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Charing Cross.
    Heaven was the first gay club he had ever gone to. He was nineteen at the time, new to London, and only out to two people—his personal tutor at college and Caroline, who was renting a room in the same house as him. Both fugitives from towns they vowed never to return to, both eager to make a new life for themselves, they hit it off immediately and quickly became friends. It was Caroline who had encouraged Martin to “go out and paint the town pink,” although that hardly described his frame of mind at the time. He had stood outside the club for over an hour, chain-smoking his way through an entire pack of cigarettes before finally summoning up the courage to go in. Once inside, he had stood frozen to the same spot for half an hour, terrified that someone might talk to him, equally terrified that they might not, before finally leaving, alone, but feeling strangely proud of himself, as though he had achieved something small but significant. The following week he was back again, a little more relaxed and high on the sheer number of sexually available men all under one roof. That was Heaven’s main appeal. In those days, sooner or later every gay man in London ended up there. And while this no longer held true, it was a reputation the club was only too happy to trade on.
    It was almost five years since he’d last been to Heaven. Not a lot had changed. The club was still as busy and the staff were just as surly. Trying to bullshit his way into the Departure Lounge, he was turned away by a bolshie lesbian with a walkie-talkie, who took great pleasure in informing him that this area was for members only. He considered asking whether she would allow him in if he said he was a hooker, but thought better of it. Wandering back toward the main dance floor, he noticed there were a few more women than he remembered. And if he wasn’t very much mistaken, there were a few more drugs in circulation, too. Back in the days when he used to hang around Heaven every week, looking for love and picking up fashion tips, the only drugs you ever saw were poppers. Actually, you usually smelled them long before you saw them. Some of the older cloney types would soak their bandannas in the stuff and then leave them hanging around their necks so they could inhale the fumes without constantly having to fiddle about with those little bottles. Now everyone was on E, and the smell came from the toilets and all those drug-induced bowel movements. Why were the toilets always so disgusting in gay clubs? There was never enough toilet paper, the doors on the stalls never locked properly, and there was always a horrible stench coming from somewhere. How anyone could even think of having sex in a place like that was beyond him.
    Nobody seemed to mind, though. They were all running around rolling on E or dancing with their shirts off. He spotted a few faces he vaguely recognized, only they looked as if someone had surgically removed their heads and sewn them back onto different bodies. Potbellies and skinny, sunken chests had been replaced with glistening six-packs and gleaming great slabs of muscle. Martin didn’t need to be told why this sudden transformation had taken place. Ever since the arrival of AIDS, gay men had been piling into the gym in ever greater numbers, desperate to be seen as healthy, or to build up a solid mass of muscle as security in the event of being struck down by a wasting disease. In an age of sexual anxiety, a strong body was like an insurance policy. Still, he felt intimidated by the amount of muscle on display. He remembered the first time he took Caroline to Heaven. She spent the whole night commenting on how attractive the men were—and those were the days before every gay man in London started going to the gym and having his chest waxed. Suddenly Martin found himself wishing that Caroline were here with him. Gay clubs never seemed half as scary with her by his side.
    He bought a bottle of water from the sullen