The Outcall

by Evelyn Weiss

  15Tuesday 1 August

  If you’re logged onto GirlsDirect, then your profile gets pushed up the front-page listing that the punters see. It can increase bookings, especially last-minute bookings: a guy feels horny, he logs onto GirlsDirect wanting sex that same night, but rather than search for the best ratings, he just goes for the first profile he sees on the front page. After Pawan left, Jazz and I logged on from our phones, and stayed logged on, 24/7. I also phoned some of my regulars. “Hi babe, special offer this week…” Meanwhile, we’re clearing the flat, buying new bits and bobs, cleaning, getting it nice and ready for some serious work. Jazz is happy to lend me her week’s earnings, too.

  By Sunday we’ve earned nearly £2,000. I’ve got less bookings for the week ahead than expected, but Jazz has more, so by the time I meet Krasniqi it will be nearly £4,000: not enough to satisfy him, but enough to show that I do mean to pay him. I rehearse the words in my mind “I already had £5000 gathered, but the burglars took it all. But look, I’ve done my best since then to raise the money for you.”

  It’s the early hours of Tuesday morning: suddenly, I’m wide awake. There’s light, and I see Jazz standing over me.

  “Hol. You were screaming in your sleep.”

  It’s half an hour later. We’re sitting on the sofa. Despite yet another sweltering night, we’re drinking cocoa. A comforting taste.

  “It’s my nightmare. Not the one about the murder and the blood. No, it’s a recurring one, I’ve had it every now and then all my life. It’s an overwhelming feeling, I’m running down dark corridors and a sense that something dreadful, something I can’t escape, is happening. I come to the end of a corridor and it’s blocked, and I know that this is the end of my life, that whatever I’ve been escaping all my life long has caught up with me and I have nowhere left to run. And then I wake up, which is a relief. But the feeling hasn’t completely gone away, and I still feel – not scared, exactly, but a sense of dread, like something really bad is going to happen. And now – “

  She looks at me, inviting me to go on.

  “The bad things – they have started happening. They’re happening all around me, around us.”

  She strokes my hair, my cheek, and I hold her close for a moment, before we sit back again. Mustn’t spill the cocoa. I’ve no family: she misses her Mum and Dad, she can’t tell them about her life here, and I guess we’re all animals: to feel physically close to another person is such a basic need. I picture us both as old women, still friends, living in some country place like that village with the duckpond, and everyone saying we’re dykes, like we’re the focus of all the village gossip, but everyone likes us. All the old guys, the sort who sit on a bench on the village green, can pop in for a coffee in our farmhouse kitchen, and we have a chat sitting round the Aga. This, I know, is a mad fantasy.

  But it’s strange. As we sit side by side, I feel protective. Like she’s the vulnerable one. Neither of us speaks or needs to speak, but it’s almost like our pulses are in synch. We sit there, both looking forward, time seems to stand still, and I know she can feel it too.

  Another day, another little journey. I’m trembling to think of what I may find. No Ferrari this time, just Anglia Rail. I’m headed for the London that no-one wants to think about. Even the station names along my journey are notorious. Bruce Grove: over the last few years, thirteen murders within five minutes’ walk of the station. White Hart Lane, just round the block from the site of Britain’s worst riots this century. Silver Street, where one guy was murdered over a £10 debt, and another was stabbed to death in the station doorway because he told off some boys who were throwing conkers. Edmonton Green, where a train was stopped by a pitched battle on the platform, knives and baseball bats. And that’s where I’m getting off the train. It’s weird, this railway line is like a dark vein, tracing its way up through Tottenham and Edmonton, the grimmest reputation in London, but when I get out onto the streets, it’s nothing like Brixton’s Barrier, the houses are almost suburban. Only yards from the station, I’m walking in the sunshine along a sleepy street, normal, Anytown. There’s even a couple of old people out in their front gardens, enjoying the sun, pottering about, someone mowing the lawn. A cluster of bright colour looms ahead. Then I see, it’s flowers. Tied to a lamp-post, photo of a young guy. Baseball hat, gleaming smile, eighteen maybe.

