If I look away from my screen I can pretend I’m not responsible for what my fingers are doing. Can I come over? I can. It’s fine, it’s fine. One last hurrah. It’s the final orgiastic day before a self-imposed, sexual Lent. I should shower, I should shave, but when I shove my hand under my armpit, I don’t feel too stubbly. A quick spray of deodorant, the last drop of a Diptyque Do Son sample stretched all the way from ear to wrist to elbow to knee. A hunt for a better bra and almost matching knickers—black mesh buttock burrowers, but il faut souffrir pour être belle, or rather pour faire l’amour avec un homme mauvais. A fist, shaken at my wardrobe, and then at the sky, before a slightly bobbly, faded, fitted black Lycra dress is unrolled from my washing basket, plucked of bits of tissue, and rolled onto my body. A pair of opaque tights receives the same treatment. I gave up wearing stockings for Sam Strong some time ago.

I throw make-up on my face as fast as I can manage, before I can change my mind. Then it’s the same old routine, down the stairs and out-the-door and into the cold, onto the train, into the city, then inside a taxi somebody else is paying for, London grey but glittering, lighting itself up as I speed over the river, towards a place where I am a plaything, not a problem.

Chapter Seven

Some enchanted evening

Imogen

I don’t actually mind much when Sam Strong smokes in bed. Sometimes I worry that it’s faintly Oedipal—or Electracal, I suppose. Mmmm, just had sex with a middle-aged man who smells like my dad! But there is something profoundly comforting about the urban, social stink of it. I’m not above taking the odd, delicious drag. With him, I can pretend I’m in a French play. More to the point, when Sam Strong lights a cigarette it’s difficult for him to ignore me because it’s hard for him to smoke and scroll through his phone at the same time.