“Something about the horridness of the world means I crave to lose myself completely in another. I get so wrapped up in the sin of it, the layered transgressions I make against God—I cannot marry my lover, my lover is a man—that I briefly forget none of it really matters, in the end. What use is there in getting worked up about my so-called sins when living to thirty is a luxury? Hell is here. Hell is on earth, clawing at London’s walls. And if I can live a little happier for taking someone to bed, why shouldn’t I do it”