Sarah and I started kissing on the dancefloor, our arms round each other’s waists.

‘I love your tooth,’ I said.

‘What?’ She leant in closer.

‘Your tooth.’ I stepped back slightly, pointed at the corresponding eyetooth in my mouth, at her face. ‘I like the way it sticks out a bit.’

Periodically she’d disappear, return to tell me she’d been chatting with the woman at the cloakroom, big deal, a woman on the stairs, so what, the DJ …

‘The DJ?’ Heartbeat.

She pulled me closer. ‘I told him it was my birthday, asked him to put on something really fucking dirty with heavy bass.’

‘What did he say?’

‘That he’s building to it, I have to be patient.’

We danced, Sarah moving like the natural she was, me stepping from side to side to side to … She leant in again, held my shoulder. ‘He guessed I was a Gemini. How cool is that?’

‘Because today’s your birthday.’

Leaning in again, her scent of coffee, toffee, her mouth.

‘He said he knew from watching me dancing.’

‘That you’re a Gemini?’

She nodded, smiled, turned away from me, faced the DJ booth, swayed.

* * *

I hugged Josh, waved as he got in the taxi, sat on the kerb outside the club next to Sarah, admired her legs.

‘I don’t feel middle-aged,’ she said.

‘That’s good.’

‘But it’s the middle of my life, hun.’

‘Who wouldn’t want to be in the middle of life?’

‘Does anyone have a light?’ Mel said.

Zac handed one to her. He’d thanked Sarah profusely for helping him through the worst of the MDMA. She’d sat him down in the corner of the bar, given him water, talked him into a state of relaxation. In his words, she’d saved him and he owed her a life debt.

‘I’ve loved every second of dancing,’ she said. ‘That’s twice in the space of a week, I can’t believe it. Those drugs were good, Chris – I just wish we had some grass for later.’

‘We do,’ I said.

‘You’ve gone all-out, hun, haven’t you?’

‘Josh gave me some. I thought it would help with the comedown.’

‘Wow. My hero.’ She put her arm around me, squeezed, lay her head on my shoulder. ‘You’ve really thought of everything.’

I shrugged it off, taking it as a massive compliment and confirmation of my value as a human being. In an hour or two we’d be at home, in bed, having sex for the first time in years. Yep, Zac would probably come home with us, as would Mel, smoke a joint for the road, but they’d leave, and Sarah and I would fuck our way into her forties.

* * *