Not because I am sentimental. I am not. I keep receipts, lipsticks that are nearly dead, and the odd lighter that is not even mine. A keycard is just another thing that ends up at the bottom of a bag next to a travel mascara and a crumpled club stamp. The difference is I know exactly why this one is still there.
The lighting in that bathroom was criminal. Warm, a bit dirty, the kind that makes your collarbone look expensive even when you have been up since Thursday. I took the photo standing on the closed loo lid like an idiot. If it does numbers, I might need the room number again. Research. Obviously.
How I even ended up there
We were in Soho. Not the cute early bit. The 1am bit, when the good places have stopped pretending they have a door policy and everyone has decided they are funnier than they are. I had gone out in a black dress that Sophie said was “a bit much for a Wednesday” which is how I knew it was right.
He was at the bar with a work lanyard still stuffed in his coat pocket, which should have been a warning. Visiting for two nights. Finance or something adjacent. I did not ask properly because I did not care properly. He had a room at one of those places off the Strand that looks anonymous from the street and costs more than it should once you are inside.
I could have gone home. The night bus exists. My own bed exists. Mia was already texting asking if I wanted a share of the chips she had just bought. I said I was getting a taxi. That part was true. The destination was not Parsons Green.
Look, I know how this reads. Girl meets boy, girl goes to hotel, girl writes about it. I have done the version where I pretend I was surprised at myself. I was not surprised. I wanted a bed that was not mine and a bathroom that was not shared with two other women and a leaking shower tray.
The room was fine. The bathroom was the point
The room itself was mid. White sheets, a kettle, that faint hotel smell that is half cleaner and half other people’s perfume. He poured something from the minibar and talked about a meeting he had at nine, which is the least sexy sentence a man can produce and somehow I still took my earrings out.
The sex was good enough. I am not going to dress it up into a novel. He was keen. I was awake. We managed not to make it weird until afterwards, which is the actual achievement. What I keep thinking about is not him. It is the mirror.
Hotel bathroom mirrors are a different species. Ours at the flat is always fogged or covered in product or reflecting Sophie in a towel asking if anyone has seen her hairdryer. This one was huge and a bit smoky around the edges and the overhead light made my skin look like I had slept eight hours. I had not slept eight hours since 2022.
I did my mouth again. Then I took the picture. Then I took another one because the first one had my arm at a funny angle. He was on the bed on his phone and I do not think he even noticed. Men never notice the important part of the evening.
Morning is where it gets honest
I woke up first. That is my usual trick. You get a look at the situation before the situation looks back. He was still out. The lanyard was on the desk. There was a half bottle of still water and a sock that was not mine on the carpet.
The keycard was on the side table next to his watch. I picked up the card. I did not pick up the watch. I have some standards, even if they are sliding about.
I nearly put it back. I stood there for a second like a person with a conscience. Then I thought about that photo and how the light hit the side of my face and how I will never get that exact ugly-beautiful glow in our bathroom at home, not even if I buy every bulb in John Lewis.
So I put it in the inside zip of my bag. Under the lip gloss. Under the emergency concealer. Next to the receipt from the taxi I will not claim on anything because what would I even call it.
I left before he properly woke. I did the whisper thing. Thanks, last night was fun, I have to go, all the lines that keep it light. He said something into the pillow. I took a mint from the bowl by the lift. The woman at reception did not look at me twice. London receptionists have seen worse at 7:40 on a Thursday.
The flat found out, obviously
Mia found the card before I had even taken my coat off. She has a gift. I emptied my bag onto the kitchen counter for a charger and there it was, little white rectangle, hotel logo, room 412 staring at us like evidence.
“You kept it,” she said, which was not a question.
Sophie was already making tea in the judgemental way she makes tea. “Are you going back?”
I said no. Then I said maybe. Then I said it was for the lighting, which made both of them laugh in that flatmate laugh that means they believe you and they also think you are unwell.
I made toast. I did my face in the kitchen window because the hallway mirror is cracked and I refuse to replace it on principle. The photo from the hotel still looked better. That annoyed me more than it should have.
Why I have not thrown it away
I could chuck it. It is plastic. It probably does not even work anymore. They cancel these things once you check out, or they do not, I have never tested the theory and I am not starting a crime career over a bathroom.
I keep it because it is proof I was there. Not proof for him. Proof for me. A night that could have been another blurry Soho story now has an object attached to it. I can hold it and remember the exact tile grout and the way the extractor fan sounded like it was dying.
Also, and this is the bit I will get messages about, I might go back. Not for him. He was fine. Fine does not get a second booking in my calendar. But if I am nearby, and if I want a photo that does not look like it was taken in a shared flat with a damp patch above the shower, I now know the room number.
That is the job. I will do a lot of things for a story. I will do slightly more for a picture that makes me look like I have my life together when I very much do not.
What I told myself on the way home
The taxi driver played talk radio. I sat in the back with my shoes in my lap because the left heel had started to rub and I am not above suffering but I am above blisters if I can help it. London at that hour is just delivery bikes and people who look like they also kept something they should have left on a side table.
I thought about texting him. I did not. He had my number. If he wanted a rerun he could do the work. Most of them do not. That used to bother me when I was twenty-two. Now it just saves me a conversation.
I thought about deleting the photo. I did not do that either. It is sitting in a folder I tell myself is “content” so it feels like work. Sometimes it is work. Sometimes it is just me, in a bathroom that is not mine, looking like a person I would follow.
Sophie asked later if I was being careful. I said yes. I was. I am nearly always careful in the ways that matter and sloppy in the ways that photograph well. That is the split.
The card is still in the bag
I saw it this morning when I was hunting for my Oyster. Same zip. Same logo. Room 412 looking back at me like a dare.
I am not going to pretend this is deep. It is a piece of plastic from a night I chose on purpose. I could write something about loneliness or validation or whatever people put under these posts to make them sound like a lesson. I do not have a lesson. I had a good bathroom and a decent few hours and a picture I keep opening when I should be answering emails.
If the photo does numbers I will tell you. If I go back I will tell you that too, or I will not, depending how the light is.
For now the keycard stays. Not as a souvenir of him. As a reminder that I know what I am doing, even when it looks like I do not. Especially then.