  The last house in the street is different. The garden’s a mess of weeds, and there’s spray-painted words all over the walls and around the front door, I can see it’s been washed away, rewritten, washed away again. I knock, wait. The door opens.

  It’s weird to see the face of James Goldbeck surrounded by graffiti. Before I even step over the threshold, I have to ask. “What’s all this?”

  “The writing? Every few days, it reappears. I’m past caring, it doesn’t bother me, but I don’t want – a certain person – to read what the words say. So I keep scrubbing it.”

  “Who?”

  “I’ll get you a coffee – or a tea? and I’ll explain.” We go along the hallway, past an open door into a sunlit front room, and another into a bedroom, to a tidy, bright kitchen. I can see out onto his back lawn, flowers and mown grass, looks rather nice. Once you’re past that front door, it’s a different house.

  “Thanks for calling me. I’m glad you’re interested in talking to me. Because I guessed you must be trying to find out something about Home Croft. Unless you always go round impersonating Devine Cattrell?” That smile of his must be popular with many of Home Croft’s female patients.

  “You tell me first, how did you rumble me?”

  “Rather obvious, if you don’t mind me saying. Out in the gleaming world of Home Croft I may act all Home Counties, but my roots are here. I grew up in this house. Edmonton Green – before the gangs – is my home, my roots. A North London boy, from a good Jewish family. James Goldbeck is Spurs to the core. And you can’t support Tottenham without hating Tony Cattrell. Scored five times against us last season. And you can’t hate Tony Cattrell without noticing, on the front cover of Hot, what a gorgeous woman he’s netted.”

  We go back along the hall into his front room. “So it was a crap disguise, then?”

  “It was, to be honest. Don’t try it again. You only got away with it because not one of them at that place actually knows their patients as people. They don’t know anything about normal human life, they just do what they do, like machines. Sometimes I watch it all going on around me and I think: am I the only flesh and blood here? Are all the others androids, no feelings, no awareness, just doing their very clever stuff?”

  “Tony Cattrell shagged me. I got paid for it, though.”

  Those deep brown eyes are saucers. But I’ve realised something: the feeling I had at Home Croft, his odd familiarity. It’s his voice. I’ve realised it now he’s told me he’s North London. The same trick as Jazz’s, although she’s originally Watford. It’s the accent – the disguising your voice as something educated and posh. It’s a kind of lie about your origins, I guess, but it’s a necessity, if your job involves calling yourself London_Courtesan. Or, if you work at Home Croft. So I understand why he does it. Now that he’s away from work, his fake posh voice is – like a thinner layer, like you can see what’s below, showing through. Yup, James, you’re a member of my club, those of us who fake it for a living. I feel comfortable, open with him: I tell him that I work as an escort, then about Wycherley, about the Soames, and about why I came to Home Croft. He’s a good listener. We’re on to our second coffee, and at last my story’s told, and I ask him. “So what does the Home Croft clinic do? You obviously want to tell me. You don’t write your phone number on every patient’s hand.”

  Is that a smile playing across his lips? “Well Holly, I may as well start off by saying, there are definitely things that you need to look into – but, what I can tell you is limited. I don’t know most of what goes on. They take patient confidentiality very seriously, it’s like they think they’re MI5. James Goldbeck’s humble part
is to be window dressing. I make the patients feel welcome. There are a lot of – how can I put it...”

  “Women of a certain age?”

  “Well – me sitting there like a stuffed dummy makes our clientele feel they are at somewhere – exclusive. I look, apparently, like someone you would only see in places where ordinary people aren’t welcome. Which they are not, at Home Croft. I work there, you see, but I hate the ethos. Most of all, I suspect there’s a lot I don’t know, and I want those things found out, exposed, stopped.”

  “A bit like I felt about working at the Soames Hotel.”

