6.30pm

When I woke up, I had that moment I always have of wondering where I am, almost who I am.

But even then, before I'd opened my eyes, I could somehow feel, from the shape of the bed, maybe even from some kind of sixth sense, that he was in the bed beside me.

Then I felt him shift and when I opened my eyes his face was right against mine.

'Heya,' I said and he smiled and I thought, this is going to be all right.

There are those times when you wake up and there's someone in the bed and you think to yourself, Oh God, what have I done?

You feel you've lost a bit of yourself and you just wish that they'd go away and you'd never meet again and you can pretend that that bit of your life never happened.

6.35pm

But even so, you know for ever and ever that there's someone out there who's seen you like that and been with you like that. 

And they probably feel smug about it. 'Oh, I had her once.'

The bit of you that you've lost, that's the bit they've got, the bit they've taken.

That's what I couldn't bear with Rob.

Rob. Rob. I'm trying to forget even the name.

He'd stolen something from me and I needed it back.

Had to have it back.

But this was different...

It was one of those rare evenings when everything went according to plan.

6.40pm

I took her to the Mayflower because it serves food as well, so the evening could go either way according to how things were working out.

If she'd been a complete drag, we could have finished our white wines and said that was nice and we must do it again soon and we could ratchet the relationship back down to the odd nod in the corridor.

But it was fine and we were chatting away and so it was easy to ask if she wanted something to eat and she just nodded.

Call me Mr Sensitive but I don't like to ask some big question which can then have a big negative answer.

It's better if things just go in stages.

So we had a meal with a bottle of wine and I said I'd see her home and then she asked me up.

6.45pm

All right, all right, I can see the eager look in your eyes.

I'm not going to go into the nitty gritty of what occurred.

Well, maybe some of the nitty.

But not the gritty.

It was all civilized and straightforward, the way it hardly ever is.

And the only thing I'll say to satisfy your lurid curiosity is that it went better than does when I'm more worried about it, when I care more.

If you see what I mean.

He was a good lover.

No, that's not the right way of putting it, it sounds too technical.

It's more that he was my lover.

6.50pm

Loving me as if I was special, and exploring my body in a way that felt new.

When we woke up and sat it was four o'clock we both laughed and he said he'd have to get home so he could change.

I got up with him and made him some coffee, which we gulped down together before he left.

I didn't say anything stupid.

I didn't say, 'I don't normally do this,' 'I don't normally sleep with someone on a first date,' 'I don't normally bring someone home who I hardly know.'

That was what was good.

We didn't need to play games.

There was an understanding.

6.55pm

Normally the bit afterwards is awkward and a letdown.

You wonder whether it was worth it.

When you leave it's all a bit embarrassing.

But when I said I had to get back she was fine.

She made me some coffee.

I had this sudden feeling that we were being grown up about this.

It's not like a battle.

That sex can be fun, the way it is in movies when it's beautifully lit and there's soft music playing and there are no consequences.

Although of course I don't normally sleep with someone on a first date.

I never do.

7.00pm

This was a first, an act of faith.

One day I'll tell him that.

Am I going to see her again?

Yeah, I guess so.

Maybe.

She was good fun.

Nice to be with.

It doesn't mean much, but I don't want to get hurt all over again, do I?

I've had enough of all that for a bit.

I don't think she feels it means much either.

She's easy-going, sophisticated. Nobody's going to get hurt.

We met later that day, in the crowded lift.

7.05pm

There were two people between him and me and I couldn't even reach out a hand and touch him, secretly.

But he looked at me and winked.

I could feel my face burn.

She's probably used to this kind of thing.

I wonder who else she's had sex with here - you don't know, do you?

Not that it matters.

But I think she must have.

Because you know what happened next?

I couldn't stop thinking about him.

My hands were trembling on the keyboard.

I felt feverish with longing for him again and I knew he would be feeling the same. 

I went to the toilets and splashed cold water on my face. 

When I looked at myself in the mirror I hardly recognized myself: my eyes were big and bright and my face had a glow about it.

I thought I looked beautiful, and then I thought: what's the point of looking beautiful if your new boyfriend doesn't see you like that?

7.10pm

So I raced back to my desk and I wrote him an email.

I said, 'Meet me by the stationery cupboard in half an hour' and before I could stop myself I pressed 'send'.

I spent the next twenty minutes staring at the screen, all the words and figures blurring, my head throbbing, my body throbbing.

Then I went downstairs and I waited and I thought he wasn't coming, thought maybe I'd gone too far, overstepped some invisible line.

Because how do you know? How do you ever know?

You just think you know.

You just have to trust that the other person feels the same as you do.

But he does. I know he does.

I wouldn't feel like this if he didn't as well.

She was by the door.

7.15pm

So lovely. It was lovely.

When she saw me coming, she didn't smile or anything, just lifted a hand and beckoned me over.

An affirmation of everything.

I knew I was right about him.

Yeah, we did! I'm not kidding.

It's a tight squeeze in there.

I was terrified someone would catch us, but she seemed perfectly calm.

I held him so tight I couldn't tell if it was his heart beat I was feeling, or my own.

Two hearts beating as one.

I bet she's done it in there before.

What a cool customer.

I didn't say it to him, but I said it inside myself: I love you.

I do I do I do I do I do.