Chapter 1: The Hangover

Between Us Girls by Natalie Drenovac

Oct 15, 2025

Disclaimer: This story is a work of fiction. The characters, events, companies, places, names, and incidents are either products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance, whether direct or indirect, to actual persons (living or dead), places, events, or businesses is entirely coincidental and unintended. Where reference is made to real locations or historical events, such references are included solely for the purpose of creating a sense of authenticity. They should not be interpreted as depicting real people, their actions, or their conduct. The author expressly disclaims any and all responsibility for any such interpretations or assumptions.

Sunday, June 9

The first thing I register is salt air, the distant crash of waves. Second is that my mouth tastes like we drank Giselle’s entire Bordeaux collection last night and then licked the floor clean.

The third is that I’m naked.

I’m sprawled across what I assume is the main bedroom of Giselle’s Hamptons house, though I can’t recall how I ended up here. Sunlight streams through floor-to-ceiling windows overlooking Mecox Bay. It’s bright. Everything is too bright. My head feels like it’s being split open by a persistent, rusty nail and I have the kind of hangover brewing that makes you question every choice that led to this moment.

My phone is buzzing somewhere in the tangle of heavy cotton sheets, the vibration drilling directly into my parched skull. I find it wedged between two down pillows, the screen already lit with our group chat that’s apparently been active for the past ten minutes.

Carmen: If anyone’s missing any clothing, it’s probably in my room 😅

Emily: I can’t find my underwear anywhere

Giselle: Check the pool deck. Also, I’m making coffee - we’re all going to need it

Miranda: Alex, where are you?

Jess: What the actual fuck happened after I passed out??

I stare at the messages, trying to piece together fragments of last night. There was wine. So much wine. Giselle’s legendary collection that she’d been saving for “a special occasion.” Drinking games that started innocently enough. Never Have I Ever with increasingly personal revelations. Jess taking those edibles she’d brought from the city, giggling uncontrollably until she’d curled up on the outdoor sofa around ten, completely blissed out.

That’s when things got interesting.

The memories start to seep in, each one more intoxicating than embarrassing. Someone, Carmen… I think…Suggesting we take the party to the pool. The collective decision to abandon our clothes for skinny dipping under the stars. Miranda challenging Carmen to a dance-off on the pool deck, music pounding from the outdoor speakers while the rest of us cheered from the water. Miranda and Carmen laughing, water dripping down their bodies, Carmen reaching for her bikini top and then, turning suddenly, and

Miranda and Carmen kissing.

Jesus.

Not a quick, playful kiss either. They locked into something heated and competitive, like they were trying to win. I remember Emily going completely still in the water beside me, watching with an intensity that made my skin prickle. How the air shifted, charged.

Later, Emily emerging from the pool, her mouth finding mine with a hunger that tasted like chlorine and champagne, the way her body responded to my touch, as if she’d been waiting for permission. And then

After that, everything becomes a beautiful blur.

My head is pounding. I need water. Possibly a priest.

I drag myself to the ensuite bathroom and catch sight of myself in the mirror, wedged between the Carrara marble and chrome fixtures. Mistake. My hair looks like I’ve been through a hurricane. There’s what appears to be lipstick on my shoulder and it’s definitely not my shade.

Clothes are scattered across the heated stone floor and there’s a wet bikini top hanging over the lip of the sink. It isn’t mine. Designer, the kind Carmen would wear. I reach for one of the plush towels. There’s a strap-on harness draped over the heated rack like some kind of modern art installation, and my cheeks burn with sudden intensity.

“Miranda said that would be your fantasy,” Emily had whispered later, her breath warm. But I’d known that wasn’t entirely true. Emily had wanted it. Needed it. And I’d been happy to oblige.

The shower helps marginally. I find my jeans still damp and pull on yesterday’s t-shirt. It smells like Emily’s sandalwood perfume and chlorine and something else. Something just her.

I can hear voices in the kitchen, the tap, the clash of coffee cups and peels of laughter. The sounds of people pretending last night was perfectly normal. I take a deep breath and head downstairs. It’s somehow even brighter than the bedroom. Giselle’s house (well her family’s house) is all windows and white wash walls, designed to blur the boundaries. The furniture frames expansive ocean views but is somehow still warm, lived-in.

I guess because it was lived in. The house had been in her family since the 80s….the 1880s. Giselle has been coming here every year since she was a baby and so would her kids and so would theirs. If you asked her where she found an item of furniture, she would smile with genuine warmth and tell you ‘oh, we’ve had it forever’. Giselle had inherited impeccable taste, a sense of self belief she never questioned, and the kind of liquor cabinet no one kept tabs on.

