Choices Shape, Losses Break

by Nia Lucas

  I pinch my legs brutally to stave off the tears and turn again to look at sleeping Nico, my gorgeous friend who was supposed to just be in this for giggles, revenge, solace and orgasms.

  Nico had come to give me back the CD's he'd borrowed, arriving only an hour after I got back from London that fateful Sunday afternoon four weeks ago. Wonderfully familiar in his Kappa Jacket, his earring and his freckles, shower fresh and happy, he got the shock of his life when I flung open the front door of the flat, a sweaty, red faced harridan, my curls standing on end like Medusa. Instead of finding me in post-podium Sunday chill-out mode as per usual, he found me newly single, alone, incandescent with rage, hell bent on revenge, throwing their shit into boxes and screaming my fury into the empty flat.

  I told him that they’d gone, that they’d pissed off because I was going to Ibiza without them. I told Nico that I was so angry with Shay, that we were so fucking finished.

  “Lorn, he didn't deserve you, he’s never deserved you. Fuck them Lorn, fuck them. Forget about them, go to Ibiza and forget about them. Forget fucking Shay. Yeah?”, his green eyes sparkled with sincerity and a glint of what I thought might be satisfaction.

  I’d paced around the flat, my hair curling wildly down my back as I threw random things into cardboard boxes, “I'm so angry with them Nico, I've....I've never felt this annoyed before. I feel like I want to tear my skin off, scream, shout, set fire to something. I’m so fucking agitated by them....Jesus, it's like the worst PMT”.

  Nico had grabbed me by the shoulders, “Lorn, LORN! Don't let them get to you woman, just...just fucking chill, yeah?”, he'd licked his lips, looking a bit antsy himself as he rubbed my arms, “Just...just concentrate on something else, eh? Take your mind off it all with something else...or...or someone else”, his eyes scanned me anxiously and suddenly I felt prickles of danger in the air.

  Nico's freckles, his earring, his beautiful green eyes, his dark curls, his strong body. Nico. My kind, friendly, funny kryptonite. We stared at each other for a moment before Nico growled out, “Fuck it”. With no warning, he firecracker kissed me, pulling my vibrating body against his and pinning me to him, his lips hot and insistent as my shock rendered me immobile for a second.

  Our lips became a means with which to convey our mutual frustrations and my hands, my itching need-to-punch-something hands fisted his t-shirt and pulled at him. Revenge.

  My brain kick-started, “Nico stop, STOP. Fuck, what are we doing?”, I felt a bit woozy and clutched my head.

  Nico held my arms again, staring at me, his voice husky, “What does it matter Lorn? If they're gone, if he's gone, then what does it matter what we do? Eh?”, his words sounded like a plea.

  If they're gone. My white hot rage drove me and before I registered that I'd moved, I’d pulled Nico back into a furious snog, our terms of engagement gun-shot dictations from me, gasped between tongue thrusts.

  “Can't be a serious thing Nico”

  “OK Davies”

  “Mates Nico”

  “Yeah”

  “Not together, mates”

  “Got it Lorn”

  “This is fucking revenge. Literally”

  “Yeah”

  “Just messing, fun”

  “Uhuh”

  “Make me forget”

  “Fucking on it Lorn, now shut the fuck up and let me fucking do you”

  Charming.

  That was four weeks ago this has got to stop. Right now. It’s got to stop before I lose him, before I lose something that is so very precious to me.

  It was 'blind eye' night at the club last night and Han, Chris, Nico and I had all gone and I had real proper fun with my ridiculously fit friend who makes me laugh and knows me so well. We’d snogged and pratted around, indulging in hilarious loo sex at one point, scandalising the other toilet occupants. “Davies, if you don't lift your leg up higher, my dick ain't getting in there cara”

  “D'Angelo, I'm wedged on the loo roll holder, improvise, use those muscles...Oh FUCK, give a girl some warning, eh?!”

  Nico, sober because of Good Friday training, drove us back to the flat where a bit of A-grade shagging saw him make a cataclysmic confession, “Oh fuck Lorn, belissima this is so good, this is so fucking good. Fuck.....I love you Lorn, I've always loved you Lorn, be mine, fucking be mine.....this is so good......I'm gonna come, fuuuuuuuuuck”

  Shock silenced the air around me. It killed any climax I was headed for.

