Simon and Melanie are bringing their kids over to avoid Pearl’s holiday mark-up. Their daughter, Natalie, is a tawny-skinned girl with dark, soft curls and wide-set almond eyes. She is Sadie’s age. Charlie, pink-skinned and bald, is barely any age at all. They are supposed to come at eight, then we’ll get the little ones set up with Posie before shooting out. My bed is wearing the contents of my closet. Nothing seems right for New Year’s. New Year’s won’t even be New Year’s without my leather pants. They make me dance, make me want to stay up late. They even tell a good joke. They speak to me with their last vestiges of animal spirit. But it’s so hot here I’ll never make it out alive if I wear them. And while I want to be buried in my leather pants, I do not feel ready to go yet. Ah well, the Daisy Duke shorts will have to do – they make me yodel, swig beer and kick butt. Getting dressed for New Year’s, to me, is like picking out the best stuffed animal to sleep with, the right song to have sex to, the right topping on your pizza. You have to be in touch with your mood-goals.

I blow out my hair real big and am generous with my make-up. The tiny faces of Sadie and Huxley, watching everything I do, get a make-over too. Frank hates that I let Huxley wear lipstick, but he also hates that I paint Huxley’s fingernails. (I never told Frank that I taught Sadie how to put cream on Huxley’s penis after his bris. He would think it had something to do with Huxley’s unflagging fidelity to Sadie.) Anyway, I would rather see Huxley dolled up than left out. Huxley doesn’t think it’s perverse to acknowledge his feminine side. I unpack from Phuket, and finally relinquish the bedroom.

‘Frank, it’s all yours. They’ll be here in five minutes.’

I pop in a video for the kids and wait and pouf my hair a little more. I make myself a gin and tonic. By 8.30, I am still waiting for them, and Frank. I’m looking forward to seeing Frank in what I strongly suggested he wear (suggestion being to lay it out on the bed): a black Jacquard silk shirt, black slacks and his signature cowboy boots.

Back in the days when Frank first started flirting with me, he didn’t make too much of an impression until I noticed his boots. And how he’d walk in those boots. I met him at my first job in New York. He was on the cc list of every memo I had to type. My guess, from typing his name several times a day, was that he was an esteemed person of advanced years. So when my girlfriend, another secretary in the subsidiary rights department at M Publishing, introduced me to him, I was surprised by his youth and standing. We were all headed into a meeting. I was to write down everything that was said, and there was that tacit understanding that there would, of course, be no quotes attributable to myself in my notepad. That was just one reason no one laughed when I asked if the book title Sniglets was pig Latin for ‘little Negro’. Another reason no one laughed was because Sniglets was a sacred cash cow. Mostly, though, they didn’t get it and they never laughed anyway. But Frank did. He even riffed on Sniglet and Margaret Mitchell, using two cash cows in one irreverent joke. Everyone else was dead silent, looking at the dipshit Shelley Sherstein, the head (giver) of the department. She was the one who clicked by on stiletto heels and Heather-Locklear-circa-Melrose outfits. She was the one who snapped my bra while I was typing a memo, probably just at the FSR, Esq. part, and said, ‘None of my girls will have their bra straps showing.’

Thereafter, from time to time, Frank would stop by and sit catty-corner to me. Like the day he came down wearing a walkman and just sat there. I finally acknowledged him when I finished typing the 29 names on the bcc part of the memo that I had to get out to fifty bazillion people along with ten pages of photocopying each that I hadn’t done yet. I was a bit frazzled since it was nearly 5.30. He slouched into a chair, all full of nonchalance, which I knew was really ‘damn I like watching you’, and said nothing. I said nothing. I kept on madly typing. ‘I am pleased to enclose the excerpt from Fruiti de Lane by Natalie Plattau.’ (Whose last book, Over There, sold 75 copies – the exact number of her close friends and relatives – and was about her three years as an expatriate.) ‘This is Ms Plattau’s diary from her two years spent studying roadkill from around the world. Be sure to catch it in next month’s Uncommon Pets magazine.’ I had a few more lines to type and all the copying and stapling to do, but FSR Esq. started talking.

