02:13am

Eric had long given up on trying to decide which of his friends from university was the worst. Mostly because it was inevitable that when he thought about it for long enough, the finger ended up on him. 

"I've invited some of the Billy Boys for your game," Kitty had told him with all the nonchalance she could muster, although she knew that her son was too sharp to be fooled - that was how she'd raised him. He knew exactly what his mother was up to.

The group she was referring to comprised of the haughtiest and most highest-ranking of his friends from Oxford. In first year, they'd started a secret society, and named it The Billy Boys after some folk song Eric couldn't remember anymore. The idea was simple: excess. Drinking 'til they couldn't walk straight, eating until they couldn't walk at all, and screwing girls like it was going out of fashion. To a gaggle of 18-year-olds freshly freed from Mummy and Daddy's watchful eyes, the mindless concept was irresistible.

All the society had amounted to, beyond faux philosophy and latent alcoholism, was cult-like loyalty. Inexplicable allegiance to one another and to the unprincipled principles of elitism, excess and arrogance. In truth, the Billy Boys were part of the reason Eric had gone to London. He preferred to interact with his past in his own time, on his own terms. Around them, Eric wasn't the man Evangeline had come to know. He was lewder, easier to control - usually on account of intoxication - and his morals seemed to slink into an alleyway, letting reckless egotism take the lead. That was why Kitty had invited them to take over the poker game. She loved her son, certainly, but he was so much easier to love when he thought the same way she did.

"So, Milo, you're telling me," Eric laughed, "that you've never donated to a single charity?" The poker game had finished, and fifteen-odd men remained. Milo had been the most eager to strike up the banter, given that he was the victor. Eric laughed and wisecracked along where he could, in a hope that if he told enough jokes, they'd leave sooner, and he could finally spend what was left of his birthday the way he'd wanted to all along – with his Evie.

"Not a shilling," Milo retorted with pride. A diamond heir and sporadic photographer, Miles Selwyn was a perfect stereotype and didn't seem to mind it at all. His slender face gleamed with dastardly pleasure,

"Whole thing's a charade. It's leaving my pocket for some other clever bastard's. I'm a frank man, gents, I say we call a spade a spade."

"A spade's a spade, and a Selwyn's stingy," Eric quipped, smirking into his port to the sound of laughter. Milo winked at him without shame.

"I prefer selectively spendthrift."

Early on, London had taught Eric shame. How to lower his voice when he said his name in the presence of too many people; how to only carry £20 at a time, when he was used to pockets full of hundreds. The Billy Boys easily disregarded feelings like shame, and no matter how he tried, Eric found that his own disgust for it was hard to shake off.

"Have you boys heard about James? St. Hill?" Miles asked with occupied eyes as he shielded the fire lighting his cigar.

"I hear he's been an absolute state since his mum passed."

"I heard he's been living in his father's hotel in London."

The oak-walled room shook with the reverberation of malicious laughter at the misfortune of the poor sod. Eric only remembered the name vaguely from boarding school, but he laughed along all the same.

Really, who 'James' was was of no importance. The group was bound by a shared worldview, in which they were the principal actors, and the lives, tears and tragedies of others were little more than entertainment.

"Bastard's fallen off the wagon," came the darkest voice at the table.

Tom Bathurst had a kind face, but arrogance dripped from his voice like poison. The only thing that threw the unsuspecting bystander off the scent of his immorality was his smile. It was as though all the friendliness he staved off with his cruelty flooded back into his face when he smiled.

"With any luck," Tom went on with a grunt as he propped his feet up on the table's wooden edge, "we'll shake a few wild London nights out of him before the wagon completely runs him over."

Eric, with the rest of the boys, roared with epicurean pleasure. The tragic notion of the downfall of the 'James' character was quickly overshadowed by the prospect of what fun he could give them.

"And Auby can show us the way around London if we get lost..." Tom eyed Eric with false indifference. "I hear you've been up there doing a spot of babysitting..."

"Don't know what you're on about, Bathurst." The spotlight had turned to Eric, and he cursed himself. He swore he would only spend an hour with them at worst, for fear the conversation would wander too far out of his control, or that he would become the person that he couldn't help but become around the Billy Boys. Now it was too late, and he was damned no matter what he said.

Another voice chimed in, although the sound of Eric's heart in his ears didn't let him identify it.

"Aw, don't hold out on us, Auby! You go off the radar somewhere in London, we hear you've found some tigress in Wimbledon, and now you won't even corroborate the rumours?"

When Eric didn't respond, rolling his eyes in hopes of escape, Miles spoke smugly,

"I hear she's a rough regional."

