by Angela Mack
“Hey Sunshine.” He kissed me on the top of my head, exactly like Josh had done, winking at me. I giggled as Josh shoved him away.
“What have I told you? Izzy is off limits from your stupid banter.” Josh rolled his eyes.
“Can’t blame a guy for trying,” Ollie smirked, waggling his eyebrows. I folded my lips inwards, holding back laughter. As they stood side by side, I got a proper look at how filthy the pair of them were. They were both in my dad’s grey, branded construction company tops, with baggy black cargo shorts and grey work boots.
“Attempted plastering today, did we?” I arched a brow.
“Only mixing up for some of the other guys. Dipshit here got a bit carried away with the paddle mixer.” Josh rolled his eyes again, nudging Ollie with his elbow.
“I’m starting to regret hiring both of you at the same time,” Dad said, but he was laughing as he put a hand on each of their shoulders. Although Ollie had dropped out of school, he’d decided to retake his A Levels next year and start from scratch. Jess told me that his teachers thought he would have had no problem catching up if he had re-enrolled to continue with this year, but Ollie had refused. He wanted to restart sixth form with Josh next year, so he wouldn’t be on his own. I thought it was sweet, but I wasn’t sure how Josh would react. Ollie had told him that Mr Tapps had said he wasn't allowed to restart and had to re-join next year instead. I didn’t feel the need to contradict him.
Once Dad had heard, he’d made the same offer to Ollie as he had to Josh. He could work part-time for Dad’s company and as Ollie didn’t have a project to continue working on, he increased his hours at the insurance company he usually worked for on Saturdays. Now, Ollie worked there three days a week, with Wednesdays and Fridays at work with Josh and Dad. He did swap out his Saturday shift though, meaning his weekends were now freed up. We were seeing a lot of Ollie lately; sometimes we’d all hang out together, or if Josh was working on his art project and I was studying, Ollie would spend time with Georgie instead. Even Mum was impressed by how good Ollie was at helping Georgie with his homework―Josh teased him all the time about it, calling him a nerd. Ollie would grin and duck his head, showing Georgie how to work on his multiplication or helping him read through his latest reading assignment.
“Right, I better go wash the day away before getting dinner on,” Dad slapped Josh and Ollie on their backs before turning away.
“I’ve already got it started, dear,” Mum called from the kitchen. Dad’s eyebrows flew up.
“Uh oh,” he muttered, darting in to give her a quick kiss hello as she tried to swat him with a potato masher.
“Don’t ‘uh oh’ me. I’m not that bad of a cook,” Mum frowned, trying not to smile. Dad widened his eyes at the rest of us and we all looked away, not wanting Mum to see our smirks.
“I helped make the mash!” Georgie piped up from his stool next to Mum. He had been helping Mum prep the vegetables and Oreo sat patiently next to him, wagging his tail, waiting for Georgie to drop him snacks. I'd already seen Georgie sneak him a few pieces of raw carrot when Mum was pretending not to notice.
“Oh, well we’ll be alright then,” Dad winked as he climbed the stairs.
“Shotgun the other shower!” Ollie yelled, running out the room before Josh could complain.
“Dickhead,” he chuckled, shaking his head. He sat down in the chair next to me, helping me gather up my notes.
"Hey, Oreo! Where's my hello?" Josh called. The pup glanced over his shoulder at Josh, before continuing his vigil next to Georgie.
"Traitor," Josh muttered, shaking his head.
“Oh, Izzy. Miss Lovey called today.” Mum slid her shepherd’s pie into the oven, before folding her arms and peering at me. This couldn’t be good. Georgie jumped down, running into the lounge. He threw himself onto the sofa, flicking the TV on. Oreo chased after him, hopping up into his lap. Josh shook his head, laughing.
“She said she was very impressed with your personal statement.” I’d wanted a fresh pair of eyes to give it a once over, and Miss Lovey offered when I’d mentioned it during our last session. I wouldn’t have taken her up on it if I’d known she was going to bloody blab to Mum, though.
