I got out, locked the car up with the button and walked towards the lift, carrying my bag. I’d left my suits hanging in the car.
As I rode the lift up to the top floor I thought about the security guy watching me when I’d let Sharon suck me off in here, or fucked her, or fucked one of the girls we’d brought in. I bet he thought I was an arrogant prick. He’d probably watched it like a porn show and laughed at me.
I hadn’t cared before.
When the doors opened I walked into our private hall and unlocked the door. The place was quiet.
I didn’t shout. I had no doubt there would be people in here. I ran upstairs first and checked the spare rooms on the mezzanine level. There were no people in there. Thank God. This would be easier than I’d thought. I checked the bathroom and looked outside, no one.
I went into our room last, my heart pumping hard.
They were sleeping.
There was a guy I didn’t know on the bed, tangled up in the sheets with Sharon, and one of her girlfriends was cuddled into his back. She must have gone out with Sharon. Another girl, who I didn’t know, was sleeping next to Sharon. My guess would be they’d pulled a couple in a club and promised them the night of their lives. It was the promise Sharon always made. She’d used the line on me when we’d met.
I stood there looking at them for a minute. If Sharon was awake, her hand would be lifting out to me, begging me to join whatever tangled cobweb of sex they were in. I was her handsome, rich plaything. I don’t think she loved me any more than I loved her. I’d been kidding myself in the beginning and she’d been having fun. But this was the end. It was time to call stop. I couldn’t bring a child into a life like this.
I kicked the sole of the guy’s foot. ‘Get up.’
He groaned. He was going to feel like shit. They’d probably snorted cocaine and Sharon loved picking out people who didn’t normally do that sort of thing.
I kicked him again. ‘Get up.’
He rolled over, on to Sharon. ‘Where the—what the fuck?’
The women woke too.
‘Get up and get out. This is my place. I don’t want you in it.’
He sat up, looking back at Sharon. He was a bulky, muscular guy. If he wanted to fight me he’d probably win. ‘I thought you said your boyfriend was cool with this…’
‘He’s my husband—’
‘And he is cool with it, very cool,’ Sharon’s friend Karen, who had fairly regular sex with us, answered.
‘Not any more. Get out. All of you. I pay the bills here, I own the sheets you’re fucking on, and I am not cool with it. So, fuck off.’ I grabbed the top sheet and pulled at it, revealing some of their tangled-up naked bodies.
The guy got up. ‘Alright, mate, no need to go fucking mental.’ He walked past me and picked a pair of jeans up off the floor. Then looked back as he put them on. ‘Come on, Pen.’
‘You too, Karen. Get out.’ I glared at her.
She got up, all long skinny limbs. She was into heroin, not just cocaine. She had needle marks all over the inner sides of her arms.
My conscience kicked; her relationship with Sharon and I was probably a part of her addiction. I don’t think I’d ever looked at her when I was sober and clean before. I saw a different person.
She smiled at me, came over and touched my crotch. I gripped her wrist and took her hand away. ‘Just get out.’ She smiled as if she believed we’d call her in an hour and ask her back.
Never again. I’d received my wake-up shout and Daisy was my get-out-of-jail-free card.
When they walked out, clothes thrown on or hanging in their hands, I went into the hall and watched until they walked out the main door. It clicked shut behind them.
For the first time I thought about what all the hangers-on in my life might have done with the freedom of my apartment while I’d been out of my head. But I didn’t have much to steal. Sharon and I didn’t spend money on trinkets, we spent it on sex and drugs – and clothes – but Sharon did have some jewellery. We’d probably had stuff stolen and not even known.
I went back into the bedroom and looked at her. She was leaning up on her elbows in the bed. ‘What’s brought you back in a bad mood?’
I stared at her. I didn’t know what to say to this.
‘Come and get into bed. You’ll feel better.’
‘No.’ Oh, just say it. ‘I have a kid with one of the girls I was at school with. I found out today.’
She sat up and the sheet slithered to her lap, revealing her body to the waist. ‘What?’
‘My daughter is seven years old. I got a girl pregnant and she didn’t tell me.’
‘Oh, my God. That was a riot, then.’ It was said in a dismissive, sarcastic tone.
‘I need to change my life. I want my daughter in it, and this is not the sort of life a child can see. We’re not having any more parties and no more cocaine.’
Her face screwed up, as though she was annoyed and she thought I’d gone crazy.
‘I mean it.’
She slid across the bed and got up, then grabbed a dressing gown off the floor, walked past me and went into the bathroom. ‘Don’t be pathetic.’
‘I’ve had enough of living like this. I don’t want to do it any more. I’m not this man.’
‘You’ve never complained before.’
‘No. But I’m complaining now. We need to settle down. I want to be normal. I want to be able to invite my daughter here. I want to stand up in front of her and not feel dirty.’
She made a face at me, then squatted down over the toilet and weed, with the door open. ‘How do you know she’ll even want to see you? How can you know you’ll even like her?’
‘I like her already.’ Victoria was in my mind and through Victoria I could imagine our child. She’d be sweet, polite. If I’d had a child with Sharon, it would be a spoilt brat. ‘I called John. I’m getting a DNA test done and then he’ll start working on legal rights and I’m going to set up a trust fund for her.’
‘You haven’t even met the kid—’
‘I don’t need to meet her. She’s mine and I have seven years of her life to make up. So, Sharon, you need to change or we’re over.’
‘What?’ She shouted as she wiped herself. ‘What have you taken?’
‘Nothing.’ For the first time in a long time.
Only Sharon would have this sort of conversation with me while she was using the toilet. She had no decency. But even that had turned me on in the past.
‘Then where’s this sudden burst of anger come from?’ She walked past me, her dressing gown hanging open. Then she climbed on the bed. ‘Come to bed, Jack. You’ll get bored of the kid and forget about this and think differently in a few days. Come on. I’ll make you forget your bad mood.’
‘No thanks. Me and my bad mood are happy together. I like it. You can go back to sleep.’
I walked out and went into the living room, then sat on the floor with my back up against the sofa and my knees bent up, and watched the sun rise over London through the glass.
Sharon wouldn’t change and she wouldn’t go, and I didn’t want to be with her. If I was going to change my life, I had to be the one who left.
At seven I went back into the bedroom and started packing. She was out cold in the bed. I packed my clothes into five suitcases. She didn’t wake. My clothes were all