Ice Queen

I sat perched on the edge of my bed, fingering the obnoxiously flowery stationary of Pandora's birthday invitation. It's handmade. Crinkly brown cardstock with bright foam flowers stuck haphazardly around the words 'PANDORA'S PYJAMA PARTY' in great, looping letters.

Fucking hell. Why did I fucking agree to this?

I toss the invite onto my bed and begin sweeping through my wardrobe for something to wear. If I am going to this thing I'll at least have a decent outfit. No way am I wearing pyjamas. No fucking way.

I hold a printed tee against my chest and glance despairingly at the mirror. Shit. I toss it onto my bed. For the next fifteen minutes, item after item of clothing follows suit into a lump of clothes on my bed. With an angry groan, I knead my fists against my temples, meeting my gaze in the mirror. I'm nervous. There is a coiled mass of nerves sitting like a rock in my stomach. I glare at the familiar blue orbs staring back at me in the mirror.

Stop it. I tell myself firmly. Ice queen, remember?

But my mind is swimming with a pair of eyes that are not my own. Warm, chocolate brown instead of husky-blue. Those fucking eyes. Like honey and dark chocolate. I never thought myself much of a fan of brown eyes until I saw hers. I used to find brown kind of flat, like the sweet but blank gaze of my neighbour's King Charles. And then I saw hers – no, was swallowed – and realised how incredibly fucking wrong I was. Like the deepest, richest mahogany – silky chocolate darkness with an amber sheen. They were warmth. Pure fucking warmth.

FUCK. Ice queen, Naomi, you dozy cow. Stop infatuating.

Angrily, I turn to the mountain of clothes and grab the first half-decent ensemble I see. Dark tee, striped pull-over and a kind of boho red vest over denim shorts. It will do. It's not like you give a fuck anyway, I tell myself weakly. I strip out of my current comfy ensemble – sweat pants and my favourite tee sporting a large print of a pig (don't fucking ask) – and discard them onto the pile as well. In just my bra and panties, I lean to dress but pause, catching a glimpse at myself in the mirror.

I straighten up, glancing at my figure curiously. I don't fucking know why – I mean I know what I goddamned look like, obviously. It's like I'm suddenly self-conscious. I pinch nervously at the skin of my navel, twisting to the side to get a better view. I look at myself with a critical eye, my mind subconsciously wandering to whether those brown eyes would wander over my skin appraisingly or with disdain…

For fucks sake. I quickly dress and toss a necklace yanked from the glittery mess on my dresser around my neck. I yank a brush through my hair and stare stonily at my reflection. It's just a fucking slumberparty.

"It's just a fucking slumber party," I repeat out loud to myself. "You're not gay."

I cringe at the word. It sounds ugly. Like this terrible-no-good-thing that should never be formed by my lips. I cringe at my memory of the other night. How I'd thrown the word at Emily like a knife. The way those eyes tightened with hurt at my callousness. I felt cruel afterwards, dirty. I had been cruel. Yes, she was the one who kissed me at that stupid party, but we both well know that I kissed her back. My fingers flutter against my collarbone nervously at the memory. The velvet warmth of her lips, her tongue tracing a line of fire along my lower lip, her fingertips resting against my cheek, dusting my skin with a feather lightness that made my head spin. But I couldn't help myself. I wanted to throw that word at her the way she'd let Katie and her minions throw it at me.

I glance at the clock. Time to leave. I've got a fucking pyjama party to attend.

Christ. I grab a bottle of something from the alcohol cabinet on the way out. I'm going to fucking need it.

-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-

Jesus.

Pandora's house is like a fucking poster child for suburbia. There are pink balloons tied to the mailbox. I nearly turn around right there. I swear I nearly do.

But there are tendrils of fire-red hair tied to my mind like an anchor. They pull me toward the door like steel.

Singing. It trickles from under the door with a plasticine cheerfulness that makes me want to puke.

"Fucking hell," I mutter under my breath. I am so not prepared for this. I turn to see some nosy old codger peering disdainfully at me through a pair of oval glasses. He's clenching a pair of hedge trimmers like it's his last defence against the horror of my teenage drudgery.

"Yes?" I snap.

"Nothing," he smirks, "I have nothing to say to you at all." He turns back to trimming at the hedge with pompous intensity. What an arselicker.

"Hi!"

