The Centre(47)

“He doesn’t, does he? You’re scared he’ll think you’re a prostitute.”

There are words you can say that can shatter a lifetime’s worth of trust. I felt, instantly, a deep shame. Naima sat across from me, still saying nothing.

“I didn’t mean that.”

“You think that word shames me?” she said and laughed, and there was an edge to her laugh that made me want to sink into myself. “If you want to call me a prostitute, feel free, babe. If I don’t call myself that, it’s only because I think it would be disrespectful to sex workers. I don’t want to appropriate their struggles. But I don’t see myself as any better or worse or even different, necessarily. It’s revealing to know how you see it, though.”

“I didn’t mean anything bad by that, Naima—”

“Enough, Anisa. Just, stop. You need to free your mind from these chains of shame. I can practically see the rust congealing around you.”

She looked me straight in the eyes. It felt as if she were boring a hole into my forehead.

“Promiscuity,” she continued, “can be a kind of radical hospitality. That’s Garth Greenwell. You have no fucking clue what I do.”

“Don’t be angry,” I said.

She got up to leave.

“Look,” I said desperately. “It just scares me, that’s all. I guess I’ve always felt like I was your significant other.”

She looked at me suspiciously, as if assessing whether I was being sincere or just attempting emotional blackmail.

“We can have more than one significant other,” she said.

“How? When you’re moving to Devon or wherever with this guy?”

She sighed. “Do you think I don’t feel scared as well? Of settling down with him. Of what that means? That … meteor thing.” Naima’s voice broke a little as she spoke. “You think I’m not worried about that too? But you can’t feed my fear with your own.”

She had seen it, I realized. The fading flame. It wasn’t just me. Both of us had been tracking the dimming with some concern. But she was still hopeful of a redemptive love that I was thoroughly unconvinced by.

“Maybe we should listen to that worry,” I offered tentatively. The air had become tender. “Are you sure—”

“I should go,” she said. She picked up her backpack and left.

·

The bond between Naima and me spanned nearly two decades and wasn’t one to be easily broken, but things chilled between us for some time after that night. We exchanged a few texts but not much more. I wished that things had gone differently, that we hadn’t taken that sharp detour and that I had told her about what I’d seen at the Centre. Now, it felt like I definitely couldn’t, but I also couldn’t do nothing. I decided that the next best thing would be to find out whether Adam knew anything. He had, after all, been with the Centre for years. I sent him a text, asking if he wanted to meet. It had been over six months since we’d last spoken. My message stayed on read for a couple of hours before he replied.

Pretty busy these days, but if you want to come over for tea, you’re welcome.

So … I had never been to Adam’s flat. I know that sounds shameful considering we were nearly engaged, but he lived in Seven Sisters, which was basically the other side of London. Like, an hour on the train. And he had a flatmate, Steven, whereas I lived alone. It had just seemed more convenient all around if he came to my place. And he seemed happy with the arrangement. But there he was, asking me to come all the way to his, not even to a café in between. It felt like a power move. Now that there was nothing at stake, he couldn’t be bothered to put in the effort. So I went. I picked up a chocolate tart from Waitrose on the way.

Adam’s flat was nicer than I’d expected. It was very clean. I suppose I should have guessed this from how much care he took in my home. It was also cozier than I’d pictured—comfortable sofas, nice bookshelves, posters of films on the wall: Hitchcock, Kubrick, things like that. The only resemblance it bore to the boys’ pad I’d imagined was the small home gym he and Steven had set up in one corner, with weights, resistance bands, and a bench thing.

“Your flat’s really nice,” I said.

“Yeah,” he replied. There was a reprimand in his voice, and I felt ashamed that I’d never been before. “You want some tea?”

“Sure.”

We sat in the kitchen, which was cold. Adam and I had very different ideas on when to turn the heating on. I wondered if that’s why I’d never been to his house, because I’d intuited it would be cold.

“How have you been?” I asked, cradling my mug.

“Not bad,” he answered, and then, searching for something else to say, continued, “I just got back from a work trip.”

“Cool! Where did you go?”

“Italy.”

“Oh, nice,” I responded. And then, after another awkward pause, I asked, “Did you … eat a lot of pasta?”

He smiled to himself. Nodded. There had once been a time when Adam and I were entirely unselfconscious around each other, a time when we had lain naked together. I wondered if he was thinking about this too.

“So … how’s Billee?”

“He’s good,” I said and pulled up a recent photo on my phone of him crouching just above my head on the back of the sofa.