Revelry. Lucy Lord

with a riot of hearts and flowers on the shutters and climbing up the side of the house. After spending a happy afternoon seeking out remnants in the fabrics and wallpaper departments of Peter Jones, I hung pretty pink and white gingham curtains at the windows, and had a real blast with the interior, wallpapering each room in different shades and patterns of pink and even laying tiny bits of cream carpet. The pièce de résistance was the installation of battery-operated fairy lights throughout, so that the house lit up when you pressed the switch on the back. Of course it was beyond kitsch, but Milly absolutely adored it, and the delight on her face when she opened it was worth every penny I’d spent on it (in the end, it worked out significantly more expensive than it would have done just to have bought her a new dolls’ house).

      I felt slightly sheepish about the hours I’d put into my labour of love – let’s face it, it was a pretty bloody twee thing to do – and was reluctant to tell Poppy and the others. As it happened, I needn’t have worried. They all thought it was brilliant, and Pops even insisted Damian drive me all the way over the river to Emma’s terraced house in Stockwell to deliver it, all wrapped up with a pink bow on top, one cold December evening. Mark did take to calling me Polly-Bella-Anna for a few weeks afterwards, and often asked if I’d done my good deed for the day, but all the piss-taking was affectionate.

      My phone rings. I look at the display. It’s Poppy.

      ‘Hi babe, we’re downstairs.’

      ‘Yay! You’re early! I’ll be down in a sec.’ I lock the balcony door, plonk a pair of oversized shades on my nose, heave my rucksack over my back – fuck me, it’s heavy – pick up my tent and card and stagger down four flights of rickety stairs.

      I love Damian’s car. He bought it last year when he was upgraded from staff writer to features editor and columnist on Stadium (Poppy refers to the promotion as ‘the Faustian pact’). It’s a navy blue convertible late Sixties Merc and today will be the first time I’ve been in it with the top down. Hendrix is blaring from the stereo. We are going to look like such a bunch of wankers rolling up to Glasto. I can’t wait.

      Poppy jumps out to give me a kiss. She looks fantastic as ever, in her Ibiza denim hot pants, cowboy boots, sage green long-line vest and the trilby she had on the other night. If anything, she seems even more hyper than I am, chattering away at such speed I can barely follow what she’s on about.

      ‘If you can shut up for one moment, I have something for you,’ I say, proffering the card. Pops looks at it properly and a big smile crosses her lovely face.

      ‘Oh Belles, you are so talented. I wish I could draw like that. Look, darling, at what Bella’s made for me.’ She shows it to Damian.

      ‘Bloody brilliant. You’ve captured my missus perfectly, gorgeous little jet-setter that she is.’ He gives the card a kiss and props it up on the dashboard.

      ‘Thanks guys!’ I bask cheerfully in their praise.

      Poppy opens the boot and there is just enough room for my rucksack and tent.

      ‘’Fraid you’ll have to put Mark’s stuff on the back seat,’ she says. ‘Never mind – you can put it between you like a wall to stop his groping hands.’

      ‘I really don’t think Mark’s going to be interested in groping me,’ I say, still mindful of what I just read in Stadium and thinking, irritatingly, of the Brazilian twins and the young intern with the pierced nipple.

      Damian laughs, the sun bouncing off yet another pair of designer shades. ‘You’re female, aren’t you?’

      I get into the back of the car via Poppy’s passenger seat. We get going and within minutes I am rummaging for something to tie my hair back with. Driving west out of London is great. People in other cars hoot and the odd pedestrian waves. My elation is building to a disquieting crescendo and we haven’t even started on the intoxicants yet.

      ‘So where are we picking Mark up from?’ I shout over the wind and music.

      ‘Richmond,’ shouts back Poppy.

      ‘How very respectable,’ I laugh.

      ‘I know – seems unlikely, doesn’t it?’

      ‘By the way, Bella, big respect for what you said to Alison the other night,’ shouts Damian. ‘The look on her face when you chucked your drink at her! She started ranting about getting you to pay for dry cleaning after you’d left.’

      ‘Oh, she wants more than that. She wouldn’t contact me directly, of course. She told Andy to tell Max that her shirt was ruined and she wants me to replace it. It was Jil Sander apparently. Fuck knows how I’m going to afford that.’

      ‘They’ve got identical shirts in Primark for a fiver,’ says Poppy. ‘And you can cut the label out of my old Jil Sander coat if you want. Bet she won’t notice. Insensitive bitch.’

      We all crack up at this. God, life is good.

      ‘So what’s this shoot Ben’s on tomorrow?’ I ask, unable to resist the temptation of talking about him.

      ‘Abercrombie and Fitch,’ says Damian. ‘He said the last one was great – the director got them all stoned, then just filmed all these pretty young things laughing unselfconsciously together. Money for old rope if you ask me.’

      ‘Yeah, like you work your fingers to the bone. Comparable to mining is the life of a Stadium columnist,’ says Poppy, as I try to banish from my mind the image of Ben getting stoned with a load of nineteen-year-old natural beauties. I really wish I hadn’t picked up that bloody magazine.

      After a while we turn into a tree-lined street of semi-detached Edwardian houses with perfectly kept front lawns behind box hedges. It’s the sort of street where dads wash their cars on a Saturday morning.

      ‘This can’t be where Mark lives,’ I say in bemusement. ‘It’s so … so … suburban.’

      ‘Oh he’s all talk and no trousers, our Marky,’ says Poppy. ‘Underneath all the bullshit, he’s as conventional as they come.’

      Mr Conventional swaggers out of No. 42. Bare-chested, he is wearing very tight, very faded jeans, a leather thong around his neck, Aviator shades and a cowboy hat.

      ‘He sooo waxes his chest,’ says Poppy under her breath.

      ‘Auditioning for the Village People, Marky?’ shouts Damian.

      Mark grins. ‘You’re just jealous I can carry it off,’ he shouts back, and makes his way over to the car, pausing to say hello to a couple of little girls on tricycles.

      He chucks his huge rucksack into the back seat as effortlessly as if it were made of foam, then saunters back inside and returns with a crate of Stella, which he throws in on top of the rucksack. Winking at me, he mouths, ‘Hello gorgeous.’ I smile. For all his manifold faults, there is something about Mark you can’t help liking.

      We resume our journey and soon excitement is mounting again.

      ‘Beers, anyone?’ says Mark.

      ‘Better not mate,’ says Damian. ‘But the rest of you go ahead.’

      ‘Poor love,’ says Poppy, leaning over and helping herself. ‘I’ll drive on the way back.’

      ‘Yeah, when a drink’ll be the last thing you want,’ laughs Mark.

      ‘Dammit, you’ve rumbled my cunning plan.’