Fuck. That smoky voice. I turn.

God, she's fucking adorable. That flaming red hair lit up by the soft afternoon sun. Just a touch of light and those locks are fluorescent. Her mouth is curled into a small, nervous smile, but I can see a larger one itching beneath it. God, she's such an open book. She's genuinely happy to see me. It's like a punch in the face; that brazen show of emotion. As if she's just thrusting her thoughts into the space between us, wrenching them from the shadowy safety of her mind and just letting them sit in plain view – fragile as stained glass, and just as beautiful.

Jesus, hold it together Naomi.

"I've never been to a pyjama party before," she smirks, "So I brought vodka. Was that right?"

Ice queen, Naomi.

"Dunno," I shrug indifferently, but I can't bite back the smile that crawls across my lips. Fuck, she's looking at me so sweetly. For a moment I panic that she can see right through my whole ice-cold-bitch routine, that somehow she knows exactly how her eyes make me dizzy. No, I tell myself firmly. You're good at this. She doesn't even know you.

That warm little smile doesn't budge.

"I don't wear pyjamas," she says, leaning in conspiratorially. Fuck me. Did she really just say that? I desperately try to supress the images ricocheting in my head: a sleeping Emily, the line of her spine stretching down her bare back, the soft curve of her waist – fuck, stop it. "Me either" I want to whisper in reply, and watch that honey-sweet smile twist into something sharper.

"Right," I say quickly, shaking the images from my mind. What the actual fuck, Naomi?

"I don't know why she invited me anyway," I say, hurriedly pulling the conversation away from pyjamas, or lack thereof. "I hardly know her."

"I asked her to invite you." Suddenly the smile has slipped to serious intensity. She flicks her eyes up at me, and those chocolate-honey eyes touch my skin like a burn. She's doing it again – thrusting her feelings into the open, knowing full well they could fall and shatter in an instant. My blood spikes with the honesty of it, of her. She's challenging me with those walnut eyes: uncovering those shimmering glass panes of truth, Break them she dares me.

It terrifies me.

I backpedal from the intensity of that gaze. The thought of opening myself to that kind of vulnerability – like an animal uncurling to reveal their tender underbelly – is intolerable.

"I thought we sorted this out." I let my voice fall flat. I'm curling behind the coldness of my words like a shield.

"No, I didn't mean that," she protests, her voice stinging with hurt. And disappointment. It makes me nauseous. I'm a fucking coward, and she can see it. "Well, it doesn't hurt to get to know each other."

"Emily," I sigh, secretly savouring the shape of her name on my tongue.

"We're in the same class! We'll be hanging out for the next two years – " Theres a lilt of anger in her voice now. I'm a fucking coward and she knows it.

I panic.

"You going to tell people you're gay anytime soon?" I throw the question like a shard of ice. She's silent. I watch her face fall, like I knew it would. I want to curl away from myself in revulsion. But it's like second nature now, this cold cruelty. It comes too easily.

"What?" she demands, her voice husky with hurt. "I'm not. I'm not gay."

I chuckle. I fucking chuckle.

"Telling you, Em. You haven't thought this through."

"No," she sighs. Bet she's regretting trying to confide in Naomi, the fucking ice queen.

"So can I just say again? Me, not muff-muncher. Me, cock cruncher." I pull the words around me like curtains of steel.

I turn toward the door.

"You getting any?" she demands. "Cock?"

I smile tugs at the corners of my mouth. It's the white flag. I glance at her, eyes dancing and wearing a cheeky grin. I don't stand a fucking chance.

"I have done," I say with false indignation. I glance at her again. White flag. Truce. "Except he had erectile dysfunction," I smirk, "Seventeen times."

She laughs this soft, smoky laugh and suddenly this pyjama party doesn't seem like such a shite idea.

"I was getting tennis elbow, you know?" It's addictive, that laugh. I want more. And it's bloody true, too. I had to ice my fucking arm.

That pompous arselicker is staring down his nose at us again. We smite him with simultaneous looks of 'fuck you'. "Yes?" I snap, again. "Can I help you with something?"

Disgraceful young women, he says. "Yeah?" I smirk. "Go fuck yourself, tosser."

I look at Emily. She's grinning at me like maybe I'm not just a pathetic coward. No, she's looking at me like she thinks I can do anything in the fucking world.

