Roof Terrace

I am ridiculous. I’ve been hiding in here for an hour, my stomach tangled in a sticky web of nerves. In prime smoking position; I’m unflatteringly poised with one leg on the sink and the other one on the toilet lid. This is my fifth cigarette. I feel dizzy. My throat burns. My brain hurts. I’m over thinking.

It's time to cut the crap. Make an appearance. He’s your boyfriend. He’ll think you’re late. They probably think you’re rude. Having said that, these are Manhattan’s elite – I could sit here unnoticed for years. I’d survive, there’s plenty of water and I could have someone slip things under the door when I get hungry.

Okay stop drifting off.
Focus.

Cigarette – stub out.
Hair – fix.

You are pretty. Maybe not as pretty as some of the other girls here, I mean they are models, one of them just finished shooting for ELLE and then there’s Abby with the monster legs whose face you can’t avoid because it’s staring down at you from every billboard on Times Square.

You are not hideous, people don’t look at you and gasp at the horror that is your face, or do they? No they don’t but please sort out your make-up. The cigarette smoke and unventilated bathroom heat have made your face droop. The black line on your upper lid flicks out to your temples; you look like Winehouse after a drug binge.

Okay you’re fixed.
Here we go.
Unlock the door, step out.
Smile at the caterers.
You’re almost there.
Through the sliding doors, onto the terrace, as if you were born to do this.
Chin up, arch your shoulders.
Double check wedgy status.
Shit, never mind someone’s behind you.

Keep walking.
We’re in.

Do not trip over that woman’s bag. What the hell is that anyway? Looks like an alligator wrapped in a fur – an oriental sausage roll.

There he is. He’s got his I’m-impressing-people-outfit on, like he dove into a Brooklyn flea market and came out with all the vintage-cool items wrapped around his skinny frame. He’s being huddled by equally cool looking people, Soho hipsters, actors, writers, models, blah blah blah all armed with a cigarette in one hand and a glass of red wine in the other. They watch him like he’s a piece of art, an attractive painting, pleasing to the eye but impossible to understand. A girl tilts her head to the side. I bet none of them are listening to a word he’s saying.

“There you are”

“Hiya. Hello”.

“This is Emma, my girlfriend.”

Smile.