The Guest List(31)

Angus is the first to lose. As he drinks the mixture slops on to the immaculate white of his shirt, staining it brown. The others jeer him.

‘You idiot!’ Duncan shouts. ‘Most of it’s going down your neck.’

Angus swallows the last gulp, gags. His eyes bulge.

Will’s next. He puts it away expertly. I watch the muscles of his throat working. He turns the glass upside down above his head and grins.

Next to end up with all the cards is Charlie. He looks at his glass, takes a deep breath.

‘Come on, you pussy!’ Duncan shouts.

I can’t watch this. I don’t have to watch this. Sod Charlie, I think. This was meant to be our weekend away together. If he wants to take himself down it’s his bloody lookout. I’m his wife, not his mother. I stand up.

‘I’m going to bed,’ I say. ‘Night all.’

But no one answers, or even glances in my direction.

I push into the drawing room next door and as I walk through I stop short in shock. A figure’s sitting there on the sofa, in the gloom. After a moment I recognise it to be Olivia. ‘Oh, hey there,’ I say.

She looks up. Her long legs stick out in front of her, her feet bare. ‘Hey.’

‘Had enough in there?’

‘Yeah.’

‘Me too,’ I say. ‘You staying up for a bit?’ I ask.

She shrugs. ‘No point in going to bed. My room’s right next to that.’

As if on cue from the dining room comes a burst of mocking laughter. Someone roars: ‘Drink it – drink it all down!’

And now a chant: Down it, down it, down it – switching suddenly into raise hell, raise hell, RAISE HELL! Sounds of the table being smashed with fists. Then of something else shattering – another glass? A slurred voice: ‘Johnno, you fucking idiot!’

Poor Olivia, unable to escape from all that. I hover in the doorway.

‘It’s fine,’ Olivia says. ‘I don’t need anyone to keep me company.’

But I feel I should stay. I feel bad for her. And actually, I realise I want to stay. I liked sitting with her in the cave earlier, smoking. There was something exciting about it, a strange thrill. Talking to her, with the taste of the tobacco on my tongue, I could almost imagine I was nineteen again, talking about the boys I’d slept with – not a mum of two and mortgaged up to the eyeballs. And there’s also the fact that Olivia reminds me of someone. But I can’t think who. It bothers me, like when you’re trying to think of a word and you know it’s there on the tip of your tongue, just out of reach.

‘Actually,’ I say, ‘I’m not all that tired. And I don’t have to get up early tomorrow morning to deal with two crazy kids. There’s some wine in our room – I could go and grab it.’

She gives a small smile at this, the first I’ve seen. And then she reaches behind the sofa cushion and pulls out an expensive-looking bottle of vodka. ‘I nicked it from the kitchen earlier,’ she says.

‘Oh,’ I say. ‘Well, even better.’ This really is like being nineteen again.

She passes me the bottle. I unscrew the cap, take a swig. It burns a freezing streak down my throat and I gasp. ‘Wow. Can’t think of the last time I did that.’ I pass the bottle to her and wipe my mouth. ‘We got cut off, earlier, didn’t we? You were telling me about that guy – Callum? The break-up.’

Olivia shuts her eyes, takes a deep breath. ‘I guess the break-up was only the beginning,’ she says.

Another big roar of laughter from the next room. More hands thumping the table. More drunken male voices shouting over each other. A crash against the door, then Angus falls through it, trousers about his ankles, his dick flopping out obscenely.

‘Sorry, ladies,’ he says, with a drunken leer. ‘Don’t mind me.’

‘Oh for Christ’s sake,’ I explode, ‘just … just fuck off and leave us alone!’

Olivia looks at me, impressed, like she didn’t think I had it in me. I didn’t, either. I’m not quite sure where it came from. Maybe it’s the vodka.

‘You know what?’ I say. ‘This probably isn’t the best place to chat, is it?’

She shakes her head. ‘We could go to the cave?’

‘Er—’ I hadn’t planned on a night-time foray about the island. And I’m sure it’s dangerous to wander around at night, with the bog and things.

‘Forget it,’ Olivia says, quickly. ‘I get it. I just – it’s weird – I just felt it was easier talking in there.’

And suddenly I have the same feeling I did earlier. An odd thrill, the feeling of breaking the rules. ‘No,’ I say. ‘Let’s do it. And bring that bottle.’

We sneak out of the Folly via the rear entrance. It’s really creepy at night, this place. It’s so quiet, apart from the sound of the waves on the rocks in the near distance. Occasionally there comes a strange, guttural cackling that raises all the hairs on my arms. I finally realise that the noise must be made by some sort of bird. A pretty big one from the sound of it.

As we continue, the ruined houses loom up next to us in the beam of my torch. The dark, gaping windows are like empty eye sockets and it feels unnervingly as though someone might be in there, looking out, watching us pass. I can hear noises coming from inside, too: rustles and creaks and scratchings. It’s probably rats – but then, that’s not a particularly reassuring thought either.