‘Hey, babe, you having fun? You’re the belle of the ball tonight!’
Polly sweeps past me in the arms of a very tall man in top hat and tails. They look exactly like Ginger Rogers and Fred Astaire. I try to screech at her that actually I want to go, but the music is too loud. I try to veer away from the friendly fingers and hands on me, but there’s no point. There are too many of them, big men, slender women, heads bobbing and pecking like birds in their elaborate costumes and sinister masks, all with red-painted mouths, those clever white fangs which look totally real, stabbing at their lips.
Whatever was in those canapés suddenly kicks in and instead of panicky and desperate I now get high. Euphoria must be close to mania, because now I’m laughing as two men wearing cat masks advance on me and throw me back and forth between them.
I know I’m hallucinating mad because as Polly twirls in her partner’s arms and Fred Astaire’s face appears above her head, I’m convinced that she’s dancing with Gustav Levi. Through the mask those eyes are unmistakable, glittering black and boring into my very soul.
I clap my hand to my mouth, my whole body trembling with excitement.
‘Gustav!’ I shout and wave, trying to push towards him. But he doesn’t hear or recognise me, because like an artist’s anatomical doll he turns Polly stiffly in his arms and spins away into the shadows.
That jealousy, twisting like a small knife again. If I’m the belle of the ball, Polly is undoubtedly the queen. She always is. She’s sorted. She has a job, a flat, a man. There he is, parading her in his arms. And me? Apart from a large inheritance which has come by default from people who would rather have pulled their own eyes out than give me anything, what have I got?
I stagger backwards through the crowd, aiming for the cubicle where my clothes are strewn about on the floor, but the push of the throng sends me crashing out into the back yard instead, and when the doors shut behind me it’s blissfully quiet out here. The embers which were heating the cauldron earlier are still glowing, heating up the patio.
I stumble towards a kind of bower in the corner and without checking what or who might be there as well I collapse onto a day bed under a curtain of ivy, spread-eagled across the white calico cushions. All I can see through the curtain of ivy is the orange fuzz of the city sky. No moon. No stars. No clouds.
‘Are you OK?’ Someone else has got here first.
I heave myself up onto my elbows, irritation prickling through me. ‘I thought I was alone out here,’ I mutter crossly. ‘Who’s that?’
I find myself staring into the blank gaze of mirrored Elvis shades. As my eyes move over the interloper I see how totally incongruous those glasses are with the short white toga and laurel wreath he’s wearing, shoved on top of impossibly golden curls.
‘Friend of Pierre’s. Who are you?’
‘Cousin of Polly.’
He doesn’t move from his Caesar-like pose. I fiddle with my tattered dress, realising that even if I wanted to leave I’d have to take it with me, because I can’t get out of it without help.
‘Wrong party, huh?’ he murmurs in an American accent. ‘You look far too pure and innocent to be mingling with these ghoulies and ghosties. Some very decadent people here, you know.’
‘Polly dressed me up like this. It’s not really me. Her idea of a joke.’
‘May be a joke to you, but however dirty you really are you sure look the part in that scrap of a dress. Bit rough with you, were they?’ He speaks with a subdued gruffness that makes me glance at him more closely. ‘A bit of rape and pillage back there?’
I toss my head in just the way a vestal virgin would. ‘All a bit of fun. Actually I’ve got to go. I’ve got things to do in the morning.’
‘Hey, you don’t want to go now. This is where it starts to get interesting. Why should our host and hostess have all the fun?’ His hands gesticulate as if they might slice right through me like butter, then he aims them like a couple of pistols to point out my cousin. ‘You can tell they’ve only been dating for a short time. They can’t keep their hands off each other!’
It’s true. Polly and Pierre are in the doorway. The moon is their spotlight as they sway together, totally oblivious to everyone else.
‘She deserves it. New York has always been her goal. She’s worked for it.’
He picks up a bottle of wine and hands it to me. ‘And you haven’t?’
‘I’m just starting out. My first day in London.’
I regret it as soon as it’s out, like I did earlier when I told Gustav Levi my name, and sure enough those disconcertingly blind shades are still fixed on me, the American mouth grinning as I take a big swig of wine and wipe my mouth with the back of my hand like a navvy.
‘How about that! Mine too. Fancy showing me the sights while I’m here? Starting now? Show Princess Polly she’s not the only one who can take a city by storm?’
I glance instinctively back towards the party, as if I need to ask permission.
But there’s no-one to ask. Certainly not our Polly. She has always encouraged me to go for it. Rebel. Do what the hell I like. In any case, she’s not available for comment. Her eyes are closed behind her mask, her arms around Pierre’s neck and his mouth is locked down on hers, and they are kissing, hard, I can see their tongues, and their hands are roving, hers going under his tail coat and squeezing his buttocks, his wandering shamelessly between her legs, wrinkling up her red skirt, pushing it up her thighs, his hand and wrist diving in.
Polly’s knee lifts and hooks around her boyfriend’s leg to steady herself as his hand disappears, touching her where no-one else is allowed, assuming that no-one else can see.
But I can see, and so can my companion. I tear my eyes away from my cousin, because the sight of that naked love, or at least lust, is embarrassing to watch. She’s got what you haven’t got. But the jealousy is all grown up now. Emphasising what I’m missing. Who I’m missing.
I squeeze my bare legs together, trying to quell the hint of heat between them, and then I see all too obviously what the sight of my kissing cousin has done to the American. There is a big bulge under his toga. The white cotton is rising in a comical tent over his crotch.
‘How about it, Polly’s cousin? They’re all at it in there, or they will be.’
I blush hotter as he shifts closer along the seat. I move slightly away, but he’s reasonably gentlemanly, at least at first. He takes my hands and pulls me closer.
‘There’s a light in your eyes,’ he says quietly, his mouth close to mine now. ‘And I can see you’re distracted. Who are you thinking about?’
I don’t move or say anything. He’s right, I am distracted. I can’t help thinking about Gustav. I wish he was here, looking at me like a glittering treasure he found in the snow. I’m dying to show Polly, her friends, that I can click my fingers and get anyone. But this all feels like a silly game. My heart isn’t in it. I want to get out of here, back to him. Look into his eyes which will tell me clearly that they like what they see.
‘Well, if you’re not distracted, I sure as hell am. Look how I’m fixed now.’
The guy takes my silence for consent, and takes my hands. He places them over the rigid shape under the cotton and it jumps in response. He leaves my hands there and strokes my legs, fingers wandering, under my dress. They pause, politely, then move on up my thighs.
My hands are still resting on him. I’m letting him touch me. I should play along. I will myself to want it, enjoy it, but I can’t. I shake my head and close my legs against his exploring fingers,