Usually, Zoe tried not to think about it. It was three years ago now, that night, and she could almost forget about it, until something sharp and wretched stirred in her stomach and she’d know it was still there. Now, cycling home from seeing Adam, thinking about what he’d asked her, she could feel it becoming dislodged again.
She had been afraid. That was really the only reason. It was her last night in London Fields with Laura; she was moving in with Rob the next day. She sat on her bed surrounded by boxes, the cardboard pale and soft with age. Two scratchy check laundry bags from the pound shop were bulging with clothes. She was holding a collection of things she’d found under the bed – socks, books, underwear – covered in a pale grey fur so thick that it had developed a structure of its own. She pulled it off.
The bedroom was pretty much done. She had to do the living room and kitchen next, but Laura was there. She’d never said she didn’t want Zoe to move out, but she’d become quiet and distant when Zoe started talking about it. She was hostile to Rob when he came round. It broke Zoe’s heart but also irritated her, which stopped her running into the living room and telling Laura that she didn’t want to go. It was too late now, anyway.
She was afraid of moving and moving because she was afraid. She’d loved their flat more than she thought possible. She could see its flaws – the dingy carpet, the soft plastic leather sofa, the scratched perspex-topped kitchen table, the intolerably ugly kitchen chairs. You could see into the flat below through the floorboards in the bathroom, and in the living room there was a hole in the ceiling that workmen had knocked in the week they moved, exposing the innards of the partition. Presumably whatever they’d found was bad news, too bad to deal with, because it was just abandoned, and the landlord never answered their calls.
But she was proud of the flat and every small thing they’d done to improve it – Laura had made curtains and put them up, Zoe had bought an off-cut from a haberdashery shop that they used as a tablecloth. They ignored the hole in the ceiling and put a throw over the leather sofa; it kept sliding off and they kept pulling it back into place. They’d moved in in summer when London Fields was dense with people every day, the air filled with barbecue smoke and chatter. They went to Shoreditch together to get fringes cut, and bought vintage dresses from Broadway Market that never quite fitted properly. They bought oven cleaner from the pound shop and cheese from the farmers’ market. They drank pints in the Dove and sat at the side of the lido in bikinis.
But it was temporary; they knew this from the beginning. The corner shop started selling expensive chocolate and taxis began to appear, sleek and incongruous, on Kingsland Road. The new Overground station was coming and the building works felt personal and aggressive, as though Zoe and Laura were being dug out. It opened the following summer, flanked by luxury flats. Zoe loved the low, dark, gun-metal grey of Dalston Junction station; the flash of orange hurtling across the sky above Middleton Road; the feeling of glimpsing behind the scenes as the train cut through the rooftops. The line extended, orange ribbon running all over London, with more and more connections. But people they knew had started talking about Clapton, Homerton, even south of the river. Zoe told Laura that their friend Jo and her husband were thinking about buying in Dalston. ‘Oh, for fuck’s sake,’ Laura said. Jo and her husband were management consultants. Zoe and Laura were constantly worried that the landlord would decide to do their flat up and sell it, or rent it at market rate. Flyers and letters from estate agents came through the door, and they hurried them into the bin. They stopped calling about the hole in the ceiling.
Flatsharing was becoming a kind of game, a scramble for remaining space, and if you played badly or were unlucky, you were out, adrift. It had endless rounds, usually initiated when someone absented themselves to live with their boyfriend. She longed to stop playing, and sometimes she looked at studio flats, but she didn’t know anyone who lived alone at twenty-five and she couldn’t afford them anyway. The only practical solution was Rob: he kept saying they should move in together. He’d qualified as an architect and they could afford a one-bedroom flat if they moved a little further out, deeper into Hackney, away from London Fields. But that meant leaving Laura.
‘You can’t put your life on hold because of your friend,’ Rob said. ‘That’s ridiculous. Laura’s an adult, she’ll work something out.’
‘But what? What will she do?’
‘I hate to say it, Zoe’ – this was a tic of his that she was starting to find disagreeable; most of the time it was something he really wanted to say – ‘but I don’t think that’s really your responsibility.’
‘But she’s on her own, and she doesn’t have that much money.’