‘Do you like music?’ he asked.

‘No. And I don’t like colours either,’ I said.

He laughed.

‘See you later. You look busy,’ he said. I looked up to make amends just as he was leaving. I would have put my head back down to the typewriter, but I couldn’t help noticing his gait. It was eons slower than a New Yorker’s. It was by degrees more casual. It was easy and fluid, unhurried, cool, unflappable. The cowboy boots were doing their thang, scraping across the floor, transporting FSR Esq. into his saddle again. I couldn’t take my eyes off him. Though there was nothing nearly acceptable, sartorially speaking, above the boots, there was promise. We could do something with that rancher’s bod – long, thin, elegant and broad-shouldered. Indeed we could. He loped away to the elevator. I put everything down and ran after him. We went to a bar. I got fired and five years later we were married but I’ll not digress on all of that because at least 75 of you – the exact number of my close friends and relatives – already know all about the courtship of Fran and Frank.

Okay, Frank will be a little warm in these clothes tonight but he doesn’t dance like I do – crazy, frenetically. I always thought I was a good dancer until the damn video camera made a point of proving that I am actually spastically jangling to a meter even the Chipmunks can’t achieve. It’s like everyone around me is hearing something different to what I am. It’s like I’m furiously applauding instead of clapping to the beat … so fast my hands could turn into butter. Maybe Frank moves at the speed of light so it just looks like he’s standing still, leaning against the wall.

Before I can finish my thesis about attire and why a caged hamster married Brer Tortoise, Simon and Melanie arrive. Melanie has the same dark skin, black lustrous curls and wide-set, violet eyes as her daughter. Her father was Scottish and her mother Maori, traits visible in her colouring and high warrior brow. Her mouth is expressive, her lips shapely but thin. She has a heart tattoo on her wrist and has an artsy demeanour, wearing flowing caftans and gauzy shirts that look very sexy on her. If I didn’t appreciate her, understand her like I do, I might think she was dishevelled and her clothes frowzy. She has a good, impulsive, explosive laugh. But, if I didn’t know her, appreciate her like I do, I might sometimes wonder what the hell she’s laughing about. It could be something from yesterday, it could be the part about ‘Your table is ready’ or ‘Is this your son’s cup?’ It doesn’t take much. She’s that easily tickled. And, well, it does come with the territory, you know, being creative and all, but some might say she’s completely unstable.

Simon is British, but was raised all over the world, left in boarding schools and often sent to live with relatives while his parents researched … things. He has peach hair and light skin – in fact, he’s pretty darned monochromatic all over. Indeed, at first glance, he’s featureless, but if you squint and catch him in a shadowy overhead light, you can see that there is a nose, a mouth and eyes – they’re just reticent, very British, very reserved. He shows signs of genius – intensity, wit, impulsiveness. I just wish I could understand the half of what he is saying. His voice is low, his accent is thick, he uses a few big words I don’t know, and he’s usually pissed as a potter by the time I see him. Simon and Melanie are in Singapore for only a short while and we hope that means what it usually does – three more years – but Melanie hates living here for some reason. Some people just do. I thought she liked it when I saw her sleeping under the stars a few weeks ago. You can’t do that everywhere, enjoy a slumber in the great outdoors. Turned out she was too tired to make it all the way home and thought she’d just lie near the fish pond and her unfinished vodka and rest her eyes for a minute. It wasn’t her fault that the sun was up before she was. Simon had a bit more stamina. He made it as far as the grocery store steps. Pearl was babysitting so it was okay.

Simon and Melanie are famous for their fights. They make me and Frank look like mourning doves, but that’s just because we usually get on each other’s nerves when there aren’t others distracting us, like at home, in the car, on vacation, in elevators, etc. To Simon and Melanie, the world is their home, their car, their elevator, and that’s all there is to it. Whether it’s camping down with the fishes or shouting ‘I’ll fucking kill you! You fucking piece of shit …’ over the seesaw at the colourful playground, they are honest, wear their hearts on their sleeves, and are down-to-earth and full of life. There’s no one better I can think of to ring in the New Year with.

