The music pulsed so loudly it was as though I had gone to war.
The evening had started fine. Pre-drinks in a grotty halls room, couldn't remember whose and anyway they were all pretty much the same. Ring of fire, truth or dare. Nothing too raucous.
The girls had been dolled up, hair piled on top of their heads and tight dresses clinging to every curve. Low cut, for the most part, all brightly coloured. Some of the dresses had odd details, like bits of metalwork around the midriff. They all wore large, clunky jewellery. They were heavily made up. I supposed it must be fashion.
The lads also had a uniform, although it was less inspiring. Mid blue supermarket jeans, and ugly going out shirts. There had been an overpowering fug of aftershave and perfumes combining in the air above the drinkers, worse than the all pervasive cigarette smoke.
And now we were down the Cavern, the strobe lighting making everyone's movements syncopated out of time with the music. The one saving grace was that it didn't matter how well you danced when nobody could see properly.
Tom moved in front of me, hips jerking, arms half-raised. He waved his head towards the bar and made a drinking motion. I nodded.
I watched the girls from our hall, laughing and dancing. Their balance was amazing. They could go from being upright to a crouched position, and then slinkily rise up again, all while poised on six-inch heels and waving their arms in the air. Their skirts rode up their thighs while they did this.
I had been at uni now for 6 months. The final term had just begun. Spring, when young man's fancy turns to thoughts of lust, was well and truly ending and a long summer of jacking off and dreaming of summer romances lay ahead of me. Far from being the carnal nirvana I had expected, I had got more action at school than I had here. The closest I had come to getting my dick wet was a sloppy, aborted blowjob during fresher's with someone from the next corridor. I'm not sure she even remembers.
The club was filling up, and all of our bodies were closer together. Tom came back with a bottle of Fosters in each hand and passed one to me. The dance floor was filled with groups of friends and acquaintances, each set bunched in a rough circle and sort of bobbing to the bass heavy noise. Carla was opposite me and Tom, with Amy, Leigh and a girl I didn't recognise. A course-mate?
Along with Tom and the two girls from my corridor, I had entered the Cavern with Chris, who had since left our circle and was pressed against the wall sticking his tongue down the throat of a Languages student I vaguely knew. I felt a twinge of jealousy in the pit of my stomach.
As the night wore on the tempo slowed. The set-list at this club was the same every week. It began with chart toppers and contemporary drum n bass, and then slowed to a slow dance speed like we had yet to graduate from the horrors of the school disco. After half an hour of swaying to warbling millennial trills, I knew that the night would culminate in a festival of old pop punk, and that everybody would be jumping around before spilling, exhausted, into the night air. It would be several years before I learnt that this was not the way it had to be.
Around me some people were coupling up, while others stayed in their little groups. The atmosphere was intense. Everybody knew that this was the last big blow out before exam fever hit. I didn't learn until later that first year exams really didn't matter at all.
My eyes were drawn to the girl I didn't know. She had until now been wedged between Carla and Amy. She was slim, and, like every other girl in Bristol under the age of 24, was wearing a figure-hugging dress which ended above the knees and a pair of terrifying black heels. Unlike the others, she wasn't kitted out in a dress of canary yellow or near-fluorescent green. She had gone for the little black dress. Her dress had a lighter grey lace detail to the trim and chest, which helped to emphasise an asset she didn't particularly have. She was striking though. Pale, with very dark brown hair falling halfway down her back.
Bryan Adam's Heaven was drawing to an end, and the DJ was obviously getting bored. It was time to get the room moving again.
"I'm just a teenage dirtbag baby..."
We all joined in. There was even a small cheer from one corner. Now we were bopping around and the energy in the room was ramping up. I was surrounded by hot bodies, all moving lithely as one. I was fascinated as always by the interplay between singles who became couples. Short skirts riding up, tops lifting up as arms were raised to reveal glittering navel piercings. Hot taut young bodies all around me.
The girl I didn't know was properly into the music now. Her arms would rise up, fingers pointed like a professional dancer. She caught me staring and winked.
Finally the lights went up and the volume lowered to a dull roar.
We burst through the double doors, swept along by the wave of sweaty people. Tom and I automatically headed for the kebab van. The dark haired girl from the club was also heading that way, as were two dozen others. The queue was lengthy. Plenty of time to chat.
