Seeing Other People

Like a door slamming followed by the scent of a heavy, sweet-smelling perfume. I opened my eyes but the darkness was impenetrable. Trying to make sense of it all I reached up with my right hand to the back of my head, clenching my teeth together in readiness for the moment my neurones would signal the full extent of my injuries. But there was nothing. No matter how hard I rubbed my scalp I couldn’t find so much as a spot of tenderness, let alone the blood and bruising that I was expecting. I had been hit hadn’t I? I’d been hit from behind. A blunt object. A stick or a club or something similar. So where was the damage?

I went over the little that I could remember. I’d been in East London. For the Divorced Dads’ Club shoot. I’d had a drink with Carl the art editor and his assistant. I’d been using my new phone. Bella had texted me. I’d texted Bella. A young kid had approached me dressed as if auditioning for a part on a gritty TV drama as ‘council estate youth#1’. He’d wanted a light for his cigarette. But he’d been wearing a Zippo around his neck. And then I’d been hit. Cigarette Boy must have been some kind of decoy, distracting me while his mate came up from behind. They must have been after my phone, laughing at me as I lay on the pavement.

The pavement.

I arched my back slightly. Whatever was underneath me was clearly not regulation paving stone. It felt soft. Like a bed. I fumbled around in the darkness. I had a duvet over me. I was in a bed, not lying on the pavement where I’d fallen. Who’d found me? Who’d picked me up? Was I in hospital? Nothing was making sense. Gingerly I touched my scalp again. Still no cuts or bruises. What was going on? Ridiculous thought: I’m not dead am I? I pinched my arm hard. The pain was very real. I attempted to collect my thoughts once more. I’d been mugged but I had no cuts. I’d been mugged but I was no longer on the street. I’d been mugged but someone had put me to bed. I touched my chest. I had no shirt on. I moved my hand downwards. I had no trousers or underwear on either. I was completely naked.

Now I really was panicked. An urban myth sprang to mind: the one about students getting drunk on a night out in Sheffield and then waking up in a Chinese hospital minus one of their kidneys. It couldn’t be true, could it? Disconcerted by this theory I reached across to feel the wall behind me. Maybe there was a light somewhere. My hands knocked against a glass object. I ran my fingers over it. It felt like a lamp. I traced a line down the base to the cord and then along to the switch. Click. And then there was light. The bulb was quite dim, barely bright enough to read a book by. I looked around the room. I wasn’t in hospital but I wasn’t at home either. It was a medium-sized bedroom. On the wall nearest to me was a chest of drawers with a star-shaped mirror on top. Draped across some of the star’s points were a number of necklaces and below that, lying flat on its side, a hairdryer. Against the far wall was an open clothes rail. The clothes were feminine, dresses, blouses and the like. There might even have been a fur coat on the end but it was hard to tell in the feeble light. On the wall partially obscured by the clothes rail was a Rothko print in a clip frame. I knew the print because Penny and I had bought one from the Museum of Modern Art on a trip to New York. It used to hang in the hallway of the last flat we rented before we bought our current house.

As I concluded that the regular inhabitant of this room was most likely a young woman I heard a gentle sigh emanating from the opposite side of the bed. I was not alone. I picked up the lamp and lifted it in the air a little so that I could get a better look. I almost dropped the lamp in shock. It was Bella. The intern. She was the person lying in the bed next to me. I carefully set the lamp back down on the bedside table and collated this new information together with what I already knew. I was naked in bed with a woman who was not my wife. The news hit me like a punch in the stomach. How could this have happened? The last thing I remembered was getting hit across the back of the head and now I was in bed with Bella. Was I dreaming? Was this part of some elaborate ruse? Maybe I’d just got the wrong end of the stick. I gently lifted the duvet up and took a peek underneath. She was naked too. I took a moment to digest this news. I was naked in bed with a naked intern who I’d met for the first time less than a week ago. My stomach lurched uncontrollably as again I tried to recall the night before. I’d been out for a drink after the shoot and had been heading home. Bella had texted me. She’d wanted me to meet her. I’d told her I couldn’t. She’d persisted and though sorely tempted I’d just about managed to say no. She’d promised me that I wouldn’t regret it then . . . what exactly? I hadn’t said yes to meeting her, I was sure of that, and yet here I was. And if I had said yes to meeting her then why couldn’t I remember anything – not even the taxi ride over to Soho – about my evening with Bella, let alone how we’d ended up in bed? There had to be some kind of rational explanation for what had happened. There just had to be. And whatever the explanation I was absolutely sure that it wouldn’t involve me having cheated on Penny.

I thought hard. Maybe I’d met up with Bella and we’d started drinking and had ended up so drunk that she’d taken me home and put me to bed. That made sense, surely? And maybe I didn’t have any clothes on because . . . I don’t know, maybe I’d been sick over myself and she’d put them in the machine to be ready for the morning. That sounded plausible. I never could hold my drink. Relieved to have conjured up a life-saving narrative I concluded the best thing I could do was grab my clothes and get out of there.

Easing aside the duvet I edged my legs out of the bed and stood up. The laminated floor beneath my feet felt cool but there was something rough stuck to the underside of my right heel. I reached down and plucked the offending object from my foot and studied it in the light of the lamp. It was an empty condom wrapper.

I felt sick.

I couldn’t have, could I?

I looked over at Bella’s sleeping form.

If I’d slept with Bella surely I’d remember it. I’d been faithful to Penny our entire relationship. Twenty whole years! If I’d cheated surely it would have made some sort of impact? This made no sense at all. I had to get out of here.

I scanned the floor and lying at my feet as though they had been abandoned in the heat of the moment were my clothes. I put them on as quickly as I could: underwear, socks, jeans, shirt and then my jacket which felt oddly weighted as though there was something in one of the pockets. I put my hand in the inside pocket and pulled out the object. It was my phone. But how could that be? What kind of attacker mugs someone but doesn’t steal a phone when there’s one there? I took it out and checked the screen. It was five twenty-five. This too confused me as I knew for a fact that Jack had been waking early all week because it was too light in his bedroom. I walked over to the window and pulled back a corner of the curtain to see a blackout blind beneath. I tugged that too and sure enough it was getting light outside. At least that was one mystery solved.

I wondered if my phone might be able to shed any light on my activities the night before but after checking it I was left even more confused. The last text I remembered making was at 21.18 and read:
Really I can’t
in response to Bella’s promise not to keep me out too late. But then at 21.24 I’d apparently sent one saying:
I’m just looking for a taxi. I’ll be there as soon as I can
. At 23.55 I’d sent a text to Penny:
Had a bit too much to drink. Will crash at Carl’s place so as
not to wake you+kids. Will call in morning. J xxx
. My brain throbbed under the weight of this revelation as I finally joined all the dots together. The mugging had been a dream. I’d obviously sent the texts, met up with Bella and having most likely dulled my conscience beyond all recognition had reached a point where I’d agreed to go home with Bella, covering my tracks with a text to Penny. With the exception of my lack of a hangover – how could I have drunk so much that I’d forgotten the whole night and yet didn’t have so much as a headache? – it all made sense. After the best part of twenty years of faithfulness I’d done the one thing I’d never dreamed I’d do: I’d cheated on my wife.

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