And so it was that they found themselves in a bar in Bath Street, one of the cooler drinking areas of town. Unfortunately, the bar in question was so cool that it was heaving, and the queue at the bar was three deep.

"What do we do if we see someone we know?" Charlie whispered worriedly to Thea. Knowing her luck, she would run into a colleague. Like Aaron.

Thea had thought of this. "We'll tell them it's actually one of the other girl's hen nights and you wanted to try on the get-up to see what it's like. People will believe that."

"Sadly, that's true," Charlie sighed. People truly would believe she was that pathetic.

They appeared to be the only hen party in situ anyway, she noted, looking around. She could see no one else wearing a sparkly veil and "Bride to Be" banner crossing her chest as if she was a contestant in Miss World. Thankfully, people in Glasgow were so used to hen parties that they barely looked at her. Although perhaps she should be insulted about that. If no one noticed her, then how could she pull?

"Ah, it's a condemned woman!" A man lurched up beside her. A rather drunken and unattractive man. This was not the kind that she was looking to pull, that was for sure. Well, she could accept the drunken bit, but for all this trouble, she wanted a looker. Someone tall and dark, with sparkling brown eyes and a single dimple and . . . argh!!! Get that prick out of your head, she screamed at herself.

Although if she could find a lookalike who wasn't an arse, well, that would be okay. Maybe he had a twin, and Aaron was the evil one.

"Would you like to dance?" Her facially challenged suitor was slurring and his breath, right in her face, was a rank combination of whisky and garlic. The heady scent almost made her spew.

"Really, really not," she replied carefully, turning away and making an expression of horror in the direction of her friends. "Oh my god," she gasped to Thea. "He fell out of the ugly tree and hit every branch on the way down," she giggled. "And found time to eat some garlic bread en route."

"Hey!" he shouted. "I heard that."

Charlie wasn't even embarrassed. She'd had just enough alcohol to let her inhibitions go. "Oops," she laughed in his face. Thea grabbed her and dragged her to the other end of the bar in case Lurch lashed out.

"I know you're drunk already," Thea muttered at her through gritted teeth. "But at this rate you'll be beaten up before you can even attempt to pull. Try and be a bit nicer, eh?"

"Yes sir!" Charlie saluted, and sat down on the edge of a booth. It belonged to a group of guys, but she needed a seat urgently and she was beyond actually asking whether or not they actually minded.

“Um . . . hi?” The voice in her ear made her jump and she nearly fell off the seat. A hand grabbed her gently by the elbow and steadied her. She turned to see the group of guys looking at her, some smiling and others a bit confused.

“If you’re going to join us, you should probably introduce yourself” laughed the man who had spoken to her first and then prevented her from falling to the floor.  He was very good looking with bright blue eyes and an amazing smile and . . . he was wearing a wedding ring. Oh well. “I’m Alex, your name is . . .?”

“Charlotte,” Charlie replied definitively. That made sense. She was playing a fake character, she should use a different name. Okay, it was her actual name but she didn't generally use it so it would be like she was someone else. 

He held out a hand to shake. “Nice to meet you, Charlotte.” He gestured around the table at the other four men sitting there. “Dean, Rob, Jake and Alex. Yep, there’s two of us. Must have been a popular name 30 years ago.”

“There were three other Charlottes in my class at school and it was very confusing - we never knew which one of us was in trouble with the teacher,” Charlie giggled. “Of course, there probably will be even more now thanks to the newest Princess.” All five men looked confused. “Never mind - hi, it’s nice to meet you all! Sorry for just crashing your table like this but my feet are killing me.”

“Well, it appears to be your big night so we are honoured it’s our booth you decided to crash,” one of the other men said. Dean-or-Rob possibly. Their faces were all sort of meshing together in Charlie’s drunken hazy vision. She also had no idea what he was talking about . . . oh wait, she was the hen. She really needed to start remembering that.

