ He set the mugs on the bedside table and sat down next to her.

  ‘Yeah,’ she said vaguely. ‘Too much to drink last night, I think.’

  As soon as she’d arrived home the previous night she’d gone straight to the drinks cupboard in the kitchen and poured herself a large whisky. She hated whisky, but it was all she could find. Oliver had various open bottles; he considered himself a bit of a connoisseur. She’d downed the glass, then poured herself another one, the soothing warmth quickly engulfing her.

  She subtly rearranged her towel under the duvet, pulling it up over her chest and securing it as best she could, then sat up. He passed her a mug. It was the one she’d bought him as a present when they first moved in together. It had a picture of Kenneth Williams dressed in scrubs and the caption ‘Ooh, Matron!’ underneath. He’d bought her a pair of antique emerald and ruby-studded drop earrings.

  She sipped tentatively, watching enviously as Oliver drained his mug of piping-hot tea. She was convinced his mouth was lined with asbestos. ‘Ah, yes,’ he gasped loudly at the refreshment. ‘And what did you get up to last night?’

  ‘A drink. Alicia from work,’ Polly said, still trying to get the evening’s events straight in her mind.

  Oliver pulled a face. ‘What were you doing hanging out with the little black pixie?’

  She glared at him.

  ‘I’m just joking, but you have to admit she’s a funny little thing.’ He had met the receptionist briefly when he met Polly at the office after work one evening. They’d exchanged five words at most. ‘Did you go anywhere nice?’ he continued.

  She couldn’t think clearly. At that very moment the feeling of the stranger’s hands clawing up her thighs to her knickers flashed through her mind.

  ‘Earth to Polly,’ Oliver said, waving a hand in front of her face when she didn’t answer.

  ‘I’m sorry, what?’ she said, trying to catch up with the conversation.

  ‘Last night – where did you go for a drink?’

  ‘Oh, some new bar on Chancery Lane,’ she replied, unable to remember the name of the place. She was trying desperately to act normal, but couldn’t bring herself to look at him.

  ‘Must have been a heavy one: you were all over the place when you got in.’

  Her head snapped up to look at him. She had no memory of having seen him when she got home last night. ‘I don’t remember. Did I get you up?’

  ‘No, I just heard you.’

  She couldn’t help letting out a small sigh of relief.

  ‘You were banging about in the bathroom for ages,’ he continued. ‘It was a mess when I went in there this morning, your clothes all over the place and a massive puddle in the middle of the floor.’

  She vaguely recalled attempting to take a shower before going to bed. It had felt too weird sliding in next to Oliver after having been with someone else. She’d stripped off hastily, giving no care to her dry-clean-only skirt and hand-wash-only top. In the shower she’d tried to wash herself, but as soon as the jet of water had touched the tops of her thighs and gone between her legs she was tingling again. She hadn’t been able to resist allowing her fingers to gently work their way in. She’d closed her eyes, remembering his face, and lost her grip on the shower head, spraying water everywhere, drenching the tiny bathroom.

  ‘Oh,’ she said, lost in thought.

  It took several seconds for her to realise that Oliver had gone quiet. He was watching her, a serious look on his face.

  ‘What?’ she said, suddenly frightened that he could see inside her brain and was reliving the memory with her.

  ‘I tried to call you last night. Did you get my messages?’

  ‘No … well, yeah, but not until late,’ she said, remembering the five missed calls. She hadn’t listened to any of the messages yet.

  ‘I arranged for us to go out for dinner.’

  ‘What?’ said Polly. ‘But you said you were on call.’

  ‘I know I did.’ He looked down at the duvet sheepishly and began picking at a tiny piece of fluff. ‘I was trying to be romantic, surprise you.’

  Polly looked at him, surprised. ‘But you said not to wait up.’

  ‘I know,’ he said, looking annoyed. ‘But I wanted to … Oh, forget it.’ He pulled away.

  ‘You wanted to what?’ Polly asked.

  ‘It doesn’t matter; it was nothing.’

  ‘No, tell me.’

  ‘I organised a surprise dinner, but you didn’t answer your phone, so I couldn’t get in touch with you. Serves me right, I guess.’

  With thoughts of last night still running in her head, Polly closed her eyes and started massaging the bridge of her nose with her thumb and index finger.

  ‘Don’t get upset, Pol,’ said Oliver moving in close and putting his arm around her. ‘It’s my fault, I should have told you about it, or at least said I was planning a surprise.’

  She opened her eyes and looked at him. He gave her a half-hearted smile. Guilt crawled all over her; she wanted to make it all better. She leant over and kissed him. He responded, but as soon as her tongue ventured forward his lips clamped shut. She persisted, letting her towel fall away and pressing herself into him. He pulled away from her. ‘Steady, Pol,’ he said.

  ‘Why?’ she asked, her lips moving down his cheek then on to his neck.

  ‘We need to get ready for work, and … you’re not washed or anything.’

  ‘It doesn’t matter.’ She gently started nibbling at his earlobe.

  ‘No. Come on, now.’ He started pushing her away.

