The Liberation of Alice Love - Abby McDonald [129]
“That sounds fun!” Alice tried to seem as if she were masking disappointment. “A whole group’s there?”
“Yeah, my flatmates and our school friends…But maybe when I get back?”
“Absolutely!” Alice agreed. “You just call me, and, we’ll set something up.”
“OK, you have a nice weekend.”
Alice hung up. Pushing aside her pile of work, she wandered restlessly through the house, her frustration growing. She was so close—at the agency, and with Carl too, but she just kept hitting this wall. What would it take to get where she needed to be?
She was staring absently into the fridge, hoping for a satisfying answer to materialize in front of her, when the doorbell rang.
“Hi, sweetie!” Cassie was waiting on the doorstep, dressed in a chic tube of tight black fabric. She beamed at Alice with what must be freshly whitened teeth, such were their luminescent glow. “I wasn’t sure if you’d be in! There’s a big launch thing in town; want to come with me? Get drunk on free champagne?”
Alice gazed at her evenly. “That depends,” she replied, a little coolly. “Will I be treated to three hours of moaning about the fact that Dakota has left you again?”
Cassie’s smile slipped. “No. I mean, yes, we’re finished, but…It was my doing, this time.”
Of course it was. Alice shook her head, still impatient. “Cassie…I’m really not in the mood for this.”
“But I’m sorry!” A flicker of sincerity shadowed her face. “You were right, I…I just couldn’t let him go. But I needed to hear it.” Cassie gave a sharp nod, as if still trying to convince herself. “So, what do you say?” She gave Alice a hopeful smile. “Come out, party with me. We’ll have fun, I promise!”
“Fine,” she conceded at last, shooting Cassie a warning look. “But the minute you start sobbing into the cava, I’m leaving, you understand?”
“And you won’t have to!” Cassie insisted brightly, her vivid confidence back again. “I’m done, cold turkey. Going on three weeks now!”
“Congratulations,” Alice murmured, still dubious. “Now, this party of yours…Wannabe football wives or indie wankers?”
“Go short, tight, and trashy.” Cassie grinned, striking a pose to illustrate. “Come on, it’ll be fun.”
***
And it was. The slick party was crammed with feuding minor celebrities, gazing balefully from their separate corners in patent heels and designer suits while Cassie, Flavia, and the rest of the group grew louder and more raucous with every new bottle of free champagne. Soon, thanks to Petros’s scuffle over the affections of a British girl-band member, they were summarily ejected from the bar and decamped en masse to a cramped, sweaty shack of a bar in the depths of Dalston, where a trio of stern-faced Jamaicans slung drinks from a vat of potent cocktails, and Alice’s scrap of bright red Lycra stood out like a flaring neon sign among the scruffy plaid shirts and skinny jeans in attendance.
She didn’t care. Between her friends’ constant theatrics and Alice’s own breathless flirtations, she was having a wonderful time. Alice became Ella became Juliet became Angelique as she whipped through what felt like an avalanche of pickups and come-ons. Even when a drunken, desperate Dakota made a surprise appearance, begging for Cassie to give him another try, the night wasn’t ruined. Cassie simply told him to fuck off and show some self-respect—they were finished.
She was almost giddy from the power of it for the rest of the night. “I can’t believe I did that!” Cassie exclaimed, on more than one occasion. “You just have to do it, Aly. You’ve got to say ‘fuck them’ and take what you want.”
***
Alice wished it were so easy. What she wanted were the deep, intimate details of Kate Jackson’s life—complete with photos and fingerprints to compare with Ella so that she could know, for certain, if this was even that right track she was pursuing, but with Carl off in Cornwall for the weekend, she had nothing left to do but wait. Again. Alice had already spent too much of her life waiting, she decided the next