VIOLATED REAL LIFE
Nikitta Byrne, 26, from Cardiff, went to a party to let her hair down – but what happened that night was sickening...
Sipping on my Magnum cider, I felt my phone buzz in my pocket. Looking at the screen, I saw it was my friend
Clare* calling. ‘Hey, what you up to?’ she asked. ‘Not much,’ I replied. With my daughter Poppy, then three, at her dad’s for the weekend back in August 2020, I was just making the most of chilling out in the summer sun with my mate Sophie*.
‘Fancy coming to a party?’ Clare asked.
‘Yeah, why not?!’ I smiled – we’d not long come out of lockdown, it would be nice to let my hair down. So an hour later, Clare came to pick me and Sophie up, and drove us to her mate’s house in Penarth, just outside of Cardiff.
The party was being thrown by two lads, Tom* and Simon*, who were friends of Clare – and as we pulled up in the driveway I gasped.
It was a lovely chilled vibe
‘This house is huge!’ I exclaimed in awe – and it only got more impressive as we went inside.
It was like a proper mansion with gorgeous views over the sea, and decked out like a Love Island party, with a BBQ, DJ and everything.
Pouring a pink gin and lemonade for me and Sophie, I joined the rest of the group in the garden – some mutual friends, and some new faces. It was still early, so there weren’t many people there, and it was just a lovely chilled vibe as we all drank and chatted to each other. ‘Want another drink?’ Sophie asked. ‘I’ll have a water, please,’ I said. I wasn’t a big drinker, plus I had Poppy back the next afternoon, and I didn’t want to be hungover.
I got chatting to one of the lads there, Ben*, and I was having a great time.
As the night wore on and more people arrived, the party started ramping up.
‘So, are you single?’ Ben asked me.
Our chat started getting more and more flirtatious, and I definitely felt a little spark between the two of us.
We hit the dancefloor and I floated about, making friends with all the new faces I met and taking funny Snapchat videos, too.
At around 9pm, I popped into the kitchen to refill my drink when I bumped into an older bloke.
‘Who’s that man?’ I whispered to Clare.
‘Oh, that’s just Tom and Simon’s dad,’ she told me as I looked over at the man in his
70s, necking a glass of red wine and smoking a spliff. ‘He’s called Huw.’ ‘What a legend,’ I giggled. It was a bit of a novelty, seeing a grandfather figure partying, getting wasted and keeping up with the kids.
‘Let’s take a picture,’ I laughed, snapping a smiling selfie with him as he took a drag on a cigarette.
The party started getting rowdier, and there was even cocaine being passed around – it defin