We’ll be going to Sam and Valerie’s party later. The big scandal is that Brenda decided to have a dinner party even though she knew about the Markses’ party. Yes, can you believe? She even managed to bag a few seminal couples, enticing them with her idea of having an elegant New Year’s Eve with a candlelit midnight dinner and fancy dress. It was predetermined who would go to Brenda’s and who to Valerie’s by the established bonds of friendship. The groups overlap, but if forced to choose allegiances, they will find themselves in different camps. Brenda’s minions are more expatty, more Town & Country, know all the right restaurants, clubs, trips and schools. Valerie’s group knows a lot about where you can sneak in wine and duck the corkage.

Frank is not ready so the three of us have a drink on the balcony. In fact, his delay is bringing us dangerously close to still being here when Sadie and Natalie come down, as they inevitably will, in costume to put on an entirely ad-libbed show that has no end. It’s the performance version of ‘The Song That Gets On Everybody’s Nerves’. Here comes the whispering, the giggling. I hear Sadie back-kick Huxley into the wall, ‘No, Huxley, you’re not in this part!’ They goof their way through a few minutes, only to be interrupted by a thunderous booming upstairs. ‘I can’t fucking find it!’ It’s just Frank banging around looking for something. Frank’s always losing things.

‘Out of the way, Huxley,’ Frank says harshly. ‘This doesn’t have anything to do with you. Fran, do you have any idea where my leather satchel is? I have all my cards in it. I can’t go out.’

‘Come on, we’ll just take cash. We’re only going for a drink and then to the party. Frank, watch the show, I’ll get money from the coffee can.’ I go to the kitchen and take it down but it’s empty. Shoot.

‘All right, let’s just take out cash from the machine,’ I suggest. ‘Carry on without us, won’t you girls. Oh, Sadie, don’t cry. It’s a great show; practise for tomorrow.’

We leave and go to the ATM, but it spits my card back.

‘This is just my luck. The machine isn’t giving any more tonight.’

We head to a wine bar I’ve spotted to try for some tapas and champagne before going to Sam and Valerie’s. When we’re at the street, Melanie stops and flails her hand.

‘What are you doing?’ I ask her.

‘Hailing a cab,’ she answers.

‘Why?’ I ask.

‘How else can we get there?’

‘Melanie, it’s three blocks away.’

‘Yeah. Here’s one.’

It passes us, lighting up its ‘for hire’ sign.

Not many more come by and after 15 minutes we use a cell phone and go through the whole Comfort Cablinks thing.

‘Is this 9-082-4 …’

‘Yes.’

‘Going to Bayshore, is it?’

‘No.’

‘But you are 9-082-4 …’

‘Yes. I’m going to –’

‘Leaving from lobby J?’

‘No, actually –’

‘You have moved from lobby J, is it?’

‘No, I’m standing on the street!’

‘Is this Mrs Flank?’

Finally, it is understood where I am and where I’m going and before I hang up, the taxi is there.

The driver has to travel two miles in the wrong direction just to get to a spot where he can make a u-turn. He turns and doubles back, and when we get across the street from the very spot where he just picked us up, he makes a right, passes a school, a shop and stops. We’re there. It wasn’t even three blocks from where we stood, a five-minute walk.

The place is empty. I’m not sure why because it’s really quite nice. There’s a long, smooth bar and a couple of pool tables, votive candles and dark walls, oriental rugs and tables all along the periphery, with sofas and cushions. Maybe the crowds come later. We go to sit at one of the plush tables.

‘Ah, sorry lah, that one is reserved, you see.’ The waitress indicates the paper tent on the table that says ‘reserved’.

I notice that all the good seats are ‘reserved’. Only the plain tables scattered in the middle – the type that wobble when you put your elbows on them, as you sit hunched up in your cold, hard chair – are not. I don’t want to be seated in the centre of a big, empty room in an uninspired metal chair, apologising for tipping the table, whilst staring at the good seats.

