Look. I thought I had the flat to myself. That is the whole point of this story and also the reason I am never believing a weekend plan again.
Sophie said she was going to her mum’s. Guildford. Saturday lunch, Sunday roast, the usual. She even packed the good moisturiser, which is how you know she meant it. Mia was already in Peckham with that photographer she swears she is not sleeping with. So Friday night I had two empty bedrooms, a clean-ish kitchen, and a man I had been talking to since half ten in a bar on the New King’s Road.
His name is Ollie. Works in something dull with money. Nice arms. Talks too much when he is nervous and then goes quiet once he has you on the bed, which I actually prefer. We had one drink at ours. I redid my lipstick in the microwave door because the hallway mirror was filthy. Then we went to my room and I stopped pretending this was going to be a chat.
What I thought was happening
I was on all fours. That is the bit you need in your head before the rest of it makes sense.
Not because I am performing for the internet. Because that is where we had got to. Skirt still on, knickers somewhere near the radiator, my face in the pillow I keep for exactly this. He had one hand on my hip and the other in my hair and he was not being gentle. I had already come once and I was being greedy about the second. The headboard was tapping the wall in that way that makes you hope the neighbours are out. I was making that stupid broken sound I only do when I am not thinking about anything except not stopping.
I did not hear the front door.
Parsons Green flats are not built for privacy. The hallway is short. My room is the first one on the left. If someone comes in and they are not trying to be quiet, you get about four seconds. Sophie was not trying to be quiet. She never is. She dumps her keys in the bowl like she is announcing herself to the building.
Four seconds is not enough when you are that far gone.
The door
It opened.
I felt the air change before I clocked what it was. Light from the hall cut across the bed. I turned my head and there she was. Coat still on. Bag on her shoulder. Face doing that very specific Sophie thing where she has already decided she is disappointed and is just waiting for the sentence to catch up.
Ollie did not stop.
I need you to sit with that for a second. The door is open. My flatmate is standing there. I am looking at her. And he keeps going. Same pace. Same grip. Like the interruption was a draft.
I made a noise that was not sexy. More like a laugh that got stuck. I said his name. He made this low sound in his throat and pushed in harder, which would have been hot in any other context and was still, unhelpfully, a bit hot in this one. I am not proud of that. I am also not going to lie about it.
Sophie said, “For fuck’s sake, Chels.”
Then she shut the door.
That was it. No screaming. No throwing anything. Just the click and her footsteps going down to the kitchen like she had walked in on a spill, not her flatmate getting railed on a Friday.
Ollie finally paused. Breath on the back of my neck. “Was that…”
“My flatmate,” I said. “Keep going.”
He did. Of course he did. I came like that, door closed again, Sophie filling the kettle on the other side of the wall, and I hated how good it was. After he finished I stayed face down for a minute because I could not face sitting up and being a person yet.
The bit after
He wanted to stay. They always want to stay once they have come. I told him he had to go. Not because I was ashamed. Because Sophie was in the kitchen and I was not doing the walk of whatever-that-was with him in a towel.
He dressed fast. Kissed the side of my head. Asked if I was alright like he had just remembered manners existed. I said I was fine. I was not fine. I was buzzing and mortified and a bit wet still, which is an annoying combination.
I heard the front door. Then I heard Sophie laugh once, short, into her mug. That was worse than if she had shouted.
I put on an old shirt and the least slutty shorts I own, which is still not saying much, and I went out there.
Breakfast was awkward
She had made tea for two. That is Sophie all over. Furious, and still boiling the kettle for you.
I sat down. She looked at my mouth. I had not redone the lipstick. There was a smear at the corner. I knew it. I still sat there.
“Mum’s boiler packed up,” she said. “I got to Woking and she told me to turn round. I texted you.”
I had not looked at my phone since the bar. It was face down under the bed next to one sock.
“Right,” I said.
“You could have put a scarf on the door. Or a note. Or, I don’t know, not left the door unlocked while you get fucked in the first room off the hall.”
Fair. Completely fair.
I told her I thought I had the place. She told me thinking is not a lock. I told her he should have stopped. She looked at me over the mug and said, “You didn’t stop either.”
Which is the sentence I have been turning over since.
She is not wrong. I could have shoved him off. I could have laughed it dead and pulled the duvet up. I didn’t. Part of me liked that he didn’t flinch. Part of me liked that she saw it and still put tea in front of me. That is a rotten thing to admit. It is also true.
We ate toast. She told me about the boiler. I told her Ollie works near Monument and I am not seeing him again, which might even be true. Mia FaceTimed from Peckham, took one look at our faces, and said, “What did Chels do.” Sophie held the phone up so Mia could see the hallway. I gave them both the finger. Then I went and had a shower so long the bathroom mirror steamed and I had to wipe a circle just to check the smear was gone.
What I keep coming back to
It was not the sex that got me. The sex was good. Rough in the way I like when I have had two drinks and I want my brain off. It was the four seconds where all three of us were in the same fact. Me on my knees. Him still in me. Sophie in her coat, home early, seeing exactly who I am when I think no one is looking.
I keep replaying her voice. Not angry. Tired. Like she has filed this under the growing list of things Chelsea does because Chelsea cannot sit still and be normal for one Friday.
I redid my face before I left the house later. Old habit. If I look finished, I can pretend the morning was a story instead of a mess I have to live in. Sophie was on the sofa with a face mask on when I went out. She didn’t mention it again. She will. She always does, usually on a Tuesday when I am hungover and she wants the last of the milk.
Ollie texted at four. A question mark and a little flame. I left it. Not because I am becoming a better person. Because if I answer, I will have him back here, and next time Sophie might not close the door.
Anyway. That was my Friday. If you live with people, check the group chat. And if you hear keys in the bowl, maybe finish later.
I probably won’t.