Ow, my head. Ow. Ow. Ow.

Ow.

My head.

I’m going to kill Tash. This always happens when I go out with her. Even my hair hurts. And I’m naked. Why didn’t I put my pyjamas on or at least a t-shirt? I hate sleeping naked, it’s weird. And I wasn’t even that drunk, was I? I almost always manage to take off my make-up, clean my teeth and put my pyjamas on. My stomach clenches with panic – did I bring my bag back? I can’t remember. I’m not going to get out of bed and check though. There’s nothing very exciting in it anyway.

I stretch my legs down the bed and feel a strain in my inner thighs. Shit. Did I have sex? No, I didn’t have sex, fuck’s sake. Did I? There’s definitely a strange feeling… down there. God. I shouldn’t be having sex if I’m calling it ‘down there’.

Tash didn’t have me leapfrogging bollards again, did she? No. I’d remember that, surely.

I open one eye and look at the bed next to me. Empty pillow. No Max. He plays football first thing on a Saturday morning and gets out of bed with more enthusiasm than he has for, well, pretty much anything else.

Oh my god.

Max.

Oh no.

I tried to seduce Max. I roll over and bury my face in the pillow until the image of me flinging my leg over the back of the sofa recedes. Ow. My head. God. The shame. I’m going to kill Tash. This is all her fault. I don’t know why I always let her make me feel so insecure. Although she’d say she couldn’t make me feel insecure if I didn’t already. Or something. But it’s hard to feel sexy when you’ve got a best friend that men – and sometimes women – would merrily knock you down just to talk to.

And I do sometimes think that I want what Tash has. She’s right about how I’m lazy, how I’d rather spend the evening in my pyjamas watching Friends than shagging frantically in some club loo somewhere. But I do sometimes think that a club loo would be okay every now and again. As long as it was clean.

But of course I couldn’t seduce Max. What was I even thinking? That kind of thing needs a build-up, preparation, planning. If I was on the sofa eating Doritos and he staggered over and flopped his knob over the back, I wouldn’t be so keen either, would I? But, God, he didn’t even look at me. I’d have looked at least. And then said, ‘Put that away.’

I curl up in the foetal position. I’ve felt pretty invisible around him for a while, but that? That was humiliating.

I don’t know how much longer I lie there. I cry a bit – the tears running into my ears. I massage my head doing the fingertip Shiatsu thing Tash insists cures all her hangovers. Which is probably bullshit, much like her encouraging sex chat. I reach down and fumble around my inner thighs until I find the source of the pain – a rough bit, feels like a carpet burn, from the back of the sofa. Only I could get a carpet burn without actually getting any sex. Ugh.

Oh god. I can’t even bear to think about sex. If Tash thought I was repressed before…

I stare at the ceiling. It needs painting and there’s a cobweb the size of a small car in one corner. Everything is shit. I should just stay here until I die. It probably won’t be long.

My phone buzzes frantically on the bedside table and after I’ve said ‘Ow’ a few more times, I grab it and hold it up in front of my face, head throbbing at the brightness of the screen. It’s from Tash. Of course it is.

She’s added an emoji with swirly eyes.

Bit bloody late if I didn’t, isn’t it? My eyes feel a bit swirly, actually. They’re certainly not working properly. I screw them up tight, but when I open them again I’ve got purple dots floating across my vision.

I tap the phone screen to reply, but something’s wrong. I can’t see my finger. I close and open my eyes again but it’s still the same. A migraine. Typical. I had a visual migraine once years ago. That time I had a sort of wobbly water effect in the corner of my eye. This is worse. I can’t see my hand at all. What was even in those cocktails? The waiter probably put in double measures in the hope that I’d go home and leave him with Tash. Or he was trying to get Tash pissed and I was collateral damage.

I lift my other hand up, but I can’t see that either. What the hell? I can see the phone, but neither of my hands. I put the phone down on the bed then pick it up and try again. No. Phone, but no hands. It looks like the phone’s floating in the air. What the actual hell?