‘Look, there’s no one in here. We’re just going to be about an hour, or less even,’ I say.

‘We reserve these tables for our members,’ the waitress answers.

‘Members? What’s that?’

‘It’s $500 a year.’

‘And?’

‘And $500 the next year.’

‘Okay, but what is a membership?’

‘You get to have the reserved seats.’

‘Yeah?’ we all ask.

‘And, you get a bottle of your choice of whiskey, vodka or gin when you join,’ she explains.

‘Doesn’t that take business away, you know, if everyone gets a bottle of liquor to take home?’ Simon asks.

‘Oh, we keep it here behind the bar.’

‘So you can charge for the mixers,’ Melanie whispers to us.

‘Bloody hell, $500. Do you have many members?’ Simon inquires.

‘We don’t have members yet. We just opened a week ago.’

We crack up. Simon takes the sign off the table, sits on the overstuffed library chair and says, ‘Here’s the deal, love, if you get 50 members in the next 50 minutes, I pledge that we will give up our seats peacefully. How ’bout you get us some Moët? Thanks, me duck.’

The champagne comes to us warm. It seems the refrigerator hasn’t arrived yet, but they bought a few bags of ice. We wait while it chills in the ice bucket. We gaze upon our uncorked bottle, silently. Our conversation is in there. As soon as the first sign of sweat drips down the neck of the bottle, Simon thumbs it open, pours four glasses and begins his stories, ranging from white-water rafting in New Zealand to going to sleep in Spain and waking up in New Delhi. I am too outclassed to win them over with my limp little tale about hitchhiking for two years. Compared with them, I was just faking it all that time, waiting for Daddy to spank me and bring me back to finish up college. But I tell it anyway; it’s all I got. They love the part about when I fell asleep in a car and woke up in the middle of a cow pasture.

Frank tells his story from Switzerland. (He usually saves this for Christmas Eve.) He’d been travelling for a while and had developed a stomach upset on the leg to Switzerland. He dropped off his bags at the hotel and planned to kill time until his room was ready, an estimated three hours. On his way back to the hotel, he stopped at a pissoir. ‘My, what a clean Johnnie On The Spot this is,’ he thought as he unzipped his fly. And basking in the relative comfort of his environment, zipping back up his fly, he unleashed the fart that had been grieving him for so many hours. Unfortunately, and ever-so-unFrankly, the fart was, by definition, not a fart at all; it had substance. He made it back to the hotel and adopted a haughty tone so as to put the staff to the task before they could determine his soiled state. They poked around on the computer for a moment and told him his room was ready but they would need a moment to deliver his luggage. ‘Fine, fine,’ he flicked his hand, disguising his relief. He went into his room and immediately dropped his drawers and started running a bath. The doorbell rang. ‘Bellhop, Sir. We have your bags.’ He looked at his underpants. He heard another knock. ‘Sir? Sir?’ He wrapped a towel around himself, opened a window, grabbed a hanger and scooped the loaded underpants onto the hook. He extended the armed hanger out the window and swung it around until the centrifugal force was powerful enough to send those babies flying. He returned the hanger to the closet and opened the door. He hadn’t bathed yet and the man gave him a very Swiss–French ‘pee-yew’ face. Who cares, thought Frank. He felt better now and took his bath. He was even well enough for a little room service and a glass of wine and a tawdry pay-per-view movie. He fell asleep around nine. The next morning he woke up early, full of brand-new-day energy, and pulled the curtains aside to breathe in the fresh, dewy air. He looked out at the mountains, proudly showing themselves against a cloudless sky. He heard the clattering of silverware and muffled conversation. It was coming from below his window. Just one floor down was an outdoor terrace café where the waiters were setting up for breakfast. They’d just begun. In only a few moments, they would start putting plates, napkins, silverware, coffee cups, saucers, milk, cream, sugar and maybe a vase of flowers on the table just below Frank’s room. The table just below Frank’s room, where his briefs had landed. They lay there still, as yet unnoticed, smack in the middle where the vase of flowers would go.

