Romantic is generous. Functional is closer. His belt buckle kept clipping the dispenser and I still came, which is the bit I said I would leave in, so here we are.
Look. I did not leave the flat thinking I would end the night with one heel off and a stranger’s hand over my mouth because the lock on the stall was doing a performance of being a lock. I left the flat because Mia put a location in the chat and Sophie did that face she does when she already knows she is going to be the one making tea at 11am. I put on the black dress that photographs well in bad light. I redid my lip gloss in the hallway mirror. Twice. Then we went.
That is how most of my better stories start. Not with a plan. With a location pin and a refusal to stay in.
The bit before the loo
It was one of those Soho rooms that thinks it is exclusive because there is a curtain and a man with a clicker. The floor was already sticky at midnight. Someone had spilled a whole tray near the booths and nobody had mopped it. Very on brand. We did the usual lap. Bar. Smoking bit out the back. Mirror. Bar again.
He was by the speakers, which is a terrible place to stand if you actually want to talk, and a good place to stand if you want someone to lean in. He leaned in. London boy, maybe 29, dark shirt that had started the night tucked in and given up. Not the fittest man I have ever clocked. Not mid either. The kind of face you remember for a week and then only when a song comes on.
We did the shouting conversation. Where are you from. Who are you here with. Have you been here before. All the filler you do with your mouth while your body has already voted. I told him I write. He told me he was in “events,” which in this city can mean anything from promoting nights to carrying ice. I did not press it. I did not want a pitch. I wanted the lean.
Mia clocked it from across the room and lifted her glass like well done. Sophie was still talking to a girl from work and pretending not to watch. I love them. I also ignore them when it suits me.
Two drinks later his hand was on my waist like it had always lived there. Not grabby. Just present. I let it stay. That is usually the tell, if you are paying attention. If I move the hand, the night stays clean. If I do not, I am already writing the headline in my head.
Why a stall and not a cab
People love to act like club toilets are a last resort. Sometimes they are. Sometimes they are the only room in the building that has a door, which in London nightlife is basically architecture’s idea of consent.
The queue for the women’s was a situation. Four girls, one of them crying into her phone, one of them filming the crying, classic. The accessible loo had a sign that had been ignored so many times the paper was curling. He nodded at the corridor like shall we, and I did that stupid little laugh I do when I already know I am going to say yes.
I could have said Uber. I have said Uber. Uber is warmer and you get a rating at the end. A stall is faster and you get a story. I was in a story mood. I usually am after midnight.
The cubicle was the middle one. Of course it was the middle one. The outer two feel like they have slightly more dignity, which is a sentence I cannot believe I have now written. Door shut. Latch across. It did not catch properly on the first try. He jiggled it. Very husband energy for a man I had known forty minutes.
Then it was quiet in that weird club-quiet way, where the bass is still in your ribs but the room has shrunk to two people and a toilet that has seen things.
Functional, with interruptions
I am not going to dress this up like a film. The light was that mean overhead white that makes everyone look a bit unwell. There was a bin that had already given up. Someone had written a number on the back of the door in eyeliner. I thought about adding mine and decided I have a blog for that.
He kissed like he meant it, which I did not expect. A lot of men in rooms like that kiss like they are trying to get to the next bit. He stayed in the first bit long enough that I actually noticed. That is probably where the word romantic snuck in, uninvited, like a friend who turns up to afters.
My dress came up. His belt came undone and immediately became a problem. The buckle kept tapping the dispenser every time he shifted. Tap. Tap. Soft, stupid little sound under the music. I laughed into his mouth and he laughed too, which helped. If you cannot laugh when a soap unit is joining in, you should not be having sex in a stall. That should be on a poster in every club loo in Zone 1.
Someone came into the bathroom. Heels. Bag dumped on the sink. The outer door. We froze like teenagers, which was ridiculous because we are not. I put my hand over my own mouth before he did. Then he did it anyway, which I liked more than I will admit in most rooms and will admit here because that is the job.
The someone washed their hands for a very long time. Or it felt like a long time. Time goes weird when you are half against a partition and trying not to make the exact noise that would finish the sentence for whoever is at the sink.
