The Party

Frances Smith

Small town life, that's what I was used to. In 1979 when I was twenty I worked in a bank in the Ayrshire town where I had lived all my life with my parents.

Most of my friends were at university but I had somehow been left behind. I'd drifted through school without focus, immersed in teenage malaise. I'd vaguely considered primary school teaching but had done nothing about it. I liked working in the bank but I wasn't at all sure I would still like it in a few years down the line. On this particular Wednesday in March I was excited because I was going to a friend's twenty-first in Glasgow. The venue was 'Saints and Sinners' in, I think, St Vincent Street. Jane was in her last year at Glasgow University and lived in a flat in the West End. Beset friends at school, we were now separated by time, distance and experience. When I did see her occasionally, she talked about people and events that were alien to me. I was impressed that she had a Greek boyfriend; as far as I was concerned, things didn't get much more exotic than that.

Having just split-up from my long term boyfriend I was going to the party with Jane's sister. I'd had the same boyfriend since school and even though I was glad the relationship was over, I was conscious of being adrift. The realisation that all of my friends had moved on and I was stranded at home was making me discontented. Actually, it was making me frightened especially since my last remaining friend at home had decided to join the Army. When, like me, you have been to a tiny Catholic school, your circle of friends is small and, consequently, you don't know many people in your hometown. I was ready for change, for something more exciting.

The day of the party I trawled through my wardrobe and decided to wear a floaty navy skirt with pink roses and a pink blouse from Chelsea Girl. I wasn't happy with the outfit; skirt OK, but blouse not fashionable enough for a party in the city. Why hadn't I gone shopping for something more sophisticated or, at least, trendy? Probably because I was so unused to going to parties, I didn't realise how awful my clothes were. However, I did better with Jane's present, buying her a pretty silver necklace in the local jewellers - a ramshackle, dusty shop that must have had the worst dressed windows of any retail outlet in Britain. Still, when you persuaded the assistant to turn the jewellery right side up, you saw that they had some lovely pieces.

The party didn't disappoint. I loved the venue - very dark, very atmospheric and very different from anywhere I'd been before. The centrepiece of the buffet was the birthday cake - a Black Forest gateau. Jane and her flatmate had made it searching everywhere, so Jane old me, for the kirsch necessary for authenticity. I was struck by the adultness of it all; living in your own flat, doing your own cooking, searching the shops for bona fide ingredients. By comparison my life was bland, sedate; I was no better than a schoolgirl, still living at home with Mum and Dad. She was independent, I was not. I had never been aware of any difference between us when we were at school, yet now I felt inferior.

Jane had been anxious that the disco wouldn't be good. She needn't have worried, it was superb. Well, that's how it seemed to me. I stayed on the dance floor for ages, partnered by a young man who introduced himself as Richard. He didn't seem to notice my ordinariness or my unfashionable clothes. We went outside for some air and to chat away from the boom of the music. The street was quiet and our breath smoked in the freezing coldness. We talked and laughed and kissed until it was time for me to leave. He was the cherry on the cake, the kirsch in the gateau.

My mother, waiting up for me, asked if it had been a good party. 'It was marvellous,' I told her, but it was beyond me to explain just how wonderful it had been or how it had affected me. In my bedroom I looked at my reflection in the mirror and promised myself that soon I would be part of the student world and no longer living at home.

That December I held my twenty-first party. Jane had finished university and was back home waiting for paperwork to be completed to allow her to do VSO work in West Africa. She came up to Glasgow for the party as I was living there, training to be a teacher. I loved the student life and had made new friends. As for my Richard, my paramour from Jane's party? No one knew who he was. 'A gatecrasher,' said Jane. Never mind. He'd served his purpose.