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 resplendentopen 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 myGOD,’ 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 aneyebrow. ‘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 …’
