2 kids

Wine and old friends

Ashley.

If wine can taste better with passing years, so can life. It's a simple new philosophy I'm planning on living by from today.

"You can't compare wine to life," Nina simply says.

"Why not? It's a perfect metaphor – you get older and wiser and it's a perfect comparison to flatter a woman."

Nina's brown eyes pierce through mine, and I can almost see her brain connecting the dots. "It's a lovely compliment."

I smile at her. "See?"

Nina rolls her big eyes before she starts to talk about her weekend. Leaving no details out her mouth doesn't close for the following ten minutes. At the end of her monologue I slowly start to zoom out. Though I force my brain to focus on Nina's words, at some point it wins, and her words don't break through the barrier.

Nina waves her hand in front of my face. "Are you paying attention to me?" There's a frown coating her face.

"Yes."

With raised eyebrows and a chuckle she shakes her head. "And I'm getting married next week."

"And you didn't send me an invitation? I'm hurt now."

"I'm forced to keep it a secret."

"Who's the lucky man?"

She ignores my question completely, instead says, "Speaking of men – we ought to go clubbing soon. You need a distraction; I need a distraction. We deserve some spice in our lives."

"Stop trying to set me up with more boys."

A while ago she offered to be my wingman. She figured out, with the assistance of Mae, that I needed socialising. I needed fun and someone new to enter my life. And feeling absolutely down, I listened to their words. Nina calls Alex just a chapter in my life, always reminding me to stop re-reading. I have to turn the page, she says. Little does she know the pages have been glued together. Alex isn't just a chapter in my life, he's a whole book.

But unfortunately, their plan didn't go as they imagined. Nina described her pick as a tall, dark haired handsome boy with deep green eyes and a humour that wouldn't bore me to death. Now I'm not sure if the name got paired with a different face, or where the problem was, but who I met that night was someone different. Far from Nina's lovely description.

I'm not the one to judge people based on their alcohol tolerance, but he sucked – a few drinks down his throat, not more than four and most of those drinks were soda, and he was already wasted. If I hadn't witnessed his behaviour when he was sober, I might've blamed the alcohol for his actions. Drunk or not, disrespect was radiating from him.

I had his attention only for a while and soon he couldn't fixate it on just one girl. He attempted to kiss me after knowing me for only twenty minutes, confidently trying to convince me to sleep with him. He ignored my refusal and with every attempt to leave, he'd grab my wrist and pull me back to my seat.

I wished for someone to be with me, but Nina was far away with her own date. Fear seemed to have taken over me. I was left alone with a drunk guy harassing me and no one to help me. My heart longed for Alex, but my mind knew he wouldn't come. And so I wished for Ace, or River, or Parker and Francis and Ray, or even Nico.

Realising I depended on someone to save me from a guy barely standing on his feet made me feel weak. I knew I could eventually free myself from him, but thinking about worse scenarios made me almost throw up. And so I thought of what Heather or Ciara would do. I channelled my inner Heather, slapped him across the face and spilled my drink over him. Pink and purple liquid ran down his face and upper body.