As they probed, Eric he considered his options in a lightning-quick instant,

It occurred to him that he could tell the truth. Tell them about London, about the love of his life, about how much he wanted to live out the rest of his life with her by his side. But surveying the room, the thought left his mind in the same instant it came. If he told them that he'd found a girl who was hope personified, they'd mock him, and her. They wouldn't understand. His Evie was upstairs, safe, and undiscovered by these materialistic, randy bastards – he intended to keep it that way. And so, Eric decided to keep his treasure to himself, and speak a simpler, less honest language that they would find easier to understand.

"Then I'll stop you there," Eric said abruptly. He could feel the leers awaiting his answer, and under the influence of those eyes, and the drink, of course, Auby the Billy Boy emerged. "A gentleman never tells. But I will say... she's got Irish blood, and she gets rough and regional where it counts."

"O-ho-ho! Cheeky Auby!"
"That's our boy!"

Guffaws of randy praise rang all around him. It was abundantly clear that no matter what noble title they held, the Billy Boys were still only boys, and each of them relished their Neverland lives.

"Come on then, Aubs, show us a photo."

"Let's have a look-see at your latest."

Eric let out a coarse laugh, and their salivating mouths assured him that he had made the right decision. Equally, there was a part of him, shy but growing in audacity, that had missed giving in to the lust and pride and greed – the triviality of his boyhood.

He pulled up a photo of Evie, taken on a Thursday afternoon, when she'd gotten up to grab a snack from his kitchen table. She didn't understand why, but it was his absolute favourite photo of her. Mid-bite of a spotty banana, it was her eyes that twinkled with a gleeful smile when she saw him.

"What?" She'd laughed, bounding over to the sofa where he sat to have a look. "Eric, no! I look like I just woke up!"

The way Eric saw it, she looked flawless. Her cheeks were flushed with their ever-present pink, her fiery hair was up in a haphazard bun, and her lithe neck and milky shoulders were left exposed in a strappy vest. His Evie. Gleeful, glowing, and comfortable – just as he always wanted to see her.

The banana innuendo hadn't escaped him, of course. Neither had the gentle swell of her bust at the neckline of the thin cami. To Eric it was incidental, but Auby knew the Billy Boys, and had no doubt as to where their one-track minds would go first.

"Fucking hell, Auby!"

"I'd pay good money to be that banana."

"Christ on a bike, that figure!"

Eric felt a boyish pride at their approval. Inner conflict didn't let him dwell on it too often, but Evangeline was gorgeous beyond belief, with an unmatchable allure that she hardly knew she had. Her heart and mind convinced him that she was the one, but her skin, her lips, her legs, her svelte stomach... the boys were right, even if their word choice was somewhat ignoble.

"You'll have to bring doll face along on a night out, Aubs. I'll bring a couple, too. I've got to see that body in person – Christ." Milo said, the thick, twisting smoke of the cigar smoke obscuring his face. 

Eric laughed his lie. "Just tell me when and where, mate."

"We might have to pop down to London to see your little tigress," came someone else's retort, along with a lewd wiggle of their brows, "oh, and you too, I suppose."

"Alright, alright, keep it gentlemanly," Eric rolled his eyes yet again, self-satisfied. It seemed that under certain circumstances, Eric was still just a boy, too. The boy in him revelled in their lustful praises for her, but as a man, he wanted her nowhere near them. As best as he could, he'd keep Evangeline away from men like Tom and Milo; men who were in fact just boys with trust funds and greedy eyes and entitled hands – men like the man he used to be.

Tom clapped him on the back as he stood to walk over to the bar,

"You know how to pick 'em, Aubs. She looks like a proper good time." When Eric let out a shaky laugh in response, the room's rhythm continued as before, moving on to the next trivial topic. But Tom had caught wind of it – he'd known Eric the longest, and could read him as well as his mother did.

Eric didn't know it, but Tom had already seen Evie. He'd already seen the rose-lipped red-haired girl through the window and connected the dots from the rumours that Eric had brought a girl back from London. It was clear that Eric didn't want the boys to know the girl's whereabouts. Had Tom been another man, decent and kind, he might have left it at a cheeky compliment, and gone his merry way. But Tom was neither of those things.

On the wall by the bar nearest to the elevator doors, there was a little gold touchpad, for sending text-like messages the rooms aboveground. Tom remembered when Eric's mum had it installed – they must have been 15, 16. That was when the games room became a mancave of sorts. With just a few taps, Eric could send off an electronic lie to his mother at 11 at night – to: mum's room: just one more hour mum – before they spent another 3 hours gaming and messing around until the wee hours of the morning.

Tom chuckled to himself as he typed a message now – to: eric's room: come down. want to see you. auby xxx

He didn't know if the system still worked. He wasn't even entirely sure if the girl was staying in Eric's room. But the details weren't of particular importance to him. As he took his seat at the table again, grinning into his glass, he thought of the fun that could come of it. Harmless fun, really.