In Bed With Lord Byron

need to contact the British Embassy. In the mean time, I’ll lend
you some money so you have a place to stay for the night.’
    ‘God, that’s so kind of you – thanks so much.’ My heart swelled at his warmth.
    ‘No trouble at all. Now, let
me
pick a hotel for you this time.’
    ‘Can we stay in your hotel?’
    ‘Ah, no,’ he replied, slightly jumpily. ‘I’m actually renting my own place – I’m living here at the moment. Come on, I’ll take you to a hotel
now.’
    He hailed a rickshaw and we all squeezed in. I had forgotten how wonderfully crazy it was to travel in India. Traffic lights were exuberantly ignored; instead the traffic system seemed to be
dictated by who could beep their horn the hardest. Our rickshaw competed crazily with trucks, cars, taxis, and the occasional cow wandering across the road. It was rather like being on a
rollercoaster, only with more dust.
    The hotel was indeed plush – very different from some of the guesthouses I’d stayed in when I’d visited India on my travels. There was a pleasant, clean bedroom with a double
bed, a fan that actually sliced the air rather than just shuffling it around, and an ensuite bathroom.
    ‘Thanks,’ I kept repeating, in a terribly British way. ‘Thank you so much.’
    ‘Really, it’s fine. I know how scary it is to be a foreigner in a country you don’t know.’ He headed back to the door and opened it. ‘Well, I guess I should leave
you to it.’
    ‘Well – yes.’ I looked down at Adam and caught him smirking. I flashed him a cross look. Was it that obvious? I fretted. That I was desperate to see this man again, that
somehow there was a connection between us? And I know this sounds clichéd and corny, but I really did feel as though I’d known him for much longer than the last twenty minutes.
    I paused in the doorway and he just stood there with an awkward smile balanced on his lips. I realised I was behaving like a lemon, so I smiled and closed the door.
    ‘Auntie Lucy, are we staying?’ Adam cried out eagerly, bouncing up and down on the bed.
    ‘No!
No!
We’re having a very quick break and then we have to go back this afternoon—’ I broke off, for there was a knock at the door. I ran to it, yanked it open
and stood there breathlessly.
    My dark-haired stranger was still standing in the corridor.
    ‘Um – I was wondering if we could meet tomorrow? I could help you sort out new passports.’
    ‘Yes, yes, please, yes—’ I broke off, realising that I sounded as though I was practising my orgasms again. ‘Um – yes.’
    ‘Great.’ When he smiled, it was so shy-making: his eyes crinkled up and two white sparkles danced in the centre of his pupils. He turned to go and then turned back. ‘I’ve
just realised that I don’t even know your name.’
    ‘Lucy,’ I said. ‘And you’re ... ?’
    ‘Peter,’ he said. ‘Well, bye, Lucy.’ He spoke my name as though it was a blessing.
    I closed the door. Adam gave a whoop of excitement, declaring how much fun it was to be on holiday. I grinned too, his childish abandon rubbing off on me.
    But as we lay in bed together that night, I found myself with a deep feeling of unease. Now that my initial euphoria had faded, I started fretting that I ought to take Adam back; imagine if
anything happened to him . . .
    Still, I told myself, this wasn’t a dangerous place, not like going back to the 1920s to meet Al Capone . . . Like Adam said, we were just on holiday. And God, I needed a holiday, some
time to be away from Anthony, to reflect on how I felt about him. Surely we couldn’t run into any harm . . .
    ii) A memory of Anthony
    Perhaps one reason why I felt so uneasy was because India held bad memories for me. Someone only had to mention the place and I’d feel my heart throbbing as though full of
splinters. I’d always sworn that I would never return, for India was the place where Anthony and I suffered our first Major Row.
    It was just after our fifty-first one-night stand. Anthony and I had reached that awkward point in a relationship. It was the end of the Honeymoon Period; the ushering in of the Compatibility
Era. That strange, transitional time where we were popping bubbles of bliss, getting to know each other’s faults and weaknesses, gracefully allowing each other to climb down from our
pedestals. Anthony had discovered I was an awful cook; I had discovered he liked cutting his toenails in front of the TV. I’d discovered he owned the world’s