“She also said she’d looked up the open days for the universities you were interested in. She emailed the dates over to me.” I rolled my eyes as Mum tried to keep a wide smile from taking over her entire face. Every time she’d tried to talk to me about university in the past, I’d shut her down. I hadn’t wanted to think about it, let alone talk about it. I knew that giving me space to figure it out on my own had been killing her, but she looked ecstatic now.
I was about to elaborate when I noticed Josh had gone still next to me. He was studying a page of my notes in his hand, almost as if he were reading them. We still hadn’t spoken about me going to university. It was over a year away, but the decisions I was making now were going to affect both our futures. I was struck by a spasm of guilt; maybe I should have involved Josh earlier, but it wasn't like I had actually applied to anywhere yet. I had a while before the application deadline, but for some reason, I was still terrified to talk to Josh about it. What if my hopes for our future didn’t match up with his?
“I hadn’t realised you’d decided on which universities you wanted to go to,” Mum smiled. I widened my eyes, inclining my head in Josh’s direction. I thought she would get the message, but she either missed my silent communication, or she was being purposefully obtuse. I was betting on the latter.
“So? Which ones?” Mum prompted. Yep, definitely the latter. I sighed.
“I was er, hoping to stay close. So I could carry on living here during my time at university. I thought I could commute.” I twisted towards her on my chair, staring at Josh’s profile. He didn’t move, didn’t say a word. But my notes were starting to crumple a little at the edges where he was gripping them. Shit. Was he annoyed?
“Oh, honey! Are you sure? That’s what you really want? You don’t want to stay on campus with all the other freshmen?” I could see the hope shining from Mum’s eyes. I knew she’d be over the moon if I decided to live at home for a while longer.
“Um, yes. I’d really like to live at home. And there were more local universities than I thought that have some good courses. Suffolk and Essex have great programs.”
“But Nottingham is considered a much better university isn’t it? Especially for Sciences?” Mum queried, small wrinkles appearing along her forehead. “I’d love for you to live here with us still, but I also want to make sure you’re, er, making the right choices for the right reasons.” Oh, so now she looked at Josh.
“Nottingham is better, yes. But a science degree is going to be tough and I’m going to need a lot of support. I don’t want to be distracted,” I murmured. I’d already planned this argument out in my head, which had sounded solid before, but seemed flimsy and stupid now.
“I want to stay here, Mum. Please.” She rushed over to me and I jumped up, just in time for her to wrap me in a hug.
“Of course you can, sweetie. Can’t you see how happy it’s made me to know you’re going to live at home still?” She pointed to the tears in her eyes and I laughed at her.
“So, you’re staying?” Josh looked up at me. I couldn’t read the expression on his face. Mum sniffled, dabbing at her eyes with the backs of her hands. She shuffled off into the kitchen, trying to look busy even though there was nothing left to prepare for dinner. She turned on the tap above the sink, letting it fill with water. She began noisily piling up utensils and pans, snapping on her rubber gloves. We had a perfectly good dishwasher, but I appreciated the sentiment all the same.
“Yes,” I nodded, my stomach lurching. His eyes searched mine, and I tentatively smiled at him. I could feel my heart thumping. Without warning, Josh flew from his chair, picking me up and whirling me around. I laughed, whacking his shoulders.
“Put me down, you wally!”
“What’s going on in here?” Dad padded in on bare feet still t
owel drying his hair, wearing jeans and t-shirt.
“Izzy is going to go to a local university. She wants to stay at home!” Mum sighed happily as Dad beamed. Josh put me back down on the floor, crushing my lips with his own.
“I think Josh has only just found out, too,” Mum laughed.
“And here I was hoping I’d be able to get that indoor gym I’ve always wanted,” Dad winked at me. Once Josh had let me go, Dad gave me a quick hug too, kissing me on my forehead.
“You weren’t seriously worried, were you?” Ollie strolled into the room in only a pair of shorts, grinning at Josh. Josh’s nostrils flared as he took in his lack of clothing. Ollie pretended not to notice and slumped down on the sofa next to Georgie, eyes on the TV.
