At about eight o’clock, I caught the bus to the address that Anne wrote down for me. I’m quite talented at catching buses. I’ve caught buses all over the city during my whole life, and I know almost all of the routes now. But on the bus ride there, I started getting very worried. I wasn’t sure if I would know anybody at the party, except for Penny. And I suppose Anne, too. I thought about what would happen if they weren’t even there. I’d probably end up walking around the house the entire night by myself. It sounded awful.
The bus dropped me off a few streets down from the address. I sort of knew where it was, so I walked towards it. It was already very dark outside, and I had to concentrate quite hard to see where I was going. There were some street lamps, which provided quite a lot of light. But they didn’t cover everywhere, so there were lots of dark patches. I always walk more quickly through those parts, just in case.
Only just then I remembered that I didn’t even change into my dress! I had it in my bag, but I forgot to even put it on. I was so annoyed. I was only wearing my lame clothes. I figured I didn’t have any choice, I would have to get changed just out on the street. I sort of found a spot that was a bit hidden, kind of next to a fence. I quickly took off my top and skirt. I felt pretty crazy for a second, being outside in only my underwear. But then I got my dress on very quickly. I can do that stuff very fast, when I try. Then I kept walking.
Even when I wasn’t even at the house yet, I could already hear some loud music. I assumed it was coming from Lily’s party. There always seems to be a lot of loud music and loud shouting at parties. I haven’t been to too many parties before, but I’ve been to some. I don’t know why it’s always so loud. If I ever had a party, I would make it a quiet one. I’d make it so you were only allowed to come if you weren’t going to yell at everyone and make a lot of noise. But I’ve never had a party. Not a real one, anyway. My mother never let me; she was always too worried about bad things happening. But thankfully I don’t live at home any more. I went flatting because it was becoming too hard to function with her around.
I found number nineteen, which was Lily’s house. There was a lot of noise and light and music coming from inside. It was a very expensive looking house. She lived in a very nice neighbourhood. It was up this big driveway that curved to the right. There were two long decks on different levels of the house, and I could see a lot of people outside drinking and talking. I decided that I would go in, and if I couldn’t find Penny within two minutes, that I would just leave. I didn’t want to get stuck with a big bunch of drunk people that I didn’t know.
I walked up the driveway and toward the door. It was this huge wooden double door, with these big bronze handles. About four of my doors could have fit into that one door. It looked so big and heavy, I wondered if I would even be strong enough to open it. I’m not even sure why someone needs a door that big. I guess maybe if you have big furniture in your house, you need to be able to fit it through. But I never saw any furniture that big before.
I knocked, but nobody answered. I even stood there for more than a minute, and still no one came. I suppose I didn’t knock too hard, because my hand isn’t that tough. And the music was quite loud, so probably Lily couldn’t even hear me. I knocked again, harder this time. The door was made of this very hard wood, and it kind of hurt my hand a little bit. I waited around, but still nobody came. I was thinking about maybe leaving, when I heard these two girls come up behind me. They were dressed in these very flashy-looking white dresses. They both had on red lipstick and black shoes. They looked kind of like the same person, they even both had gold bracelets on the same arm. Except they had different colour hair. They slowed down and looked at me. It was a bit awkward. They both just mostly stared at me.
“Are you going in?” one of the girls said to me. I meant to tell them that nobody was answering the door, but for some reason, I couldn’t seem to talk very well just then. I just pointed at the door, without saying anything. They both looked at each other when I did that.
I thought then that they both looked kind of horrible. Kind of bitchy. Then they just walked past me. One of the girls turned the doorknob and opened the door. There was this big blast of noise that came out and I saw a whole lot of people inside. They both went in, and they started laughing, and one of them looked back at me and shut the door. I felt very embarrassed.
I just about ran away right then. My face felt very hot and there was that rushing sound in my head again, blocking everything out, even louder than the party. But then someone opened the door. It was Penny. She was wearing this very nice knee-length navy blue dress and a silver necklace with a little acorn on the end. I thought she looked very pretty.
“I thought I saw you out there,” she said.
I didn’t say anything, I felt like I couldn’t talk just then, but I sort of waved at her. I felt very strange. She just smiled though and grabbed my hand and took me inside.
It was too loud inside, and everything smelled like alcohol and perfume. It made me feel quite ill. If it wasn’t for Penny holding my hand, I definitely would have left. There were lots of groups of boys and girls all drinking beer and wine and other things. They were all shouting at each other. I guess they had to shout, because the music was so loud. I had to let go of Penny’s hand, to cover both of my ears, but I kept following her. We walked toward the back of the house. I was very glad to get away from everyone, because we walked past some very horrible looking people that I didn’t want to hang around.