I sit up so fast that it makes the inside of my head slide like a bag of shopping in the boot of a car. I grab my temples with both hands and wait for it to stop hammering. While I wait, I look down at myself. I can’t see anything. I hold one arm out in front of me. It’s not there. I pull the duvet back. Nothing. I can see the sheet, but not my legs.

I’m still asleep. I must be.

I slap myself in the face. Fucking OW.

Someone must have spiked my drink. That would explain the really stupid seduction attempt. That would explain… whatever the hell is going on now.

I carefully swing my legs out of bed and tentatively cross the room to my mirror. Big, free-standing, full-length mirror in the corner of my room. There’s no reflection. No. That’s not true. There is a reflection of my room. There’s no reflection of me.

Apparently I’m fucking invisible.

I don’t know how long I’ve been standing staring at nothing, but I think it’s probably been a while. I’ve been expecting to wake up – obviously, despite the slap, I must be asleep – but no. And then I figured it probably was something in my drink that made me temporarily randomly blind or has given me some sort of psychosis or something, but there’s been no change yet. I need to go and drink a huge glass of water, maybe get something to eat. Right on cue, my stomach rumbles and I put my hand on it.

It feels really weird. Not my stomach – that feels the same as usual: softer than I’d like it to be – but it is weird to feel my stomach under my hand but not be able to see it. The amount of times I’ve stood in front of this mirror naked, grabbing my stomach with both hands. Or turning to the side and sucking it in and then pooching it out. Or looking at my arse and thighs to see whether they’ve magically shrunk or got any more toned. And now I can’t see any of it. Weird.

I put my other hand on my stomach and run both hands across my waist, down over my hips and then up again to my boobs. This is when I would usually hoik my boobs higher, just a couple of inches, so they’re pointing forward instead of down. But today I just run my hands over them instead. It feels nice. They feel nice.

But I can’t stand here feeling myself up. I need to work out what the hell’s happened to me and how I can fix it.

I start by getting myself a glass of water. If this is a hangover – or someone did spike my drink – getting it out of my system is the obvious first step. I pick up a glass and my stomach clenches as I watch it float through the air. It is the weirdest thing I’ve ever seen. I can feel it in my hand. I can feel my arm moving. But the glass looks like it’s moving by itself. If this is a dream it’s a really fucking cool one.

Back in the bedroom, I figure I need to work out how this whole invisibility thing works. I’ve seen TV shows where someone’s become invisible and it’s as if they’re made of glass – they still obviously have a form and you can sort of see their outline. And if, say, they stood in front of the TV, the TV would be blocked, but by something you can’t see. But that doesn’t seem to be the same for me. I can see through myself.

I stand in front of the mirror again, holding the glass of water I got myself in the kitchen. I can only see the glass. Well, and the water. But I can’t see me. No part of me. I drink some, half expecting to see the water travelling down inside my body but a) the water disappears as soon as it touches my mouth and b) the idea makes me feel so disorientated that I have to sit down. I probably need to eat something. I’m getting lightheaded. Or maybe I’m having a stroke?

My phone buzzes on the bedside table. It’s Tash ringing, probably because I didn’t answer her text. I’m still in front of the mirror, but sitting on the bed, so I see the phone travel up to where my ear should be. Where my ear IS. I just can’t see it. Which may be why I hit myself in the side of the head with the phone.

‘Hey!’ Tash says, when I answer. ‘I was starting to worry. Have you only just got up?’

I stare at my lack of reflection. ‘Tash. Something really weird has happened.’

‘Bad weird or good weird? You sound funny. Are you ok?’

‘Sort of. I mean… no. I’m not. But… I was going to say don’t worry, but I don’t know, maybe—’

‘Bloody hell, Iz,’ she says. ‘You’re scaring me! What’s wrong?’

I take a deep breath. I can’t believe I’m going to say this, but I know I have to. ‘I’m sort of… invisible.’

There’s silence on the other end of the phone and then I hear Tash snort. ‘Jesus, you had me there for a minute. What do you mean? What’s he done?’

‘No, nothing to do with Max. I’m serious.’ I stand up and look in the mirror again. There’s nothing to see. ‘I know it sounds completely mental. I don’t expect you to believe me. But I’m in front of the mirror and I’ve got no reflection.’

