I go back to the kitchen and study the note again. Then I exchange my bright red top and blue pants for a gray hoodie and black jeans. I learn the numbers by heart. I make a pocket in the pad of one of my bras and slip the key into it before wearing it. I take the battery out of my mobile phone before stuffing it with two large cloth bags into a small handbag.
Then I slip out of my apartment and walk to the Tube station. There I surreptitiously look around me. A man—he is young and thin—looks away as I meet his eyes. I won’t look in that direction again. The train comes and I board it. Five stops later I get out and start walking to the opposite platform. I sit on the bench and wait. A train comes but I don’t get on it. I look around casually and notice the man standing at the far end of the platform. When the next train comes I get into it. As the doors are closing I lunge out. The train whooshes away.
I look around me. There is no one but me on the platform. I run up the stairs and make for the Central line. There are only two Asian guys and a woman with a pram on the platform. An elderly woman appears. She looks at me with hostility. I have never seen her in my life. I am being paranoid.
The train is due to arrive in one minute. It arrives. I get on it and change again at Tottenham Road. I sit alone in the carriage and watch the train tear through the darkness of the tunnel. I get off at Goodge Street station. Here the amount of people thronging around me makes me feel safe. I get out of the station and take a taxi. I don’t go directly to the apartment.
I go to the coffee shop down the road and order a glass of orange juice. I sit with my drink and settle my nerves before going to the toilet and removing the key from the padding of my bra. I slip it into my pocket and casually walk to the building. It is on a quiet street. Most probably why he got it in the first place. I look around me and there is no one about. I read the names against the bells. So Myra lives in Flat 3. I give her direct neighbors a miss and ring bell number thirteen. No one answers. There is no one at Flat 14 either. I hit gold with Flat 15.
‘Hey,’ I say making my voice sound as young and apologetic as possible. ‘This is Myra from Flat 3. Could you please let me in? I’ve left my key at home.’
There is a rude grunt and the door buzzes open.
I push it and enter. The lobby smells dank. I have a flashback of coming here with Jaron that first night. I was so high and excited I did not notice the smell or the dankness of it. I am too hyped to wait for the lift. I run up the stairs and hear my own footsteps reverberating loudly in the empty stairwell. To the third floor. I put the key in Jaron’s door and enter.
Inside I lean against the door panting for a minute. My heart is pounding so hard I can barely hear myself think. All the curtains are drawn shut and it is dim. The flat is exactly the same as it had been that night. Spartan. Clean. Unwelcoming. In fact it has that sepulchral, crypt-like aura about it. I put my handbag on the hardwood floor, hurry to the bedroom and switch on a light. It is cold in the bedroom. I look around me quickly. The bed is made. I have an image of it unmade with both of us naked and clawing at each other. I don’t dwell on the image. It is not lost. I can still have it back.
It is almost a cliché but I run to the wardrobe and tap on it. Well, what do you know? It is almost too easy. I feel a surge of excitement. I tap in different places and find that the whole fucking thing comes back hollow.
I sit back on my heels and stare at it. I yank all the clothes from the clothes rail and throw them on the ground. I start looking around the sides. The edges are all smooth and clean. It is too neat and well built. I know what I am looking for and I am closer than I think. In the end I find it. A little button just behind the door. I push it down and grin.
The panel slides back, so smoothly and silently that my eyebrows rise with admiration. The admiration turns to awe as the panel reveals what lays behind it. An oblong vault door made of solid steel. The rivets are so huge they are like those you see in bank heist movies. An electronic lock blinks at me. There appears to be a fingerprint scanner but Jaron must have switched it off and only one light is glowing red. Shaking with nerves and excitement I key in the numbers in my head and the light becomes green. Grasping the massive lever I heave the heavy door toward me. It swings open slowly.
A room, an actual room yawns at me.
My skin tingles with anticipation as I take a step toward the darkness. I have the feeling that entering into it is akin to crossing an imaginary threshold into another world. Jaron’s world. I enter it without a second of hesitation. I feel the sides of the door and locate the light switches. The spotlights that come on blind me. I blink and then my eyes widen with wonder.