Shelly hadn't been tempted to continue her experiments with mixing drinks, despite her bravado. Half an hour after finishing the first bottle of wine, however, Hannah announced that there was another bottle in the fridge, and Shelly hadn't turned down the offer.

"Sacha, you gotta help us with this one" she said.

Sacha demurred. "I think I'm drunk by osmosis" she said.

Hannah furrowed her brow. "What does that even mean!" she shrieked with laughter. She got three glasses off the shelf.

"Oh, we're being classy now?" Shelly joked as she took one of the glasses from Hannah's hand. She reached up her other hand to grasp Hannah's briefly, and gazed into Hannah's eyes. She giggled, and switched her attention to the bottle. "Well open it, then!"

Hannah poured Shelly a glass, then she poured Sacha one too, and gave it to her. Sacha sighed, but she didn't say no. "Anyway, it's your turn" Hannah said. "'Fess up."

They'd been talking about hopeless and awkward boys who'd had crushes on them in high school. No particular reason, Hannah and Shelly were just drunk and that was the topic they'd stumbled upon. For obvious reasons Sacha doubted that her stories would be as amusing as Hannah's or Shelly's, but they were both looking at her expectantly now, so she searched through her memory.

"Well there was this boy when I was in Year Eight" Sacha began.

"Oh yeah?"

"I mean I was just a kid then, I wasn't even interested in dating anybody . . ."

"Yeah, right!"

"But he just got fixated upon me. I mean he'd just stare at me all through class. He wouldn't even pretend that he wasn't!"

"They're like ducklings" Shelly said, "they just get you in their head then they can't take their eyes away."

"Yeah, and they think you're their mother" Hannah added sardonically.

"But I mean, he never actually said anything to me" Sacha continued. "I didn't even know his name! It was Roger, or something like that. He just stared. That's all he did."

"Then what happened?" Shelly asked.

"He moved to the U.S. with his family."

"That's it?"

"Yeah."

Hannah frowned. "No offence, Sacha" she said, "but that's a pretty lame story."