#benjy4

Caitriona was beginning to consider the possibility that she had made a miscalculation. She’d thought nothing could be worse than staying in her townhouse that did not quite feel like home where she had so many things to do but nothing to hold her attention; she’d been wrong. She still didn’t know what was in the punch, but it was clear that it was having a marked effect on those who’d imbibed. It seemed like every other conversation she found herself caught in was a stream of consciousness-esque inner monologue made outer. It was giving Caitriona a headache. 

When she started to feel like she couldn’t take it anymore, Caitriona slipped out of the main room, through a set of double doors to a shadowed, open air balcony. The winter night was cold, colder than Caitriona would normally have preferred, but it was bracing, too. Caitriona leaned against the railing and closed her eyes, breathing deeply, trying to gather herself before she began to shiver. Perhaps it was simply time to leave. She’d spent a couple hours at the party by now, that, at least, was time she wasn’t wandering her empty rooms in Kensington.