Trust No Bitch: Part 2

Alice Jenkins

Alice could feel her boyfriend, Louis Blackmore, getting steadily more and more drunk all evening, though she wasn't sure how to go about stopping it. It was hard to exercise her flair for ordering people around with Louis; he was stubborn, imperious, and even taller than her, with the muscle to match his height. He took economics and Alice had met him at very same pub one evening in second year. Their introduction to one another had been accompanied by Paolo Nutini, and Cleo King's drunk squalling as she made her way around every man in the pub, running her hands along their chests, throwing her mane of blonde hair back as she laughed. Alice couldn't remember what her and Louis had first spoken about because she used up all her energy on flirting, not sparing enough for remembrance. Louis, however, spoke of the conversation with such spirit that she didn't have the heart to tell him she had little recollection of the night. The feelings that she held for him were less that of love and more of attachment. He was a safe base, a symbol of solidity in her life that she clung to when everything around her was a cyclone. Alice couldn't bare the thought of him leaving her. She couldn't bear the thought of anybody leaving her, for that matter. Clowns, heights, rats and spiders, fears like that tend to come in sharp, transitory bursts like the stab of a knife. Abandonment and rejection and everything that they encompass, though, they're more like an incessant throb, similar to being interminably tattooed. Each one of the frailties and defeats and ones that got away, scribed all over the body in indelible ink. So it was for that reason that she looked up at Louis and tried, really tried to see the good. It was hard, especially when he was drunk. The slight pout she'd thought was so endearing at the beginning, she now found unintentionally childlike. His angular, alabaster face was clammy with perspiration. His hazel eyes were vacant. The rich, thick brown hair he usually coiffed was unkempt, and not in that effortless, rough-hewn kind of way. No. In that drunk off one's face, unable to tell left from right kind of way. Alice couldn't ignore the sloppiness; even when high on several different substances at once, she still had the common decency not to go around burping in people's faces. But regardless, she continued. Continued attempting to fill herself up to the top with gratitude to push out the exasperation that was souring inside her. It didn't take long for her to internally regret her lenience, however. Only an hour of them being at the pub, only forty-five minutes of that really even spent in his company passed before things went egregiously wrong. Only one play of Paolo Nutini before the whole evening went to shit. After being beaten by Louis at pool she had retreated to the table in a sort of dignified sulk to join Clara and Lilly. The atmosphere could've been better; Clara wasn't in the mood to talk and Alice wasn't sure she wanted to speak to Lilly. If Louis hadn't been so hammered she might not've minded being swept off her feet, so to speak.

"It's our song!" He had cried, throwing down his cue and swaggering towards her with his arms reaching forwards. For God's sake, she thought to herself. Our song? What are we, 12, or something? "You remember, don't you? When we first met! This was on." Alice, who had been resting her chin on her fist looked up at him and tried to smile in spite of her apathy.

"Paolo Nutini?"

"Yeah. What do you think?"

"I think they need to update their playlist." She murmured.

"I meant, will you dance?" Louis asked, extending his hand.

"Louis.... It's really busy. People will stare."

"Come on, Al. Live a little." He grasped onto one of her and arms and managed to yank her to her feet with little struggle. She burrowed her head into his chest with a costive laugh.

"People are looking..."

"Fuck them." He spun Alice round but she hung behind, dragging her feet. "I know you want to dance. You love to dance. Even though you can't." She slapped him lightly and laughed again, only with more sincerity.