8

      The sound of an angry male voice jolted me awake. I wondered briefly if there was actually someone standing above the bed, driving a shovel into my head. The throbbing was so steady it was almost comforting, until I realized that I was not, in fact, in my own bed. Nor was last night’s all-black-all-wrong outfit in sight; instead, I was wearing a pair of unnervingly tight gray Calvin Klein boxer briefs and a giant white T-shirt that read SPORTS CLUB LA. Don’t panic, I instructed myself, trying to make out the words of the faraway male voice. Think. Where were you and what were you doing last night? Considering that I was not in the general habit of blacking out and waking up in strange places, I congratulated myself on a good start. Let’s see. Elisa called, dinner at Cipriani’s, cab to Bungalow 8, everyone at a table, dancing with … some tan British guy. Shit. The last thing I remember is dancing with a nameless man in a club and now I’m in a bed – albeit a huge, comfortable one with extremely soft sheets – I don’t recognize.

      ‘How many times do I have to tell you? You simply cannot wash Pratesi sheets in hot water!’ The male voice was shouting now. I jumped out of bed and checked for escape routes, but a quick glance out the window told me we were at least twenty floors off the ground.

      ‘Yes, sir, I am sorry, sir,’ said a whimpering female voice with a Spanish accent.

      ‘I’m keen to believe that, Manuela, I really am. I’m a reasonable bloke, but this just cannot continue. I’m afraid I have to dismiss you.’

      ‘But, sir, if I can just—’

      ‘I’m sorry, Manuela, but my decision is final. I’ll pay you your wages for the rest of the week, but that will be all.’ I heard some rustling and muffled crying, and then there was nothing but silence until a door slammed shut a few minutes later.

      My stomach sent me the signal that it wasn’t going to tolerate its hangover much longer, and I glanced around frantically to locate the bathroom. I was rooting around for my clothes, debating whether it was better for him to see me half-clothed or throwing up since there clearly wasn’t time to remedy both issues, when he walked in.

      ‘Hello,’ he said, barely glancing in my direction. ‘Are you feeling all right? You were fairly pissed last night.’

      His appearance distracted me to such an extent that I actually forgot I was about to be sick. He looked even tanner than I remembered, which was only highlighted by a skintight white T-shirt, flowy white pants, and some of the straightest, brightest teeth I’ve ever seen in a British mouth. He was like Enrique in The Tycoon’s Virgin Bride, his looks utterly begging to be on a dust jacket.

      ‘Uh, yeah, I guess I was. This, uh, has never really happened to me before. I’m afraid I don’t even remember your name.’

      He seemed to remember that I was an actual person and not a bed adornment, and sat down next to me on the pillow.

      ‘I’m Philip. Philip Weston. And don’t worry about it – I only brought you back here because I couldn’t get two taxis and didn’t want to maneuver to the East Side. Nothing happened. I’m not some rapist. I’m an attorney, actually,’ he said with not a little pride in a thick, upper-crust English accent.

      ‘Oh, well, thanks so much. I really didn’t think I drank that much, but I don’t remember anything after dancing with you.’

      ‘Yes, well, it happens. Stressful fucking morning so far, don’t you think? I loathe having my post-yoga calm shattered by rubbish like this.’

      ‘Yeah.’ He didn’t just wake up in a stranger’s bed, but I wasn’t feeling great about my arguing position.

      ‘My housekeeper was washing my Pratesi sheets in scalding-hot water. I mean, what bloody good are they if you have to double-check every move they make? Can you imagine what a disaster it would’ve been if I hadn’t spotted it?’

      Gay. He was definitely gay. He wasn’t Enrique, but Enrique’s fey friend Emilio. This was a tremendous relief.

      ‘What would have happened, exactly?’ I washed my own sheets in hot water and dried them on high because it seemed like the best way to make them softer faster. But then again, I’d bought them at Macy’s and admittedly didn’t spend all that much time thinking about it.

      ‘What would have happened? Are you serious?’ He strode across the room and spritzed some Helmut Lang cologne on his neck. ‘She would’ve burned out the thread count, that’s what! Those sheets cost twenty-eight hundred pounds for a king set, and she would have destroyed them!’ He put the bottle down and began patting what I hoped was aftershave but was more likely moisturizer into his golden skin. I did a quick calculation: four thousand dollars.

      ‘Oh. I guess I didn’t understand. I, uh, I didn’t know sheets could be that expensive. But I’m sure if I paid that much for them, I’d be concerned, too.’

      ‘Yes, well, I’m sorry you had to endure all that.’ He pulled the T-shirt over his head to reveal a completely bare, perfectly sculpted chest. It was almost a shame he was gay, considering just how good-looking he was. He closed the bathroom door briefly and turned the shower on, and then a few minutes later he emerged wearing only a towel. Pulling a dress shirt and suit from the oak-paneled walk-in closet, he handed me my clothes in a neatly folded pile and discreetly left the room while I stripped.

      ‘Will you be all right getting home?’ Philip called from what sounded like a million miles away. ‘I must be off to work. Early meeting.’

      Work. Jesus Christ, I’d completely and entirely forgotten that I was currently employed, but a quick check of the bedside clock reassured me that it was only a little after seven. He’d already been to yoga and back, and we couldn’t have possibly gotten home before three in the morning. I had a brief but intense flashback to the one and only time I’d gone to yoga. I’d been fumbling through my first class for thirty minutes when the teacher had announced thirty seconds into our current pose – the half-moon pose, to be precise – that it was equivalent to eight hours of sleep. I’d accidentally snorted and she’d asked me if there was a problem. Luckily I’d been able to restrain myself from asking what was really on my mind: namely, why had no one before enlightened us to the miracle of the half-moon pose? Why, for all these centuries, have humans wasted a third of their lifetimes sleeping when they could’ve just bent at the waist for one half of one minute? Instead, I mumbled something about it being a ‘really cool concept’ and sneaked out when she wasn’t looking.

      Philip’s hallway was longer than the entire length of my apartment, and I had to follow the sound of his voice to find the right room. Colorful abstracts hung on the walls and the dark-stained wood floors – real wood, not New York parquet – highlighted the stark, metal-frame furniture. The entire place looked like a Ligne Roset floor sample, as though it had been plucked directly from the showroom and put back together in this guy’s apartment. I counted a total of three full bathrooms, two bedrooms, a living room, and a study (complete with floor-to-ceiling built-in bookcases, two Mac G4 computers, and a wine rack) before I found him leaning against his granite counter-top, feeding blood oranges into a high-tech juicer. I didn’t even own a can opener.

      ‘You do yoga? I don’t know any guys who do yoga.’ Any straight guys, that is, I thought to myself.

      ‘Of course. It’s smashing strength training, and I love how it clears your