Frank and I often say there are two kinds of people in the world: those who love this story and those who haven’t a clue why it’s being told in the company of fair ladies. It’s no wonder we want to ring in the New Year with Simon and Melanie.

We order another bottle of Moët.

‘Gone already,’ says the waitress.

‘Yeah, we’re quick, so we’ll have another.’

‘No champagne left.’

‘Not a drop. It was so delicious. Anyway, we’ll take another.’

‘We don’t have any more champagne. That was all. Anything else for you?’

We convince Melanie that it makes more sense to walk back to Fortune Gardens. I try two more bank machines along the way and still can’t get any money out. We get to Sam and Valerie’s at about 10.30. It’s pretty packed. A buffet of nibblies is spread on the table. I did think to contribute. I had ducked back to our apartment to pick up a tray of hard, brown bread squares, which I’d earlier brushed repeatedly with my homemade shabu-shabu sauce. I’d invented a new appetizer. Wrap a little smoked salmon around it and whoo doggy. In fact, my little cruncherretta put the stake in previously undiscovered fusion possibilities. I had German bread, Japanese sauce and Norwegian salmon. I put my tray out in a prime position, moving inferior appetizers out of the way, and retrieve my drink from Sam. I go to hang out on the balcony. It’s the best place for people who want to talk and smoke – outside and distanced from the stereo speakers. Of course, you listen only by default if you can’t manage to talk while you’re drinking or dragging.

Sam keeps coming up and filling and filling. He dances through the room asking us to taste his concoctions – a soursop daiquiri, a mango margarita, a papaya colada. And we do, because we can tell he’ll be sad and sobered if we don’t. He makes a toast to his lovely wife, swoops up his still-awake four-year-old son, Andrew, and dances with him to some hometown favourite. When the song’s over, Andrew returns, dazed, to the sofa to sit with his mother, who seems to be content as a spectator.

Melanie and I start dancing. She’s doing that Deadhead sort of dance where you pretend you’re a weed in the wind or something. I try it. I know I look more like a dust mite in a hurricane; my heart rate is already at 170 and we’re only listening to Olivia Newton-John.

Frank has just come back with a shoebox full of our CDs. Clive hunkers down next to him, looks from side to side to see if he’ll be spotted, and surreptitiously pulls out another stack from his inside pocket. Joe furtively pulls out a few of his own. Veterans of Sam and Valerie’s New Year’s parties come out of the woodwork and hand over their smuggled-in disks. Not that his music isn’t good. I’m sure he likes it. Now the stack is as high as the corn in July. Soon, we’re dancing to everything from Prince to Queen, from Cake to Cream, from Phish to Meat Loaf. Oh, if Brenda’s party could see us now, they’d all agree they made the more suitable choice if they were to act their age. We’re bouncing on the sofa, jumping off chairs, picking up candlesticks and salt shakers, holding them like mikes. I’m livin’ the song and singing loud, it’s a cold and lonely night. I’m not even aware of the major dings I’m making in the Burmese teak coffee table as I stomp in queble time about doing what I can and worrying about it in the morning, I mean, ain’t no doubt about. Then, everyone’s down for the count, moppin’ brows, falling back onto the sofa. Sam and I stand alone before them on our Burmese-teak coffee-table stage, gathering up all the anguish of that teenage night when the devil sat on our shoulders, feeling blessed, feeling 17, feeling barely dressed. I crouch down as low as I can, and know it just as well as he that we’re gonna go all the way tonight … I pick up a champagne flute, and finish the song, doing both parts. When the song ends, we get applause. I dance with Frank to NRBQ and take a break outside for a smoke. I’m about two puffs into it when harpies come – the first strains of Hair. I stub out my cigarette and meet Sam in the middle of the living room. Melanie’s good for ‘Age of Aquarius’, but then it’s a two-man show for me and Sam – until Clive croons in with ‘Colored Spade’. I don’t even know there’s an audience when I make my way with all my heart and soul through ‘Once Upon a Lookin’ for Donna’. When I do look up, Sam is gazing at me, puzzled. What are you? Valerie is still awfully relaxed on the lounge, barely even making a dent in her durian daiquiri. When the title song comes on, Sam and I traverse the room, leap athletically from surface to surface, land on the floor together as if it’s been rehearsed a dozen times and embrace at the end to shattering calls for an encore in our heads. The party continues with more dancing and singing and drinking and chips sloppily scooped into dips. Midnight comes and goes unnoticed.