  “By the way Holly, I meant to say when you were telling me. The Soames – we sort out stuff from that awful place.”

  “What stuff?”

  “Well, for starters, we do high-class plastic surgery for the escorts – as well as for their clients of course. But in the case of the escorts, it’s made-to-order.”

  “Meaning? ...”

  “Scenario. Global music star, a regular at the Soames for years, suddenly he likes an escort there. Likes as in wants to be seen with her, in public. There have even been marriages, you know. And I’m not talking drug-wasted aging rockers. I’m talking about the sort of people who look fantastic for their age, and appear on your TV telling you to save the rainforest. Anyway, let’s say the escort has small boobs: musician likes big boobs. We deliver the solution. That kind of thing: a lot of it. Actually, I lie. Mostly we make boobs smaller, not bigger.”

  “Shit.”

  “Well, the girl does consent, of course. She gets new boobs that maybe she didn’t want, but she also gets the crumbs that fall from the star’s table for a few months. Financial crumbs that might set her up for life. I know one that we changed until she looked positively prepubescent, she’s now a very happy suburban housewife – housewaif I should say – with two little kids. Respectable as anything. Husband’s an accountant in the City: doesn’t know a thing about what happened to her, her former life. Never will.”

  “And the Soames is always involved?”

  “Well you see, Home Croft itself don’t advertise. We don’t even have a website. We don’t want publicity, because then you’d get lots of middle-class wannabes banging on the door – however exclusive our pricing is, there are always people willing to mortgage themselves in order to buy something that makes them feel like they’re a celebrity. And if our real clientele became aware that any Tom, Dick or Sally can walk into Home Croft, put down a wad of money and buy a new face, then they’ll find another Home Croft for themselves in the States or Switzerland. So, we get our work almost exclusively through the Soames, or by personal recommendation from Soames members to their peers, one celebrity to another. OK, some people might think the setup’s too hand-in-glove, but in the end, there’s a demand for what we do: if we didn’t meet it, someone else would. But what bothers me is this. Our close relationship with the Soames includes not only doing plastic surgery, but every now and then we have to sort out – in secret, of course – the results of what happens when the sex, drugs and egos all boil over and someone, usually a young girl, gets hurt. You see, the operating theatre is equipped for major operations. Home Croft was originally set up as a full-scale private hospital, but now we just concentrate on the plastics... and, every few months, what drifts in from the Soames. But the latter – it’s all unofficial business, I don’t think our management knows the seriousness of it. I think they’re not aware of what goes on. Not long after I first started work there, I saw it with my own eyes. A girl from the Soames, brought in screaming, several broken bones I’d guess.”

  I’m silent.

  “There was a stretcher, and blood, and a serious air of panic, and that chubby guy, the one with the hair...”

  “Cheriton.”

  “Yes, him – fussing about, terrified she would die and then there’d have to be a real cover-up. Of course, she was nowhere near dying, but her pain was horrible to see. There was a sulky-looking blonde with him, too, also from that place. I thought to myself at the time: that girl really, really hates Cheriton. And he’s not got her under control. I overheard that blonde, her saying to Franklin that a footballer did that to that girl. She named a guy who’s had a seven-figure transfer fee. When she spilled the beans about that to Franklin, Cheriton looked at her like he could kill her.”

  “Was it Cattrell she named?”

  “I can’t tell you who she named.”

  “In which case, I guess it must have been a Spurs player?” He smiles at my little joke, but he’s thinking.

  “There’s a woman, a patient of ours. She told me that she’d found out a few things about Home Croft which were less than perfectly Hippocratic. Stuff I know nothing about, medical things. She threatened to tell people. But unlike me – or you, come to that – she’s high-profile enough that they couldn’t shut her up. She’s not a household name, but she’s unbelievably rich, and she has serious connections. So the Home Croft management talked to her, they agreed an uneasy truce. They got away with it, I guess, because she felt she didn’t have enough evidence to go to the police. But... if you were to dig around, find out about the nasty cases – maybe it would give the Home Croft management enough of a scare – not to close the place and lose me my cushy job, but – for them to stop the nasty stuff. They’re rolling in money – they don’t need to do it, except maybe to please certain very demanding clients, and to keep the Soames sweet with them.”

