Charlie wobbled drunkenly as a hairy ginger guy told her she had a nice ass and asked if she wanted another beer. She felt nauseous, and worried that she’d lost everyone. It was less than an hour till the eleven o’clock curfew and she didn’t know the way home.

Then she spotted Juno necking an Asian guy. The distraction made her trip on the leg of a sun lounger and somehow Brad was in Charlie’s face when she straightened up. His shorts were dripping, but he’d ditched his T-shirt and swiped some other dude’s plaid shirt. He wore it with the buttons undone, so you could see his perfect chest.

‘Fun, fun, fun?’ Brad roared, sounding as drunk as Charlie felt.

‘Babies making babies back there,’ Charlie said, outraged but laughing too. ‘Little bare ass, pumping in the moonlight.’

‘That’s poetic,’ Brad said.

‘Uh?’ Charlie said, vision blurring as she moved her head too fast.

‘Moonlight,’ Brad slurred. ‘Words of poetry …’

There was a drunken pause when Charlie and Brad realised they had no clue what the other was saying.

‘You’re really sexy,’ Brad said as he closed in.

Charlie smiled. She knew he was wasted, but nobody had told her she was sexy before and it was good to feel like she was worth something.

‘You’ve got …’ she began, thinking of complimenting Brad’s abs, but unable to hold the thought. ‘I want you to … I don’t know the way home. I don’t want to lose you again.’

A sun lounger sploshed into the pool as Brad moved closer. Charlie’s eyes were level with his chin and his breath tasted of a joint he’d puffed. Charlie didn’t know what she wanted, but Brad’s face was right there and it seemed easier to kiss than back away.

But Charlie was off balance and after the barest touch of lips she stumbled. Brad thought he’d scared her off and his wounded look made Charlie smile. She stepped forward, and after a couple of seconds of drunken bafflement they started kissing properly. Or they tried, because Charlie didn’t have a clue.

‘Relax your mouth,’ Brad said softly. ‘Let me do the work.’

Charlie had imagined a first kiss to be some Disney thing, but it turned out to be a guy she didn’t know very well sticking booze-tongue in her mouth and it just felt weird.

It got sexier when he grabbed her butt and lifted her up slightly. Charlie tipped her head back and shuddered as Brad pushed two fingers between her thighs. With her head back, he could only kiss her neck and she liked it when his nose tickled her ear.

‘You’re amazing,’ Brad purred.