Brenda is just serving her starter, a fried slice of foie gras with a raspberry drizzle over toasted, crust-free farmers’ bread. They’re listening to Vivaldi, drinking champagne. Everyone still has good hair. Brenda’s husband, Tim, looks through binoculars and tells Brenda, ‘Oh, it looks pretty beat. Everyone’s on the sofa watching the coffee table.’

‘What are they eating?’ asks Caroline.

Frank towels me off and offers me water, like a good coach. Knock, knock, knock. There’s an insistent rap at the door. A guardly hammering.

‘Let’s guess which one. Winner gets $100.’

‘I say it’s Mr Quiff!’

Knock! Knock! Knock!

‘Let’s hide in the bathroom and make him think he’s crazy.’

‘No, no, let’s get naked and slither on our bellies down the hall.’

‘Wait, wait, I got it,’ Sam says and goes to the door. Some of us were hoping for a shot at $100 or at least a little naked slithering, but he takes matters into his own hands. He opens the door, slowly approaches the guard, seems about to kiss him on the lips and says, ‘I told you not to come here. What if my husband catches us!’

Valerie, who is the most sober of us and has her child and lease to consider, intervenes. ‘Oh, we’re sorry. He’s just kidding. We’ll keep it down. Here, take this.’ She hands him a box of chocolates. ‘Happy New Year!’ The guard backs out, nodding and smiling. One of the good guys. He wants us to know that beneath his uniform … once the pistol holster is removed … and the club put aside … his cap taken off … shiny shoes left outside the door … walkie-talkie disengaged … chain of keys returned to their hook … he is loco too. ‘Sam Marks! You better watch yourself,’ Valerie says, patting him firmly on the rear.

A screamingly good game of Pictionary is being played at Brenda’s. The tarts are beginning to brown.

We troop out of the Markses’ and down the hall, drinks in hand, because the swimming pool is the best suggestion of the night. When we arrive, we are careful to be quiet as we spread around the area like druids. Melanie pops open a bottle of champagne and sits, fully clothed, in the baby pool. Her gauzy skirt is transparent; her shirt has become mostly unbuttoned. I am the first to take off my clothes and dive into the deep end of the big pool. Many follow suit and we swim away a few points of alcohol. I hear a two-finger whistle from above. I look up. It’s Greg and Samantha. They are spending their New Year’s alone. It’s their tradition, because it’s their wedding anniversary. And somewhere in the back of my mind, I’m guessing there are other reasons.

‘Fancy a swim?’ Tim says, putting down his binoculars. Brenda lowers the volume on Frank Sinatra, miffed that the cappuccino wasn’t timed properly. She straightens her taffeta skirt and puts out the tarts, crumbles and cakes. She calls Tim to come and reach the brandy snifters. She places them on the table. They have no brandy in the house, but she is not yet aware.

We see flashlights heading our way. Of course the guards have found us and all we can hope for is that it’s Mr Loco. If it’s Don Knotts, he won’t rest until we get the caning we deserve. If it’s Mr Quiff, we’ll lose our pool privileges for a while. I can already see from the silhouette that it’s none of the above. It’s the guy who wears the worst toupee you could ever imagine. It is a carpet sample. Or maybe it’s the hair-part from a giant Ken doll. Maybe it’s half a coconut. Maybe he glued brush bristles on a yarmulke. Whatever, he wasn’t born that way and it’s got to be pretty hot under that thing during the day.

