When she walked back through the restaurant, skirting around tables, she heard the professor laughing loudly. As she got closer to the booth, she realised there was another girl sitting in her place. She was maybe twenty, her hair was messy and she was wearing a dirty green coat with gold buttons. Underneath her coat Natasha could see a short dress, tight and tacky. Her eye make-up was black, heavily and expertly applied in thick streams. She looked like what was promised to men when they returned from war. She looked like a deep, dark forbidden river. She was also, from all appearances, monstrously drunk.

‘Welcome to the good life!’ the girl shouted.

‘You’re in my seat,’ Natasha said.

‘Natasha,’ Professor Carr said, ‘this is Lucy.’

‘Hi.’ Lucy extended her hand.

Natasha stamped to the other side of the booth. She slid in beside Professor Carr. She smoothed down her floral-print dress. To calm herself, she thought of all the beautiful things she had ever worn in her life.

‘I don’t like anybody my own age,’ she said, after a while.

‘What’s wrong with you?’ Lucy asked. ‘Did you have an argument with your boyfriend?’

‘He’s not my boyfriend. We’re having a liaison.’

‘How nice.’

‘I’ve just met Lucy,’ Professor Carr said.

‘It’s marvellous,’ Lucy added, smiling.

Natasha was silent.

To ease the tension, Professor Carr signalled for the waiter. Lucy held the menu for a long time, shaking in excitement. ‘I like to order a lot of food,’ she said, ‘and then eat all of it.’ She dragged her finger through the menu, marking things off to the waiter. She ordered two starters, two mains and two desserts. ‘I like food that is lumpy and improper,’ she announced to the table. She insisted on three bottles of a bubbly drink that was close to champagne. ‘This is all I drink now. Bring everything together.’ Natasha watched this display in fascination as Professor Carr rested his hands on both their knees.

‘You’re a pig,’ Natasha said.

‘Do you like to have fun, Natasha?’

‘It’s a waste of time.’

‘I like it. I like parties.’

‘So do I,’ Professor Carr said. He struck Natasha in that moment, despite his education, as a fool. He was the most foolish she had ever seen him.

‘If you want,’ Lucy said, ‘you can compliment me until the food arrives.’

‘I will start,’ Professor Carr said.

‘Don’t compliment me,’ Natasha said. ‘Don’t dare compliment me. I will vomit all over this table if you even pass one single compliment in my direction.’

‘Natasha has a lot of anger,’ Professor Carr said.

Lucy turned to Natasha. ‘How long have you had anger?’

‘A year. Maybe more than a year.’

‘It doesn’t suit most people,’ Lucy said, ‘but I think it suits you. You bear it well.’

‘Thank you.’

When the food and drink arrived, Lucy spread out the plates and arranged them as if there were a particular system, a definite hierarchy, but she ate everything in different orders, regardless. She dipped chips into reservoirs of ketchup and danced them in the air, as she held her almost-champagne flute in her other hand. She let chocolate ice cream dribble down her chin. She drank at a reckless speed. She drank like she was trying to quench a fire, except that fire was heavily dispersed and within herself. Professor Carr giggled, a high-pitched shriek that drove Natasha to the brink of her sanity; and he pushed his hands further up their legs. With her mouth full, Lucy spoke about the holiday she had been on recently and how it had changed her immeasurably. Had either of them been to the edge of the world to discover themselves? Had they lain on an uncomfortable mattress and watched the sun rise and fall like it was string-operated? Travel was now fundamental to her human make-up. But she was only in second year and was stranded on the island of college for another two years.