Phyllis and Elsie exchanged a doubtful look before pushing open the door of the ladies' toilets.
"Daisy?" Phyllis called out.
"In here," came Beryl's voice in reply.
"Oh dear me," Elsie frowned as the door of one of the cubicles swang open, "Daisy, girl, how much have you had?"
Daisy was prevented from answering. Phyllis, Beryl and Elsie flinched collectively; Beryl, crouched on the floor beside Daisy, making a valiant attempt to keep her hair out of the way until she'd finished being sick.
"Daisy, I've got your coat," Phyllis told her, "John and Anna said you can sleep on their sofa and John will drive you home in the morning. They're just upstairs calling for a taxi now."
"Here," Elsie had somehow managed to find a paper cup and offered it to Daisy full of water, "Drink this and then get your coat on."
"I'm sorry," Daisy wailed a moment later, after she had had some water, as they all helped her up and began to help her get her coat on, "I'm such a mess!"
"You're alright, love," Beryl told her, patting her back gently, "I daresay we've all been in a similar state once or twice in our time."
Phyllis smiled at her encouragingly, tucking her loose hair behind her ears for her in case she felt sick again.
"Have you got your phone?" she asked her.
"Yes," Daisy mumbled.
"Then, I think you're ready to go. Do you think you can manage the stairs?"
Daisy nodded unevenly, and then, unexpectedly, blurted, "Don't let Thomas see me?"
Phyllis threw a quizzical look at Elsie as Beryl, her arm around Daisy, helped her towards the door. She heard Elsie give a sigh.
"She was rather taken with Thomas, when she first came here as an intern," Elsie informed her.
Phyllis raised her eyebrows.
"But Thomas is-…"
"Oh, I know, it's not exactly a secret," Elsie replied, "But try telling her that. I know we all did."
"Poor girl," Phyllis remarked, checking her phone quickly, tucking it back into her bag a moment later, "She has about as much look as Joseph did until you turned up."
Phyllis looked at her for a moment, taken aback. She had a feeling that Elsie would not have said that had she had a little bit less to drink. However, the fact was that she had, and so she simply swung her bag back onto her should and asked her, "What do you think I meant?' before marching out of the bathroom.
"There you are!" Joseph shouted at her, waving enthusiastically from the edge of the dance floor, extending his arms out towards her, "I thought you'd decided not to turn up!"
The club was so loud that, in spite of his raised voice, she barely heard him, and had to shout back in return.
"We had to take care of Daisy!" she told him.
"Is she alright?" he wanted to know.
"Yes. We got her into a taxi with John and Anna."
"That's good," he replied, "I thought she went it a bit on those shots."
"It's busy in here. Where's everyone else?" she asked him.
"Charles went and got a table."
"Charles is here?" she asked, surprised.
"Thomas talked him into it, when we thought you'd all gone," he told her, "Look, they're over there."
He pointed to the far side of the club, where Beryl and Elsie were joining Charles and Thomas at their table. They both, for whatever reason, looked decidedly relieved that someone else had shown up. Phyllis grinned. She couldn't blame Charles; this was not the first night out she'd had with Thomas over the years.
"Do you want to go over and join them?" Joseph asked her.
Having just thought of the previous dissatisfying nights out she'd had with Thomas- and Elsie's remark in the bathroom of the cocktail bar- she shook her head.
"Let's get a drink," she told him, "And then I think we should go and dance."
Without so much as thinking about it, she stretched out her hand for him and pulled him through the gaggle of people separating them from the bar.
"I love Kate Bush," she told him.
"What?" he shouted in reply.
It was very very loud, and just a crowded. She leant closer to him.
"I SAID I LOVE KATE BUSH!" she repeated, nearly blasting his ear drum out and pointing vaguely in the direction of the DJ, just to make sure he didn't miss the point again.
He did nothing but laugh.
"I know," he replied, patting her arm in a friendly way, "Me too!"
The club was getting more and more packed, and their contact, once made, was not easily broken because of an economy of space if nothing else.
But or course, there was something else.
She smiled at him, wrapping her arm around his neck, and he smiled at her too.
"I'm having such a good time!" she told him, leaning forwards, talking into his ear again so that he could hear her above the noise, "I didn't think I would, but I'm having a lovely time, because of you."
"I like you too!" he replied loudly, grinning broadly at her.
She giggled, leaning her forehead against his shoulder.
"That's not what I said," she explained in his ear, pulling herself closer to him again, "But that doesn't mean I don't like you too."
She tried to plant a gentle kiss on his cheek, but it ended up being not quite so gentle and nearer to his mouth than anything else when he was apparently shoved forwards by someone behind him. Phyllis, tightening her arms around him, managed to prevent him falling, though.
"Oi!" she shouted over his shoulder at the back of the offending man's shirt, "Mind what you're doing, will you? Don't push my friend!"
She knew it was probably too loud for him to hear her, but that did not stop her annoyance increasing when he did not acknowledge her and continued to dance boisterously. Putting her hand on his back, she gave him a little shove.
"i said," she told him again, "Don't push my friend."
When the man turned around, she was barely even surprised to see that the man she was on the verge of assaulting was Thomas.
"Mind what you're doing, will you, Phil?" he told her.
"Then you stop pushing, Joseph!" she told him, drawing herself up to her full height.
She was about to give him another shove for luck when a hand gently took hold of hers.
"Come on," Joseph murmured in her ear, "He's not worth it."
She allowed herself to be lead away to the sofa at the side of the club.
"I'm sorry," she told him sadly, reminding herself a little of how Daisy had looked earlier.
"Don't be sorry," he told her, "I don't mind. I thought I'd better stop you hitting him though," he added, "It is his birthday."
"I'm sorry," she apologised again, looking up at him rather forlornly.
"It doesn't matter," he assured her, "Don't think about it. Come on, you wait here and I'll go and get us some more drinks and ask the DJ to play some more Kate Bush."
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