Something had changed about her, but Felix couldn’t work out what it was.
“I’ve got an absolutely brilliant idea,” Rima finally said. “Let’s play Don’t Get Me Started.”
“Noooooo,” Leah moaned, just as Kasper crowed, “Yes! Leah has to go first! Last time was classic!” He told Harriet, “The idea is to give someone a topic, like global warming or Ant and Dec, and see how long they can rant about it. Leah absolutely smashed it last time – she managed to complain about ‘the calendar’ for seven hours!”
“October really should be the eighth month,” Leah said sullenly.
Lisa had loved this game, before she disintegrated. She was always the best at it, when Kasper brought her along to play.
“What’s the topic?” Felix asked. He always invigilated when they played party games – it was his universally accepted position. Otherwise they’d get nowhere. “How about ‘the Tooth Fairy’?”
This was so obviously the right choice that Leah, a glint of simmering rage already visible in her eyes, began talking immediately. She passed Claudia to Kasper, who juggled the baby with expertise gained from decades of babysitting.
“Don’t get me started on this bloody Tooth Fairy nonsense. I hate it!” Leah began. “You want to know why? Firstly, it’s immoral to lie to children. I know it’s a cliché, but socially speaking…”
Felix found himself zoning out the longer she spoke. By the time Leah had finished, his buzz had died down.
“Way to harsh my mellow,” Rima muttered. “You’ve officially ruined that game, Leah. That was the worst two hours of my life.”
“It was only forty minutes, technically,” Felix pointed out. “Unless you’re taking into account the time-dilating effects of boredom.”
Kasper started laughing at Felix, despite himself. He tipped his head back, revealing the underside of his jaw. “You get so articulate when you’re drunk. ‘Vodka increases my productivity by thirteen per cent, I’ll have you know’,” he said in Felix’s voice, adjusting invisible glasses.
“Hey,” Felix said, and then, a beat later, “Yeah, all right. I get slightly more effusive when I’m drunk.”
“Effusive!” Kasper repeated, delighted.
Sometime later, Felix realized that Harriet and Kasper were missing. He wandered into the next room and found them wrapped in each other’s arms.
A long groan tugged its way from Kasper’s throat. If Felix had to choose a word to describe their kissing style, it would be … frantic. Desperate. Hungry.
Felix’s heart was pounding: a dull throb of pain racing in his chest. He took three deep breaths and twisted away, unable to watch.
Harriet closed her eyes, ignoring him. He wanted to tell her that Kasper was his, that she couldn’t touch him – but he had no right to. He couldn’t justify how much he hated the flow of her hands over Kasper’s skin, tracing the lines of the muscles running over his ribs – and Felix was watching him again. He needed to look away. Right now.
Harriet was so much better than him. Felix couldn’t compete. It wasn’t like he was even trying.
Rima bumped into his back and gasped, tugging him back out of the room. Felix wasn’t watching, he wasn’t, he wasn’t, he wasn’t…
He wasn’t picturing what they were going to do in there. He wasn’t.
Felix wasn’t drunk enough for this.
Felix was crying.
“Oh,” Rima said, distraught on his behalf. “Oh no!”
She wrapped her arms around him, pulling him down to her level.
Felix sobbed into her shoulder, and when Rima tugged Leah closer, he pulled her into the hug, too, dropping a kiss onto Claudia’s baby-warm head.
“I hate this so much,” he said, snotty and embarrassed. He rubbed tears from his eyelashes, and his hands came away wet.
“I know,” Rima said, pained. “I know.”
HARRIET
Harriet tugged down Kasper’s trousers, toppling backwards with him onto the mattress. She was suddenly starving with the need for touch and attention.
The energy from the Shell was doing something strange inside her. It wasn’t like being drunk any more. It was like overdosing. Harriet had to pay absolute attention to keeping the energy under control, or it would start oozing out of her pores in a golden glow.
Her brain was running on double-time, struggling to keep up with the flow of information coming from her nerves. It made her jumpy and desperate, but the feel of Kasper’s fingers on her skin gave her something human to focus on.
Kasper was moaning quiet exhales of noise into the pit of her neck. She dug her nails into his back, guiding him inside her. This was exactly what she needed to stop the energy taking over completely. It was lying dormant beneath her skin like an unexploded bomb. She still hadn’t worked out whether she’d gained a power from the Shell at all.
“Harriet,” Kasper moaned, gasping into her mouth.
She rolled him over, cupping one hand over his mouth as she climbed on top of him.
“Just – quiet,” she hissed.
He lay silent, staring up at her. Throwing her head back, Harriet tried to pretend that he wasn’t there.
When he groaned long and low below her, she bit down on the urge to tell him that she wasn’t done, and twisted her hips.
Shuddering, she finally came. She didn’t know whether she was imagining the calming of her molecules, the reduction of the buzz of her energy. When she opened her eyes again, Kasper was gaping up at her with wide, amazed eyes. She didn’t want him to look at her. She didn’t want him to see this. This was for her, not for him.
His expression changed, then. He looked confused – and scared? Why would he be scared?
She glanced down. Her body, from head to toe, had turned clear. Wherever Kasper’s limbs rested against hers, there was only air.
She was see-through. She was invisible! The Shell’s power must have manifested!
Harriet had a moment of joy, and then pure fury swept over her – because this wasn’t