  “Nico.......?”, I was wide eyed as he panted his post-orgasmic recovery into my neck, his broadening back heaving against my hand with his need for oxygen, his coal-coloured curls tickling my cheek.

  He flopped onto his back beside me, his words rumbled timidly in the darkness,“We're good, yeah Lorn, this here is so good? Why the fuck would we not want to be more? It's been weeks, we could do this. I...I want to give us a real go. I...I love you...ti amo tanto Lorn...SHIT”, he sounded frustrated, lacking the words.

  I swallowed thickly, “Nico, we talked and I said, that first afternoon when I got back after I broke up with, er, Shay. This was just sex, just fun, messing around, nothing serious. We agreed yeah?”, I went for the humour, nudging him,“Just to piss Shay off, to screw him over, like you said?” but I trailed off as he tutted beside me.

  Silence. Painful, awful silence.

  I swallowed again, “I can't Nico. I can't. It's still...it's too soon. I can't be more right now. I'm so sorry. I...I really care about you Nico, you're my mate”, I reached for his hand but he snatched it away.

  I waited for him to leave but he didn't, “Go to sleep Lorn. Let's just fucking sleep”, and he turned over, his back to me. During the night, we were drawn back together, clutching tight.

  I must end it now, now that I know that it's more for him. I care about Nico too much to play him false. He’s too good for the likes of me, a broken, unwanted little slag. Nico is kind and good and strong and whole. He deserves better. Grabbing my clothes I take a final look at him in the morning darkness. This isn't just about sex, it is more. I do feel so much more for Nico but I am too absorbed in them to extricate my feelings right now. I don't have the mental energy to analyse.

  Hastily throwing on my clothes and exiting the flat in to the damp, misty April morning, I let myself into the pub kitchen and start to prep for the guests' breakfast, stirring baked beans and wondering what the fuck I do now. I have another eighteen months of my life before I go to Uni, I have no money to eat or pay my bills, my boyfriends have cheated on me and then abandoned me, I have been shagging my best male friend whose heart I have bruised and who will probably hate me, my parents couldn't give two shits about me, I live alone, my A Levels are harder than I imagined and I am so, so frightened and heartbroken that I worry that my bones might actually dissolve. I have nowhere else to go if Gill throws me out and I have nobody who loves me and is in a position to help me. I am all alone in handling this shit. I have nothing.

  With that thought, my grief and pain hit me full force and I crumble in the kitchen of the pub I call home and I howl my sadness for the first time since watching the boys I love cheat on me. Through the window I hear the sound of Nico's car screech out of the car park as he goes home to his warm house and his family that love him and this sends me further into despair. Bye Nico.

  Puzzled by the lack of breakfast being offered to her guests, Gill finds me inconsolable on the kitchen floor. She hugs me, kisses me and puts me on a chair in the corner of the kitchen while she carries on seamlessly prepping breakfast. I stare out of the window and hiccup my sobs into the toaster, the only thing I can usefully operate at the moment.

  Breakfast over, Gill leads me upstairs to her flat, “C'mon, start talking madam”, her eyes are filled with concern as she settles me onto the sofa.

  I lose it again and Gill, with a sigh of 'Oh sweetheart', sits beside me, holding my hand as I glup, “Gill, the boys aren’t working away, I lied. I’ve…..I’ve broken up with Shay. He’s gone, Lee too. They…..they..�
�, I can feel the words slipping out before I can catch them, “I told them about me going to Ibiza and...he cheated on me Gill, he did it in front of me and then he left”, and I howl.

  Gill knows that I’m going to Ibiza in May and that I’ll be gone until the closing parties in September but the new reality is that the boys won’t be occupying the flat over the summer now. I tell her between sobs that I understand that she might want to find new tenants and that I will need to find somewhere else to live when I get back.

