“To being wild and crazy,” I said. His eyes looked unusual in this light. The pink light emanating from the club had turned his blue eyes a shade of purple.
“To being wild and crazy!” he repeated, and we made our way to the front. Our skater friends were clearly familiar with the big bouncer with the tattoos on his face.
We walked into the club, ducking under the doorframe. When I got inside, I was even more shocked by what I saw. There was a bar to my left that looked like it had been made with corrugated-iron roofing sheets and a small stage in front of us, which was currently empty, and then, hanging from the ceiling . . . cages! With gyrating women in them wearing red leather bikinis. In the far corner, a small skateboard ramp had been set up and a few people were skateboarding on it.
“Wow!” I said. I had never been to a club before, and if this was what clubs were like, I had seriously missed out on what was clearly a mind-blowing, eye-opening experience.
“Are all clubs like this?” I asked Noah, who was watching one of the girls in the cage. A tiny stab of jealousy hit me in the ribs.
He shook his head, still staring at the woman in the cage. “I’ve never been to one like this before.” His voice had taken on a tone that sounded full of awe. And then he pointed at the cage and my heart dropped.What was he thinking?Look how hot she is? Look how sexy she is in her little leather get-up, all swishing her hips and shaking her ass and bumping and grinding against the poles.
“Do you think those are custom made?” he asked.
“Uh . . . the women?”
“No.” He laughed. “The cages! I must try and get one that big for Chloe. She would love it!”
“The cage! Oh, right, the cage!” I burst out laughing. “You were looking at the cage, for your parrot. Of course.”
“Well, what else did you think I was looking at?”
I shot him an incredulous look. “I kind of thought you were looking at what was inside the cage.”
He looked back up and cocked his head from side to side, as if he had only noticed the dancing girls now. And then he looked back at me and scrunched his face up. “Nah, not really my thing.”
“Oh! Okay!” I tried not to sound thrilled. Not that I was his thing either, considering that fact he hadn’t kissed me back in the field, which was probably the most mortifying experience of my life. I wondered what his thing was.
“Let’s go and have a drink,” he said, moving off to the bar area.
“A drink?” I mused. The old Zenobia hardly ever drank. But I had already broken that rule when I’d woken up and downed all that champagne and called my boss a crappy human! I might as well continue. Besides, I was all about new experiences now. And the new me would bloody drink in a strange, dark and dingy club filled with people who looked more like they had stepped off the set of a futuristic sci-fi film. What was the name for this subculture anyway? I made a mental note to Google it at some stage.
“Sure, a drink! Why not?” I declared, and followed Noah to the bar. It was busy, a flourish of black leather and spikes and colored hair, and we stood waiting our turn, only to realize it didn’t work like that around here. Elbowing and jostling were the name of the game, and pushing your way to the front was the only way to get anywhere, it seemed. Noah took me by the arm and shot me a “you ready?” look over his shoulder. I gave him a firm nod, and then, joining in the general vibe of the place, we jostled our way to the front, pushing aside a variety of characters who didn’t even look pissed off, as if this was the thing to do.
Finally, a little out of breath from the effort, and with a scratch on my arm from walking past a man with a spiky cuff around his wrist, we had arrived at the front. It took Noah another five minutes to catch the bartender’s eye, and when we did and Noah asked for two glasses of wine, the guy burst out laughing.
“Good one, man,” he said, looking at Noah. “No, seriously. What do you want?”
I glanced at the wall behind the bartender, after watching Noah stumble and stutter a few times.
The rows behind were stacked with only a few things: whisky, tequila, vodka and a few craft beers by the names of Nuclear Waste, Happy Bastard, Satan’s Drool and Panty Dropper. I blinked a few times, making sure I was reading correctly. I was.
“Two shots of tequila!” I said quickly, getting the idea from that girl who’d complimented my outfit earlier and was now standing opposite us ordering drinks.
The guy behind the bar nodded and walked away, as if this was the correct answer.
“You sure you want to start with tequila?” Noah asked.
“Sure, why not?”
“Uh . . . have you ever drunk tequila before?”
“Nope.”
Noah smiled at me. “Okay, if you’re sure.”
A few moments later the tequila arrived in small shot glasses. And not only had I never drunk tequila before, I’d also never drunk anything out of a shot glass. This all felt very exhilarating, if not nerve-wracking as hell. But when I looked across at Noah, he gave me this inexplicable calm feeling, and I couldn’t help believing that there was nothing I couldn’t do if he was standing next to me.
“Ready?” he asked, lifting his shot glass into the air and holding it in front of me.