-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-

I've decided that Panda's mum is fucking fantastic. Of course, I'd bloody riot if she was my mother, but for a few hours it will be immensely entertaining to observe this specimen of suburbia hilarity. She's completely ra-ra as her daughter would so finely put it. I mean, Christ.

"So, your all chums?" She's wearing a plaid sweater and an apron. She's fucking Betty Crocker, in the flesh.

"Oh yeah!" Panda crows, "Ems and Naomi are real good friends. Real good!"

I glance at Emily and she's giving me this embarrassed little smirk that makes me buzz like I've just downed a few shots of vodka.

Betty Crocker is just now struggling with the realisation that Emily is awfully familiar. I watch the cogs turn, labouredly, in her head she approaches the unfathomable concept of twins.

"They're twins!" Pandora declares proudly, helping her out. "C'est incroyable, baby!"

"Sorry?"

"It's French! Thomas taught me. He's such a blinking dream and…"

Betty Crocker snaps her head like a bloodhound catching a scent. It's actually rather fucking terrifying. I bite back a smirk as Pandora jerkily stumbles to answer her mother's questions about who exactly Thomas is.

Don't laugh, Naomi. Its called sensitivity, people use it sometimes.

"Actually, he's my boyfriend." I volunteer. Why the fuck not. I'm feeling charitable.

With that settled, Emily and Katie's remarkable existence returns as the topic of interest.

"So, are you interested in all the same things?" Betty Crocker asks, naïve to her complete and utter dumbassery.

I suppress an eye roll, biting my lip. No they are not, I want to snap, They are absolutely not the fucking same.

I catch Emily's eye and her mouth twitches, curling into another honey-sweet smile.

No, definitely not the same.

-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-

"Twister." I say flatly, staring aghast at the wrinkled plastic laid out on the floor in front of us. "You've got to be shitting me."

I'm sat next to the two Fitches. The two completely-not-identical Emily and Katie. Fire and ice. Sugar and salt.

I mean, Pandora seems like a nice girl and I don't want to hurt her feelings or anything, but I don't know if I can actually make it through this. Twister, for Christ's sake. I mean, I'm just unsure of whether I could actually physically survive how fucking stupid this is.

And then Katie announces that she spiked the brownies with MDMA and I feel considerably better. Emily, not so much.

"You think it's funny?" she demands from me angrily when I muffle a snigger. She looks genuinely upset, like I'm letting her down by siding with Katie. A pang of guilt, but then I catch myself. What the fuck. I don't owe her anything. Why do I feel this pathetic need to please her?

I turn to Katie, defiantly. "So Katie. You going to be nice to be now that we're twister pals?" I ask dryly. "I promise not to grab your minge or anything."

She glares at me for a moment, and then snorts with laughter. "Yeah, hands off the muff and we're sorted."

"Gotcha, no buffing the beaver."

"No groping the growler."

"Don't tickle on my tinkle."

"OK, I wont fluff up your flange."

The banter is cruel. Emily gazes back and forth between us, hurt. There's that creeping stain of disappointment again. "You done?" she snaps.

"Yep, we're double done with the DNA dump." Katie smirks, collapsing into a fit of laughter. Emily is staring at her feet with this kicked-puppy sadness painted on her face. For a moment I am swallowed by this ridiculous, totally fucking stupid desire to cup her cheek and wipe away the expression with my fingertips. Instead, I snigger at Katie's stupid joke, and my laugh sounds fake and callous.

Pandora bursts into the room, ruddy faced with excitement. She's brandishing a pile of what looks like scrap fabric. Pink fabric. Pyjamas. You have got to be fucking shitting me.

Sorry Ems, but I really am glad Katie spiked those brownies.

-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-

We're huddled in some kind of fucking girl-scout circle, changing into these horrendous pyjamas. It's totally shit and everything, but I can't stop this stupid smile from plastering across my face like some ridiculous cartoon character. I try to remind myself that I'm at a bollocking pyjama party, but I'm giggling like an idiot and for the first time in a while the whole ice queen thing kind of slips away. I'm having fun. At a bloody pyjama party. Christ.

I am studiously avoiding the opposite side of the room where Emily is changing, because Naomi you are not a fucking pervy lezzer and even the few glances I've snatched of her pale navel have got a flush itching at my neck.

But I can feel those brown eyes trace my skin like fire.