  Gill’s shaking her head, “I cannot BELIEVE that boy, how dare he treat you like that sweetheart. I’m disgusted with him and frankly, I expected better from both of them, leaving you here on your own like that”, Gill shakes her head before turning slowly to look at me directly, wincing as she softens her tone, “Lorna love, I don’t know how I feel about you in that flat alone now they’re gone. I mean, you’re so young poppet and you only earn a few hundred pounds a month here- how will you manage with the bills and rent?”

  Gill takes my hand, gently saying the words I’ve feared the most, “Lorna, I don’t think I’m comfortable letting you live here on your own sweetheart. I think you might need to find somewhere more suitable for somebody your age”. I sob into my hands as she strokes my back.

  Our chat is interrupted by the phone and with a kiss to my head, Gill goes off to answer it.

  She's back seconds later, concern etched across her features, “It's Jock sweetheart, he wants to speak to you”, her tone mirrors the concern on her face.

  Gill knows Jock. They've met several times actually in the months since the boys moved in, months in which my life has changed beyond recognition. Months which have left me wondering who the fuck I am now.

  As I pick up the receiver, Jock's voice is warm but strained, “Ach sweetheart, it's lovely tae hear your wee voice. How you been darlin?”, he sounds tired.

  My voice is barely a whisper, “Where are they Jock?”, my manners lost in the pain I feel.

  Jock sounds exhausted, “Right now lassie? Right now they are in the cells at Tottenham Police station”.

  I fall onto the floor of Gill's deep-pile carpeted living room, “Why?”, it's a whispered howl.

  Jock sighs a deep, angry sounding huff, “Oh, they're there because they’re stupid wee bastards who I thought were past this sort o' shite. They're there because they seem tae have lost the very minds the Lord gave them and ah’m calling you ma wee lassie because I need you tae help me understand wha’ is going on wi' them before they end up in fucking prison”, I have never heard Jock this disappointed, this defeated.

  I don't realise that I'm crying until Jock tells me to stop, to calm down. He asks me if I'm coming to London for work at the weekend,

  “Yeah, yeah I'll be up on the coach tomorrow morning”, I whimper softly.

  Jock clears his throat, “Right, well love, how about you and I meet fer a wee chat, eh?”, we arrange to meet at a café near Victoria Coach Station.

  Jock sighs again, “Lorna, are you OK sweetheart?”, his voice is gentle again.

  I close my eyes and whisper the truth, “No, I'm not Jock. Are they in deep shit?”, my voice wobbles

  Jock sighs, “Mebbe darlin, mebbe. I dunnae know at the moment. See you Saturday sweetheart”, and he rings off.

  Prompted by her concerned expression, I tell Gill what Jock said. She gasps and clasps her hand to her mouth. She offers me advice and kindness but I'm too spaced out and shocked to take it in. I just smile distractedly and nod. After I manage to convince Gill of my 'okay-ness', I go back to the cold, dark flat and I find a note on my pillow.

  “Lorn,

  I love you Davies. I've loved you since that first time we were together in my room last year and I've tried really hard, really fucking hard, to just be your mate, to keep this thing chilled but I can't keep it up. I know you love them. I know it. They don't deserve you, neither of them does but you wouldn't be that fucking angry with them if you didn't still love them. And yeah, I know it's both of those twats, I figured it out a while back. In a way, it makes sense I guess even though it’s a bit fucking twisted.

  Lorn, I need to maybe stay away from you for a while, get my head together. You're going to Ibiza in a few weeks and I'm going to Spain for that training camp so maybe it's best if I catch up with you in September. A bit of space will get my head back in the game, I reckon I'll be able to just be your mate then when you get back.

  I'm sorry for fucking this up. Being with you these last few weeks, it's been everything I ever wanted but you still want them and that's killing me. Stay safe Davies, get on with that reforming eh coz honestly, you are still a MASSIVE pain in the arse.

  Love (but I'll fucking work on it), Nico x

  PS I know there's nothing wrong with the wiring. Put this £20 on the meter so you can turn shit back on. You can pay me back when I see you in September, dickhead.

