‘Jack Daniel’s. Get the party started. Just don’t wave it about in the cab, yeah?’
Misty ducked behind her wardrobe door to pull on a blouse that might help disguise her as someone who’d vaguely made an effort. Her friends passed the bottle between them as she dragged a brush through her hair and stabbed her mascara brush up and down to try to pick up the last bits from the empty tube.
‘I prefer it with cola,’ Karen was saying, pulling a face.
‘Gets us drunk faster this way and fewer calories,’ replied Alex. ‘Do you want some, Misty? I could put it in this mug, so we don’t catch any of your germs!’
‘You’re so thoughtful. It’s okay. I think if I had some now it might finish me off before we got there.’
‘It’s time we were going anyway,’ said Karen.
‘Just getting my shoes on.’
None of them bothered with coats just to walk across college to the front Lodge where the minicab would be waiting. But even in the quads there was a chill east wind and Misty shivered violently. The three girls clung together, a little knot of festive colour amidst the dun paths and darkened wintry gardens. Alex started a plaintive chorus of ‘In the Bleak Midwinter’ and Karen quickly joined in. Misty, without the benefit of the whisky, was too self-conscious to sing in public.
She was the one, though, who caught the moment in the shutter-click of her memory. Christmas, cold, the headiness of the perfume and the fever she hadn’t quite shaken off. She felt a rush of love for Alex, exuberant enough to even take in Karen, and a sudden certainty that these friendships were true. That they would last and be important.
*
The house was a sprawling old villa on the edge of town, built of grey stone, rather than the typical Cambridge pale gold, which lent it an air of foreboding. Although the outside was austere, warmth and light seeped from the windows, shimmering like tinsel. When the door swung open a cacophony of sound tumbled out and the warm, fuggy air hit Misty like a solid object.
‘Come on,’ said Alex, grinning, ‘let’s go in.’
Misty was startled to be offered a glass of wine by a uniformed waitress in the large, wood-panelled hallway. The room was busy and full of festive welcome; a log fire blazed to the side, a glossy piano was garlanded with greenery, and the scent of pine and candles filled the air.
‘Kitchen,’ said Alex, pushing past the people standing around. Misty tried to guess who they were but there was such a mix of ages, of styles of dress, it was impossible to generalise.
There was definitely a younger vibe in the kitchen. Octavia was there and Karen, evidently half-thrilled and half-relieved, rushed over to speak to the popular older girl. Four young men, presumably students, were leaning against the kitchen table and drinking wine from plastic glasses. They were all in black tie, although three of them had lost their bow ties, and two clutched musical instruments.
‘That’s him,’ Alex hissed nodding towards them.
‘Who?’
‘Andrew Dyer. He plays the saxophone.’
Misty focused in on the boy she was gesturing towards. He was half a head shorter than the others, but undeniably good-looking.
‘And you like him?’
Alex rolled her eyes dramatically. ‘I’d die for him. He’s a second year. How can you have missed him at college? He’s the most gorgeous boy we’ve got.’ She made a determined move towards the band members, pulling Misty along by her wrist.
‘Hi.’
The boys nodded and grunted hellos back at Alex.
‘So, you’re playing tonight then?’
One of the others looked down at the trumpet in his hand. ‘Um, looks like it. Professor Penrith will be here in a minute, demanding we get onto the next set. She’ll want her paid monkeys to be dancing.’
A third boy nudged the one who was speaking and nodded towards Alex. ‘Shut up, you idiot. She’s …’
‘It’s all right. I know my mum’s a slave driver. And I also know where they keep the good booze.’ She raised an eyebrow. ‘I’m Alex Penrith. And this is Misty Jardine. She’s a first year at St Barts too, although she’s a medic, so you’ve probably never seen her.’
‘Misty, that’s an unusual name.’ The trumpeter was talking, and smirking. Misty sighed inwardly, cursing her mum and Johnny Mathis once again. But he let the point go and the boys introduced themselves properly. Alex produced some proper glasses and a bottle of Spanish brandy from one of the many kitchen cupboards.
‘I can’t believe she gave you plastic glasses,’ she teased, ‘it’s like you’re at the kids’ table. All the adults out there have got the real ones.’
Octavia sailed over at that moment, bringing Karen and a couple of girls Misty didn’t recognise with her.
‘Alex, darling, amazing party. Do you know there are two members of the Royal Shakespeare Company here? And apparently a cabinet minister. Can’t remember which one, granted, but then they’re not very memorable, are they?’
One of the band boys put his arm around Octavia’s shoulders, pulling her towards him. Another began to whisper to Karen. Misty caught something about going into the garden, but Andrew shook his head.
‘We’re on again in five minutes. You’re not going anywhere, Eastley.’
As the boys collected themselves, Alex sloshed brandy and cola into glasses for the three of them and Octavia.
‘No point in taking it easy when you’re all staying the night anyway. Let’s get wasted and shag some tottie,’ Alex said, raising her glass.
Misty snorted her cola out through her nose, partly at the idea, but mostly at the word ‘tottie’.
‘In your parents’ house?’ said Karen, incredulously, having managed to hold it together enough to express the thought that was once again on the same lines as Misty’s.
‘You don’t know my parents,’ replied Alex, darkly, before decisively knocking back her own drink.
*
A few hours later – she was vague on exactly how many hours as she was on much else – Misty was sitting on the stairs, leaning against the wood panelling and looking through the railings at the comings and goings in the hall below. She felt like the little girl from The Sound of Music, except very drunk and slightly nauseous.
The quartet had long since finished their official set, and Andrew was conspicuously absent, as was Alex. The pianist hadn’t got so lucky, or else preferred his music to the other pleasures on offer. He continued to jam with himself, his fingers chasing his scatting voice as he filled the hall with sound. Misty listened, watching groups and couples leave in the stream of taxis that pulled up outside. The crowds were thinning; it was much quieter. A fat, bearded man slept in a wingback armchair, his hairy stomach protruding from his shirt. The door opened once more and Misty shivered in the chill