  She stopped and looked up at him.

  ‘Good girl,’ he said, then got up and went into the bathroom.

  Polly lay back down on the bed. She heard him turn the shower on. She couldn’t remember the last time they’d had sex. When they had first started going out, things had been fine, kind of. But, since they’d moved in together, a blanket of contented domesticity had settled over him. Maybe he was nesting. The thought filled Polly with horror. Polly and Oliver had met on a blind date – they hadn’t been set up together, the blind date had actually been with a guy called Ben. He was the brother of a girl she went to uni with. The date had been a disaster from beginning to end. Ben was late. She’d sat in the restaurant awkwardly for forty-five minutes. When he finally turned up, he was wearing a T-shirt and jeans. Polly had made an effort, in a short black dress and heels, and she felt horribly overdressed – she knew it the second she walked into the restaurant. She’d thought with a name like The Royal it would be a posh place, but most of the people were in casual gear, slouched around in mismatching chairs and tables. When Ben got to the table, he had looked her up and down and said, ‘Like, wow,’ sarcastically, before leaning forward to kiss her on the cheek. Polly nervously overshot her head as she bent forward, and he ended up kissing her ear.

  Their conversation was stilted from the start. They would either talk over the top of one another or sit in long silences when neither could think of what to say. Polly drank far
too much wine and, having barely touched her meal, ended up getting pissed. But not a good pissed. The atmosphere between them made her feel nervy and cynical. She kept coming out with things that she didn’t really think or mean. Ben seemed to enjoy this and spent the rest of the evening questioning everything she said, tying her up in knots.

  Just as the bill came, he excused himself, saying he needed to use the toilet. Polly, feeling ridiculously paranoid, thought he might have done a bunk, leaving her to pay. After a couple of minutes she got up from the table to look for him. She found him still in the restaurant, just by the toilets. She ducked back round the corner just before he saw her. He was on his mobile. She couldn’t help listening to the conversation.

  ‘What the fuck were you thinking? She’s a nightmare.’ Pause. ‘I’m not being mean. She’s sat at the table pissed as a fart. And the bill’s just turned up. She barely took a mouthful of her food and no doubt she expects me to pay for it. I fucking hate ana girls.’ Pause. ‘Sis, of course she’s anorexic, or a puker. Either that or she’s got some kind of wasting disease. Hey, wait a minute, you haven’t set me up with a terminally ill chick, have you?’ Then he laughed, a loud, raucous laugh.

  Polly didn’t listen to any more. She went back to the table, grabbed her coat and left in tears.

  As she reached for the door handle, an arm had nipped round and pulled it open for her. ‘Let me get that for you.’

  Polly looked up. It was Oliver.

  ‘Oh,’ he said, noticing the tears streaking down her face. ‘Are you OK?’

  ‘Fine,’ she muttered as she moved past him.

  ‘Are you sure?’

  Something in his voice made her stop. He sounded so concerned. She looked back up at him and her bottom lip started to quiver uncontrollably.

  ‘Hey, Polly, what’s going on? Where are you going?’ Ben’s voice had come booming from behind them.

  ‘I gotta get out of here,’ Polly muttered.

  Oliver took one look at Ben then gently guided her out of the restaurant and on to the pavement. ‘Fancy getting a coffee somewhere?’ he asked.

  She nodded, unable to speak for fear of the avalanche of tears that were about to fall.

  Oliver wasn’t Polly’s usual type. He was blond, for a start, and big. He’d played rugby as a prop forward until his knees had given out a few years before. He had the stocky build for it, but, since he’d stopped playing, most of his muscle had turned to fat. But it suited him: he was comfortable in his skin, and it was difficult to imagine him any other way. He was older than her by almost nine years. When he mentioned he was a surgeon, she was instantly on edge, waiting for him to start patronising her, but he didn’t. He was charming and funny and gentle. She told him what had happened on her blind date, all but the bit about Ben saying she was anorexic. Oliver said he wanted to take her on a proper date. She accepted.

  She heard Oliver turn off the shower and the clatter of curtain rings as he got out. She slowly sat up and re-secured the towel around herself. It was then that she noticed the four deep fingertip marks near the top of her right thigh. They already had purply-yellow rings around the edges. She placed her fingers over each one and pressed down. They were tender to touch. She closed her eyes. Who was he? She was suddenly tingling all over again.

  ‘Shower’s free.’

  She opened her eyes to see Oliver standing at the bedroom door, and quickly pulled down the towel to hide her bruises.

  ‘It’s almost eight,’ he said.

  She didn’t answer. She should be leaving for work in fifteen minutes. She moved to get up, but had to stop for a second: she felt woozy and her head ached worse than ever. Eventually, she shakily got to her feet and plodded towards Oliver, still standing at the door. He tapped her on the bum as she walked past; she shot him a sour look.

  When she got to the bathroom, it was a mess. Her clothes were strewn everywhere and soaked through. Oliver had left it exactly as he’d found it and, from the looks of it, used her skirt as a bath mat.

