Chapter 22
Ash
If Ash had to sit down at her laptop and write the opening to a novel set at a birthday party in Lisbon, what she’d come up with wouldn’t even be half as atmospheric, redolent, as her actual real-life experience of Luis’s actual real-life fortieth.
She was going to meet CJ and her cousins beforehand so that they could all turn up together, but a mishap with her hair straighteners puts her behind schedule.
Since the only thing worse than being late for an event is knowing you’re making other people late too, she texts CJ, says, hair emergency, go ahead without me.
Mine’s a mojito! Once she is sorted – hair half up, half down, tied with a pale pink-coloured ribbon, matching baby-pink textured cloqué Ganni babydoll dress, deep-V front and back, so short it’s indecent, really, wedged espadrilles and a bright red clutch – she heads out into the late evening alone, map on her phone leading the way.
The door opens, a creak emanating for dramatic punctuation.
From the shadows comes a man in white gloves and full Downton Abbey-esque service suit.
He says, ‘Boa noite, senhora,’ and sweeps his arm towards the darkness, which, once she sets foot through the door and turns the corner, Ash finds is littered with hundreds of tea lights in small jars, guiding the way towards a melodramatic archway, beyond which are the signs – and sounds – of life.
Ash can’t help but smile as she takes it all in.
Who knew that behind that anonymous door was this, a magnificently huge cobbled courtyard, flanked by the balconies of all the houses backing onto it on three sides.
Surely there’s an extended metaphor about being brave enough to simply take a step into the unknown, begging to be acknowledged, but now isn’t the time.
Coloured paper lanterns are strung up like an intricate spider’s web, laced on garlands festooned from the outside of the courtyard inwards, so they all meet at the centre, where twenty or so paper lanterns are knitted together as a crescendo of a chandelier.
The outer edges of the courtyard are framed with long trestle tables, bench seating either side, and about a hundred dinner plates are uniformly arranged in dots down each side too, with folded linen napkins and knives, forks and spoons beside them, vases of fresh flowers everywhere.
In one corner is a band: two singers, two guitarists, a drummer and a pianist currently being largely ignored by the mass of people milling about what will no doubt become a dance floor later.
The fourth wall is actually a resplendent open balcony in and of itself, opening up like a mouth to the throat of the city, those rooftops Ash has come to know as the backdrop of her story here, the waters of the Tagus out there somewhere, a reminder that there is all of this …
before there is nothing. So enjoy, drink, dance, flirt. Live.
‘Ash!’
She hears her name from up above, and looks to see CJ, Miguel and Todd on one of the balconies, reached by a wrought-iron staircase winding around itself in the direction CJ points in.
‘Oh my GOD,’ Ash says, flinging her arms open wide once she reaches the summit. ‘CJ! I almost didn’t recognise you! You look sensational!’
CJ bats away the compliment with a hand.
‘We all do,’ Miguel says, coming in for an air kiss. ‘I can’t spot a single ugly person here. Luis has only beautiful friends. Look at these people!’ He gestures to the courtyard below. ‘It’s like the beautiful and the damned.’
‘And which are you?’ Ash enquires, accepting a drink from Todd, who hands her a tall glass, thick with condensation, a sprig of mint peeping out over the rim. ‘CJ said a mojito,’ he tells her, and Ash beams at CJ for getting it right.
‘Thank you,’ she says.
‘I, for one, am both beautiful and damned,’ Miguel tells their little group. ‘Which is often the best type of person, is it not?’
‘Always have a story to tell, the beautiful and the damned,’ says Ash.
‘Yes,’ agrees CJ. ‘Normally a tragic tale of inherited wealth and the impossibility of getting good staff.’
‘More like the uncompromising inconvenience of champagne tastes on a lemonade budget,’ says Ash.
‘Oh to be beautiful, but damned to no personality?’ says CJ. ‘That would be worse.’
‘Hey!’ counters Todd. ‘I’ve been accused of that myself.’ He pouts, like everyone should feel sorry for him.
‘It must be hard to be so handsome,’ CJ tells him.
‘Thank goodness I am,’ he mischievously winks. ‘Otherwise, I worry Luis wouldn’t have invited me.’
They pass an hour like this, being dressed up and silly, slurping on the syrupy cocktails of whatever is passing by on any given waiter’s tray. Luis has, rather generously, paid for the bar, and so Ash finds herself three drinks in before dinner even starts.
‘God,’ she says to CJ when they get settled at the table. ‘Pass me that water, babe. I need sobering up.’
‘It’s nine-thirty,’ says CJ.
‘Exactly,’ Ash tells her. ‘I gotta pace myself.’
‘And to think you said you weren’t ever going to drink again after that afternoon with Mona.’
‘I know. What an amateur.’
‘You did claim it in a fit of mortification,’ CJ reminds her. ‘I could never hold you to something suggested so soon after the event.’
‘And yet, here I was thinking you always hold people to their word,’ Ash bats back. ‘You triple Scorpio, you.’
