The Crowded Room

4. Risqué Business.

"R100 entrance per person? Are they fucking crazy?’’

Mila’s breath hitches as she clings onto me, her head motions backwards to let out a bombastic laugh. My eyes start to water as I try to contain my laughter.

I don’t think they are the crazy ones here.

The bouncer clears his throat breaking me from humorous distraction his face is painted with a serious look and suddenly my laughter dies down. I look at the stamp he holds towards me and quickly hold out my hand as the cold ink attaches itself to my skin. While Mila’s hand gets stamped, I look around in confusion.

Who paid for us?

Phil waits for us by the door with a bright smile.

Ah.

‘’Thank you so much kind Sir.’’

His smile widens at my words. I don’t know what Mila said to him earlier, but she clearly had Phil gain a liking in us or more in her.

We walk inside and the place is humongous. Disco lights elevate the place with colour. The gentlemen are all at the bar that feels as if it cascades on for miles busy ordering drinks, but Mila and I don’t fuss over there, instead, we make a detour towards the nearest bathroom.

My head feels a little whooshed from the all the alcohol, but I don’t mind it. As we enter the bathroom, I take a breath of relief. Both of us look at each other pointedly and burst out laughing almost immediately.

‘’God.’’

‘’I know!’’

I look at myself in the mirror. I look so different from earlier today. I’m actually smiling. It feels good to feel something other than stress or anxiety.

The alcohol must be working.

I adjust my dress, make sure it sits where it’s supposed to sit and make sure my laces are still double knotted on my boots.

Can’t afford to fall flat on my face tonight.

I scratch in my bag to find my bottle of perfume and damp it on my neck and wrists allowing the sweet scent to taint the air around us, then I run my fingers through my hair and shake it up nice and wild. I smile at my appearance feeling satisfied.

This is me.

‘’You look great hun.’’

She stares at me lovingly. I smile at her warmly as she grabs my perfume and steals a dab or two for herself then pushes it back into my bag. We don’t say much else as we lace our arms together and casually walk back to the party. Chris waits for us by the bar with two beers already ordered for us. We both kindly thank him and move along to explore the rest of the bar. The place seems somewhat empty, most of the people are occupying the balcony area, which is where the rest of the guys are. Except Pierre who is in deep conversation with a stranger on the dancefloor.

Already forgotten about me I see.

We pass along the dancefloor and I force her to halt and twirl her around according to the beat of the music being played. She laughs at me but goes along with my actions anyway. We then swiftly enter the balcony area. Mila and I decide to sit at an empty table, Phil joins us.

Conversation transfers between them and I am entertained by Chris and Aaron who also move closer, but they keep the concentration on their own conversation.

Here I am snuggled in the perfect sandwich.

I standup to go stand at the open window directly across from our table. The fresh air hits my face and I breath it in. I peak my head out the window like a dog and look down. We seem to be really high up.