‘Let’s run!’ I say. I don’t want him shining his light in my face and identifying me. Everyone races to the sides of the pool and catapults out, grabs whatever they can find and runs in the opposite direction. I look back to see if Melanie is hustling but she is still rooted in the baby pool and now she’s crying.

‘Simon!’ I hoarsely whisper. ‘Simon!’

‘I think he’s vomiting in the bushes,’ says Tess.

Melanie wails as if she can’t believe he’d do that without her.

‘I’ll help you with Melanie,’ Tess offers.

The bushes part and Simon comes toward us, then way to the left, then back in our direction, then way on over to the right, and in three times as long as it should take, he is there, standing above his wife saying, ‘Bloody hell, you stupid git. What the hell are you doing? Mad cow, can’t you see this is a pool for children?’ Then he slips down next to her, pushes her back, lifts up her skirt and throws himself onto her. Melanie grabs his back and moans. Tess and I look at each other and run. We catch up with everyone in the lobby of block three. Clive is in the middle of a pile of clothes holding up a bra. ‘Okay, I have one black lacy thing here, size 32 B. Do I have any takers?’ Lisa shyly stretches out her hand and yanks it away. ‘Has anyone seen my other shoe? Jennifer, where’s my shoe?’ Ward asks.

‘Marks and Spencer white cotton briefs … anyone? Going once …’ No one fesses up.

Brenda kisses each cheek of each guest who supped in her home and bids them a Happy New Year and a good night as she hands them a designer goody bag. She closes the door and rolls her pantyhose down, kicking them off along with her mules. She goes to the kitchen and stands in front of the counter with a knife, evening up the edges of the cake. She slivers off portions from each end, like trimming a moustache. It is very important. She wipes the chocolate from her face and sees her husband slipping out of the apartment with a towel over his shoulder.

‘Let’s go to the beach!’

‘Wait, I can’t find my shirt.’

People are still pawing through the tangle of clothes.

‘Your mascara escaped down your face.’

‘So what, I can see your nipples.’

‘Fran, we have no money.’

‘Where’s Simon and Melanie?’

Ding. The elevator doors open. Twelve adults come out, carrying small, decorative bags full of festive whatnots. The last to emerge is Brenda’s husband, Tim. ‘Hey mates,’ he says, ‘guess I missed the swim but made it for the garage sale.’

Everyone heads to the beach. Tess and I hesitate, look back, and figure that as Natalie and Charlie are safe with Posie, it’s okay to go. There’s a party going on at the Surf Club which, when I say that, sounds a lot cooler than it really is. What it really is? A ton of Singaporeans ten years younger and ten degrees less uproarious than us, and a smattering of expats much like ourselves and therefore embarrassing to look at. There’s a trifling Singaporean DJ saying things like, ‘All right! Now, let’s get the party started!’ and playing music that acts a lot like a finger down my throat. The drinks are totally watery and this seems like a big mistake … until … I see the big, black, juicy sea. ‘Come on!’

‘No, Fran. Don’t,’ Frank says with all the conviction of Willy Wonka before Augustus Gloop drinks from the chocolate river. I pull Sam. He was just thinking the same thing. We run to the sea, singing ‘She’s Come Undone’, leaving a trail of clothes behind us. We swim out and moon the crowd, dive about and swim some more. Frank and Valerie are dancing a slow dance.

When we see our gang leaving, we hurry on after them. Everyone goes back to Sam and Valerie’s to gather their things and go home, but no one does because Sam insists on one more song and the best drink of the night. He’s been saving it for this moment: an iced coffee white Russian. Mmmm, I put my bag back down. The track Sam puts on, the first great Smash Mouth song, gets everyone stomping again so naturally it’s just a matter of seconds before … knock, knock, knock.

‘Who’s there?’

‘A guard.’

‘Agard who?’

‘A guard, please …’

‘I don’t know an Agard Please, perhaps you have the wrong …’

‘Sam Marks, it’s not funny. Let them in!’ admonishes Valerie.

‘Okay, doll.’ He opens the door and, this time, actually does kiss the guard, full on the mouth.

‘We’re terribly sorry, everyone’s just leaving now. Happy New Year,’ Valerie quickly says and hands over a plate of cookies.