CJ furrows her brow. ‘Triple what now?’ She cocks an eyebrow. ‘Come on, you know I don’t fuck with all that star sign shit.’
‘So you’ll have no interest in what your chart reveals about you, then,’ Ash counters. She looks at her sideways, teasing.
‘I’d bet this whole bread basket,’ CJ chuckles, ‘that even if I say I’m not interested in hearing it, you’re so desperate to tell me that I’m gonna get told it anyway.’
‘Gah!’ Ash laughs. ‘I just want you to understand that this is like, legit stuff! Knowing somebody’s chart can be so helpful in understanding them.
If we just forget for a second that everything needs to be practical or have tangible evidence, if we can proceed with a sense of belief and intuition … ’
‘Intuition.’
‘You’re saying that somewhat sardonically, and yet yes, intuition.’
‘I don’t know what sardonically means.’
‘It means shut up and listen,’ Ash says, and CJ throws a piece of bread into her mouth and says, ‘Babe. I’m all ears.’
As Ash breaks down the deep sensuality of a Scorpio, let alone a triple Scorpio like CJ, she can feel herself putting on a bit of a show.
She couldn’t deny it under a legally binding oath, and yet she still won’t admit it to herself fully: the threesome thing, with Luis?
Ash mentioned that on purpose the other day.
She’s been thinking about it. A lot. And she’s fairly certain that with a bit of encouragement, CJ will get involved.
She mentioned it in passing (‘in passing’) the other day too!
Of course, she cannot coerce the woman, cannot tease her into it or cajole her.
That wouldn’t be sexy. Sexy is this, now.
Talking with her hands and reaching out to CJ’s shoulder and feeding her off her fork and telling her all about how carnal her birth chart is, how she should embrace her sexuality as much as she does, stay curious, experimental. Open.
Ash likes CJ. She’s fun. Sexy, obviously.
And Ash has never before got intimate with a friend – past group sex has been with strangers, end of – and yet, Ash isn’t going to be here for much longer, and Luis is such a terribly good lover, and it can be a fun time, fooling around, it doesn’t have to mean anything or be serious.
At least not to Spring Fling with Life Ash.
Sex is great! And in this courtyard, in this outfit, with CJ looking so damned pert in those leather pants, yeah, OK, fine.
Ash is hot for her. She is a human woman with blood in her veins and eyes in her head.
They should all fuck! She can’t think of a reason why they shouldn’t! Lisbon Ash is hot for it.
‘Here he is!’ CJ says, brightly, her focus shifting to the birthday boy, who is doing an incredible job of schmoozing with every guest in attendance at his celebration.
‘Here I am!’ Luis says, and he is positively glowing with birthday love. He embraces both of them, issues compliments about their attire, and then the girls budge apart so he can slip in between them. He just needs a moment’s reprieve from air-kissing, he says.
‘I was just talking to CJ about all the sensuality in her birth chart,’ Ash says, once again knowing exactly what she is doing. ‘The animal within.’
Luis’s eyes flash with familiarity.
‘See,’ Ash says. ‘Luis knows it.’
‘Look,’ CJ says. ‘I’ve never been shy about liking a good romp in the hay. We don’t need the stars and the sun and the moon to tell us all that.’
Luis looks at Ash, slyly, and then tilts his head to CJ and says in stage whisper, ‘CJ. I think Ash is just trying to flirt with you.’
CJ’s gaze flickers across to her.
‘Caught red-handed,’ Ash laughs, giving Luis a wink.
Luis senses something is happening, and leans back on the bench just enough so that the women can see one another clearly.
‘And you often flirt with your friends, do you?’ CJ asks.
‘Only the very hot ones,’ Ash shoots back, and she actually can’t believe that she’s taking it there, taking the conversation from implicit suggestion to explicit acknowledgement.
‘I like this conversation,’ Luis says. ‘This is the best conversation of the party, if you ask me.’
Ash looks at him, lets her eyelids go heavy. She reaches out to his face and cups his cheek. Then she leans in, kisses him lightly enough to not put people off their food, but close enough to CJ that she couldn’t possibly miss it.
When Ash leans back again, CJ’s face is impassive.
Ash can’t tell what she’s thinking. She looks at Ash hard, for what feels like a very long time.
Ash swallows, unnerved now that this could blow up in her face.
CJ is beautiful. She was wearing red lipstick before, when Ash got here, but it has worn off, leaving her pout stained but not glossy.
CJ cocks her eyebrow an almost imperceptible amount, and it makes the space between Ash’s thighs beat.
Throb. CJ looks at Ash as she reaches out for Luis’s jaw, and keeps her eyes open as she kisses him, eyes fixed firmly on Ash’s face.
Ash lets her mouth fall open, tongue push out over her teeth, and when Luis pulls away he looks between them and says, ‘Yes. Definitely the best conversation at this party.’ But Ash barely hears him.
Blood is rushing to her ears. She knows, now, has her confirmation, about how the evening will play out, where it will end up, and all she can think is, I’ll get to kiss CJ.