  Nico's note makes me want to howl for the love that I cannot claim, for the friend I shouldn't have hurt. However, right now, howling is going to get me fucking nowhere and I have money to earn. I take Nico's £20 note to the bar and convert it to £1 coins. I fill the meter and I have a shower in my own flat for the first time in weeks. I get dressed and go to the Estate Agents who are mercifully open today. I pick up a day’s work leafleting and I earn myself £30 for delivering hundreds of postcard flyers. I take a gamble and on my way round with the flyers, I call in at my Dad's house, hopeful that Good Friday Mass will have my mother occupied and my Dad at home alone. I'm lucky on both counts.

  For the first time since I was ejected from his house, I ask my Dad for money and it kills me. I tell him that I will be working abroad from May, that I will be dancing in nightclubs in Ibiza for four months. I take some pleasure in his horror. I tell him that I have arranged everything with my tutors at school, that I am coming back for the three modular exams I need to sit at the end of June. I bulldoze every objection, every concern, every query. I tell him that the boys are not currently living with me, that I am supporting myself entirely and that I need his help. I ask him to loan me £500 for rent. I tell him that I will pay him back when I’m back in September.

  Dad's jaw opens and closes with no noise coming out until he croaks, “Love, where will you live when you get back from Ibiza?”.

  I give him a look filled with the anger that I want to direct to them and I sneer out, “That's not really your concern any more, is it?”, with a tone that would take varnish off wood.

  I take pleasure in the slump of his shoulders. He agrees to lend me the money and I get him to write a cheque made payable to Gill.

  He hands it to me with shaking hands, “Lorna, love, will you give me an address, some details maybe, of where you will be staying in Ibiza. I'll...I'll worry about you out there. The flight details maybe? Where you're working?”, he looks so sad, like a big, greying, wounded puppy.

  But the soft parts of me are plasticising, hardening. They are gone, they are slipping beyond my reach, lost to me. I have nobody but Han and Dan who love me and who give a shit but they are powerless. Nico says he loves me, he gives a shit but I don’t deserve his goodness and he's not mine to claim. I have nobody. I have nothing. I have only me and I don’t even fucking know who me is now. I want to be in Ibiza, lost in the music for luxurious night after night, unfamiliar things surrounding me, freedom in my fingertips at every turn, nothing that holds painful, hurtful associations in my daily life. I want to be gone from here, from them, from this life. I want to be somewhere that is mine and mine alone to define and enjoy. I want to be seventeen and burden free. Jesus, if it's as good as I hope, I might not ever come back.

  Dad hands me the cheque and I snap, “I'll give my Ibiza address to Dan. Thanks for the cheque”, and without looking at him, without any further exchange. I leave. I will not see my father again for twenty-three weeks.

  I give Gill the cheque as I start my shift. She frowns and goes to question it but I smile and walk off, not having the energy to explain.
I earn £20 in tips and I put the entire lot on the meter. That night, I pack my dance stuff into as small a bag as possible. In a large holdall, I pack their stuff. I pack the Playstation and as many equal quantities of their clothes and possessions as I can. I pack a pair of their trainers each. In a malicious moment, I pack both photo frames with the pictures of 'us' in them that I gave them at Christmas. It makes me feel better, weirdly.

  Saturday 6th April 1996

  I dress this morning like I'm putting on armour, like I have a battle to fight. I find the clothes that make me feel sexiest. This is not for Jock's benefit, I laugh at the thought as it enters my head. This is for my benefit. Plaid mini-skirt, black silk bomber jacket, over the knee socks, Timberlands, Cropped Jumper, hair down. I get on that Coach like a warrior going to do battle. When I eventually get to the cafe near Victoria, Jock looks exhausted.

  He pulls me into the usual bear hug, “Well lassie, it's good tae see you”, he smiles kindly and pushes a hot chocolate towards me over the table.

  He tells me that the boys were released on bail yesterday evening, that somehow, they were de-arrested for a Petrol Station robbery, CCTV coming to their rescue. Their other offence, a fight at the club in which there was some serious injury, well, that is still an issue. He does not say where they were bailed to. Jock looks at me kindly and asks me what happened between us three, admitting that he'd been concerned about our lack of visits in the previous few weeks. He tells me that neither of them will tell him what happened but that Lee 'is in a bad way Lassie', with a look that makes me have to swallow down a flood of concern.