‘It was Laura’s choice to try and be an artist.’
‘Oh, come on!’
‘What?’
‘“Poor people just make bad choices”, yeah?’
‘I’m not talking about poor people. Laura comes from a middle-class family, she could have done any degree that she wanted, and she chose to go to art school and pursue an insecure profession. I’m not saying that makes her a bad person, I’m just saying that there are consequences to that kind of choice.’
‘But she’s really talented.’
‘I’m sure she is. Just personally, I think it’s foolish to choose a fine art degree when there are so many practical applications of that talent. Graphic design, product design, fashion, even . . . If I had a child, there’s no way I would allow them to go to art school. It’s irresponsible.’
She told herself then, as she often did, that she must never have children with him, and let it pass, as she always did, without thinking too closely about what that might mean for them now.
He looked sad. ‘Don’t be like that with me.’
‘Like what?’
‘Like you think I’m a bad person. I’m not. Sometimes you act like you don’t like me very much.’
She didn’t say anything.
*
She went out into the living room to divide her possessions from Laura’s. It was easier than she’d thought it would be. Laura was sitting cross-legged on the floor, cutting up bits of fabric for an artwork, and she was pretending to be cheerful at least. Zoe’s things had grown into Laura’s to form a coherent whole, and they didn’t make any sense on their own – what sort of person owned a tea strainer but no bowls? How could she make scrambled eggs when Laura had the best pan? Of course, she and Rob would go to Ikea or Argos and build a new collection of things. She couldn’t envision it.
Was it normal to feel this anxious about moving in with someone, if you loved them? She would wake up in the middle of the night, terrified. The idea of someone being there every time you woke up felt intrusive. She worried that they wouldn’t have enough forks and she worried she would never masturbate again. If she could just have one more year . . .
Laura got up. ‘I’m going to make tea – do you want some?’
‘Tea tea or supper tea?’
‘“Supper” tea.’
‘I’d love some. Are you sure that’s OK?’
‘Yeah, it’s just pasta.’
‘I was hoping it would be.’
Laura smiled. ‘It’s always pasta.’
Zoe went out to get some wine. The wine tumblers, the ones they’d bought when they wanted to pretend they were in a European cafe, were hers and packed, so they used water glasses. As Laura cooked and they drank the wine, they began to talk smoothly and fluidly again. Laura had some damson gin that her mum had made – it was near the end of the bottle and hadn’t been strained properly. It was like jam mixed with gin; they drank it anyway.
‘I guess I’d better start getting ready then,’ Laura said without moving. It was Hallowe’en and she was going to a party; Zoe had said she was going to stay in and pack. But suddenly being alone in the flat seemed too bleak. And she didn’t want to be apart from Laura, not when they were like this together.
Laura lent her a black body-con dress. She’d bought a black lipstick from Superdrug and they smeared it on – it was thick and greasy and they needed to press hard to get any kind of effect, but after a few coats, it worked. They looked at themselves in the mirror: they were unrecognizable. Zoe sat on the floor in between Laura’s legs while Laura gathered her hair in clumps, backcombed it and pinned it up. Laura had a handmade corset and a mask of a bird’s head, white with a long yellow beak and black-rimmed eyes.
They got the bus from Dalston Lane and walked through Hackney Wick. Zoe thought she would always find it desolate: those endless stretches of brick and corrugated iron. Even the rows of terraced houses had a kind of blankness about them.
The party was in a warehouse above a Costcutter. The room was full and hot. Fabric was pinned over the windows and on the ceiling and gathered on the walls: red velvet, brown with pulsing orange flowers, batik silk. There were grey velvet sofas, wicker chairs, pot plants, and everyone was dressed up, with peacock feathers, leather masks and fans. Two women had come dressed as Frida Kahlo. Zoe said hello to Laura’s friends and hung around the group for a bit, before wandering off. It normally made her anxious to be alone at a party, but she was enjoying the possibility of being anonymous.