They left. We did not.
I came first, which I was not expecting either. Not because I am precious about it. Because club toilets are not designed for anyone’s benefit except the landlord’s. It was quick and a bit messy and the buckle did the dispenser thing again at the worst possible second, and I still went over. I bit the side of his hand. He swore, quietly, like he was trying to be polite to the plumbing.
He finished not long after, with his forehead on the door and one of my knees doing an awkward hover because there was nowhere decent to put it. Glamorous. Iconic. Deeply stupid. All three.
The walk back to the floor
Getting dressed in a stall is its own sport. Tights. I had worn tights, like an idiot who thought we were going for “smart.” One heel had come off and I had to do that hop to find it without putting my bare foot on the floor, because I do have standards, they are just applied selectively.
I redid my mouth in my phone camera. The lighting was criminal. I did it anyway. Maintenance. Always maintenance.
We walked out separately by about twenty seconds, which felt very spy film until I clocked that nobody was looking. Clubs absorb this stuff. People are too busy trying to get served or trying not to lose their friends. You could probably host a small wedding in a Soho loo and only the attendant would know.
He found me at the bar and bought a drink I did not need. We did not do the big talk. Thank God. No “what does this mean.” No number immediately, which I respected and also clocked as a possible problem for later. We danced a bit. The dancing was worse than the stall, if I am honest. Some things should not be asked to exist in public lighting.
Mia raised both eyebrows so high I thought they might leave her face. I shrugged. She grinned. Sophie looked at my hair, then at my mouth, then at the time on her phone. That woman can do a full risk assessment in three seconds. It is a gift. It is also annoying.
What happened after, because you will ask
We did not go home together. He had a mate who was “in a state.” I had flatmates who would have comments. The night split the way London nights split. Abrupt. A bit unfinished. Still good.
He texted at 3:41. A single line. You good. I sent back a photo of my shoes by the front door and nothing else. Let him work.
Sophie was up when I got in, because of course she was. Kettle on. Arms folded in the way that means she is not actually angry, she just wants the version she can file.
“Stall,” I said.
She blinked. “Romantic.”
“That is generous,” I said. “Functional. His belt kept hitting the dispenser. I still came. That is the bit I am leaving in.”
She made the tea anyway. This is why I live with her.
Mia appeared at some point in a full face of last night and asked if he was fit. I said he was fit enough. She said that is how I describe most of them and she is not wrong. Fit enough is a category. It covers a lot of excellent evenings and a few I should have left at the bar.
Why I am writing the unflattering parts
I could have cleaned this up. Made the lighting better. Lost the soap dispenser. Given him a better job title. Pretended we made it to a flat with a proper door and sheets that matched.
I did not, because the unflattering parts are the true ones. The laugh when the buckle hit plastic. The girl at the sink who never knew. The hop for the shoe. The fact that I checked my face before I checked if I even liked him.
People get precious about where sex is allowed to happen, as if a bed is moral and a stall is a character flaw. A bed is just more comfortable. That is it. I have had dull sex on very expensive mattresses and a surprisingly decent time in a cubicle that smelled faintly of someone else’s perfume. The room is not the point. The yes is the point. And the story, if you are me.
Was it romantic? In the flowers and taxi and forehead-kiss sense, no. In the we-were-both-there-and-neither-of-us-pretended-it-was-something-else sense, maybe. I will take maybe. Maybe photographs better than perfect anyway.
He has texted twice since. I have replied once. I am not being cruel. I am being accurate. It was a good stall. It does not need to become a situation. Some nights are complete when the latch goes back across and you walk out with your mouth redone and your dress sitting almost how it sat when you arrived.
Sophie has already asked if I am seeing him again. I said I might. I also said I might write this first. She said of course I would. She is very rarely wrong about me, which is peak, and also why I keep her.
Anyway. That was Saturday. The buckle still makes me laugh. I can hear it if I think about it too long. Tap. Tap. Against the dispenser, under the bass, while I tried not to make a sound and then made one anyway.
Leave that bit in.