“Anyone with half a brain could have told you that Izzy wouldn’t leave your sorry arse behind.” Mum and Dad laughed and turned back to the kitchen, Dad using a tea-towel to begin drying the pile of washing up Mum had left on the side. I slipped my arm around Josh’s waist.
“He’s right, you know. There was no way I was going anywhere without you.” I felt stupid for not talking to Josh about university sooner. No matter what he wanted for his future, I’d have planned mine around it. The realisation slammed home―I really would have changed all my plans for him. I’d do anything for us to be together. Anything.
Chapter 32
Joshua
“OK everyone. This is the moment you’ve all been waiting for!” Mrs DeLaney clapped as we all climbed onto our stools. The desks were further spread out than usual and we each had one to ourselves, instead of sharing. There were only fifteen of us in total, so we had plenty of space.
“Today is day one of your final exam. It’s 10 a.m. now and we’ll stop for lunch at 12. We’ll then restart at 1:30pm and finish at 4. Same for tomorrow.” Everyone nodded; this was not news to us. Mrs DeLaney had been prepping us all for weeks on what to expect from today. She’d even laid out our workspaces exactly as needed. I glanced over my shoulder and noticed that one student was at the back behind me, sitting cross-legged on the floor. There was a large sheet spread out next to them, with various materials arranged around the edges. Judging by the tons of Modroc and wire mesh rolled up, they were going to work on creating some kind of sculpture.
I straightened up on my stool and saw the back of Jess’ head over to the left, up front, a crisp piece of extremely large, white paper laid out in front of her. She had a box of fine-tipped black markers and various colours of tissue paper and PVA glue spread out on her desk. The guy sitting at the desk to my right had the same size piece of paper in front of him, but his was black. He had different coloured chalks scattered around. Surprisingly, I was the only one that had a canvas on an easel set up in front of them. The canvas was large, and it blocked out the two rows of desks directly in front of me.
I was taken over by an unexpected jab of nerves, making my knee bounce, my fingers tapping on the desk. I eyed the thick tubes of oil paint and the different brushes, pots and mixing palettes arranged around the edge of my desk. My sketch pad stared up at me from in front of the easel, it’s black cover sucking my gaze in.
I shook out my arms, reaching down to grab my backpack. I yanked out my headphones and slipped my phone from my pocket, placing them both in front of me. I’d already cleared it with Mrs DeLaney that I could listen to music whilst I painted. I noticed a couple of other students placing headphones on their desks too and I let out a sigh of relief, feeling less awkward.
I’d not painted in front of the rest of my art class before. Sketched, sure. Painted? Nope, never. I’d used the time in my usual timetabled classes to focus on filling my sketchpad up with clippings of other artists’ work that had inspired the design of my final piece. Mrs DeLaney would help me with what I should write next to each one and would give me tips on how to display my own smaller pieces of artwork alongside it. She was far better at making my work stand out on the pages. Sometimes I’d sketch little sections directly into my sketchpad, but most of the time my work had been done on scraps of paper in Mrs DeLaney’s office in my own time. I was actually kind of proud of how my sketch pad had shaped up.
“Remember, you can use your sketch pads as guides for your final piece, but you cannot work on them themselves during this time. This time is only for your final piece. You must hand your sketch pads in for grading at the end of tomorrow.” Mrs DeLaney was pacing slowly at the front, taking it in turns to eye each of us as she spoke. Her long, tie-dyed skirt swished around her ankles and the stack of bracelets on one of her wrists jingled.
“Now, I have some exciting news!” She clapped again and stopped in the middle of the room. I dragged my stool over to the right so I could see her around my canvas. I felt my face grow hot as the stool scraped in the otherwise silent room. Why did I feel so self-conscious?
There was an excited murmuring from the rest of the students, and I felt like I was the only one who didn’t know what Mrs DeLaney was about to say.
“As some of you may know, I hold an exhibition at the end of every year for my final year art students.” I automatically glanced at the wall to the left of me, the space reserved for artwork from the sixth formers in the year above us. That wall was like a shrine to talent. It was bloody intimidating.
