‘Thank God. And no, not at all. The whole thing was an insult to poetry, honestly.’
‘Remind me to get it for you later.’
He smiled. ‘Thanks. There’s bound to be a decent bonfire I can chuck it in on my way home.’
He said this, I assumed, because it was Guy Fawkes that night. But anyway. I didn’t agree. I could tell how much longing and love had been poured into even just the few lines I had read.
I started to tell him so, but had to almost shout to make myself heard over the music. Acid house, a relentless, galloping beat. Giving up, I mouthed, ‘Hey, do you want to...?’ gesturing to a sofa at the edge of the room, away from the speakers.
We moved over to it and sat, the cushions sagging slightly beneath us. It was a little quieter in that corner, but only just. We shuffled close together, our heads inclined.
Sipping my drink, which was dizzyingly sweet and violently alcoholic, I asked what his novel was about.
‘It’s crime. A kind of... cold-case procedural thing.’
‘Is that the official pitch?’
He laughed, looked down at his hands. I noticed a writer’s bump on his middle finger, a soft knoll in the flesh of him. His skin was smudged with ink. I pictured him having ideasfor novels in the middle of the night, scribbling them down frenziedly with a leaking pen. ‘God, I hope not,’ he said.
‘You must have worked hard.’ I privately envied his bravery, quitting uni after just two months to follow his dream.
He nodded, but modestly. ‘Swerved a lot of school discos.’
‘Lucky you. I always hated the discos.’
‘How come?’
‘Two left feet.’
He raised a palm. ‘High five to that.’
Our eyes met. His were liquid brown, and I wanted to dive into them. The air between us felt charged, suddenly. Molecules realigning, a shift in pressure.
He asked what my ambitions were, a question I always dreaded, given I could never come up with anything more thrilling than wanting a steady job I might stand half a chance of enjoying. I suspected this lack of imagination would disappoint him. But, equally, I didn’t quite see the point of lying.
‘Nothing wrong with wanting security,’ he said, once I’d filled him in, to my relief. ‘I don’t think you should ever try to be anything other than exactly who you are.’
At that moment, another friend of Ingrid’s, who was having tequila funnelled into his mouth nearby, sat abruptly upright and projected a stream of it directly at Josh. Liquor shot through the air, a surprising volume of it spraying all over his grey T-shirt.
I started laughing, reached out to touch his arm. ‘Oh, my God. Are you okay?’
‘Sorry, mate,’ gasped Ingrid’s friend, holding up a hand. ‘Sorry. Gag reflex. Sorry.’
Josh just looked at me as he wiped second-hand tequila from his face. ‘Gag reflex,’ he repeated, deadpan.
I laughed harder. I couldn’t help it.
‘Do you want to get out of here?’ Josh said.
And oh, how I did.
In the distance, just visible in the purple sky above Bedford’s building tops, gunpowder was exploding, mingling with the music still beating inside my head. The horizon was hypnotic, whirling with colour and dancing light, the ink of the dark made pale.
Josh turned his body to mine. Somehow, I think he knew he didn’t need to speak. Taking my face between his palms, he leant forward and kissed me, his mouth warm and sweet from the lager he’d drunk.
I pressed my back against the cold wall. I could feel his pulse firing. Our skin was hot in the wintry air. The spilt tequila had lingered, the spice of alcohol blending with his ocean-scented cologne. He pushed his hands through my hair, kissing me so deeply that all the breath left my body.
Eventually, he pulled away, levelling his dark eyes to mine. ‘I’m really glad it was you, Rachel.’