“Oh yes, it’s all about me tonight,” she rambled. She realised she had absolutely no idea what to say now. She might be the queen of verbal vomit but sometimes her small talk button just wouldn’t engage. Especially when it came to flirting. And did she even want to be flirting with these guys? Alex number one was married anyway and she was struggling to keep focussed on the other ones long enough to even see what they looked like. In fact, she was now having a bit of stage fright and just wanted to escape. This suddenly all seemed like a very bad idea.

“Hey!” Her best friend had appeared at her side, Thea to the rescue as usual. Charlie stifled her sigh of relief and smiled widely at the table. 

“This is my very best friend in the whole wide world and the most gorgeous person you could ever hope to meet, everyone. This is Thea.” She swung an arm around her friend and Thea took the opportunity to use this move to pull Charlie out of the booth, and back onto the floor. 

“I’m just going to remove this little hen and give you some peace,” Thea smiled at the guys as she started to drag Charlie away. “You need to sober up a bit,” she hissed through clenched teeth. “You’re not even going to make it into a club at this rate.”

“Were any of them hot?” Charlie asked, barely registering Thea’s words. 

“I didn’t get a proper look but they certainly hadn’t fallen out of the same ugly tree as that bloke earlier.” This earned a confused look from Charlie, who had already forgotten her rude comments from ten minutes before. Lurch certainly hadn’t though as he was still glaring at her from the corner of the bar. 

Oops.

---------------------

Thea was concerned. Charlie was already pretty drunk and not in a good way.

Having known her for a long time, Thea knew all of the stages of Drunk Charlie.

First there was giggly tipsy Charlie, followed by happy drunken Charlie . . . then at some point this would descend into way-too-drunk-and-can’t-actually-function Charlie. The tipping point was getting close and if she went over the edge there would be no going back.

On top of that, when Charlie reached that last stage she went from fun-loving and vivacious to maudlin, insecure and paranoid. And Thea absolutely hated seeing her lovely best friend feeling like she wasn’t worth anything; all she wanted in the world was for her to be happy . . . and to find her happy ending. 

Okay, so this plan probably wasn’t going to be the direct route to it, given any fling that might result from it was going to based on lies from the outset, but Thea had thought it up in the hope that it would provide Charlie with the confidence boost she so desperately needed. The stuff with Aaron (prick) had really messed with her head and, although she tried to put a brave face on it, Thea knew Charlie had been gutted by the way he’d treated her. It had been a real kick to her ego, and that had been frail enough to start with.

So she had to make sure she sobered Charlie up a bit or the plan was doomed to fail before it had even began.

“Come on.” She pulled Charlie through the throngs at the bar and immediately caught a barman’s attention. “Can I have a large glass of water please? And a can of Coke? Oh, and three shots of sambucca? Thanks.”

“Ooooh, shots!” Charlie’s eyes lit up and she reached for one of the tiny shot glasses.

“Oh, no you don’t.” Thea slapped her hand away. “Drink that water, hopefully it’ll dilute the alcohol in your system already. And then the Coke to give you a wee dose of sugar.”

“But what about the shots?” Charlie wailed.

“They’re for me,” Thea said grimly, knocking all three back in quick succession. “I’m still almost completely sober.”

While Charlie grumped alongside her, glaring at the empty shot glasses while she reluctantly drained her glass of water, Thea closed her eyes for a minute, enjoying the aniseed taste and the warmth that was spreading rapidly from her throat through her body. She could feel all her own troubles melting away. 

That was more like it.

---------------------

Forty five minutes later they were at a cheesy eighties and nineties club and Charlie was back on top form - annoyed as she had been by Thea making her chug water and cola, it had definitely helped her get back on track. In the meantime, the shots had helped Thea loosen up a bit and the two of them were happily dancing to “Papa Don’t Preach” in the middle of the floor, plastic wine glasses raised to the sky as they belted out the chorus. Possibly not the most appropriate song in the world to be effectively toasting to but they were enjoying themselves too much to care.

