It occurred to Rosy, sipping drink number five, that she was standing on a precipice. Not literally, she giggled, checking to make sure her painted toes were most definitely planted against the threadbare carpet. Nor, she determined, was it a reference to the teetering heels that lay abandoned beside her bare feet. No, compulsory education - which Rosy had finished with long ago – had finally finished with her. Twelve long years of regurgitating facts, black leather shoes and high prison walls, and she had completed every level. Game over. Thank God. High school was done with and she was shedding infancy, flushing it out with every drink.
The beat and alcohol mingled in her system, infecting her soul with rhythm. Over in the distance - just where the world turned soft focus - her friends beckoned, moving her attention to a pack of males in the corner but Rosy just nodded. She was in no hurry to get up at all. Her entire life stretched out far in front of her, brimming with possibilities and she had all the time in the world at her feet. After exchanging her final exam paper with the key for her shackles earlier, the freedom was dizzying. Her uniform had lain in a pathetic puddle of her bedroom floor, grabbing at her heels for one last chance but Rosy – Queen of her own fate now - kicked it away, sentencing it to a lifetime in the attic. It seemed like just yesterday that she had donned it for the first time, unaware of the contractual slavery she had been assigned under. Well look at her now, Rosy grinned, imagining how grown up she must look compared to even a day ago and began searching for her shoes. Her friends had grown insistent, and the dance floor looked so inviting. If they asked her to fly, she might. She could do anything, now, if she tried.
In the beginning, the room they had entered had seemed a little frayed around the edges. Having navigated their way round the bouncers, walking as if the world owed them everything, it was a little more than a disappointment to be greeted with little more than a glorified pub. Even the patrons seemed a little faded. One old man, perhaps witness to the fall in their faces, let out a hearty laugh. What they were to expect from an establishment that would allow these fresh faced, doe eye girls past the door was a wonder. One could almost see their expectations – plush lounge, leather seats, glamorous adults – evaporate, their oasis of cool a mirage.
Rosy, now fumbling for her shoes, – she swore they kept moving – didn't know why she'd cared earlier. The room had taken on a softer shade now, smiling as she leaned down. She was happy and what did the décor matter? In her mind's eye, the cracked leather had transformed to a smooth neon blue, the cheap laminate of the dance floor were tiles of marble, flecked with the essence of life and the bare bristled carpet was luxurious and soft to the touch. And she was beautiful and graceful and... so adult. She wouldn't think so flicking through the pictures her friends were slyly taking later, which did not gloss over the bra strap that had slipped from her shoulder, or the effect gravity was having on her hair, as she blindly reached for her heels. The floor lurched, she reached a hand out, steadied herself. A bottle bounced, somewhere. It echoed a distance outside of Rosy's bubble of sound. Her head moved sharply, looking at the other tables for its location. It was with glee, and only when she reached down again, that she realised the bottle came from her table. She looked at her hand with amazement, grinning, before swooping it down once more. Heels finally on, she extended her legs to admire them, almost hitting Jen.
Jen sat down with a plop, giggling a little at the bounce of the fabric; “You're drunk.” Rosy's head shook, once, twice, and a third time just to feel her hair hit her cheek once more. Jen grinned knowingly and Rosy laughed. In the past, she'd laughed at her friends while they drunk themselves stupid. How naïve she'd been. How fun this was. How adult she was. How, how, how... how had her bladder filled up so quickly once more?
The world moved as she stood up. It wasn't long after before she was sitting again, legs outstretched, head thrown back in laughter. All five bottles had stored as potential energy, defying gravity and hitting her hard as she left the seat. Jen patted Rosy's leg, wise with past experience. It seemed she was about to beat Rosy's attempt before gravity took hold and both girls were consumed with giggles. For a flash, they were twelve, passing notes at the back of a classroom. Controlling herself, Rosy stood again and, defeating the evils of gravitational pull, did a little dance:
“I need a wee.” She danced once more, something reminiscent of childhood. Had the old man from before seen this, he'd have roared with inexplicable joy. Maybe he had; the music had gradually sneaked upon them, until they found themselves shouting and their heads thumped. Or maybe, maybe, maybe, Rosy sung to herself, stumbling against Jen, it was his bedtime and the old man had gone to bed and bumped his head. She repeated that bit to Jen, whose face had crumpled into a question mark at Rosy's mumblings, and whose laughter gave the impression that Rosy was Wit Himself, gracing their evening.
The bathroom was bright and quiet. Still, the music had padded their ears thickly and it was standard etiquette to shout over stalls as if they were brick. Alone in the private room of the toilet, Rosy allowed the ebb and flow of this world take her, lolling her head side to side and grinning silently. Laughing aloud would give the game away. Once she'd finished, her face assumed that serious look of a child simulating hard work, summoning as much sobriety as possible and assuring no embarrassing moments once the stall opened, a magician's box, revealing Rosy once more with no change. Magic.
