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nights. A lot of thin private-school girls, I’d noticed. He does a roaring trade.
    I’m doing pretty well at small talk with him right now. At least, for a social retard like me. He’s a pretty nice guy. Kind of cute in a hoodlumish kind of way, I think. I ask him about his school.
    ‘Yeah. I don’t go a whole lot.’
    ‘What do you mean?’
    ‘I mean, I just go when I have to.’
    ‘But . . . you have to go every day.’
    He laughs and refills my glass for me.
    The only interruption is when Chris comes over, takes the glass out of my hand and suggests quite pointedly that Jeremy fetch me a glass of water. He seems to glare in Jeremy’s direction, then leans down and says, ‘Ease down on the wine, Ripley, or you’ll get a bit messy.’ Then he goes inside to talk to Ed.
    I notice Stuart and Chris briefly glower at each other across the pool table. Jeremy returns with my water, and another bottle of wine.
    Around nine o’clock. I look round the deck and notice that Kathy is no longer on it. I peer inside to the pool room. Not there either. Hmm. Stuart, I notice, is also missing. Bianca has taken his place at the pool table. As soon as I fully absorb this information, my eyes seek out Chris. He has just come back out onto the deck carrying two strawberry daiquiris, fresh from the blender in one of the kitchens. He too is casting his eyes about the place, trying to find Kathy, then registering that both she and Stuart are missing. He sets the daiquiris down on a table, leans out over the deck railings and scans the garden and jetty below. Then he turns and walks quickly back into the house. The purpose in his stride and the uncharacteristic hardness of his mouth make me put my own drink down and rise to my feet. Jeremy stands up too and coaxes me to sit down again.
    ‘I’d better just go and see where Chris is . . .’ I begin, then grab hold of Jeremy’s arm to steady myself. I feel a bit wobbly. Maybe it’s the wine, or maybe I’ve just stood up too quickly and got a head rush.
    Jeremy puts his wine down and puts an arm around my shoulders to steady me.
    ‘Chris is fine,’ he says. ‘He’ll be back in a minute.’
    I deliberate for a moment, then detach myself and weave my way across the room with uneven steps.
    ‘I’ll be right back,’ I mumble over my shoulder.
    Bianca’s home is a bit of a maze, but after a search of downstairs I find a staircase. I take a deep breath before beginning the climb. I grip the banister firmly, definitely feeling a bit . . . something . . .
    Hold up. Quick, angry footsteps are striding down from the landing above. Chris bursts into sight, his face like the sky before a hailstorm.
    ‘Hey—’ I begin, but he leaps down the stairs two at a time, pushing past me so hard he’d have knocked me over were I not already clinging to the banister.
    ‘Chris!’
    Nothing. A door slamming.
    I hurry after him to the front door, fling it open and run out through the front yard into the street. I can see him stalking away up ahead.
    ‘Chris! Chris!’ I run after him. At my second call he whirls around.
    ‘Fuck off, Amelia!’
    He means it. He has never, ever called me by my actual name. I stand there catching my breath and not daring to say anything else, until he turns and keeps walking.
    I’m sucking back tears when I hear the sound of glass shattering at the end of the street, followed by a distant ‘Fuuuuck!’ in Chris’s unmistakable voice.
    A hand drops onto my shoulder and I hear Jeremy’s voice saying ‘He’ll be right.’
    I blink back more tears and turn to face him.
    My head is a mess, whirring with questions, general disaffection and the hurt of being so rebuffed by Chris, who I’d walk across the Sahara for if it would do him any good. All of which immediately stops when Jeremy takes a firm hold of me around the waist and kisses me unflinchingly on the mouth.
    Didn’t see that one coming.
    I break away for a second and say with all the eloquence warranted by