‘Sleep good?’ she asks in staccato English. Her skin is yellow, her hair long and dark, eyes slanted like a cat’s. I wonder if this is the girl who was in the bed next to me. She is tiny. I sway towards her, following her back into the kitchen.

She laughs at me as I try to speak. ‘I see Ana give you sleepy-time tablets.’

Ana? Who is Ana? She pulls up her sleeves to pour the milk and I can see marks, like grips or burns.

She notices me looking and says, ‘Handcuffs.’ She turns her arms over for me to inspect her wrists. ‘Game the man likes.’ She traces the marks with her fingertips before pulling her sleeves down abruptly, as if she’s suddenly ashamed by what she sees. I try to block the thoughts that her voice brings, and focus on the bird that is still singing, faintly, in the distance.

26. Sammy

26

Sammy

It finishes, like all things eventually finish, but Jesus, this is, without doubt, the longest night of my life. After he rubs me down in a towel, he dresses me, brushes my hair, dries it with a hairdryer, and tells me I’m a ‘splendid specimen’, and that I am even more beautiful bare-faced. I got the measure of him – Mr Bareback Rider. He kisses my face, then picks up his mobile and walks me into the lift, his hand on the base of my spine.

It’s weird, but I’ve kinda gone all floppy, like I’m a rag-doll, or this guy’s Muppet. It’s like there’s nothing of me inside. Even when he pushes his tongue down my gob again, I feel nothing: not hard, not spiky, just nothing.

He walks me through the empty bar downstairs and out into the soft pink almost-morning. The street is splattered with puke, but the sky is high and mighty and the birds are tweeting away. Mark squeezes me one more time and kisses me long and deep. I think he’s cast himself as the hero in some romantic war-era film, where he’s about to leave the love of his life for what may be the very last time. I wonder what his real life consists of. Is he going home to sleep, tasting me on him for the day? How long will that sustain his greedy little ‘O’?

‘Have a good night?’ Mr Taxi asks after the door has shut on Mark. I let my head fall against the window and shut my eyes.