Phone on 4%. Makeup still on. Someone in my bed whose name is in my notes as Tuesday?
That is not a bit. That is the lock screen and the state of play. The little battery icon has gone red and I am choosing this over the charger on the floor, which tells you everything about my decision making after 2am.
He is asleep on his front. One arm off the mattress like he paid rent here. He did not. This is my room. The good pillow is under his face and I am writing this on 4% like a woman with a deadline and no sense.
I could plug in. I could wash my face. I could ask him what his name is again without making it weird. I am doing none of that. I am doing the thing I always do when the night is almost over and I can still smell the club on my own hair. I write it down before it turns into a nicer version of itself.
How we got here, quickly
It started as a maybe. That is how most of my good nights start. Mia sent a location. Sophie said she was staying in and then did not stay in. I put the dress on because it was already out of the wardrobe and hanging there like an accusation.
We did Soho first because we always do Soho first. Then somewhere with a worse floor and better music. He was at the bar talking to no one in particular. I liked that. Men who work the room too hard make me tired before we have even left.
I do not remember the first thing he said. I remember he bought the second drink without a speech. That is rare. I remember his watch because I clock watches now. Occupational hazard. I remember thinking he was fit enough to take home and not so fit I would lose the plot about it.
Tuesday? is what I typed in the Uber because I asked and the music was loud and he said something that sounded like a weekday. Could be Tobias. Could be Tyler. Could be he actually said Tuesday as a joke and I filed it wrong. I will find out in the morning if he is still here. If he is not, the note stays. Archives matter.
The 4% problem
People think the glamour is the night. The glamour is this. Sitting up against the headboard with one strap down, mascara doing that crunchy thing, phone dying, and still choosing the paragraph over the plug.
This is the part nobody puts on the grid. Soft launches get the wrist and the drink. This bit gets the notes app and a headache I have not earned yet. I like this bit more, which is probably a character flaw.
If the phone dies mid sentence I will be annoyed with myself until lunch. I have lost whole nights that way. Good lines, gone. A detail about someone’s mouth, gone. The exact way a room smelled at 1am, gone. I do not trust morning me to remember it properly. Morning me wants a prettier story. Night me is meaner and more accurate.
So here we are. 4%. Makeup on. A man who might be called Tuesday breathing like he has never had a worry.
What I will not do in the next ten minutes
I will not take a photo of him. That is a hard rule I made up last year after a boy found himself in a draft folder and got precious about it. Fair play, I guess. I still wrote the piece. I just left his shoulder out.
I will not check if he has a girlfriend. I already did that at the bar in the way you do when you ask about living situation and listen to the pause. The pause was clean enough. If I am wrong I will deal with it when the battery is not dying.
I will not wake him up for round two just so I have a neater ending. He was good. Not movie good. Real good. The kind where you stop performing and just get on with it. I do not need to gild it at 3am because my phone is insecure.
I will not text the group chat yet. Mia will ask for a rating. Sophie will send the eyes emoji and a reminder about the recycling. They can have the recap when I have charged this thing and washed my face and decided whether Tuesday? gets to use a mug.
The name in the notes
I have a list. I am not ashamed of the list. I am a journalist with a social life. Names slip. Nights stack. If I relied on memory I would be introducing myself to men I have already slept with, and that has happened, and it is only funny the first time.
The list is not a trophy shelf. It is admin. Tuesday? sits under a Thursday from last month and a boy I labelled Coat because that was the only solid fact I had in the cloakroom. Coat got a full name the next day. Tuesday? is still a question mark. We will see if he earns the upgrade.
Sophie hates the list. She says it is grim. She also asked me last week who the shoes in the hall belonged to, so she benefits from the filing system whether she likes it or not.
Mia wanted a shared document. I said no. Some things can be communal. This cannot. I will share the story. I will not share the spreadsheet energy.
He looks different asleep
They always do. The cocky ones go soft. The quiet ones look like they might start talking. This one looks younger. That is annoying. I do not want to feel tender about a man whose name I stored as a day of the week.
Tenderness is how you end up making breakfast. Breakfast is how you end up exchanging proper numbers. Proper numbers are how you end up in a soft launch I have already written about and I am not doing a sequel this soon.
Still. He has a nice mouth. That is allowed. I can put that in the piece without offering him a drawer.
There is a glass of water on my side that I poured and have not touched. There is his belt on the chair like a guest who does not know when to leave. There is my lipstick on a tissue because I wiped my mouth after and then forgot I was supposed to be a person who removes makeup before bed. I am 27. I have a degree. I am still doing this. Fine.
Why I write it while it is still ugly
If I wait until tomorrow I will say we met through friends. We did not. If I wait I will say I knew his name. I did not. If I wait I will tidy the sex into something with better pacing. It did not have better pacing. It had a laugh in the middle and my jewellery making an unhelpful noise and him saying wait in a way that actually meant wait, which I liked more than I expected to.
The job is not to make it cinematic. The job is to get it down while my face still looks like the night. People can smell when you have showered the truth off. I have read those pieces. They are fine. They do not stay in your mouth.
I want this to stay in your mouth a bit. That is the whole point of doing anything for a story. You live it, you keep the mascara on, you type until the battery begs.
Also, and this is the part I do not say at lunch, if I do not write it then the night belongs only to the two of us. That is too small. I did not come this far to have private evenings. I came this far to be seen having them. Ugly wish. Honest one.
What morning is going to cost me
He might want coffee. I might want him gone. Those two things can exist in the same kitchen. Sophie will already be up because Sophie treats 8am like a moral stance. Mia will appear in a hoodie and ask, in front of him, if he wants toast. She does this. It is a test and a sport.
I will put a jumper on. I will find him his other sock. I will not offer a second night unless the daylight version of him is as good as the bar version, and they rarely are. Daylight asks questions. I am better at night questions.
If he asks to see me again I will say maybe and mean it. Maybe is my favourite word. It keeps the door moving. It keeps the notes app useful.
If he leaves his number on a scrap of something I will put it under Tuesday? with a question mark still attached. I do not promote people on first evidence. I have standards. They are strange. They are mine.
Battery, last bit
3% now. I am going to lose this if I get precious about a last line.
So here is the last line I actually have. Someone is in my bed. I still have glitter somewhere I cannot see. The city is doing that thin early noise it does when the night buses give up. I am not lonely. I am not in love. I am not even particularly proud.
I am working.
That is the job. That is the life. Phone on empty. Makeup still on. Name unconfirmed. Piece nearly done.
If this dies before I hit publish I will be livid. If it lives, good. Go to sleep. I am about to, I think. Right after I plug the thing in. Right after. I mean it this time.
