Chapters (50)
- Title Page
- Copyright Page
- Dedication Page
- Contents
- One
- Two
- Three
- Four
- Five
- Six
- Seven
- Eight
- Nine
- Ten
- Eleven
- Twelve
- Thirteen
- Fourteen
- Fifteen
- Sixteen
- Seventeen
- Eighteen
- Ninteen
- Twenty
- Twenty-one
- Twenty-two
- Twenty-three
- Twenty-four
- Twenty-five
- Twenty-six
- Twenty-seven
- Twenty-eight
- Twenty-nine
- Thirty
- Thirty-one
- Thirty-two
- Thirty-three
- Thirty-four
- Thirty-five
- Thirty-six
- Thirty-seven
- Thirty-eight
- Thirty-nine
- Forty
- Forty-one
- Forty-two
- Epilogue
- Letter From the Author
- Acknowledgements
- About the Author
It was six now and Charlie was due any minute. I went into the bathroom to clean my teeth. Opening the bathroom cabinet to get out a new tube of toothpaste I noticed something I hadn’t seen before: a bottle of Vidal Sassoon shampoo. Next to it, matching conditioner. Sliding the cabinet open further, I found a little roll-on antiperspirant, a small box of tampons and some Veet hair removal cream. There was a little brown jar containing some tablets too. The label told me they were codeine.
None of these items were mine. Charlie must have put them there.
I sat down on the closed toilet lid and thought about it. A friend of mine, Simeon, had once told me that his girlfriend, whom he was now married to, had moved into his flat by stealth: smuggling in her clothes, her toiletries, eventually so many of her possessions that there was no room in his wardrobe for his own clothes and they were living together. ‘It was when I found her vibrator in the drawer where I used to keep my underwear that I knew she’d properly moved in,’ he said.
Was that what Charlie was doing?
As crazy about her as I was, it had only been a week since we’d first slept together. A little soon to be shacking up, even if I was smitten with her. But part of me found it quite endearing and encouraging: she was expecting to be around here so much that she needed toiletries.
I made a mental note to ask her when she’d invite me to stay at her place.
I looked at my watch. She was late. Almost as soon as I thought this, she rang me.
‘Hiya,’ I said.
‘Hey.’
‘Are you all right?’
Her voice was thick with good humour. ‘I’m excellent. Why don’t you come down and see just how excellent?’
I opened the front door of my flat and peered down the staircase. ‘Where are you?’
‘I’m in the park, opposite your building. I’ll meet you by the lake.’
She hung up.
Eight
Eight
To get to the park from my flat I had to walk through the new housing development on the other side of Tulse Hill. The gate was locked but there was a gap in the railings, partially concealed behind a shrub, which saved me having to climb over. I guessed Charlie had done something similar.