Escapism (CL 16)

19. Party Time

"Right, Charles... you have to stop it now, I'm serious." Laura told him, but the way she giggled it undermined the words as she tried to bat his hands away from her.

"It's my party I can do what I want." He smirked, hands falling back on the red satin material of her dress, fingers twisting into it.

"It's your party, but we are never going to make it into the party if you keep doing that." Laura pointed out. "We're already nearly two hours late."

"It was worth it." He grinned, and she just knew from that smile on his face everyone was going to be in no doubt about what had taken the two of them quite so long getting ready.

"And the party will be fun too if you ever let me get in there." She laughed, opening the car door. The poor valet had been stood awkwardly by the drivers side door for the entire exchange, waiting to take the keys from Charles.

"Alright, let's go." Charles agreed.

"We need to get some champagne on the go and get celebrating." Laura agreed.

Charles climbed out of the car, handing the keys to the valet, before coming round to help her out of the car. She was thankful that he'd come to help her because the dress Anna had given her to wear was gorgeous, but had a slit up the side that went dangerously high, and the last thing she wanted to do was accidentally expose herself to the crowd outside.

"I really like this dress, have I said that already?" Charles asked, eyes raking down the length of her body hungrily.

"Yes. That's why we're so late, remember?" Laura laughed.

"I remember." He smirked. "Come on, let's go." And with a wave to the crowd outside, he wrapped his arm around her waist to guide her into the club.

The place was packed, as expected. The majority of the crowd already well on their way to drunk having had plenty of time to get started on the drinks while they'd waited for the hero of the hour to arrive. It was slow progress towards the bar, Charles barely able to take a step without someone stopping him to congratulate him.

Laura waited patiently, tucked in at his side, and allowing him to soak in the moment. They did eventually manage to make their way to the bar, finding Carlos talking to Anna and Josh.

"It's about time." Carlos rolled his eyes at Charles. "Where have you been? It's supposed to be your party mate!"

"Oh I've been uh... busy." Charles smirked, and Anna nearly choked on her drink at the guilty look on Laura's face.

"Busy doing what?" Carlos asked, apparently oblivious. "You left way before I did."

Laura laughed nervously. "I'd made other plans to celebrate mate." Charles laughed. "But I'm here now, and I think that champagne is in order!"

Laura had been chatting with Anna and Josh as Charles did the rounds, celebrating with his team. She didn't think anything of it, until he returned a little over an hour later considerably worse for wear, the Monaco flag now draped over his head and Carlos manhandling him by his shoulders trying to steer him in the right direction and keep him upright without him crashing into too many people.

"There you are!" He grinned, staggering out of Carlos's grasp and into Laura who just about managed to catch him. "I missed you!"

"He might've gone a little bit too hard on the drinks trying to catch up." Carlos laughed, looking at his teammate who was swaying around as he stood beside Laura. His arm slung over her shoulder was quite probably the only thing keeping him upright.

"Having a good time are you?" Laura laughed, lifting the flag up after it slipped down so it was completely covering his face.

"I won!" He grinned. "I finally won this stupid cursed race! Me! I won!"

"Yeah." She laughed. "You did."

"I think someone gave him a load of shots too." Carlos warned her. "He's going to be dead tomorrow. Good luck with that."

"Thanks, how am I supposed to get him home?" She asked.

"Did you bring his car?" Carlos asked.

Laura nodded. "Yeah, we did."

"Well, if you haven't had a drink yet then you drive it home." He shrugged, as though he wasn't talking about several million euros worth of Ferrari.

"You can't be serious?!" She looked at Carlos trying to work out if he was joking. "What if I damage it?"

"You won't." Carlos shrugged. "And if you do, Ferrari will fix it and probably assume Charles hit something while he was trying to park. It happens a lot."

"I'll drive it home." Josh offered.

"You've had way too much to drink to do that." Anna stopped him. "And that still doesn't help Laura get home with Charles."

Laura looked back at Charles, who was now leaning heavily against the bar. "I can't believe he managed to get that drunk, that quickly." She shook her head in disbelief. "That's almost as impressive as the race win."

"He's a lightweight." Carlos laughed. "Do you need some help getting him to the car?"

"I might." Laura shot Carlos a grateful look. "Are you sure you don't want to drive him home? I could walk?"

Carlos shook his head. "I've had too many drinks for that."

"You could probably drink the whole bar dry and still be better driver than me." She pointed out.

"Alright, come on mate." Carlos laughed, standing Charles back upright. He went to pull the flag off his head but Charles was muttering something unintelligible and kept pulling it back over his face, so Carlos just decided to leave it there.

"I can't believe you get to drive that car." Josh huffed as Laura quickly said her goodbyes, watching as Carlos fought to keep Charles on his feet.

"Good luck!" Anna called after her as she followed Carlos and Charles out. Laura wasn't sure what she needed the most luck for- the driving or dealing with drunk Charles when she finally got him home.