It was a bit more quiet back where we went, in some sort of lounge. Nobody else was there, just a few bottles left over from some people who must have been there earlier. We sat down on a couch, and I put my backpack on the floor.
Penny turned to me and said, “It’s really great to see you.” But then her face became very serious, and she looked me in the eyes without blinking. I kind of wanted to look away, but I didn’t want to be rude to her. Then she said, “How are you?” But by the way she said it, I knew what she was talking about. She was talking about my dad. Her mother used to be quite good friends with my mother, so I guess she probably found out. I guess I should probably tell you. My dad is dead. He died only the day before, on Thursday. I didn’t really feel like telling the truth about it before. I don’t much feel like talking about it now, either.
“I’m so sorry,” Penny said. “My mum only just told me. I wouldn’t have asked you to come if I’d known. Shouldn’t you be at home right now?”
I told her I was fine and everything. And that my mother was fine. She just said she was very sorry and all that kind of stuff. And she gave me a really nice hug. It was really very nice of her. She’s a very kind person. I just wasn’t really in the mood to chat about it. I think she eventually realised that, because she slowly stopped asking me about it.
After a while, Penny went off. I think she told me she was going to the bathroom or something, but I didn’t really hear her, because I started worrying about my essay for university again. I remembered that I was already one day behind my planned schedule. I was worried that I might have a pretty hard time trying to finish it for Monday. I actually sort of wondered if maybe I could just not write it at all. The only problem is that I would be very likely to fail my paper if I did that. And that means I couldn’t graduate. But I suddenly got this very interesting idea in my head. I thought that maybe I didn’t even need to graduate, that maybe it would be even better if I didn’t. I could just leave university and do something else that I wanted to do. Then I wouldn’t even have to write my essay at all! I could just do some job with animals, because that sounds like something I would enjoy. I could become a veterinarian, probably. I love animals quite a lot. Like my cat, Vincent. Vincent was the best guy I ever knew. I used to call him Chicken Wing, because his little toes used to make me think of that for some reason. Or sometimes I called him my little man. I don’t even know why he ran away. I was quite sad when it happened. But that was a long time ago, I suppose. But then I realised being a veterinarian probably wouldn’t work. Because I mostly only like playing with animals; I don’t really like giving them medicine and things. They always squirm everywhere and scratch you when you try to give them pills. It made me feel quite scared when I thought about if I couldn’t write my essay, and if I couldn’t get any other job either, then what would I do? Maybe I could be a dog walker, though. I like dogs, too. And walking dogs is kind of like just playing with them. And you get paid at the same time. Maybe I could do that.
I decided to have some alcohol to drink. I went into the kitchen. It actually didn’t seem quite as loud any more. It was still very loud, but a little bit better. I think my ears had adjusted to their new environment. My body is quite good at that stuff. Like sometimes in the summer, when people are very hot and sweating everywhere and just wearing singlets, sometimes I don’t feel hot at all. Sometimes I even feel cold. I can even wear a jumper in the middle of summer, every now and again. My body is excellent at adjusting itself.
I didn’t bring any alcohol with me, but some people had put their beer on the table, so I took one. I couldn’t twist the top off though. I tried for quite a while and really hurt my hand. It even started bleeding a little bit. But I know this very smart trick where you get a tea towel and put it over the bottle cap when it is too tight. Then you can twist it and gather a lot of extra friction to open it. But it still didn’t work. My hand was feeling very sore too. Eventually, a boy came over and opened it for me with a bottle opener. He must have seen me struggling. He tried to say something to me, but I was feeling very embarrassed, so I just walked away.
I started drinking it, but it didn’t taste very nice. I sort of forgot I don’t like beer very much. I often drink some every now and again, and I always don’t like the taste of it. I had a few sips and then just carried the bottle around with me. I went and watched some groups of people who were at the party. I stuck quite close to the wall, because I didn’t want to be noticed. I was being very secretive. Sort of sneaking. I saw this group of about six boys and one girl sitting at a table playing cards. They all had a lot of beer bottles around them. I wasn’t too sure what card game they were playing, I didn’t recognise it. I only really know how to play about two card games. The problem is that I don’t really like learning new things, because I often have a lot of trouble understanding the rules. Sometimes my friends have been playing something, and they’ve tried to teach me, but I didn’t understand it. Then they’re all sitting around, all looking at me and trying to explain it to me, and it is very overwhelming. One time, I almost started crying, because I felt so much pressure on me. Ever since then, I try to avoid learning new card games. But those people seemed to be having a lot of fun playing. Sometimes someone would put down a certain card, and then they’d all start yelling and laughing and clapping. Then someone would have to drink a lot of beer, like maybe even a whole bottle. All at once! I didn’t really understand it, but they seemed to enjoy it.