“Each of my students creates a final piece, much like you are doing today, but theirs are not graded here. No. Instead, I hire out a space and display their finished pieces in an exhibition, inviting their friends and family to join us. I also have a dear friend who owns their own gallery in London, Miss Julia Tate, who attends. For anyone wanting a future career within the arts, she is someone you want to impress.” A career in art? Like being a full-time, actual painter or something? Yeah right. No one actually did that anymore, did they?
“Everyone who attends fills out a card with their thoughts on each of the student’s pieces, submitting them anonymously at the end of the night. I then use this feedback to help inform my grading of their final pieces. It’s a very grand event, if I do say so myself. The highlight of my year!” Mrs DeLaney was beaming and most of the students around me were fidgeting, their enthusiasm visible. I had no fucking clue why everyone was so hyped up about an event for the year above.
“And…” Mrs DeLaney bobbed her head left and right, her own excitement barely contained. “Each year, my students in their first A Level year also get a chance to be included in this exhibition.” I swear, the guy next to me was about to cream in his pants. Muppet.
“If anyone creates a piece so stunning, so thought-provoking, that I feel as though it can hold its own against my finest students’ pieces of work, I will select it for display at the end of year exhibition also. There are no restrictions on how many students can be selected. So, if this year, there are five breath-taking pieces of artwork produced, then five of you will be selected. Likewise, if no one creates anything to a standard that I deem worthy enough, then no one from this year's group will feature in the exhibition. Understood?” Everyone around me nodded. OK, so I could see why people would think it was cool to get chosen for the exhibition. But that wasn't what mattered to me. I had put my blood, sweat and tears into this art project and I wanted to do this final piece justice. I needed to.
“OK. You may begin!" Mrs Delaney’s sing-song voice rang out as she clapped yet again. I pressed my headphones over my ears, selecting one of the new playlist’s Izzy had made for me: ‘Paint like a Badass.’ I smiled as I turned the first song up as loud as it would go. This playlist wasn’t like the first one she had helped me with that time I’d almost had a meltdown in Mrs DeLaney’s office. It was still bassy and deafening, but the tempo was completely different. It was upbeat, uplifting. Inspiring. I reached out for a paintbrush with a shaky hand.
✽✽✽
“Oh my God, I can’t believe that’s it! We’ve finally finished the end of our first year of sixth form!” Jess threw her bag on top of the table, making glasses of drinks shudder as she slid into the circular booth. The oth
ers were already seated, waiting for us. I clambered into the other end, getting comfortable next to Izzy.
“Speak for yourself,” Ollie grumbled. Although I’m bummed for him that he had been held back a year too, I couldn’t help but also feel grateful. Next year would be so much better knowing I wouldn’t have to go at it alone.
“Oh, sorry,” Jess rolled her eyes at him. Ollie scooched near to her, pursing his lips close to her face.
“I know how you can make it up to me.” Ollie made kissing noises with his lips, causing her to flinch away. I laughed, shaking my head as I laid my arm along the top of the booth, my fingertips playing with Izzy’s hair. She was hunched over a steaming hot chocolate, complete with whipped cream and marshmallows.
“I, for one, am glad exams are all over and done with. I’ve got blisters on my fingers from writing so much!” Sophie examined her fingers, tutting. Jack grabbed one of her hands, kissing it all over.
“Better?” he asked, and she giggled. Both Ollie and Ed made gagging noises at the same time, making everyone laugh. I still didn’t know Jack and Ed that well, but they were easy enough to hang out with. They never took themselves too seriously and Ed’s banter gave even Ollie a run for his money.
“Oh, and you will not believe what happened at the end of our art exam today!” Jess bounced on the leather seat of the booth, looking over at me. I shot her a death-glare, daring her to say anything. She grabbed Sophie’s drink, some kind of cocktail, and took a large gulp.
“Well?” Sophie prompted.
“Oh, er, nothing. It wasn’t anything major.” She widened her eyes at me when she said ‘major.’ I gritted my teeth, shaking my head. Izzy was too busy staring at her marshmallows to notice.
“Hey. You OK?” I curved my hand around her shoulder, squeezing. She looked up, smiling.