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Well, here we are in February. A truly rotted month in every sense. Simultaneously, the shortest and longest month of the year, an unending, tepid concoction of false hope and false endings, and what can only be described as the Tuesday of the calendar year.

It’s become a habit of mine to observe the month coming or past when I begin a post, as if you all needed a reminder of our beloved Gregorian calendar. And yet I am relentless in my bid to provide nothing newsworthy or incisive for you and that is why I appreciate you all for still being here.

I recently took a break from social media – a sort of soft break if you will – where I logged out of IG and other accounts because I was feeling a little overwhelmed with the news, constant stimuli and deluge of attractive men on my feed. I love them but in the bleak midwinter, my fragile self-esteem needs sparing.

me the minute sunlight actually hits my anemic skin

As ever with me, I neglected to tell most people – completing my unceremonious exit from the public eye. I did tell two of my work colleagues-turned-good friends though – Nefta, the mouthy and funny one and Anika, the loveable and mildly dissociative one – and was met with the usual backlash. “Like you even post anything anyway!” yelled Nefta at me in her daily greeting in the office, while Anika gazed lovestruck at her screen, dreaming of her latest London lover looking to whisk her away.

I’ve worked with them both for six months at least now and I’ve come to appreciate a lot about them. I’ve spoken (lectured) at length (an essay) on how hard it is to meet people as an adult and make friendships from them, so I feel lucky to have had two new friends enter my life this past year.

With Nefta, we have this kind of sibling relationship, which basically involves one of us tearing into the other and then in the same breath saying “I’ve missed you”. One recent incident involved us arguing in the middle of the office when she turned to one of our colleagues and said “Well who are you going to believe – the black one or the gay one?” and that stunned everyone into the kind of silence that can only come from making everyone feeling wonderfully uncomfortable. It’s times like these I know why we’re friends.

With Anika, I’d say our dynamic is more me being constantly shocked and delighted by how much she’s in her own world and her blissfully unware of everything around her. As an example, she walked in on our office potluck breakfast (a truly cursed invention) completely bemused as to what was going on and entirely empty-handed, exclaiming “what is all this” before proceeding to enjoy the spread as she deserved. She’s also perennially broke because her idea of grocery shopping is getting basics from Amsterdam’s equivalent of M&S and WholeFoods.

Either way, the friendship between us has developed so much we decided we’d go on a trip together – to Bali. And by decided what I really mean is they organised everything and invited me along and I eventually agreed. Now I’ve never been someone who’s been desperate to go but there’s eight of us staying in a gorgeous home, and I thought why not be spontaneous, something Nefta pointedly disagreed with. “The way we had to BEG you to come,” she explained to a colleague of mine. “I swear Tom doesn’t do anything unless you literally beg him to and even then he’s like ‘i’ll think about it’”. Usually I disagree with most characterisations of me, but this one is fairly accurate.

Still, I’m keen to go. There’s something about doing something on a whim (admittedly I cannot follow hundreds of euros worth of a whim as in the case here) that feels exciting, at least once in a blue moon. I’m going with zero expectations, even if I am expecting a horde of influencers and personal trainers turned life coaches ransacking the jungle while I lurk in the periphery like some demonic omnipotence, judging without any good right or reason. My favourite pastime.

But back to the point. Part of this trip is a continuation of this attempt at disconnecting I’ve been talking about – getting away from the familiar. After all, Bali has become shorthand for new-age people looking to find themselves. Luckily I’ve already done that and I’m trying to run from myself instead.

And even if Bali weren’t in the picture, I was reminded of escapism and disconnecting the other day when I received a message from one of my best friends in the world – Sadie. A free spirit like no other – as you might imagine from somebody who researches whales for a living – Sadie and I have one of those friendships where we never run out of things to say. When we meet, we unpack another layer we didn’t know was there. And we seem to always cross paths at the crossroads in our lives, when a big decision is meant to happen, or one just has.

One of those times was when Sadie came to visit me in Amsterdam after a breakup. She’d messaged me because she’d received a card I’d sent her the other month; illustrated with a view of a windmill (a less cliché one than you might imagine) that we passed on a bike ride down to Utrecht, a city south of Amsterdam, when she came to stay.

She remembers the bike ride. I, regrettably, remember something else.