  “So most of your suspicions – they’re not things you’ve seen yourself, they come from talking to this woman? If so, could you let me have her phone number? ...”

  “Sorry, I’ve not got her contact details. In all honesty, I can’t even name her to you. After all, whatever Home Croft is up to, she expects patient confidentiality, from the receptionist as well as from the other staff. I do treat my own professionalism – seriously, you know.”

  I hear a noise, upstairs. Then footsteps coming downstairs. James gets up, goes into the hall, closing the door behind him. I hear his voice, speaking to someone. He sounds like a teacher talking to a pupil. After five minutes, he comes back in.

  “I’ve got someone that would like to meet you.”

  “Eh?”

  “Well, actually, he wants to make a coffee for you. He’s in the kitchen, now.”

  “I’ve had two coffees already, thanks.”

  “He – wants to make it for you.”

  A figure looms in the doorway, awkward, hesitating. I look up, see a young man, his eyes to the floor, standing nervously there, holding a mug like it was a precious jewel.

  “You are Holly? Hello. I’m Marcus.”

  James smiles at me. “May I introduce my brother?”

  Marcus’s face is elegant, like James’s, but more so, somehow. Like an elf out of Lord of the Rings. He trembles, but only a little: doesn’t lift his eyes, but I see the hint of a smile. He carries on looking at his feet, and says, like he’s rehearsed it “Welcome to 98 Askew Road. I’ve brought you a coffee. James said you like it like this: One spoonful of Nescafe. 75% hot water, 25% milk. The milk is semi-skimmed. No sugar.”

  “Sounds perfect.” I take the mug from him. “Thank you. Delicious.”

  “This is a proud moment, Holly. Marcus, do you want to tell her?”

  “Holly. You are the first guest I have made coffee for. In my life. Nice to meet you, Holly. I am going for my nap now.”

  I want to say more to him, but he’s gone. Like a fairy tale, he’s vanished back into Elfland. I feel like I’ve dreamt the last few seconds, and I’m awake again now. Did that really happen?

  James says “The graffiti. And occasionally, dog turds through the letterbox. It’s him, you see. Some people... so, thank you. It’s called Fragile X. It’s genetic. It includes some autistic symptoms. For him, in particular, it’s fear of social interaction. Meeting new people terrifies him. As you can imagine, going out – in this neighbourhood – is just about impossible unless I’m with him.”

  I motion him
with my eyes to carry on speaking.

  “Which is why... he’s only ever made coffee and tea before for himself, and me. To make a cup of coffee for a total stranger, and hand it to her... A true milestone. Hardly anyone ever visits this house, you see. So I decided that you could be that total stranger. I hope you don’t mind.”

  The question hangs in the air. I may as well say it. “Your parents?”

  “Car crash, four years ago. We were hardly rich, but they decided to go private with care for Marcus. He lived in a specialised care home. When they died, I found that they had massive debts. And, the home was not the best place for him. I brought him back here, I’ve converted this house into two flats, so he has his own kitchen and bathroom, upstairs. He believes upstairs is his own, real flat. But in truth, I’m desperate to sell this place, move out of this neighbourhood. Round here, it’s become – evil. I want to buy two flats, next door to each other, in a half-decent area – subject to London property prices, of course. Then he could have a better measure of independence. Be able to walk down the street. The closest we get to community spirit round here visited me last night, in fact. There was a knock on the door, a gang of youths, hard as nails, standing outside. They told me that they knew who was ‘disrespecting’ Marcus, and they offered to ‘sort them out’ for me. I gave them money – you have to, you know – and politely said no thanks, please don’t. The last thing I want is for me and Marcus to end up as pawns in some gang turf war.