Panda is yanking at my pyjama top, the neckline of which had seemed decidedly too small to fit over my head, but suddenly it gives and is past my ears in a quick moment. Blinking, for a moment I forget to avoid that particular vicinity of the room. Shit.

Shit.

Emily is twisted slightly to the side, bending to pick up something at Katie's feet. She's topless. Without a bra, she clutches the pyjama at her front to cover her breasts. Fuck. Her bare back is on full show; the line of her spine a delicate stroke of calligraphy that tails off at the soft curve of her lower back. That red hair is spilling across the white-pink skin of her shoulders – loose curls that spill down her back, tendrils of fire curling against the snowy white of her skin.

She is fucking gorgeous.

I realise that I'm standing there, ogling like a complete perv. I clear my throat and look away, praying to whatever cruel fucker is out there that nobody just saw me being a complete pervy lezzer. I glance around the room, they seem oblivious –

And then I catch Effy, staring me square in the face. Oh shit. She totally just saw me perving the hell out of Emily Fitch. Shit. She raises an eyebrow. Well, you're fucked the look said.

Yep. I'm well fucked.

-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-

Betty Crocker is fucking monged. I told you she was fantastic.

We're having a bloody disco without any music, munching on Katie's 40 quid worth of MDMA brownies, our dancing growing steadily more ridiculous as the warm blur of the MDMA spreads through our limbs. Thank Christ for Katie and her brownies, because I really am a fucking terrible dancer.

I'm grinning like a loser. Effy is completely out of it, thrashing her hips about, her arms waving above her head; she keeps colliding with me and its fucking hilarious. "Watch it you dozy cow!" I shout, shoving her away gently.

A smoky laugh. It gives me more of a buzz than the brownies. I glance up, and there she is. Emily fucking Fitch, swaying hypnotically at the other side of the room. She looks at me. Looks at me, that same intense gaze that had me locking down my entire ice fortress outside. Goosebumps zipline down my forearms. Those eyes shoot through my like a barb, and she's daring me again, testing me: Look away. Ice queen, I tell myself weakly. But I'm grinning like a fucking dork and my pyjamas have 'Brainy Poo' stitched on them for Christ's sake. Those liquid pools of warmth are magnetic. Fuck it. There is still that nervous itch of fear tugging at my chest, but I lock my eyes onto those gorgeous chocolate coins and dare her right back: You first.

-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-

Eventually we get tired of our silent disco, and Katie scuttles off to find a sound system. Panda seems to have disappeared, and Effy – face taut with worry – dashes off to find her. It never ceases to amaze me the soft spot Effy has for that crazy girl. She's got this impenetrable badass routine down to a T, but it comes to loony old Panda - whose basically an overgrown child, if we're honest – she crumbles like sand. That leaves just me, Emily and Betty fucking Crocker, who is giggling on the ground. Jesus, how many brownies did this woman have?She is pissing gone. I glance from her comatose form to Em, a smirk on my lips, but she's not nearly as amused. Her face is painted with guilt, and she's staring at old Betty with genuine concern. I bite back the joke forming on my lips and blow out a sigh through my nostrils. Jesus, this girl is too nice for her own bloody good.

"Come on, Em, let's get her into bed."

She glances up at me with gratitude. I guess she's not used to anyone actually giving a fuck about her concerns, what with the way Katie treats her. I lean down and hook my arms under Betty Crocker's, and Em darts forward to lift her legs. Christ, she's fucking heavy for such a thin lady. I kick open the door with my foot and we stagger down the hall. Jesus, that dopey smile seems to have become a permanent fixture on my face. I tighten my hold on our cargo and try to avoid the way that Emily has to keep blowing the tendrils of red falling in front of her eyes. In the blurry buzz of the MDMA, those strands of hair glow like embers, luminescent red strands of light that I want to reach out and catch between my fingers.

"She's completely fucking monged," I snicker, and Emily snorts with laughter.

"Shit!" she yelps, quickly re-adjusting her hold. "You're going to make me fucking drop her, tosser!"

I giggle, and the sound is strangely unfamiliar to me. It's…nice, though.

"She's really got the moves, though, doesn't she?" Emily snorts, shimmying her hips. More laughter - it's probably just the MDMA, but I still get a little electric shock each time the sound slips from my mouth, falling into the air without my permission.

"That was so – so fun," I smile, and it feels like a confession.

