not only had I not heard from Max (even though the ticks had finally gone blue), I’d also got thrush. I realized this while sitting in the staff loos that lunchtime because my vagina felt like it was on fire, and not in a good way. Terrific, I thought grimly, standing and pulling my knickers up. I’d have to nip to Boots for some Canesten. I absolutely couldn’t teach anything about the Pyramids this afternoon with this level of itchiness going on in my pants.
When I got to Boots, there was a queue of people taking for ever to discuss their Nicorette and their sleeping problems. And then, finally, when I got to the front of the queue, the pharmacist seemed deaf.
‘Could I have some Canesten please?’ I said quietly. Almost a whisper.
‘I’m sorry, dear?’ said the elderly man in his lab coat, leaning towards me.
‘Some Canesten,’ I hissed, slightly louder. I pointed behind him at the boxes of it.
‘Oh, right you are,’ he said, turning round to look. Then, bellowing so that everyone in Boots could hear, he said: ‘The Canesten Combi or just the cream? Or just the pill?’
‘The combi,’ I whispered, glancing over my shoulder to see a snake of people behind me. I hoped they were all buying embarrassing items too. I hoped they were all buying Anusol for their piles.
‘Here you go,’ he said, slowly picking a box, slowly turning back to the till, slowly scanning it. ‘Would you like a bag?’
‘No thanks,’ I said, snatching it and shoving it into my pocket.
I went straight back to the staff bathrooms, pulled my knickers down again – Christ, the INTENSE itchiness – unscrewed the lid on the little tube and rubbed it in. ‘Aaaaaaah,’ I sighed audibly as I felt the cream’s soothing effect immediately kick in, forgetting that there was someone in the cubicle next to me.
When I stepped outside the cubicle to wash my hands, it transpired that the person in the cubicle next to me was Miss Montague. I quickly dropped the Canesten back into my pocket.
‘Hello,’ I squeaked, our eyes meeting in the mirror in front of us.
‘Afternoon, Miss Bailey,’ she said, raising her eyebrows at me. ‘Everything all right?’
‘Mmm, all good.’
But the cream still hadn’t helped much by the time Harry Potter Club rolled round at 4.30 that afternoon, so I spent an hour trying to help boys of varying ages try to design their own broomstick while crossing my legs back and forth to try and take the pressure off things down there.
I didn’t have time to go home between school and Walt’s exhibition on Friday evening so I had to go straight there. I hate doing that. For a night out, I feel like you need to go home, wash your hair, put on a clean pair of pants and reapply make-up to transform into weekend mode. I wanted to get drunk tonight. I was in that sort of mood.
Max was clearly not going to text, which made me sad. And gloomy about my dating antennae. I knew we’d had a good time. A great time. So I didn’t understand the silence. Maybe it was the shagging him on the first date thing? Maybe the old rules did still apply? Depressing.
I caught the Tube to Green Park and walked down Piccadilly towards a pub in Shepherd’s Market to meet Jess. In the evening dusk, the former red-light district still had a raffish air. Several pubs, a few cramped restaurants with tables that over-spilled to the pavement outside and the unmistakable whiff of London drains.
I saw her standing outside the pub, a bottle of wine in a cooler between her feet. She was smiling and chatting to a tall man in a black polo neck and a leather jacket. One of the art crowd, I decided, walking towards them. Either that or a trained assassin.
‘Hiya,’ I said, giving her a hug.
‘Hi, babe, here you go,’ she said, picking up an empty glass at her feet and filling it with wine. ‘And meet Alexi. He’s coming to the party too. Alexi, this is Lil. My best pal. Knows literally nothing about art. No offence, love.’
‘None taken,’ I said, reaching for the wine glass from her.
‘Lil, sensational to meet you,’ said Alexi, whereupon I went for a handshake and he went for a kiss on the cheek, so we did both and I then pulled back, awkwardly.
I thought sensational was over-egging it a bit. Was he high?
‘How do you guys know each other?’ I asked, before tipping back my wine glass. Ah, that first mouthful on a Friday evening.
‘We don’t,’ said Jess. ‘I met him at the bar and we realized we were both going to the opening.’ She smiled at Alexi and reached behind her neck to pull her hair over one shoulder. Oh dear. I recognized that flush on her face. She fancied this tall, dark stranger who was wearing a polo neck even though it was a balmy Friday evening in September. I glanced from Jess to Alexi. She and I had very different taste. Jess was into beautiful men – slim, delicate, arty men. The sorts you saw drifting about Rome or Florence in drainpipe jeans, who existed on tiny coffees and rolled cigarettes. Not for me. I’d never fancied a man with skinnier thighs than me.
‘Rrrrrright,’ I said, slowly. ‘And Alexi, how do you know Walt?’
‘Old friend from art school,’ he said, scratching his chin.
‘You’re an artist?’
He shook his head. ‘A collector.’
As Jess said, I knew little about art. If you asked me, most Picassos looked like they’d been drawn by a 4-year-old with a packet of Crayola. But collecting meant Alexi had money, no? Rubbish collecting was a job. Art collecting was less of a job, more a hobby for rich people.
‘What sort of thing do you collect?’
Alexi shrugged in his leather jacket. ‘I’m interested in young artists, but it can be any medium. Paint, graphics, installations. So long as I feel something towards it. A reaction. Something visceral, you know?’ At this, he curled his right hand into a fist and held it up to his chest, beating it against his heart.
‘Mmm,’ I replied vaguely into my glass of wine. I went to gallery openings every now and then with Jess and the only thing I felt at them was hunger because there was always plenty of wine but no snacks.
‘I think you’ll love this show,’ Jess said to Alexi, eyelashes fluttering like a baby gazelle’s. Christ. I wondered if she’d told Alexi she knew Walt because she was dating him.
Alexi smiled back at her. ‘I’m excited about seeing it.’
I felt like a pawn in a game of foreplay. ‘What is it?’ I asked. ‘I mean, who’s the exhibition by?’
‘A young artist called Daniel,’ said Jess. ‘From the Ukraine. So his work is quite intense. Twisted.’
‘He uses light to show darkness and darkness to show light,’ added Alexi.
‘Exactly,’ said Jess, gazing at Alexi with such admiration it was as if he’d just announced he’d discovered the secret to everlasting life.
‘Sounds