  So, you see why I work at Home Croft. The hours are short, and the pay, for what I have to do, is fabulous. It allows me to spend time with Marcus, and fund some care for him – bits and pieces of targeted therapy. No job that allows me to spend a decent amount of time and energy on Marcus is going to pay better than Home Croft.”

  “And then, there’s the perks.”

  “Perks?”

  “When I asked you about writing on other patients’ hands, had you ever done it before. I’m guessing the answer to that is – Yes?”

  Have I offended him? Maybe. But there’s something I’ve got to know. So I ask a question which I already know the answer to. “You said hardly anyone ever comes to this house. Have you got a regular girlfriend, James?”

  “No, I haven’t. Marcus takes my time, my commitment.”

  “You can tell me, James. I won’t be shocked.”

  “OK, OK, I may as well say it. I guess Home Croft does keep my sex life alive. Even a couple of minor celebrities... and, none of the women have taken it to mean more than a roll in the hay. I don’t tell them about Marcus, I don’t want pity.”

  “It’s fine, James. I’m hardly in a position to judge you.”

  “I guess so... in a way, you and I are alike. I get a lot of gifts. Seriously expensive gifts, good resale value. I kind of donate to my Marcus fund, if you see what I mean. I’ve made over £50K from...”

  “Sugar-mummies?”

  “Uh – yes, I guess you could call them that. £50K over the last two years, over and above what I already save from my salary. One day we’ll be able to afford those two flats.”

  My phone rings.

  “Sorry, sorry. I thought I’d switched it off. But I’d better answer it.” Unknown number.

  “Is that Holly?”

  “Hi, yes.”

  “It’s Jurgita here. I’m sorry I ran away.”

  “Are you all right?”

  “I’m fine. I went back to Brixton, back to Jonas. It was the right decision. He was not angry with me. He sees – that we can’t go on, that way. He says things will change.”

  Yes, Jurgita, and a squadron of pigs in Red Arrows formation has just flown past the window. “Well – I’m always there, if you need me. And Jasmine sends her best wishes too. Don’t tell Jonas, but she might pop in to see you one day. Just a social call.”

  “Thanks. Jasmine was so helpful, she spoke to me, she listened to everything, she asked me all about everything, my situation, even my life back in Lithuania. She was so patient, willing to hear everything. After leaving you – I phoned that Sexwork Helpline, you know, without Jonas knowing. They are advising me about lots of things, but it is difficult with Jonas. But anyway, I didn’t call you about that, except to say – Thank You. No, I call you because I worry about you. Working at that place where you do. Where Klaudija worked. I know nothing more about it, but Tasha does: you should talk to her.”

  “I’d very much like to.”

  “Yes, I thought you would. So I also phoned to say: I have Tasha’s number for you.”

  “Thanks. Thanks very much indeed.” She gives me the number. “Holly, I have to go now. Jonas has come in. But I will call you again, I promise. You are good friend.”

  Once I’ve rung off, I say “Thanks, James. Your information has been – a lifeline for me. And thank you for letting me meet Marcus. But one more question, and I’m sorry, it’s a bit personal. Your sugar mummies. You said, none of them have expected it to be more than a fling. Of course, you don’t really know what any of those women hoped for. But I know that there was at least one who expected more.”

  I’ve touched a nerve. “How do you know that?”

  “I’m right, aren’t I, James? There was at least one who believed that you and she had something more lasting? And, she’s the woman you mentioned earlier, isn’t she?”

  He plays dumb, but I press him. “You said, there was a woman. A patient, who found out things, who threatened to expose Home Croft. She must have been through a lot, I think. A woman wouldn’t share stuff like that with a man unless she trusted him. This woman told you her story when you and she were rolling in that hay of yours, didn’t she?”

  He looks embarrassed, ashamed. “Alright, yes.”

  “Can I have her name and phone number?”

  “Please, Holly.”

  “James, this is not some game. I’ve had a piece of luck, meeting you. But the information you’ve given me – the trail ends. I have nothing more to go on, unless you give me this woman’s number.”

