Victor tapped the table with the bottom of his beer glass.
“Right then, Derek, it’s about time you offered these ladies another drink, don’t you think? Your round, lad, and look lively.”
By the time Derek returned to the table with the pints of beer and two rum and Cokes balanced precariously in his hands, Pamela and Victor had decided to go downstairs to the dance floor. Monica craned her neck over the edge, but she couldn’t make them out in the swell of heaving bodies, and for a moment she wondered if Pamela had deliberately abandoned her with this Derek. But at least he was a gentleman, so she didn’t feel too worried.
He explained that he and Victor worked on the Post, and while nowadays he’d moved on to the management side, Victor was still a reporter. As she listened to him patiently explaining both his job and his prospects, she speculated as to what would become of her two boys when it was time for them to enter the world of the opposite sex. Would they frequent places such as this and try and pick up lasses? Would they be brash and know-it-all like Victor, or more gentle, caring souls like this Derek?
“Would you like to dance?” When she heard his voice, she snapped back to attention and realized that the music had changed. The dance floor was now speckled in shards of turning light as couples held on to each other.
“I hate to admit it, Monica, but I’m not a very good dancer. That said, it seems a shame to come here and not give it a go, don’t you think?”
She was too nervous to answer him directly, but she knew that it would be rude to ignore his question, especially as she could feel his eyes upon her.
“Will it be alright to leave these drinks on the table?” She coughed nervously. “I mean, nobody will take them, will they?”
The first touch was difficult, as it had been so long, but once she got used to his hand on her waist she started to breathe again as they both attempted to shuffle purposefully in the cloying mist of cheap eau de cologne. She looked over his shoulder for Pamela, but she still couldn’t see either her friend or Victor, so she closed her eyes and didn’t resist when he made a move to pull her closer to him. The music was a mystery to her as one slow song blended with the next, and she assumed that he might expect her to know the names of the groups that were singing, though quite honestly she hadn’t a clue. Sometimes she’d put on a pop music station to liven things up as she made tea for the kids, but while Ben seemed to like the music, she soon grew bored with the noise, and much to her son’s disappointment, she would turn off the wireless and encourage him to go and watch the television instead.
As Derek escorted her to the top of the stairs and began to usher her back in the direction of their table, she noticed that Victor’s hand was resting on Pamela’s leg in the space between the hem of her skirt and her knee. Her friend appeared to be either unaware of this act of trespass or comfortable with his hand, but either way Monica found it unnerving. There was also a second drink standing beside the still-untouched round that Derek had brought from the bar. She took up her seat and spoke to nobody in particular.
“You’ll have to excuse me, but I don’t know if I can drink that much.”
Victor immediately made a grab for one of his pints and raised it in a toast.
“Of course you can. Drink up, Monica. To us.”
She lifted up her glass, but as she did, she noticed how Victor was looking at her, and she now had a good idea of what he thought of the two women that he and his pal were drinking with, but it was too late to say anything to Pamela.
Monica couldn’t really remember what happened next, for everything began to go fuzzy and she felt a headache setting in. Victor insisted that Derek go to the bar for yet more drinks, although she remembered Derek’s suggesting that they finish what they had in front of them first, but Victor teased him and called him tight, and so Derek reluctantly stood up from the table. Once he’d gone she had nobody to talk with, for Pamela had scrunched herself into Victor so completely that her skirt was riding up near the top of her nylons and Monica wanted to throw a blanket or something over her. When Derek came back, he pretended not to notice her friend’s performance, but the awkwardness didn’t last, for Pamela soon came up for air and started talking thirteen to the dozen. Then Victor sent Derek back to the bar for another round, and then another. At some point all four of them were on the dance floor, that much she was sure of, and they were dancing as individuals, not as couples, but Derek never took his eyes off her, which made her feel anchored and grateful. At some point, Monica remembered, the room started to spin, and Derek offered his arm, which she took, but the stairs back to the balcony were definitely steeper than earlier in the evening, and it seemed like there were more of them. Derek sat her down at the table while he went to the bar for a glass of water, and it was only now that she picked up on the fact that the place was starting to empty out, and for the first time all evening she felt truly unsure of what she was doing.
It was Victor who suggested that they go for a drive in his Ford Cortina and look at the moonlight on the river. Pamela jumped in the front passenger seat while Monica slid into the back next to Derek, who kept both hands on his knees and gazed out of the window. She was adamant that she didn’t want to do this, but nobody would listen to her when she muttered that she ought to be getting back. Before the car engine even started, Victor grabbed hold of Pamela and they began to engage in a bout of quick, open-lipped palaver that was only interrupted by Derek’s half-pleading, half-laughing “Hey, come on.” Pamela collapsed in a fit of giggles, and Monica closed her eyes and listened to the laboured cranking of the car engine as Victor tried to start it up. When they got to the river, Victor peeled Pamela from around his neck (“Chuffing heck, pack it in for a minute will you, Pam?”), and the two men excused themselves and began to stumble towards the water. In his haste Victor had left the driver’s door wide open, so Pamela reached over and pulled it shut and then hoisted herself around so that she was facing the back seat.
“They’re alright these two, aren’t they? And they’ve got brass.” Monica shifted her head so that she was now looking in the direction of the two men, who stood on the bank of the river clearly competing to see which one of them could pee the farthest. Pamela began to shriek. “I mean look at them, pair of daft clots. What are they like?”
This was a question that a confused Monica was beginning to ask herself, for in her presence Derek seemed reserved and almost timid, but with Victor he appeared to willingly take on the role of comic sidekick as though the pair of them were some out-of-date music hall act. As far as Monica was concerned, Victor just didn’t come up to scratch. She opened the back door and stepped out of the car, and careful to make sure that she wasn’t facing the river, she began to gulp the warm night air. She looked up at the stars in the black sky, and then she asked Pamela if she could see the clouds moving. Monica began to turn in a circle, and again she asked Pamela the same question, and then she asked it again, but Pamela wouldn’t answer, and then she felt Derek drape his arm around her neck like a warm scarf, and then he moved it down across her moist, sweaty back and lifted her into the rear seat of the Cortina. She heard him tell his friend that they’d best be going as it was getting late.
Victor searched through the cupboards in her kitchen, noisily pushing cups and saucers to one side until he found four ill-matched glasses, which he placed on the small table.
“You don’t mind, do you, Monica?” Pamela was smiling at her. “I told Victor about the brandy, for I’m not sure what I’ve got at my place.”