With late spring as good a time for change as any, I moved into the small flat in New Cross that Earl shared with his dog, Coño. It was an easygoing environment: relaxed and sociable with a regular flux of guests when Earl was around. Although Sabine and I never spoke of living together again, she enjoyed rocking up there with her rucksack full of food. She’d cook for us, and whoever else, a meal that was hearty and homely.

“Meatballs in fruit sauce served on mash, Meggie, Earl?”

“Soupe à l’oignon with fat slices of crusty bread?”

“Boozy mussels fresh today from Borough Market? Quatre, cinq, six?”

She prepared the food conscientiously like a maman but ate voraciously, greedily, like a teenage boy.

The few times she stayed over, she slept on my mattress in a tank top and panties. After falling asleep, she’d kick the duvet off. By day she tended to be cold, particularly her hands and feet; by night she was always hot. Occasionally I’d lie like a succubus with my gaze fixed on whatever part of her was in view: an elbow with the shadow of a bruise on it or the oval soap curve of a breast pressed into a pillow. More often, though, I kept my eyes screwed closed since it was in bed I felt most estranged from her. We never cuddled or held hands or let so much as a foot touch a foot. It was as if she regarded the bed solely for sleep, and sleep a solemnly private matter.

Being so close to her yet so far, I would get a strange sensation in my belly. She was there, she wasn’t there; she was by my side but I couldn’t reach her.

Obsession is about not wanting to be the self. Wanting to be other. Next to her, I must have known, at some level, the ultimate impossibility of that.

When it came to kissing, Sabine and I did it only drunk and in public. Sometimes, I enjoyed the performance; surfing her wave of exhibitionism could be fun. Other times, it irritated me, though not entirely without contrariety . . .

Coming from a starchy, puritanical environment, I rejected pointless sexual boundaries. The more I knew of Sabine, the more I wanted to know. And I wanted to be wanted, of course. But I was also ambivalent about us getting more physical. Sex involves expression; fascination allows negation. My confused feelings were tossed about by our pushes and pulls, by frustration, curiosity, and pride.