Page 2 of Hot to Go

Paul disappears. I need a shower. Maybe after we’ve eaten we could go to the beach? We live five minutes from the sea and everyone is at the beach after work during this early heatwave. It would be a welcome reprieve to just run into the sea, submerge and cool off. I feel an ice-cold can at the back of my neck and close my eyes. We should have started with this. That feeling, that relief is sexy. I grab the can from him and hold it to my forehead before opening it and downing at least half. Paul watches me curiously.

‘It was too hot for sex,’ I tell him, putting the can down and sliding my dress over my shoulders. I twist my dark brown hair to the top of my head into a loose bun.

He makes a face. ‘This isn’t hot. When I lived in Dubai, it was forty-two degrees,’ he informs me.

‘You had air conditioning…’

‘Methinks the lady doth complain too much,’ he says, winking.

‘The lady doth worry about expiring before her time.’

‘I can think of worse ways to go…’ he says.

I’d rather go in my sleep, to be honest. The doorbell chimes through the house. Well, I know the food is early because that sex did not last thirty-five minutes. I get up, watching as Paul shifts his gaze to his phone. I hope he’s looking at buying us a new fan. In the hallway, the cool of the tiles against my bare feet is welcome and I open the front door.

‘Oh, I think I’ve got the wrong house?’ the delivery man says, casually looking at the number on the door and back at me in confusion. I have sex face, don’t I? I’m dishevelled and pink.It could also be because I didn’t put a bra back on, but I’ve been out in worse. I chased the bin men in knickers, a T-shirt and UGGs once.

‘No, that’s possibly for us…number thirteen,’ I tell him. ‘Are you…Sajeed? Code is 5672.’

He nods curiously. ‘It’s just…last time, you…I mean…it was a different lady. Maybe a housemate or sister? The girl with the red hair.’

I pause for a moment to think about the people who’ve been in this house, the food we’ve had delivered. A different lady?

‘She works at the gym, an instructor maybe?’

‘The gym?’

And in a split second, Sajeed’s eyes meet mine and we share the same realisation. His expression changes to distraught. ‘Must have been a different house,’ he says, trying to backtrack.

It might be too late for that, Sajeed. He hangs his arm out, urging me to take the food so he can run away. I stand there and stare at it for a while. There was someone else in this house, someone who wasn’t me? A woman?

‘When was this, Sajeed?’ I ask him. My face is frozen. A breath is stuck in my body, struggling to escape. I cling on to the door to steady myself, the heat from outside hitting me like waves.

‘Last week maybe?’ he says. ‘Seriously, I think it was a different house. All these houses look the same. Maybe it was your neighbour?’ He points to the house that shares our pathway.

My neighbour to the left is an eighty-four-year-old lady called Marjorie. She has no teeth and a flip phone so I know there’s no way she’s getting Uber Eats.

He looks to his left and right. Sweat runs down his temples. ‘Yep. Definitely a different house. Maybe even a different street. I deliver a lot of food in this neighbourhood.’

But unfortunately, his sad eyes tell medifferent.

‘Was it Thursday, Sajeed?’ I ask, trying to control the shock from bursting out of me. I was on a teaching course in London. Overnight.

He doesn’t know how to reply. ‘Miss…I…’ He hangs his arm out again.Please, just take the food.

‘Babe, problem?’ Paul says, popping his head out of the kitchen doorway. Sajeed doesn’t hang around. He puts the food just inside the door and takes a light jog down the pathway.

Paul peers around to look at him running off then looks back down at his phone. I bend down and pick up the food and turn to look at him. I think he’s on TikTok. Really? I take a long hard breath.

‘He just got confused. He remembered delivering here last Thursday,’ I say, trying to wrestle with my emotions and gain the upper hand in this situation. ‘Another woman was here.’

Paul stops and looks up at me. It’s a silent, panicked look. A face once full of colour, drained. His shoulders fall, a hand goes to the air as if he’s about to try and explain.

You absolute dick.

‘Heads up,’ I say, casually, but I put all my emotion, all my rage into my arms and throw the takeaway at him with all the force and energy I can muster. Pad Thai, papaya salad and little crispy prawns rain through the air.I can’t.

It really is too fucking hot for this shit.

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