  “This wasn’t what I reckoned on. That information is private, and it’s embarrassing, you raking it up. I invited you here...”

  “Look at me. Look into my face. This face, me, is going to end up in prison. This life, this person, is going to go to waste, rotting in jail. Unless you tell me this woman’s number. Can you live with that on your conscience?”

  We argue, keeping our voices down: neither of us wants to disturb Marcus. Eventually I say “James, you’re a decent man. I admire what you’re doing, for your brother. But can you really respect yourself, if you let things at Home Croft happen under your nose, and never lift a finger? When you saw me walk in, impersonating Devine Cattrell, you thought, aha, here’s someone that wants to dig the dirt on this place. I’ll give her my phone number, tell her my suspicions, then off she’ll go, do all the investigating, I can keep out of it. You may want Home Croft cleaned up, and you care deeply for Marcus – but you insulate yourself from life, from responsibility. You don’t want to get involved, to take a risk, to be a bit brave.”

  He’s the one looking at his feet now. But I need to know this information, I keep on at him.

  “Imagine it was Marcus, brought into Home Croft on that trolley. Marcus is vulnerable. So are the girls who get used by the clients of the Soames and Home Croft. No-one’s protecting them. A little – consistency, that’s all I’m asking of you.”

  It’s early evening as I board the train. For the first time this year, I notice that it’s a little darker, the long summer evenings are drawing to a close. For some reason, as the train pulls away from Edmonton, I don’t think of James, or Marcus, or of my problems. Instead, I think of that boy’s photo on the lamp-post. His eyes, his smile. And I drift back, I see Derry’s oh-so-young face, his confidence, his brash innocence.

  It was a warm year, like I said, my Summer of Love. Then it got colder, but the business with Derry’s clients, as he poncily called them, was still good. Long nights, lying naked next to smelly stran
gers amongst rubbish, hearing the occasional rat scuffling in the blackness. I realised, I had to get out, away from this going-nowhere life. And then one night, Debbie had had too much to drink, didn’t want to join in when Derry brought a guy back to the basement for the usual fun. She started crying and wailing, confused-pissed. “He smells of sweat and dirt, I can’t do it with him.” Then she threw up. And Derry hit her. She and I left five minutes later, carrying all our stuff in four plastic bags. Including £800 from behind my brick in the wall, which I used to put as a rental deposit for a tiny bedsit near Turnpike Lane. When finally I lay alone the following night, in my bed in the flat, with new, clean sheets – my own bed – I slept like I’d never slept before.

  The following day, I phoned Derry. He was still completely unknowing about the £800, of course. “Derry. I’ll do you a deal.”

  “You fucking bitch, Holly. Why the fuck are you calling?”

  “Look Derry, it’s Christmas, and this is your Christmas present. Some free money for you. Give guys my number. I’ll send you my photo, you can use that to get them interested. For every guy you send me, I’ll pay you twenty. I’ll leave it in an envelope for you, at a place we agree. I’ll do that, I promise. Same for Debbie. But I’ll never, ever tell you where I live.”

  And that’s how it worked, for the first six months anyway. The guys phoning, calling round, the sex. And leaving brown envelopes containing twenty-quid notes in a crack in the stonework of the park bandstand for my would-be pimp. But the freedom, from the caring control of the social workers, and Amrit, and Derry’s bossing me about, was like heaven.

  After a few months I joined an agency, started to get a quite a few punters through that. Craig Garrett, the boss, was a bastard, but at that time he was helpful to me, and he also told me about a strip club in Tottenham which he part-owned, I got a lap-dancing job there, Friday and Saturday nights. I paid £50 per night to work in the club, so any money I got over £50 went into my pocket. Derry still didn’t know where I lived, and the escorting was going well too, I started to get a few older clients, some of them wanting regular bookings. I was able to put my rates up. Another year went by. I learnt to look after myself. I even started to cook my own (terrible) meals. But Debbie was a problem. She had always been a drinker, and increasingly the mess in the flat, the disruption to my punters when she’d crash back home completely pissed, was becoming impossible to live with.

