I cradle her head as she throws up some more, until she is just retching, dry heaving gulps of air.

It is my turn to stroke her hair this time.

*

We sit for what feels like hours but is probably only ten minutes or so. The songs change, the noise peaks and rolls, the shouts and laughter grow in volume as the booze takes its toll. No one else comes in.

Eventually I sit her up, hand her some more water and tell her to drink.

“What happened?” she asks, her words slurred and strung together.

“You were sick.” The smell of vomit is coating our skin and clinging to our hair. I ask her if she can walk, if she can make it outside.

She leans on me and I help her to her feet, where she sways, as though she is dancing with me to the Wham song that’s now playing. I half drag her out of the changing room, ignoring the pointing and sniggering as we make our way to the door of the pool house.

The air outside clouts us. I can see awareness begin to creep back into her eyes as I tell her to breathe deeply. We stand, our arms around each other, swaying in the night air, the sound of the sea barely audible above the thud of the music.

“I’m ok,” Tracey says after a moment. “I can’t believe I threw up again. You must think I’m such a loser.” She bows her head, starts to cry quietly. Her words are still slurred, running into each other, indistinct.

“No, I’m the loser. I didn’t look after you.”

My skin is alive with goosebumps once more, but now it is sobering.

I’m angry.

Beyond angry.

I don’t want to tell Tracey about what El was saying, about Jason, my stupidity with the pills or that El slipped those same pills into Tracey’s drink. The photos, taken with my camera. The boys’ hands on her body.

She will hate me. She has every right to.

I’m suddenly exhausted. I want everyone to leave. I want to get Tracey up to the house where it is safe, let her sleep it off.

I can see the lights on in the kitchen. Martha is still up, pottering around. She will know what to do.

I walk Tracey over to the garden bench, where only minutes before I was stupendously falling from grace. “Stay here,” I say. I run up to the house, feeling naked and sullied in the tiny bikini, the edges of which are stretched from Jason’s heavy hands.

I burst into the kitchen, surprising Martha as she sits at the table with a cup of tea and a biscuit, listening to the radio.

“Oh! Helen! You frightened me!” She pauses, then says, “Are you ok?”