"Dump her in here!" Emily announces, balancing precariously on one leg to kick open a bedroom door behind her. I snort as she wobbles to regain her balance. Jesus, I should have gone easy on the brownies. The ice queen has been replaced by a giggly fucking girl-scout.

We roll her onto the bed and she falls, limp as rubber. Fucking hell. Don't know how Panda's going to talk her way out of this one.

"Is she breathing?" Emily asks suddenly, and when I glance at her, her brow is creased in worry. Suddenly the little crease between her eyes is the most mesmerising thing in the world. I'm monging and I fucking know it – she's staring worriedly at Panda's mum, but my world is a narrow tilt-shift and I want to trace a fingertip over that thin dimple, iron it out and restore the silky porcelain smoothness of her skin -

I'm roused by an impressive belch from Betty Crocker. Christ.

"Safe." I announce. I glance at Emily. She's smiling that honey-sweet smile and I'm grinning this big dopey grin, and suddenly I realise that Emily Fitch is more of a drug than Katie's baking. My ice fortress is a fucking puddle.

-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-

We filter back into the party, and I say we because without even realising it, I'm trailing behind her like a fucking puppy. Katie has somehow managed to get pop music blaring through the house, and Emily grabs my hand to tugs me into an unsteady sway to Lily Allen's 'Fuck You'. I laugh as she belts out the chorus, her voice drunkenly loud and off-key. She collapses into a fit of giggles and stumbles against my shoulder. Suddenly her fingers clenched around mine, that husky laugh, her weight jostling against me: its claustrophobic – like a flash of vertigo, that sensation that you get at heights, knowing that a force bigger than yourself could pull you to the bone-shattering earth. I pull away and stumble toward the door.

"Where are you going?" Emily cries.

"Wine," I shout, sighing with relief as the cool afternoon air touches my skin. "I want wine."

The sensation vanishes as quickly as it came, and I will my stupid heart to stop pounding in my chest like it's determined to crack a rib.

"Hurry up with it!" I hear Emily shout. "Get beer, lezzer!"

I chuckle at the old jab, leaning to scoop up the alcoholic loot that Panda discarded earlier in a plant pot – when her mother was still conscious.

"Alright, alright. Keep your vagina on," I grumble with a smile. I stagger back inside, swaying slightly as my vision wavers and tilts. Katie was right. That was some good fucking shit.

I stumble inside and snigger as Em rounds the corner in her 'Sexy Poo' pyjamas.

"So, what do you want Ems?" I slur lazily, rolling her name around on my tongue. "Pinot Grigio, or…" I frown, my brain fuzzily trying to decode the cursive script. "Cider oblivy?"

"Anything," she mutters huskily. I glance up. She's about two feet closer than she should be, those chocolate eyes just a few inches away, but I don't step away. "Just give me a fucking…" her eyes are glued to my lips, and a vague awareness at the back of my mind tells me that I should turn away, but I'm completely trapped by those soft pink caterpillar lips, curling delicately around the words. "Just…just give me a—"

Her eyes flick up briefly, and then she leans forward and presses her lips firmly against mine.

Fuck.

"Oh," I murmur. She's looking at me, gauging my reaction. The small corner of my mind retaining any sense is weakly demanding that I step back, throw up a wall of ice – but the rest of my mind is reeling with the feeling of her mouth against mine, and those long, dark lashes fluttering like moth-wings just a few centimetres from my face…

"It's only the drugs, right?" I question weakly. We both know the answer – what I'm really telling her is I don't know what this means, and she nods emphatically: I know.

I flick my eyes back to the velvet pink of her lips, like rosy pillows of Turkish Delight. I lean in and catch one between my lips hungrily.

Holy shit. I am snogging Emily fucking Fitch. What the fuck, Naomi?

She kisses me carefully; gently brushing her lips against mine, pulling softly at my bottom lip. I lean in slightly, deepening the kiss, allowing my tongue to gently graze the edge of her lip. Her fingertips trace lightly over my elbow, barely touching, just resting moth-light against my skin. Her mouth is so fucking soft, moving against mine with satiny smoothness; soft, lingering kisses, wrapping around my lips gently, as if they might tear. She pulls away too soon, and I want to lean back in and pull her lips back against mine – but I can't. Because underneath the heady dizziness of the kiss, I can feel an insidious tendril of fear raking root in my gut; because my heart is hammering against my chest and suddenly the feathery rhythm of my pulse seems like such a precious, breakable thing.

