The Tactician

Chloe and I stared at each other in silence. Equipped with a glass of wine and a grave expression, time was running out to put into words our most crushing defeat. What I was about to hear did not call for some dainty sip and I steeled myself for the worst whilst polishing off the glass.

“She’s bloody brilliant, isn’t she?”

I nodded languidly in mock defeat, unable to stop the inexorable advance of a belly laugh.

“Life’s unfair, Chloe. The girl’s an angel!”

It was an injustice of biblical proportions; the new girlfriend of the boy I had been in love with for the last year had the audacity to be a lovely human being. 

This tragic turn of events had begun with a surprise attack. Our friendship group’s week-long road trip across the UK had been invaded by this stunning interloper– Jason was a handsome guy, but even for him this took the piss.

Reeling from this cowardly but effective strategy, I summoned Chloe to an impromptu war room to mount a counteroffensive. We proceeded to set feminism back a few paces by insinuating that a girl of her aesthetic superiority must have something terribly wrong with her– the word ‘flatulence’ may or may not have been bandied around.

Ill prepared for her welcoming demeanour, engaging conversation and active listening, our excursion ended in absolute defeat. And here we are now, a few days later, getting drunk in a beer garden, magnanimously awaiting her arrival. Aided by our rapidly dwindling supply of alcohol, we found the whole thing painfully amusing.

My last hurrah didn’t exactly have the desired effect I was hoping for, and whilst fighting for breath I accidentally took Chloe out with friendly-fire.

“What exactly does she have that I don’t, anyway?”

Chloe doubled over in physical pain as I feverishly looked for anything on the table I could metamorphose into a projectile.

“Don’t you fucking answer that, Chloe!!”

Several peanuts underwent that miraculous transformation and took to the air. With her defences compromised by howls of laughter, Chloe was unable to properly evade said artillery and accidentally ejected herself from the bench. This did nothing to help alleviate the painful cheeks I was nursing, and it was then, amongst the hubbub of Chloe’s abrupt descent, that the lady in question emerged from our flank.

“Jesus, how much have you girls had to drink?”

She’d cunningly infiltrated our little debrief by enthusiastically accepting our invitation to come. She was a menace.

“We were just talking about you, actually!”

Melody chuckled as she unsuccessfully tried to unpack this ridiculous tableau: me laughing like a lunatic and Chloe, coated with peanut shrapnel, giving her best wounded soldier impression in the grass.

“Oh, charming!”

After helping Chloe up, our new recruit distributed fresh munitions to us in the form of colourful curly straws. Armed and ready we stared down the enemy that had foolishly pursued Melody onto the battlefield. The large plastic cocktail pitcher stood no chance, at all.