She was sitting by herself on the bottom of the wooden steps that led up to one of the mezzanine bedrooms, when someone came up to her – she knew his face, but not where from. He said his name was Sam and he was at Chelsea with her and Laura, on their foundation course. She only had the vaguest memory of him – he did brown sludgy paintings, she thought, like muddy Rothkos. She was surprised he remembered her, and mildly flattered. He was studying at the Royal College now, and she asked him a lot about his work to avoid the moment when he asked her what she did – his paintings sounded exactly the same as they were at Chelsea but she didn’t say that. Eventually, he asked and her voice went flat, as it always did now, when she had to say that she worked in marketing, for a charity. She found it hard to admit she didn’t like it – it felt like failing – but she couldn’t make herself sound more enthusiastic.
‘So you don’t do art at all now?’
‘No.’
‘That’s such a shame. You were really talented.’
She looked at him sceptically. ‘I bet you can’t remember any of my work.’
‘I can! There was that big painting, it was really blue, of these rows of houses . . .’
‘I never painted rows of houses.’
‘Really? Shit, OK, but it was, like, a blue landscape, right? With these . . . rectangles . . .’ He’d gone red and she wondered why she was being horrible to him, other than the fact that she knew she’d get away with it. She was impressed that he had half remembered. She said, more kindly:
‘They were boats, not houses. But you’re right: it was really blue. And the boats were a bit like rectangles.’
‘There you go! I told you.’ He looked relieved and pleased, and she realized then how much he liked her.
It had been a long time since she’d talked to anyone about painting. Sometimes she’d say she wanted to take it up again, in the same way she said she wanted to leave her job, trying desperately to jumpstart her brain into action. It never happened. Rob would encourage her sometimes, but slightly dutifully, as if he were mimicking good boyfriend behaviour. He’d sometimes talk about going to the art shop together and painting on a Sunday afternoon, in the way he’d suggest they go for a long bike ride or make pasta from scratch – it didn’t feel realistic or sustainable. He genuinely wanted to help with her career though – he found brochures on retraining and encouraged her to try and move across at the charity. He tried to find people who did jobs he thought she might like and put her in touch with them. ‘You need a vocation, Zo,’ he’d say and she knew he was right. He made it seem so easy. The architecture firm he worked for designed solid, useful buildings; he seemed to know exactly what he was doing and who he was. Occasionally, he talked about wanting to do something else, but in an unconvincing, smooth, satisfied way. It was as if he knew that he’d made the right choice really and it felt nice to reassure himself. She’d found it attractive at first, but recently it had started to make her irritable with jealousy.
Sam asked where she lived: she told him about Laura and the flat in London Fields, but not that she would be moving out the next day, and not about Rob. They headed into the kitchen, towards the music, and started dancing. He was moving his face closer and closer to hers and she didn’t pull away. She wasn’t particularly interested in him, but that was precisely what was so compelling about it. It was so simple, this interaction; there was nothing complicated or beholden woven into it. He moved closer in and she turned her face away by instinct. It felt like something she’d done a hundred times and it got tiring after a while, refusing things. Sam looked disappointed and she panicked that she was losing some chance, some opportunity.
She’d never cheated on Rob because she knew that she wouldn’t be able to keep it secret and, however much she had wanted other people, she wanted to preserve what they had more. There had been nights out without him, when tequila turned the evening’s edges murky, lips almost touching, but she’d stopped it, protected them, right at the last moment. She felt more vulnerable tonight.
Sam said he needed to go to the bathroom and she was afraid that he’d had enough of her. She said, ‘I’ll come with you,’ and then felt stupid. In the end, there was a long queue, so it didn’t feel so stupid, keeping each other company while they waited. Then suddenly, he turned round and kissed her. It was an odd moment to choose and she could have stopped it, said that he’d taken her by surprise, but of course she didn’t. She wanted to get lost.
In the bathroom, she looked at herself in the mirror – her face seemed all over the place and she realized how drunk she was. They moved onto a sofa in the kitchen and kissed for a bit before he asked if she wanted to go home with him. She said yes, and went to find Laura to say goodbye. She tried to read Laura’s expression when she told her what she was doing: she looked confused and concerned, but also a bit excited – or maybe that was just what Zoe wanted her to feel. ‘Are you sure?’ she asked. Zoe just nodded, although she felt sure of nothing any more.