Then I kept creeping along the walls. I was feeling quite mischievous. I felt like I could sneak into anywhere without anyone noticing me. I went through a door that led outside and heard a few people chatting. They were around the other side of the house, so I peeked my head around the corner and saw them sitting at a table. I stood there, with my back against the wall, listening around the corner. I thought that maybe I was like a secret agent, gathering secret intelligence from the enemies. But I couldn’t really hear them very well. I could hear that they were talking, but I couldn’t make out what they were saying. It got a bit boring, so I left. I walked in the opposite direction, going around the other side of the house. I came out to a courtyard, with two people sitting at another table. That house seemed to have a hundred different places for people to sit. But then I noticed that it was Anne and Penny. They saw me and waved me over.
“Hey, where’d you go?” Penny said when I went up to them. “I couldn’t find you.”
“I just got a drink,” I said. I held up the bottle of beer, so that she could see the drink I got. The bottle was empty now; I’d been drinking it a little bit. I even sort of felt like having another one. “Can I sit down?”
They both told me I could. That made me feel quite happy. Then Anne offered me a can of some other alcohol. I’d never seen it before, but when I tried it, it tasted very sweet. It was nice; it mostly just tasted like a fizzy drink. I decided I should try to have a nice conversation with Anne. “How are your university studies going?” I said. I knew that Anne and Penny both studied nursing.
“Oh god, it’s exhausting. But a lot of fun at the same time. I’m loving my population health paper. But the time we spend on the ward is crazy. We have a fifty-fifty split of classroom and ward time this semester. You should see some of the patients that come through, it’s a wonder these people can even function. The situations they get themselves into is—I don’t even know. It’s ridiculous. I don’t even want to talk about it. I saw one young man the other day who had a nail straight through the middle of his hand. I think he was playing with a nail gun at work. I don’t know, it just seems incredible to me.”
I sort of tried to laugh and then said, “Yeah.” I didn’t know what else to say. I’m not too familiar with nursing. Anne just kept on talking though.
“The worst thing happened to me the other day. I was told off for apparently arguing with a patient. Which wasn’t true, at all. The patient started yelling at me that their water was too warm. I tried to calmly tell him that I was happy to bring him a new glass of water if he’d like one, but that there was no need to yell. Then, of course, he kept yelling. And the ward doctor came in and told me off for apparently getting into a yelling match with him. It was ridiculous. The hospital even issued me a formal warning. You should have seen what they wrote on it. ‘Initiating an argument with a patient.’ I wasn’t even arguing. He was the one doing the arguing. And I certainly didn’t initiate it!”
It did sound like it would be quite annoying for her. “Oh, that doesn’t sound too good,” I said. “It’s not very nice when you get in trouble for something that you didn’t even initiate. Once when—”
“Initiate,” Anne said.
“What?”
“You said ignitiate, it’s initiate.”
“Oh.”
It was quite rude of her to point out my mistake like that. I felt a bit angry, actually. But I suppose it’s a good thing to learn that stuff. It’s probably quite good to know lots of words very well. But I stopped talking then. I was just kind of drinking my drink and looking at the table. It was a glass table, so I could see right through it, down to my feet. I really liked my shoes. They were made out of black leather. I thought they were quite cool. Quite sexy.
Then I suddenly remembered that I’d left my bag in the other room! I was worried all my things might be stolen. But I figured it would probably be okay. I kind of stuffed it down the side of the couch, so that it was hidden. But I did still have the present in my bag. I hadn’t given it to Lily yet. I hadn’t even met Lily.
“What did you get Lily for her birthday?” I asked Penny. “I wasn’t sure what kind—”
“Oh Franny, it’s not that kind of birthday party. You don’t need to get her a present, it’s just a party.”
I felt very stupid. And annoyed. I spent so long trying to think of what present to get her! I didn’t even know what she likes!
“Did you get her something?” Penny said.
“No. I didn’t get her anything.” I didn’t want to tell her the truth. It made me feel very dumb.
“Oh god, that’s good,” Anne said and laughed. Penny didn’t say anything.