Now I’m no stranger to crucifying, dare I say even mortifying, experiences, but this is up there with the worst of them. Let me explain.

When Sadie came to visit, she wasn’t in a good place emotionally, so a lot of the time we were sifting through deep, murky and charged waters in conversation. I was happy to do this, after all, it’s what she came for. At the same time I was living in a flat-share with another guy – a lovely guy who had a less lovely habit of smoking inside, gaming all-night and loved coke. It’s less important for the story but helps characterise the eccentricity of my living situation.

The flat was totally open plan. It was formerly an artist’s loft and I had the only thing close to a bedroom in the form of attic, which meant that every night I had to lug a mattress across the opening in order to create a makeshift door. Either way, there were few doors and there was little room for privacy on any occasion, let alone when you had your friend sharing a bed with you.

One night, the three of us were sitting in the living room having a low-key evening, listening to some music on my new speakers. It had been almost a week Sadie had been staying and it felt like she’d been there all along. However – and I can hear Maira’s voice in my head screaming “WHORE!!!” as I write this – I’d also not seen my boyfriend in the same time and let’s say hadn’t any time to myself or had sex in a while. I was a 23-year-old man and I was feeling pent up.

Anyway, Sadie and my flat-mate were chatting away and I thought to myself, ‘why dont’ I just sneak away to the bathroom’ right now. Maybe I could drop my boyfriend a cheeky message or watch some porn – after all, I told myself, I’m just human. When the urge strikes, it lingers.

So I crept off to the bathroom, clunking and creaking with all the ease and grace you might imagine for a man of 6ft 4' in an apartment where the wooden floors looked like they were made of driftwood. I was just going to the bathroom but the stakes felt high.

I got inside, nobody any the wider. This was my moment. I pulled up a video – something standard (code for gay!) and let it buffer. I pressed play, the distant memory of what two people having sexual tension felt like returning to my body. And yet there was no sound. That’s strange I thought, I’ll try another one.

So I did. And still no sound. I could see it was on a low to medium volume so I turned it up. Nothing. I turned up more. Still nothing. I turned it up to the max and nothing. This would be my luck.

In between me rueing my lack of technological nous, I became distinctly aware of a sound out in the living room. I listened closely, it started faint and grew louder. Was that Sadie and my flat mate?

Suddenly I heard a grunt. Slapping motions. What the fuck is going on out there, I thought to myself. It sounds like they’re having sex.

And then it hit me. Someone was having sex – but it wasn’t them.

I looked down at my phone. There it was in a hauting blue colour, my bluetooth connection. “Tom’s iPhone – Connected to Bose Speakers”.

Not only was the volume working perfectly fine, but I was currently broadcasting porn on surround sound to Sadie and my flat-mate.

I couldn’t tell you what happened next but you know those Looney Toon cartoons where they smash things over their heads? Or bash things furiously until they break?Well this was me with my phone. I frantically jabbed at the close window and disconnect sign and I heard the speakers go off.

But now what? I sort of just froze. Furious with myself but equally dying inside, I was like a dog (Maira’s voice again) with it’s tail between its legs. Instead of going out and owning it though, I just sort of stayed?? In the bathroom, which in hindsight looks even worse because it looks like I’m just now enjoying things to myself while everyone is aware of what on.

I gathered myself. Tom, I said, this is what you get. You have no tact and you can’t be normal. This is a lesson to trust your instincts and not go with your impulses. I turned the knob of the door and shuffled out.

Sadie wasn’t there anymore, but my flatmate was. He looked at me and smiled shiftly. He didn’t need to say anything. He knew. I knew. The embarrassment was palpable.

Now don’t get me wrong – there is nothing shameful about anything to do with but tell me anyone who wants to broadcast their viewing habits to their friends on full volume?

I headed upstairs and Sadie was in the room. She said nothing. In fact, she seemed to not think anything was amiss. Had I dodged a bullet? Was she so deep in conversation that the sounds from the speakers where nothing more than another whale’s mating call?

To this day I still don’t know. But when she sent me that message about her time staying with me, how it had been a way to disconnect from everything going on in her life then, I couldn’t help but wince at my own inability to do that.

As I write this, I’m my way to Bali. The girls asked who was bringing speakers for the house. I left mine at home.

remember to disconnect

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