I reach the kitchen. There’s evidence everywhere. Empty bottles scattered across the kitchen island. Shot glasses from our drinking games lined up like tiny soldiers of poor decisions. A sodden wedge of lime on Giselle’s marble dining table. In the living room, wet towels draped over furniture. Someone’s bikini bottom (black…mine) hanging from a lampshade. The outdoor speakers still connected to Spotify, frozen on what looks like Carmen’s playlist.

I follow the voices to the wraparound deck and find them arranged around teak furniture like figures in a support group.

Carmen in oversized Celine sunglasses and a silk robe, scrolling through her phone with the ease of someone who wakes up after nights like this regularly.

Emily wrapped in linen staving off the June heat, hair mussed in ways that make me want to reach out and touch it.

Miranda already composed, every blonde hair smoothed into place. She’s wearing a white dress that looks both casual and couture, makeup perfect. How she manages this after last night is beyond me.

Jess was the only honest one, sitting there in yoga pants like, “What the fuck did I miss?”

“The walking wounded arrives,” Giselle says, sliding a steaming mug toward the empty chair. She’s wearing a vintage Hermès scarf as a headband and is somehow making a hangover look chic.

“I feel like I’ve been hit by a Jitney,” I manage, settling into the chair. My head throbs in protest.

“You all look like you’ve been hit by something,” Jess says, scanning our faces with sharp curiosity. “And I have FOMO like you wouldn’t believe.”

“A very sexy Jitney,” Carmen adds without looking up, and Emily’s cheeks flush pink.

“So.” Miranda sets down her mug. “Last night.”

She says it like she’s acknowledging the weather, not the fact that we all had sex twelve hours ago while our friend was passed out on the couch.

“Well, I’ll be the first to say it. Last night was incredible,” Carmen says, finally looking up. Her smile is lazy, satisfied.

“Last night was...” Emily starts, then stops, hands wrapped around her mug.

“What I can remember of it,” I finish, though the fragments I do remember are seared into my memory with embarrassing clarity.

“Okay, stop, I need details,” Jess says, leaning forward. “Because the last thing I remember was Carmen doing some kind of professional-level dance routine.

Carmen laughs. “You missed the skinny dipping, the dance-off sequel, and” She gestures vaguely at all of us. “The aftermath.”

“The aftermath,” Miranda repeats, and there’s something in her voice I can’t quite read.

Here’s what nobody was saying: What the fuck do we do now?

The conversation flows after that. Carmen describes what she remembers, making Jess howl with laughter. The way she tells it, we were graceful and glamorous instead of drunk and stumbling. Emily shares stories about David’s latest project. He’s selling some celebrity’s estate, working insane hours. But she keeps stealing glances at me when she thinks no one’s watching.

Miranda’s watching too, I realise.

Jess regales us with her latest dating catastrophe. A hedge fund guy who turned out to be married with twins. “I swear to god, every man in this city is either married, emotionally unavailable, or both,” she says, and we all laugh.

Giselle refills coffee, somehow managing to sweep away evidence of our night without making it feel like judgment. I start washing up wine glasses but she tells me to stop “don’t worry about that” she says, smooth and certain, “it will get done.” Ethan is arriving later, her boyfriend, the one who makes her laugh in a way I’ve never seen before and I get the sense she is politely moving us along. Not exactly showing us the door, but getting there.

I try to organise the fragments of what I remember. The communal dinner we’d prepared. Emily’s coq au vin, Carmen’s truffle pasta we were already too drunk to eat, my Australian pavlova that somehow didn’t collapse. Normal conversation. Until the drinking games started and things got progressively more revealing.

That kiss by the pool that started everything else. I feel sick. I feel…

I look at my wife sitting easily in the sun, sipping coffee next to the woman I had sex with last night. She doesn’t look like she feels sick. She looks incredibly calm. Suddenly, I remember Miranda mentioning last week that she thought Emily was attracted to me. “If anything were to happen, I’d be totally fine with it,” she’d said over dinner, which had seemed bizarre then and honestly still seemed bizarre now. I hadn’t felt any attraction to Emily at all. She was my friend’s friend, the married one with kids.

“More coffee?” Giselle asks in a voice that sounds more like ‘goodbye, safe trip home’. We politely take the hint.

“I should probably find my clothes,” Carmen says, gathering her robe. She stretches, completely comfortable. We all start to move, the morning spell gently breaking.

Jess laughs. “Good luck. From the group chat, it sounds like they’re scattered across three zip codes.”

“This weekend was…” Emily starts, then laughs. “I don’t even have words. I..”

Carmen cuts her off. “The best kind of weekend. That’s all.”

We drain the last of the coffee and drift toward our rooms to pack, to shower, to begin the process of returning to real life. Downstairs, I can hear Giselle’s house keeper slowly, methodically, washing away our evening.

My phone buzzes. Private message.

Emily: Can we talk later? Away from everyone else?

Chapter 2: read now

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