  She was also an easy shag, as opposed to an escort, if you see what I mean. She was really pretty, and had no problems joining the agency. But she’d arrange an incall, and then go out for the night, end up bringing some other bloke back, or more usually not coming back at all, doing an all-nighter with a guy somewhere. Free of charge, of course, apart from a couple of cocktails bought for her at some club. I picked up some trade from her disappointed evening punters who turned up to find their bird flown. All of which made me realise that a guy comes to an escort’s flat ready to shag, and who he’s going to be shagging, as long as she’s not an actual turn-off for him, isn’t important. Not once did I get the line “I’m not paying you, you’re not Debbie.”

  But then, one night, when she was out, there was the familiar knock on the door of a Debbie punter, I opened it, and I was staring at Derry.

  “How did you find me?”

  “I’ve been here many times, Holly.”

  And he had. He’d been visiting my flat, shagging Debbie, and taking all her earnings, behind my back, for months. And giving her more booze than she could handle. He said she’d never actually lost touch with him, she even phoned him that first night when we ran away, to say sorry to him. After a while he found out from her where we lived, and once he got her back into bed, she told him about how I’d managed to steal enough cash to leave him. He told me all that – and then, what I knew would happen, happened. He hit me.

  I ended up with two black eyes, a nose that I thought was broken (turned out it wasn’t) and bruises all over. But I guess he didn’t draw a knife, and he didn’t rape me.

  Sitting in A&E, North Middlesex Hospital, with my suspected broken nose, courtesy of Derry. Will they ever call my name out? After two hours, I put my magazine down.

  “May I look at that?”

  “Yeah, I’ve finished with it.” But instead of picking it up, the elegant, slim woman, just a few years older than me, says “They should bring George Vennery down here to look at this A&E. Show him the real world, for the first time in his privileged life. I bet he’s never had to sit in a place like this, waiting for someone to call his name out.”

  “George? ...”

  “The health minister. I’m Jasmine, by the way.”

  “I’m Holly. You been waiting long?”

  “Long enough. But you see this everywhere, now. Human debris. I worked in housing, the problems I deal with... well, used to deal with, actually. I don’t do it anymore, although I still think about the bloody injustices. I packed it in six months ago. I found something that pays better, and has better opportunities.”

  “Well done you. I love your clothes, by the way. And the shoes.”

  “Courtesy of my new job. Well, self-employment, actually. At last I can afford to look like I feel. Your look’s nice too, great colours.”

  I can tell she’s being nice to me. Then she leans forward, speaks as if she’s telling me a secret. “Problem is I’ve not shaken off London’s bloody accommodation crisis myself. My landlord’s taken a sudden dislike to me, and I’ve now got a housing problem of my own.”

  I like this outspoken person who’s latched onto me. “Funny. I’m thinking of moving to a new flat too.”

  Despite my half-hint, the woman looks into the distance, then changes the subject. “This country needs to change. It’s not really about funding, it’s about attitudes. My parents, for instance – they plod along in their little jobs, not questioning anything. Not realising there’s a whole other world they don’t understand.”

  “Other world?”

  “People who aren’t part of the legitimate economy. People who don’t have the rights that we take for granted. But those people’s work, on minimum wage or worse, it props up the whole system. Or, take escorting as an example. There’s married couples sitting at home, they see something on the TV and say, how dreadful, these poor, stupid girls. And the next day he tells her he’s working late, when really he’s shagging a hooker.”

  “Well... he might need it. Sometimes people can’t tell the truth, all the time.”

  “Holly Harlow!” A nurse calls for my name, here goes at last. But as I get up, I pull out a pen, write my number on the corner of the magazine. “Call me if you’d like to chat about a possible flat-share. But if you are interested – you’ll need to understand that I often work at home. If you do call me, I’ll explain. Most people... they wouldn’t want to share with me.”