She didn't know what she expected, but her face in the mirror was hers. Beyond the mask of make up, inebriation and her new found freedom, Rosy's blue eyes looked out, as young and vulnerable as before. There was still a small zit nestled by her earlobe that had cultivated itself into fruition a few days before – French Listening Day. Le Jour du Stress. How long ago that seemed. Her left front tooth still overlapped her right slightly, giving her whole mouth a crooked feel. There was a change... perhaps, though, it was internal, a shift in her organs or a new rhythm to her heart. Rosy couldn't put her finger on it but she'd escaped high school that day... and that can't have left her as untouched as she looked. Shaking off her musings, Jen and her clasped hands and made their way to the dancefloor.
When they were fresh to the school and childhood still held onto the roundness of their faces, Rosy and Jen shuffled into the sports hall with the rest of their PE class to be greeted with a dance troupe. Their costumes glinted cheaply in the unnatural brightness of the room as they danced, and Rosy and Jen had giggled at the unnatural orange tints in their skin, unaware of the similarities in make up choice they would later rely on especially - most pertinently - on the evening of their last GCSE. Rosy still had spots in her vision when the two groups dispersed, singular dancers merging with pairs of giggling school girls. The steps they prescribed were, apparently, simple. The basics of dancing. Rosy hated lying and liars and she shortly decided she hated these dancers the most out of the millions of people she'd encountered in her 12 long years. By the end of the session, the barbie doll that had taken her and Jen had smiled condescendingly and said, “It could be worse... you could have no left feet.” leaving Rosy's confidence bruised for the rest of her incarceration.
Five years on, and completely inebriated, Rosy couldn't work out what the dancer meant at all. If she could call herself a dancer, compared to the expertise the alcohol had fuelled within Rosy. Her and Jen danced again in perfect synchronisation, with steps choreographed from the heart. Pictures later would show far too much of her underwear and plenty of unappealing poses... But Rosy was in a place beyond reality and continued, oblivious. A couple in the pack in the corner caught her eye and Rosy felt... sexy. She bit her lip at them, the way that they did in the movies and one of them made his way towards her. The alpha male. Jen grabbed her wrist but Rosy shook it off.
The thing with Jen – the trouble, and the wonder – is that she was beautiful. Beauty rainbowed out in arcs from her, brightening the world around. Puberty had defined her features at a young age, attracting attention from everybody, particularly from the opposite sex. However, there was nothing particularly striking about her. She didn't have bright eyes or flawless skin. The beauty about Jen – one thing you'd notice if you watched her walk or dance – is that she wasn't a slave to her limbs. She did not show her lowest thoughts in the way she held herself, like most are prone to do. Her soul was a core of pure confidence, radiating out and pulling in admirers of all sorts. A girl like Rosy could only have been friends with a girl like Jen through a shared history. Shared toys, shared schools... but not tonight. This boy wanted Rosy, the forgotten child. The friend left behind and it was her time to shine.
The instant her and the male were sharing space, reality kicked in. He was not her knight in shining armour or, even better, some handsome film star. His breath was rank on her face, a hangover from beer consumed, and there was no escape from the cage of his hands. She felt dirty wherever he touched, sliding his hands up and down her nylon dress. Pushing only increased his grip. His movements were sporadic, not reflected by the music at all and Rosy had a sharp thought, fighting through the mist in her brain, that it probably would reflect his response of rejection. Yet, she squirmed, feeling bile rise up. This was not how her vision of adulthood was. This was not how things were meant to go. He was to dance and to flirt and, if things went well, they'd kiss and exchange numbers and perhaps spend the next few months in a giggly euphoria of learning things about each other. After then, well, it depended on who the stranger turned out to be but this lewd drunk who kept leaning in was not it.
Rosy didn't know how she got to the toilets, or where her left shoe was. All she knew was that Jen was holding her hair – which, as pictures would later show, had deteriorated rapidly since the hours spend styling it – and rubbing her back as she cried, muttering incoherent babble in a soothing tone. Nobody had warned of this helpless feeling, of the lack of control. Being drunk was all about having fun, this wasn't how it was to be. True, she had always been warned about bad guys, but they only existed in stories.... didn't they? In the midst of her confusion, squeezed into a toilet cubicle of a dingy little club with Jen and feeling the effects of the sudden loss of control... the vague notion niggled at her mind that this was adulthood... this was life... unexpected and not very friendly at all. And, huddled in Jen's arms, make up smeared like war paint, Rosy wished for high school.