They went out into the street. It felt even bleaker than when they’d arrived. A train went past overhead, windows like little beads of light pulled along the line. The moon was a thumbnail. Sam lived nearby, in a new development of flats overlooking the canal, a warren of buildings behind endless gates and security doors. The decor was new and sharp: smooth pale wood and black kitchen cabinets so shiny she could see her reflection in them. He shared it with two couples – their furniture and his artwork seemed uncomfortable in it. ‘I didn’t expect you to live somewhere like this,’ she said and he was defensive: ‘I’ve done my time in shitty warehouses, definitely.’ He told her he’d always really liked her at Chelsea and she was flattered, even though she didn’t remotely feel the same. He showed her some pictures of his new paintings on his phone and she said she thought they were interesting and his work had really developed, and then she was lying on her back on his futon, and he was trying to pull her dress up over her hips. It was too tight and wouldn’t go, so she sat up and started patting the fabric: it was Laura’s and she couldn’t remember how it came off. She found the zip and took it off over her head. He pulled her tights and knickers off together, and put his mouth on her cunt; she wondered how she could have forgotten this liquid feeling, distinct and hazy, and how she could ever have thought that anything in the world was more important than this. He put his tongue in her arsehole, which she thought was quite a weird thing to do without asking first. The Kirby grips stuck in her scalp when he fucked her, and she never wanted it to end, and then after a few minutes, she got bored and wished it would. He pulled out abruptly; she asked him if he’d come and he said no. She reached towards him and he said defensively, ‘I’m just drunk. I don’t have an arousal problem or anything.’ They pretended to go to sleep, although neither of them had come, which she supposed was the definition of bad sex. She thought about Rob only fleetingly. It had turned out to be amazingly easy, after all.
*
She woke up at five and waited for the sun to come up. As soon as it was light, she got dressed, gently touching his shoulder to say goodbye. It was easier when he was half asleep. He asked her to put her number in his phone and she did. She got back to the flat at eight, and made herself a cup of tea. Laura was still asleep. Her phone sprang alive and she saw Rob’s name on the screen; she let it go on ringing and sat, jittery, among the boxes. She saw a pair of trousers Rob had left at the flat that she’d folded up and put in one of the boxes last night; she fell forward clutching her stomach, heaving with sadness and fear. He rang again, and again, and she still couldn’t answer. Her phone flashed and jerked in front of her, and the screen became littered with text and dots. Each one felt physically painful, but she still couldn’t bear to pick it up. The dread intensified. In four hours, Rob would be arriving with a van.
They spent the first night in their new flat crying. They temporarily lost their language and started using other people’s: he said, ‘I can’t believe you would do this to me,’ and she said, ‘It didn’t mean anything.’ Nothing made sense and her mouth was full of ‘sorry’ and ‘love’. The next day, they opened their ‘Happy New Home’ cards. She wanted to tell him that she didn’t feel anything for Sam, and that the sex was bad, but then he might ask her why she did it, and she wasn’t sure either of them would like the answer. He told her he thought she had psychological problems that meant she was never satisfied – she always needed to create drama.
Two days later, they hadn’t unpacked or showered, and they wore the same clothes they had when they’d moved in. They ate takeaways with plastic forks. She worried about the money they were spending, and felt guilty for being concerned with something so mundane. She got a missed call from a number she didn’t recognize and got excited despite herself, and then deflated when it was from her mobile phone network.
On the third day, she found a pair of knickers that had belonged to Laura; they’d got mixed up in her laundry once and she’d adopted them without thinking about it. She’d meant to give them back some day and never had. It made her cry. There was a pile of flat cardboard boxes with grease spots and tinfoil cartons smeared with sauce or a limp strand of noodle in the kitchen. It was starting to smell. Sam texted and asked if she wanted to meet up. She didn’t reply. On the fourth day, Rob told her he thought they should work on it: he knew it would be tough, but he really wanted to try. She was intensely relieved. She deleted Sam’s text. On the fifth day, she cleaned the kitchen. On the sixth day, Rob hung his shirts in the wardrobe.
On the seventh day, they had sex, which was fraught, but different at least.
‘Rob,’ she whispered as he was going down on her, ‘stick your tongue in me. No, not there. The other one. There.’