The lights were flashing at a dizzying speed and he felt the beginnings of a migraine lurking just around the corner. A cloud of smoke hovered just below the ceiling and the stale smell of cigarettes permeated everything. From all directions drunken nobodies were crushing into him as he tried to make his way through the dance floor to the back of the club where the bar was situated. Suddenly he felt someone gripping his arm tightly and turned around to see a scantily dressed woman looking at him with what he supposed she imagined to be a sexy pout. It was not, she looked like a goldfish.
"Will" came a whiny voice "where have you been all night? You know I only came here because Charlie told me you were coming"
He continued towards the bar, blatantly ignoring her, hoping she'd get the hint. She did not. When he reached the bar she was still hanging onto his sleeve. He itched to just tell her to fuck off, but couldn't quite bring himself to do that - she was Charlie's sister after all, though he'd never quite fathomed how it was possible for two so completely different people to be siblings.
"Will!" He rolled his eyes, she was parading the pout again. "Buy me a drink?" A sigh. "Fine, whatever." She didn't seem the slightest bit discouraged by his less than enthusiastic answer, but rather latched herself more tightly to his arm. He wondered briefly if buying her a drink meant he'd have to drink with her too. She inched closer and he shuddered as the smell of her perfume attacked his nostrils. Had no one ever told her you were not supposed to use the whole bottle at once?
She brought her lips to his ear and attempted to sound seductive as she whispered "I'll have a Flirtini"
"A what?" He wasn't seduced. The pout quickly made its return. "A Flirtini, silly. I'll have you know it's extremely trendy in my circles!" Yet another reason to avoid those circles. He turned his back on her and leaned over the bar to get the bartender's attention.
"Scotch. Straight, please" he glanced over his shoulder "and a Flirtini for the goldfish." The left corner of the bartender's mouth twitched slightly as he looked at the woman behind his customer. She was sporting a ridiculous pose and tossed her red hair extensions back and forth in an obvious attempt to get back the man's attention. Much to his amusement, the man seemed to ignore her blatant attempts completely and rather looked like he was scanning for the quickest getaway route.
The bartender looked slyly at Will and announced loudly that he was unable to make the Flirtini as they seemed to have run out of pineapple juice. This caught the woman's attention and she immediately barged past Will to give the bartender a piece of her mind. He took it as his cue and as soon as she had her back on him, he threw the bartender a grateful glance and started making his way away from her. As he went he could hear her shrieking voice behind him berating the bartender for the appalling service and the poor selection of the bar. You could always trust Caroline Bingley to handle herself admirably in social situations.
Clubs were not his thing. Too much noise and too many people too drunk for their own good. And the dancing, if you could call it that, the hordes of inebriated people bouncing all over the place. Most definitely not his thing. Every savage could dance. He infinitely preferred conversation.
In his hurry to get away from Caroline Bingley he tripped on someone's foot and almost fell flat on his face on the dance floor. However, just as he was halfway into instant humiliation, someone grabbed his arm and pulled him back up. He almost expected to see Caroline's shrill face again but lucky him, that was not to be. Instead his eyes met the laughing face of a girl of no more than twenty, twenty-five at most. She shouted something to him, he couldn't quite hear what, and turned her back to him still laughing. He took a few steps away from her, then turned back. It was her eyes that made him do that. Something about the tiny wrinkles in the corner of them when she had laughed. Sod it, in two seconds he'd turned into a romantic sap over some bloody wrinkles, marvelous. Old ladies had wrinkles, not very attractive, eh? He went back all the same.
A knock on her shoulder and she turned back to him again. She was tiny, her head barely at the height of his shoulders and her lithe figure so fragile he fleetingly thought there should be a sticker on her. Handle with care. She was wearing a short denim skirt and a worn and faded yellow t-shirt with the words "Never mind the bollocks" printed in the front. Sex Pistols. He remembered a photo from a different age, his mother and father laughing in the backseat of a Mini Cooper that had seen better days, his arm draped around her shoulders covered by that same yellow shirt. A melancholy thought, he missed them.
She was looking at him, expectantly, slightly exasperated. He realized he had stood there almost a half a minute staring at her without a word. And what did he do, that stupid bugger? He took her face between his hands, bent down and kissed her, just like that, without warning or ceremony.
Afterwards, she looked flabbergasted. He thought she might slap her squarely on the cheek. She did not. She had looked at him too, seen how his gaze had traveled over her figure and stopped at the shirt. He had looked so sad, so vulnerable just then, like a lost little boy. Nothing of the bored arrogance she'd seen earlier when he'd talked to Charlie. Maybe she'd got him wrong. So when his soft lips touched hers, slightly unsure, fumbling, she'd thought she'd let it slide. But there had been a catch. An unexpected jolt when he touched her, a strange feeling of fleeting bliss that made her knees buckle. So of course, she kissed him back.
His mind vaguely registered the fact that he was kissing a total stranger in the middle of a crowded club. But her hands were in his hair and their lips engaged in a hot kiss so he really couldn't be bothered with any rational thought. He'd have time to regret it later. And it seemed she was of the same mind. So he wrapped his arms around her, pressed her small, warm form tightly against himself and drowned in the sweet oblivion that was her. And you there, yes, you with the judgmental frown, wipe that look off your face. You would've done the same, no?
Inevitably, there was a question, a statement really, with the tiniest question mark in the end. Let's go? And an awkward taxi ride that could've changed their minds had it lasted even a few minutes longer. But it didn't.