‘We could try something different.’
‘…Something bad…’ Amber shivered deliciously. ‘Let’s try to get into a grown-up club. Come on, in a few months, we’ll have left school and we’ll be the only people in our class to have never done anything interesting, Ella. Everyone else has gone to clubs they’re not supposed to be able to get into, except us because we’re the sensible ones. I’m fed up being sensible.’
Sensible was nice when you were thirteen and adored by all the teachers, but less so when you were nearly eighteen. The girls who never had their homework done and never got top marks in exams seemed to be having all the fun now, which seemed like an unequal division of spoils.
‘Me too,’ Ella breathed. ‘And I’ve just thought how we can do it.’
Amber’s eyes glittered. ‘How?’
This feeling of dissatisfaction had in fact been incubating for weeks. Fed up with studying for exams and stifled by the pressure-cooker atmosphere at school, they felt the need to do something wild and rebellious for the first time ever, but their options were limited.
Most of their pocket money went on clothes or their mobile phone top-up cards, so they had little cash left over for wild behaviour.
Smoking was considered cool by some of the older girls, who insisted that it kept them thin, but cigarettes were too expensive to be more than a rare treat. Alcohol was easily available, like hash and ecstasy, but Amber’s mother had a nose like an airport sniffer dog and could smell badness anywhere, so coming home drunk or stoned was hardly an option. Faye would have had a fit and grounded her for a month, not to mention being hurt by her daughter’s behaviour, which would, in turn, make Amber feel bad for failing her beloved mother.
And that was the crux of the matter: their family unit was just two. Two people who adored each other, two people who’d gone through it all together, who protected each other from the world. But sometimes, that could be a burden too.
At least Ella had three brothers who could share living up to their parents’ expectations: Amber had the weight of her mother’s hopes and dreams resting squarely on her shoulders alone. And unlike Ella’s parents, who seemed to understand that their kids eventually tested their wings and flew the nest, Faye Reid still seemed to think that she and Amber would be together for ever.
‘What’s the plan?’ Amber asked now. ‘Where are we going? Nowhere round here, surely? There’s nothing but boring pubs.’
‘Exactly. So forget about round here.’ Ella grinned excitedly. ‘Marco’s going into town to a club tomorrow night, and if we went with him, we could get in without being carded.’
Marco was Ella’s middle brother and they both realised he was their best bet for an illegal excursion. Her eldest brother wouldn’t dream of taking two schoolgirls into a city nightclub, while her youngest brother was too square to go at all. But twenty-three-year-old Marco, who had his own late-night show on a small radio station and went to all the coolest places, just might be persuaded to take them with him.
‘Where?’ asked Amber.
‘Highway Seven.’
‘That’s twenty-ones and over.’ It was hopeless. Doormen were up to speed on the best fake IDs. Amber and Ella didn’t even have fake IDs. All the best clubs were over twenty-ones only. They’d be busted before they got in the door.
‘Yeah, but there’s a gig on there tomorrow night, some new band Marco’s going to check out for his show,’ Ella explained. ‘He’ll be on the guest list and he’ll be going in the back door of the club, so the bouncer will let him in no hassle, and if we’re with him…’
‘…We’ll waltz right in,’ laughed Amber gleefully. ‘You are one clever chick, Ella O’Brien. But how do we get Marco to take us in the first place?’
‘Bribery and corruption.’ Ella had thought it all out. ‘We’ll twist his arm this evening after school.’
Marco looked a lot like Ella: dark eyes, pale skin and the same dark hair as she’d had before she discovered peroxide. Easy-going to a fault, he wasn’t keen on taking his little sister and her friend out with him.
‘In your dreams,’ he said.
‘Mum would go mental if she knew you’d had that huge party in the house when the rest of us were in Kerry at Christmas,’ Ella said, all wide-eyed innocence. ‘The one where the neighbours called the police. You’d be chopped liver if she ever found out. You know what she’s like about not upsetting the neighbours…’
‘How did you hear about that?’ demanded Marco and then slapped his forehead and groaned. ‘You didn’t know, did you? You were just guessing.’
‘Oh, Marco, we knew about the party,’ Amber said, exasperated. ‘We were only guessing about the police, but we found some guy’s coat under Ella’s bed, along with a lot of empty Heineken cans and a condom.’
Marco blanched.
‘It’s not as if Ella put the beer cans there. We never drink beer. We prefer wine or vodka,’ she added, hoping to sound worldly-wise.
‘Can’t you go out with your own friends?’ Marco begged, not even commenting on the wine or vodka remark. It seemed like only last week his sister and her friend had been sobbing their hearts out over guinea pig funerals in the back garden and winning badges for Guides.
‘Think of it as community service for deeds previously unpunished,’ Amber pointed out. ‘We won’t be any trouble. Once we’re in the club, you can forget about us. We can look after ourselves.’
‘OK, you’re nearly eighteen and you know everything, right?’ he said sarcastically.
‘I’ve a yellow belt in karate,’ Amber said, assuming what she hoped was a karate stance, though it was years since she’d set foot on a dojo. Her mother’s insistence on self-defence lessons had been fun when she’d been ten, less so when she hit puberty.
Marco sighed. ‘Close combat is not the answer to all situations in life. The most dangerous guys in the club probably won’t ask you to arm wrestle, Amber. Understand?’ He looked at both girls as sternly as he could. ‘I don’t want to have to come home at two in the morning and tell Mum and Dad that I’ve lost you two. Or worse, tell your mother, Amber. She’d rip me limb from limb.’
Amber’s mother had always made Marco a bit nervous. There was something steely in Mrs Reid’s gaze, as if she was warning him that she had his measure.
‘We’re not kids,’ growled Amber. ‘We’re coming. It’s no skin off your nose. You only have to get us in.’
‘Well, you’ll have to watch your drinks,’ sighed Marco, knowing when he was beaten. ‘There are guys out there who’ll slip a date rape drug in your glass and, well…you don’t have any experience. You don’t know the half of it.’
‘You’re a wonderful brother.’ Ella gave him a hug.
‘This is a one-off deal,’ Marco insisted. ‘OK? And you’ve got to behave yourselves.’
‘Of course,’ said Amber, who had absolutely no intention of behaving herself. She could do that in the football club.
The truly difficult part of the plan was lying to her mother about where she and Ella were going that night. They decided that, because of Faye’s ultra-vigilance, they’d stay at Ella’s that night after their alleged trip to the disco. Having gone through it all before, Ella’s parents were definitely more relaxed about their daughter’s behaviour.
‘Mum will check we’re home, but if I put pillows in the beds, she’ll think we’re there,’ Ella said.
Amber thought of how her mum never slept until Amber was back after an evening out. How many nights had they sat up on Amber’s bed on her return, Mum listening as Amber recounted her triumphs and disasters?
Then,