Read Online Before I Go to Sleep by S. J. Watson - Free Book Online

holding between my fingers. I feel gravel under my feet and remember I have discarded my shoes and left them in this girl’s bedroom downstairs. I look across at her as she turns to face me and feel alive, dizzily happy.
    ‘Chrissy,’ she says, taking the joint. ‘Fancy a tab?’
    I don’t know what she means, and tell her.
    She laughs. ‘You know!’ she says. ‘A tab. A trip. Acid. I’m pretty sure Nige has brought some. He told me he would.’
    ‘I’m not sure,’ I say.
    ‘C’mon! It’d be fun!’
    I laugh and take the joint back, inhaling a lungful as if to prove that I am not boring. We have promised ourselves that we will never be boring.
    ‘I don’t think so,’ I say. ‘It’s not my scene. I think I just want to stick to this. And beer. OK?’
    ‘I suppose so,’ she says, looking back over the railing. I can tell she is disappointed, though not angry with me, and wonder whether she will do it anyway. Without me.
    I doubt it. I have never had a friend like her before. One who knows everything about me, whom I trust, sometimes even more than I trust myself. I look at her now, her red hair wind-whipped, the end of the joint glowing in the dark. Is she happy with the way her life is turning out? Or is it too early to say?
    ‘Look at that!’ she says, pointing to where a Roman candle has exploded, throwing the trees into silhouette in front of its red glare. ‘Fucking beautiful, isn’t it?’
    I laugh, agreeing with her, and then we stand in silence for a few more minutes, passing the joint between us. Eventually she offers me what is left of the soggy roach and, when I refuse, grinds it into the asphalt with her booted foot.
    ‘We should go downstairs,’ she says, grabbing my arm. ‘There’s someone I want you to meet.’
    ‘Not again!’ I say, but I go anyway. We step over a couple kissing on the stairs. ‘It’s not going to be another one of those pricks from your course, is it?’
    ‘Fuck off!’ she says, trotting down the stairs. ‘I thought you’d love Alan!’
    ‘I did!’ I said. ‘Right up until the moment he told me he was in love with a guy called Kristian.’
    ‘Yes, well,’ she laughs. ‘How was I supposed to know that Alan would decide to choose you to come out to? This one’s different. You’ll love him. I know it. Just say hello. There’s no pressure.’
    ‘OK,’ I say. I push the door open and we go into the party.
    The room is large, with concrete walls and unshaded light-bulbs hanging from the ceiling. We make our way to the kitchen area and get ourselves a beer, then find a spot over by the window. ‘So where’s this guy, then?’ I say, but she doesn’t hear me. I feel the buzz of the alcohol and the weed and begin to dance. The room is full of people, dressed mostly in black. Fucking art students, I think.
    Someone comes over and stands in front of us. I recognize him. Keith. We’ve met before, at a different party, where we ended up kissing in one of the bedrooms. Now, though, he’s talking to my friend, pointing to one of her paintings that hangs on the wall in the living room. I wonder whether he’s decided to ignore me, or can’t remember having met me before. Either way, I think, he’s a jerk. I finish my beer.
    ‘Want another?’ I say.
    ‘Yeah,’ says my friend. ‘Want to get them while I deal with Keith? And then I’ll introduce you to that bloke I mentioned. OK?’
    I laugh. ‘OK. Whatever.’ I wander off, into the kitchen.
    A voice, then. Loud in my ear. ‘Christine! Chris! Are you OK?’ I felt confused; the voice sounded familiar. I opened my eyes. With a start I realized I was outside, in the night air, on Parliament Hill, with Ben calling my name and fireworks in front of me turning the sky the colour of blood. ‘You had your eyes closed,’ he said. ‘What’s the matter? What’s wrong?’
    ‘Nothing,’ I said. My head spun, I could hardly breathe. I turned away from my husband, pretending to watch the rest of the