"You liked that." She says firmly, and it's not a question. Fuzzily, I try and pull my mind from the breathless stupor of the kiss. She's looking at me with this transparent kindness, not demanding anything, just warily trying to catch a glance at my thoughts. I bite my lip nervously. Yes, I fucking liked that. That's the problem. I pull in a breath through my nose, giving myself a mental shake. Get your shit together, Naomi.

"You're gay." I say firmly, with a sly smile, and it's not a question, either. Touché. We're both clinging to simple truths.

Lily Allen is crooning in the background: And I don't know how I'm meant to feel, anymore.

I brush past her, and she pauses for a moment before she follows.

"Yes," I hear her sigh, voice lilting with a smile.

-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-

I head outside, and there is a fucking bounce house in the backyard.

"Jesus Christ," I mutter. The clear air washes away some of my fuzziness and suddenly I am hyper aware of the fact that I just snogged Emily, as if the truth of it is taking weight, settling with full magnitude in my mind.

"Naomi –" Emily steps to my side, and my guts clench, waiting for her to demand answers that I don't have. I glance at her, warily.

She bites of whatever she was going to say, her eyes wandering over mine for a long moment. I know that she can see the fear that hunches there, coiled and razor-sharp.

"Come on, then," she announces with a grin, nodding her head toward the bounce house. I relax slightly, because just like that she's waving another white flag; Lower your weapons.

So I follow her into the jumping castle, and she's shoving me playfully, laughing that husky laugh. I uncoil. Christ, this girl is a fucking Trojan Horse. I'm defenceless.

I shriek like a twelve year old as she shoves me against the pillowy wall, and we fall drunkenly, snickering. Her hands are resting against my arm, and all I can think is how warm and solid and safe her fingers feel against my skin. I don't want to shake them away.

Suddenly she rolls over so that she's above me, her arms caging me in, her thigh pressed warm against mine. Her hair falls in a crimson curtain around my face, shining strands tickling against my cheek. She turns those scalding irises on me again, and it's almost as if she's uttering the words into the space between us: I won't hurt you.

Our lips crash together with a desperate inhalation. She tugs at my bottom lip, tracing a line of electricity along it with her tongue, and I eagerly open my mouth to let her in. I snake my arms around her back, pulling her closer to me, and she gasps a soft sound against my mouth. Her body meshes perfectly against mine, leg slipping between my thighs. Everything about her is so fucking soft; the pillowy weight of her chest, the smooth expanse of her stomach pressing against mine, her tongue slipping silkily into my mouth, tracing against my lips.

Some part of my brain that is not a fucking liquid puddle right now is biting at me, reminding me that it's the middle of the afternoon and we're in a fucking bounce house.

But Emily is tracing her fingers across my cheek, and the other slips behind my neck, her fingers twining in my hair. The worry fades momentarily as she nips lightly at my lip, our mouths sliding against each other with vigour.

But the discomfort grows louder and louder. Holy shit, I am making out with Emily Fitch in the middle of the afternoon in a fucking bounce house.

"Emily -" I gasp breathily, breaking away. But she continues to move her mouth against mine, and it's with effort that I pull away again. "Em, wait." I say, louder.

She pulls back, eyes fluttering open as she registers my words; sees the panic in my eyes.

"Shit, sorry," she gasps, bolting upright. Her absence leaves me cold.

I struggle upright. Heart pounding, I scan the empty yard. Nobody saw, nobody saw, nobody saw I chant desperately. That tendril of fear is back in full force, coiling in steely bands around my chest, my lungs. I crawl clumsily out of the bounce house and stagger to me feet.

"Naomi, wait," Emily cries, distraught. "Where are you going?"

I glance back at her sweet face, clenched tight with hurt. Those honey eyes see the icy glaze that has fallen back over mine, and I watch them fall, scolded, slipping from my face to stare at where her hands lay limp in her lap.

I leave her curled in the bounce-house and stagger back inside, vaguely wondering at the swarm of rowdy jocks that has appeared out of nowhere. I shove past them, batting away their pawing hands.

Still clad in those god-awful pyjamas, I shoulder my way out the front door and fucking leg it, the fragile staccato of my pulse hammering painfully in my throat.