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I look at him in consternation and see the corners of his mouth twitch. ‘You’re teasing me.’
‘I am indeed.’ He picks up the bottle of wine and inspects the label. ‘Chateau Duck Pond, I see. What some people will bring to a party. No doubt they hid this bottle at the back and are busy drinking buckets of the good stuff.’
‘What did you bring?’ I ask.
‘That bottle of Merlot. I stole it from my father’s wine cellar. Hopefully, he won’t notice. He has plenty down there.’
‘Are you a wine connoisseur too?’ I say.
‘Not a bit of it. I class wine into five groups – red, white, an odd mixture of the two, drinkable, and undrinkable.’
‘I don’t even go that far,’ I say. ‘I don’t really like it at all.’
‘Not even champagne?’
‘Champagne isn’t wine,’ I say and see his mouth twitch again. ‘Is it really?’
‘I’m afraid so. What did you think it was – some sort of liqueur?’
‘We don’t all have parents with a well-stocked wine cellar,’ I say.
‘What do your parents drink?’ he asks.
‘I think Mum mostly drinks gin and tonic. She says she used to drink something called snowballs when she was a girl, but they’ve apparently gone out of fashion. Mum likes to keep up with the times.’
He nods. ‘My mum’s generally a port and lemon sort of woman.’
‘I like port,’ I say, pleased to be able to join in.
He laughs. ‘Also wine.’
‘No!’ I say, embarrassed.
‘I’m afraid so. But it’s fortified, so we can agree not to count it. What about your dad?’
‘I think he mostly drinks beer in the summer. He probably drinks whisky in the winter.’
I look at him in sudden consternation. ‘That isn’t a wine too, is it?’
‘I really want to tell you it is. I’m almost convinced you’d believe me. But no, you’re safe there.’
I laugh. ‘Fine, I’m not sophisticated about alcohol. Perhaps if I tried some of the better stuff, I’d change my mind. But most of the wine at the parties I go to comes out of boxes, and I’ve never really seen the point.’
‘What do you drink instead?’ he asks.
‘Alcopops,’ I confess. ‘They take away the bitter taste of the alcohol. Otherwise, I stick to soft drinks. I actually prefer them.’
He nods gravely. ‘You’re naturally high on life.’
‘Something like that. What about you?’
‘Ever since I moved to Scotland, I’ve drunk nothing but Irn Bru and whisky.’
‘Not seriously?’ I say, startled.
‘Not seriously. But that seems to be the general assumption. Mum was delighted to see me looking so healthy when I arrived home. She was convinced I’d been living on deep-fried Mars bars for the past few months.’
‘I’d love to try one of those,’ I say without thinking.