‘Like a vampire? Are you hungover?’

‘Yes. Well, I mean, I was. I’m fine now. The adrenaline, I think. And I’ve just had a pint of water. I thought maybe someone spiked my drink…’

‘And it made you invisible?’ She sounds incredulous, unsurprisingly.

‘No, it made me think I was invisible. But, I don’t know, it’s not getting any better. I’m sitting in front of the mirror now and I’m just… not there. I know this sounds ridiculous, but it’s happening, Tash! I mean, it’s happened! Really!’

‘You’re serious,’ she says calmly. ‘You’re seriously telling me you’re invisible?’

‘Yes!’ I flop back on the bed again. ‘Can you come round?’

‘I’ll be there in ten minutes.’

Tash is kidding herself – she lives at least twenty minutes away and that’s on a good day – so I decide a shower might, I don’t know, wash the invisibility off? I can hear my mum in my head saying ‘A bath will make you feel better’ whenever I was ill as a kid. She thinks water cures everything. Water and fresh air. And an early night. What the fuck would she say about this? ‘Typical Isabel. None of my friends’ daughters have ever become invisible. You always have to be different, don’t you?’ And then she’d suggest a nice silk scarf to set off my lack of visible neck.

It’s an incredibly weird experience watching the water running off your body when you can’t see your body. But I find that I actually can see my shape under the water. I hold my leg up and the water pouring off it shows me the shape of my leg. I do the same with my arm. It’s strangely hypnotic and I bend myself into some ridiculous positions trying to see the rest of me. I manage to see one boob at a time, but I can’t do both at once – the water shoots off sideways instead. I close my eyes while I wash myself and almost convince myself it’s not real. I can feel my body under my hands, my hands on my body and then I have to stop because it’s almost—

‘Izzy?’ Tash shouts from my bedroom door.

She’s got a key to the flat – she’s had it for years, since before I even started going out with Max. He used to complain when she let herself in, but he gave up after a while.

‘Bathroom!’ I call back, turning the water off.

The bathroom door opens and Tash says, ‘Are you okay?’

‘How did you get here so quickly?’ I’m pretty sure I haven’t been in the bathroom longer than ten minutes.

‘Never mind that now. Are you okay?’

‘Do you mean “Are you still invisible?”’ I say.

‘Yeah. Well. I mean, “Do you still think you’re invisible, you knobhead?”’

I pull the shower curtain back and Tash screams.

I look down at myself to make sure she’s screaming because she can’t see me, not because she can. Yes, still invisible.

‘What the fucking fuck, Izzy?!’ I don’t think I’ve ever seen her look so shocked. She’s usually pretty unflappable.

‘I did tell you,’ I say, surprisingly calmly.

‘I know you did, but I didn’t fucking believe it!’

She staggers across the small bathroom and drops down heavily on the loo seat. ‘You can’t be invisible.’

‘I know. But I am. You can’t see anything at all?’

She stares at me. Or at where she thinks I am, which is slightly left of where I actually am.

She shakes her head. ‘Just sort of… droplets. In the air.’

She’s paler than I’ve ever seen her. Paler than the morning after the night of the Black and White Russians. Paler than the time she saw her ex on the front page of the paper in some dodgy kiss and tell.

‘Wait,’ I say. ‘How about now?’

I pull the shower curtain – it’s a crappy white one that cost about three quid in Tesco – up against my body, suppressing a shudder; it’s wet, cold and clammy. I tuck it between my legs and wrap the rest as tight as I can.

‘Fuck. Ing. Hell.’

‘Can you see me now?’ I say and then laugh. I must still be drunk.

‘Pull it against your face,’ she says.

I press the fabric on to my face, poking my tongue out and then dragging a bit between my teeth so she can see where my mouth should be. I mean… is.

‘That’s one of the creepiest things I’ve ever seen. You look like a statue come to life.’

‘But you can see me?’

‘Yes!’ she says. ‘I mean, sort of. But this isn’t even possible. You look like a Weeping fucking Angel.’

‘Tash,’ I say. ‘What the actual fuck?’