To The Island

Hammered, shot, gone, neutered, smashed, wasted, pissed. Another Big Night Out for the lads, cheers all round in the bars of Wanchai.

You were so drunk that next morning, (is it afternoon, is that half-light sunrise or sunset?) at first you don't know where you are. And you can't remember how you got there. It is not just the details of what you did, where you were, who you did, that have disappeared, all the hours from about 2am on have evaporated. Where did they go these hours (how many hours?), where did you go?

You have been to The Island.

The Island is a safe haven for those who have seriously overindulged in alcohol. The Island is a place of respite and calm where worries are soothed away, where bad things never happen, where mistakes are forgiven. Here, the truly hammered can have solace, be warm and comforted. They can wake up innocent.

You can never remember The Island. Its disappears in a swish of floating silken mist when you awake. You can only assume that you have been there. And like all holiday places, it is damned expensive. You return with a wallet distended with credit card receipts but no cash. There was an ATM run early in the night, but where the notes have gone, you will never be certain. Man those tropical parties on The Island, dancing under those palm-trees, trees like steel poles, to Hawaiian drums, knocking back the mai-tais of Nepenthe, no wonder you are broke. Whatever you did, you don't have any of it with you anymore. Did you eat? Your guts have three goats fighting in them and your mouth a desert of filthy sand.

You are on the couch, naked. Thankfully it is your couch. The Island dropped you at home.

You let go a massive fart. Beer. Beer it was, pints, but you lasted with that only up to a point. Midnight, wasn't it? You were so bloated that the seventh (eleventh?) pint would not get down, so you switched to spirits. JD coke? Or was it G&T? One of the guys likes Irish. A double of Jamieson's, did you join in? At the bar, Bruce asks, "Miss, do you have a Black Bush?" Laughter, incomprehension. Out onto the streets, next bar, girls (are they really girls?) in tights skirts grab at you, a velvet curtain parts. Then the lights go down, the plane is taking off, you are on your way to The Island.

Cleaning up, dizzy as you bend over, you find your shoes filthy (rain? mud?), an empty wine bottle, clothes stinking of smoke and, hey, your underpants are missing. Maybe there is another pair of shoes, high heels. A dress? The bedroom door is shut. You are hesitant to open it, did you bring some exotic guest home from your voyage? You look again at the dress.

You have seen your maid in that dress.

E@L