He She It

twenty-three: the art of staying collected

"Where the actual fuck is Eve?"

Lilly was stressed.

"Ra, have you seen Eve? No? Jesus Christ, where is she?"

Lilly was very stressed, and very panicked.

"I swear to God, I am going to throttle her with her own feather boa."

Lilly was very stressed, and very panicked, and also borderline murderous - and this, in Amara's opinion, - or, in fact, the opinion of anybody that had ever done anything to piss off Lilly Martin - was rarely ever a good combination, and normally one that ended in either crying (never Lilly) or physical violence (almost always Lilly). Amara gave Eve about two minutes to show her face before Lilly tied the feather boa into a noose and started chasing her down.

Fortunately for Eve, (and Lilly, in fact - Amara doubted the judges were particularly sympathetic towards fashion designers who had recently threatened to hang their models) she appeared approximately a minute and a half later, followed by Grace and Natalie, who had evidently discovered - and possibly emptied - the concession stand. She dumped three tubs of ice-cream and two extra large bags of popcorn on the floor, and then waved spoons in the air.

"Dig in, ladies."

"It's less than half an hour until the show, Nat," Lilly said, ice-cream for once not her first priority - although she stretched her foot out to kick the tub of honeycomb closer to her side. "We don't have time to eat."

"Maybe you don't, but me and Ra do," Natalie said, shrugging and throwing a Coke at her girlfriend. Amara, who had still not quite mastered the art of staying collected around Natalie, clasped her hands around air and let the can drop to her feet. "Practice makes perfect, babe. You'll be playing basketball for England before you know it."

"Ra, can you please take your girlfriend somewhere else," Lilly muttered, shoving Eve into the nearest changing room and handing her the dress. "She's killing my work ethic."

"Are you trying to say I'm annoying you, Lil?" Natalie asked as Amara hooked their arms together and gave her very best attempt at pulling her more vertically advanced girlfriend away. "Did you hear that, Ra? She thinks I'm annoying."

"How awful," Amara said, tugging at Natalie's arm again. "We should go and sit down, now."

"Annoying," Natalie repeated, popping open a can of lemonade. It fizzed over the side and onto her jeans, and Amara added to her mental tally of embarrassment: her - 39, Natalie - 1. As if to reassert her position as the most socially-adapted girlfriend, Natalie shrugged, took a sip, and then said: "holy shit, I just did an Amara."

"Christ, Nat. Come on."

With a final, disgusted whine of 'annoying. I'm not annoying,' Natalie scooped up the food from the floor and then trailed after Amara, who had just pushed her score up to a grand total of 40 by walking straight into the textiles teacher and then stumbling back into a rack of clothes, which teetered for a few seconds before crashing to the floor. Lilly cracked her first smile of the afternoon, rolled her eyes, and then banged on the door of the changing room.

"Eve? Are you ready?"

"Two seconds! The zip got stuck!"

"Break that zip, and I will break you," Lilly replied, and then turned to face Mrs Duffy, who had walked away after Amara's twelfth 'sorry' (Lilly could just imagine Manuel's disgust) and was now screaming about tying off threads correctly. "How long do we have, Mrs Duffy?"

"Lillian, dear," her teacher said, kicking a pair of high heels out of her way and straight into the ankle of the girl whose swiftly unravelling dress had been the target of her last rant. She glanced at her watch. "I need you ready in fifteen minutes. Oh, and Grace! Do tell me you've brought the baby."