The guard nods and says, ‘Dis is de segond gomplaind, please do nod gause any more drouble.’ She leaves, the lady guard, the one with the bindi on her forehead.

‘Sam, you’ll get us killed one day!’ Valerie says and laughs. Simon and Melanie come in. So now we have to stay for the grand finale cocktail. We dance in our socks. And finally, at four, most of us head out. As I walk down the hall, I hear Tim say, ‘Hey, man, let’s get the party started.’

Brenda has put the latch on the door. She is propped up in bed with two large feather pillows. She picks up her book and a bag of M&Ms.

Simon and Melanie follow us as best they can to our apartment. It’s slow going because of the zigzagging. We finally get there and all is quiet. I’m about to lead Melanie upstairs to her children but she and Simon go out on the balcony, put their feet up and light cigarettes.

‘Frank,’ I say under my breath, ‘why are they out there?’

‘I don’t know. Why don’t we bring their kids down. That should be a hint.’

‘Hey!’ Simon calls from outside. I stiffen. ‘You have any vodka?’

‘No.’

‘Yes.’ Frank and I contradict each other.

‘I’ll get the kids; you make them one drink,’ I mutter.

I scoop Natalie up in my arms and bring her down to the sofa. She sits upright for half a second, then falls over, deep in sleep. I roll Charlie’s pram into the living room. Melanie waves to her unconscious children from the other side of the window.

‘I wish I had some cocaine,’ Simon says. ‘I’ll bet you have some, Music Man.’

‘Sorry, my friend, can’t say that I do,’ Frank responds.

‘Well, you can’t say it but you can bring it out.’

‘Really, I don’t have any.’

‘Fuck you, you fuckin’ selfish faggot.’

‘Simon!’ Melanie says.

‘You too, bitch. Come here.’

Melanie goes over and sits on his lap, giggling away.

Simon tells a great story that almost makes me feel like staying up longer. It’s about working on a cruise liner in Spain and suddenly waking up to find himself on a sofa in a casino in St Moritz.

‘I have to go to bed.’ I stand. ‘I’m having the New Year’s Day party here. Good night, see you around two or so tomorrow.’ I leave but I have a moment of complete telepathy with Frank and I hear his mind call mine a ‘traitor’. I stop and turn around. ‘Frank, would you please come up, too? I’m sorry, Simon and Melanie, I just think Frank needs to help me tomorrow and I don’t want to go to bed alone on New Year’s, so, well, here are your two great kids and thanks for making things so much fun. No one I would have wanted to ring it in with better, that’s for sure. Good night, see you tomorrow.’

I pull the covers down. Oh my God, this feels so good.

‘Do you think they left?’ Frank asks.

‘Did you actually get that impression when Simon went into the kitchen and brought the bottle outside?’ I whisper.

Frank climbs into bed. ‘Good night.’ We both hear it: Charlie’s squeaky pram is being wheeled out the door, Natalie is saying, ‘Where are we?’ Frank and I smile and settle in. These sheets are so chilled, so fresh, they feel, uh, so amazing. The mattress is perfect. Every muscle is relaxing, and, though I still have ghost-music in my head, it’s getting fainter. Gee, that was fun, boy, I wish someone videoed me and Sam doing Hair. We’re getting really good. Frank’s in love with Valerie. I’m not in love with Sam. He can dance, that’s for sure. He’s fun. So’s Frank. We’re all a bunch of fun. These pillows are too high. I didn’t eat anything … I am yammering away to myself and my eyes are open wider than they’ve been all night and there isn’t a chance in hell I will ever ever ever fall asleep. Nope, not when everything’s just buzzing and buzzing around in my little head and I had such a great time and, gee, I wish I knew if Frank wished he was married to Valerie. ‘Frank, you up? Frank, you up?’ I kick him. He is asleep. I know this because he yawns.

I must have fallen asleep because I am wishing I never woke up. I go downstairs to make some coffee and on the way see Melanie, passed out on our balcony chair.