  Three

  Polly got to work half an hour late. It took her ages to get ready and leave the house – the connection between her brain and her body kept malfunctioning.

  She got the tube to work as usual. As soon as she got on, she couldn’t help having a quick check around to see if he was there. He wasn’t, of course.

  Polly made up one half of the legal department for a newspaper called the London Voice. The other half was James, a barrister who only came in one day a week as a favour to the paper’s owner, Lionel. Polly’s job was to keep on top of the filing and other admin bits until James could make it in. She had no legal training, and had only got the job because Oliver had pulled a few strings – his parents knew someone who knew someone.

  Working for a London paper wasn’t really living up to her expectations. She’d had visions of being in the hubbub of a busy press office, breaking news all around her, an experienced journalist spotting some hidden talent in her and taking her under their wing. In reality, the London Voice was a free paper with a non-existent readership on the brink of collapse. The only reason it had survived its first year was because Lionel kept pumping his own money into it. She’d thought about looking for other jobs, but didn’t want to appear ungrateful, especially after Oliver’s parents had pulled strings for her. She decided to bide her time. The only staff journalist on the paper, Ron, was hardly the archetypal shit-hot journalist; his latest big break had been to do with council housing benefit fraud. She’d started carrying round a notebook with her, to write down feature ideas to pitch to Lionel. She was waiting until the right moment presented itself; she already had three pages of possibilities.

  The good thing about having a hangover was that it distracted her from all other thoughts. She spent the morning hiding behind her laptop, focusing solely on the task at hand and keeping movement to a minimum. Alicia emailed several times, asking what had happened to her last night. She ignored the emails. From where Polly was sitting she could see Alicia was busy tied to the phones. She felt bad enough about Oliver; she didn’t want someone else giving her grief.

  By lunchtime, Polly was beginning to feel human again. Her stomach felt hollow and painfully empty. She usually went to an organic deli off Tottenham Court Road for lunch – they had a range of OK-sized salads that were under four hundred calories – but today she needed something with more sustenance. She reckoned she must have lost at least a pound from not eating yesterday evening or having any breakfast – she deserved a treat.

  There was a small café across the road from her office. She’d never been into it before, although she walked past it nearly every day. The menu board outside peddled thick-cut sandwiches, pasties and fry-ups – the promise of stodge was impossible to resist.

  It was a small, dank place with chequered tablecloths and tomato-shaped ketchup bottles. It smelt of chips and dirty grill pans. The sandwich counter was busy, but she only had to wait a couple of minutes to be served. She ordered a white baguette with cheese, ham, tomato and extra mayonnaise. Her tastebuds prickled as she watched the stubby-fingered waitress prepare it through the glass counter. She knew she’d be bloated and have a carb-hangover later, but her body demanded salt and starch. She picked up a bottle of sparkling water from the fridge and paid.

  As she turned to leave, she spotted Alicia seated opposite the counter. She’d spread herself out across an entire table, reading a magazine and suckling at a can of Diet Coke. Polly couldn’t believe she’d missed her when she was queuing. As soon as she saw her, she put her head down and quickly walked to the door; she wanted nothing more than to go back to the privacy of her desk and devour her baguette. She was just pulling the door open ready to leave when she heard Alicia’s husky voice calling her name.

  She was tempted to carry on and pretend she hadn’t heard, but a woman with a pushchair coming in forced her to pause and then back up. Polly looked across, forcing on a smile.

  Alicia beckoned.

  Polly relu
ctantly went over. Alicia pulled out a chair as she approached. ‘Hey, hon, how’s it goin’?’ she said as Polly sat in the chair next to her. ‘I emailed you a couple of times this morning, didn’t you see?’

  ‘I’ve been really busy today, haven’t been checking my mails,’ Polly replied, forcing herself to maintain eye contact – she’d read somewhere that liars always looked away.

  Alicia folded up her magazine so Polly could put her lunch down. ‘Just wanted to check you were OK after last night. What happened?’

  ‘What do you mean?’ replied Polly, looking down at Alicia’s plate. It had the remnants of fried eggs, chips and a reconstituted meat patty on it.

  ‘You went to the loo and then totally disappeared.’

  ‘Oh, yeah. I wasn’t feeling great so I went home.’

  ‘I wish you’d said somethin’, lady. I came looking for you. I was worried.’

  ‘Oh,’ said Polly. She felt bad. ‘Sorry.’

  ‘No worries, just glad you’re OK.’

  Polly looked down at her baguette and bit her lip. Her stomach rumbled painfully. She couldn’t wait any longer. She tore off the wrapping and took a large mouthful. She let out a small groan as the flavour brought her mouth back to life.

  Alicia chuckled.

  ‘What?’ said Polly, suddenly self-conscious, putting her baguette back down.

  ‘Nothing, just good to see you enjoyin’ your food.’

  Polly hated eating in front of other people, especially other women. She imagined they were working out how many calories and grams of fat she was consuming, compared to how many she should be having.

  ‘Don’t let me stop you,’ said Alicia encouragingly.

  Polly tentatively picked up her baguette again and took a small bite.