The Girl I Used to Be(38)

“Think about those moments before you first went into your room,” she said. “You were walking down the corridor. How would you normally open the door to the hotel room, do you remember? With a card?”

“Yes,” I said. “It was one of those contactless cards that you hold next to a metal plate on the door. It was a white card, no markings on it. The room number was on a little envelope.”

“And later on Friday night, when you were going back to your room . . . do you remember opening the door then? Putting the card next to the door?”

I closed my eyes and tried to remember, but I couldn’t. I shook my head, frustrated with myself. “I don’t know. I must have done.”

“What about your clothes? What were you wearing?”

I described my green silk dress.

“And when you woke up the next morning, what were you wearing?”

I frowned. “I was wearing my underwear. Bra and knickers.”

She was quiet for a while then, before she said, “Were they the same that you’d worn the night before?”

I stared at her. “What do you mean?”

“Well, when you arrived at the hotel, did you change before going downstairs?”

I nodded. “It was a really hot day, so I had a shower and changed my clothes.”

“And do you remember which underwear you put on after your shower?”

I thought hard. “Yes, I can remember. I’d bought it when we were in Italy last summer. It’s black silk. I always wore that set with my green dress.”

She leaned forward. “Gemma, when you woke up, can you remember which underwear you were wearing then? Was it the same set?”

I closed my eyes, panic coursing through me.

She spoke gently and I knew she was used to coaxing hidden truths from women in situations like mine. “What did you do when you first got up? Did you go into the bathroom?”

“I went into the bathroom,” I said. “I was sick. It was the drink.”

“And did you look in the mirror? What color was your underwear?”

I felt the blood drain from my face as I remembered seeing my reflection in the mirror as I dashed over to the toilet. My face had been pale and sweaty. The mirror was about three square feet, placed at waist height. In my mind’s eye I could see myself as I passed through the room. My underwear was white.





TWENTY-SEVEN


Sunday, August 6

AS SOON AS I got home I raced upstairs to find the underwear I’d been wearing the night I’d had dinner with David in London. I’d come home and tipped all of my clothes from my overnight bag into the laundry basket on the landing. That was empty now, thanks to the cleaners, and all of the clothes there had been washed and put back into drawers. I searched my bedroom looking for the set, but knew I wouldn’t find it.

I checked the utility room, hoping against hope that they would be there, left in the dryer by mistake, but no, all was spotless, not a thing out of place.

“You told me that you were naked in those photos,” Stella had said. “So your underwear was obviously off at one point. This sort of man often likes to keep something. A kind of trophy. I wonder whether he took it with him and put your other set on you so that you wouldn’t notice.”

Or so that I would notice. So that I’d remember one day, later, after he’d gone.

I sat at the dining table and tried to control my breathing. I couldn’t let myself think about this. I just couldn’t.

All of a sudden I was overwhelmed with the desire to talk to Joe. I sent him a text to ask if he was free, but I didn’t get a reply. I could phone their house, of course, but guessed his mum would answer and I just couldn’t bear to talk to her now. She’d know something was wrong and she really, really mustn’t find out what I’d done.

What had I done, though? I just couldn’t remember a thing. Something had happened and I was being punished for it. I thought again of those photos appearing on social media and sites for voyeurs and just wanted to collapse in a heap.

I picked up my laptop and opened Chrome in Incognito mode. There was no way I wanted Joe to see this. I typed in the address of the site. As soon as I saw the content I started to cry.

The whole site was devoted to images and videos of women who were unaware they were being recorded. It showed them in the shower, in the street, asleep in bed. There were unsuspecting women on crowded trains, unaware that some creep was holding a camera up their skirt. There were even women on the toilet, completely oblivious to the fact that they were being filmed. I clicked on link after link, feeling more sick by the minute. Most pictures had a stream of comments underneath, congratulating the bastards who’d filmed these women. I felt dirty just reading those messages. There were Like buttons, too; any idea I’d had that this was a niche market was quickly quashed by the sheer number of people who liked these photos.

Tears pricked my eyes as I realized that could be me on there. Next time I looked, there could be comments next to my photo, telling other men what they’d like to do to me. And it was no comfort to think the men I knew wouldn’t go on there, wouldn’t dream of looking at photos taken by a hidden camera in a woman’s bathroom; I knew these things had ways of getting out.

It didn’t take long to get a full grasp of what the site was about, and then I started to look for someone to e-mail. There were thousands of photos posted there since the date I was in London, and I couldn’t face looking at them all. I wanted to ask someone what I could do if I found a photo of myself there, but try as I might, I just couldn’t find any contact details. I suppose that on a normal site the owners are keen to be identified with it, whereas here they weren’t. Then I realized that there was a Report button next to each of the photos and videos. Perhaps I could leave a message that way?