Charlie could see Kate over in the corner kissing a hot guy, albeit one who looked like he had possibly sneaked in using a fake ID and even Keri had loosened up and looked like she was having fun - shocker! She was having such a great time now that she wasn’t even sure she needed a guy. She would be quite happy to dance and drink until they were chucked out at closing time, grab a kebab on the way home, and wake up on the couch spooning aforementioned kebab the next day.

“I need the loo,” Thea announced. “I think I have the world’s tiniest bladder.”

There was a pause in the music just as she said it and the people nearest their little dance bubble overheard. Thea looked mortified for a split second and then burst into peals of laughter. She pressed her empty glass into Charlie’s hand. “Another wine, please, wench!” she cried, and then danced away in the direction of the loos.

Charlie headed to the bar, wondering if Thea was alright. She was behaving really out of character all of a sudden. Thea rarely did embarrassing things and so, when she did, she didn’t cope with them very well. Telling everyone in the vicinity about the size of her bladder was not something she would normally deal with so her reaction was very unusual. 

She had just ordered another two vino blancos when someone brushed against her side. “Hey,” a voice said huskily in her ear. She looked up in surprise - she was pretty sure it was one of the guys from the bar earlier. She had no idea which one. She couldn’t even remember their names now.

“We met earlier, kind of,” he smiled at her. “I’m Jake.”

“H-hi!” How had she missed him before? He was delightful. Dark blond hair, slate grey eyes . . . and oh my goodness, that smile!!! To be fair, back in the bar, all of their faces had been merging together but now she was a bit more with it, she could see this guy was pretty much perfection.

What a shame she was getting married . . .

No, wait, she wasn’t. 

But he thought she was. And yet here he was, apparently interested.

Time to see how this one played out . . .

“So. . . what’s your story?” she asked, coyly, picking up the wine glass which had been placed in front of her and taking a sip. She was hoping she sounded cool, calm, collected. Like an old school movie star. In reality, she probably just sounded drunk.

He shrugged, still smiling. “It’s still being written. I’m a sucker for a plot twist though.”

“I’m more about the happy ending myself,” she replied flirtatiously, tossing her hair, feeling herself falling into those unusual eyes. Those eyelashes. The perfect eyebrows. She was immediately feeling quite smitten. “But seriously . . . tell me about yourself.”

“What do you want to know? I’m 30, I’m a lawyer . . . and I live nearby.” He raised one of those eyebrows - was this a signal? Suggestive? Quizzical? “Yourself?”

“I’m 29 and I’m a boring administrator by day . . . but by night I’m Wonderwoman.”

Both eyebrows shot up this time and Charlie bit back a gasp, wondering where the hell her suggestive comment had just came from. It was utterly unlike her to be so forward. But needs must and all that . . . and he was bloody hot.

He reached out and lightly stroked her bare arm and she struggled to get her breathing in check. Aaron who? Tonight was all about Jake.

“Where are your friends?” she asked huskily, her voice catching a bit in her throat. She drained some more sauvignon, hoping for a bit of French courage. Something to help her see this through. Because she was definitely wanting something to happen here, but she was scared. She didn’t want to overstep the mark, or simply be imagining there was a mutual attraction here. 

“Not sure. Don’t really care.” He stepped closer to her. Her heartbeat ramped up. She looked down, convinced she would be able to physically see it trying to beat its way out of her chest. She couldn’t. It did however have the effect of making him also look down at her chest. Only for a moment, before his gaze returned to her eyes. To her lips. It was an all-encompassing look. She felt like she was turning to jelly.

“You’re really beautiful.” His hand was suddenly in her hair, twirling a blonde lock around his fingers, before it slid down her neck to her shoulder. She shivered. “Your eyes are amazing; I love green eyes.”

“Thanks.” She couldn’t really think of anything else to say, any witty rejoinders. But she had a feeling she didn’t need to come up with anything else. He was very much in control and all she needed to do was agree.

So she smiled at him and turned her face up towards him and he leaned in and kissed her.

That was all it took.