shoulder. I gave him a firm nod, and then, joining in the general vibe of the place, we jostled our way to the front, pushing aside a variety of characters who didn’t even look pissed off, as if this was the thing to do.
Finally, a little out of breath from the effort, and with a scratch on my arm from walking past a man with a spiky cuff around his wrist, we had arrived at the front. It took Noah another five minutes to catch the bartender’s eye, and when we did and Noah asked for two glasses of wine, the guy burst out laughing.
“Good one, man,” he said, looking at Noah. “No, seriously. What do you want?”
I glanced at the wall behind the bartender, after watching Noah stumble and stutter a few times.
The rows behind were stacked with only a few things: whisky, tequila, vodka and a few craft beers by the names of Nuclear Waste, Happy Bastard, Satan’s Drool and Panty Dropper. I blinked a few times, making sure I was reading correctly. I was.
“Two shots of tequila!” I said quickly, getting the idea from that girl who’d complimented my outfit earlier and was now standing opposite us ordering drinks.
The guy behind the bar nodded and walked away, as if this was the correct answer.
“You sure you want to start with tequila?” Noah asked.
“Sure, why not?”
“Uh . . . have you ever drunk tequila before?”
“Nope.”
Noah smiled at me. “Okay, if you’re sure.”
A few moments later the tequila arrived in small shot glasses. And not only had I never drunk tequila before, I’d also never drunk anything out of a shot glass. This all felt very exhilarating, if not nerve-wracking as hell. But when I looked across at Noah, he gave me this inexplicable calm feeling, and I couldn’t help believing that there was nothing I couldn’t do if he was standing next to me.
“Ready?” he asked, lifting his shot glass into the air and holding it in front of me.
I picked mine up too and we locked eyes over the glass. In this light, those blue eyes were transformed again. This time, it was the overhead green light from the bar that was doing it.
“What are we drinking to?” Noah asked.
“I have no idea. What does one usually drink to?”
He looked thoughtful for a moment. And then a small smile broke out across his face. “New friends, new experiences and seeing where the night takes us.”
CHAPTER 52
“Oh my God!” I screamed at Noah from the middle of the dancefloor. Four shots of tequila later, some strange, delirious courage that saw all my inhibitions tossed out the window and the most awful music known to mankind now had me front and center on the dancefloor, watching the band play.
“This is the worst music I have ever heard,” I shouted, and laughed. “I mean, it’s AWFUL! What would you call it?”
Noah laughed and put his hands over his ears. “I think they call it death metal?”
“Death metal?” I looked back at the four people jumping around on the stage, the singer was screaming into the microphone, and I couldn’t make out one word. On the drums, a skull logo with horns read “Worm Sheep Head”, the name of the band. The random graffiti out front finally made “some sense,” although I saw little point in naming your band that. The screaming intensified and the people in the crowd began jumping up and down and bashing their heads back and forth. Was this the dancing that everyone was doing? If so, it was bloody terrible. Like nothing I’d ever seen on Dancing with the Stars or that dance program with J.Lo.
“Is this dancing?” I asked Noah, having to scream over the noise of the other people screaming.
“Headbanging!” he yelled back. “Here,” Noah said, passing me another tequila.
I took it and threw it back, the hot liquid slipping down my throat and igniting something in my veins that felt a lot like wild abandon.
“When in Rome, right?” I screeched.
And so, with that last shot running rampant through me, firing all sorts of neurons and transmitters that until now I don’t think I’d ever had in my brain, I started jumping up and down too. Noah burst out laughing and soon joined me. We grabbed hands and, just like that, started jumping up and down in a small circle, as if this was a game of Ring a Ring o’ Rosie. Which, if you think about it, is rather apt; Did you know