by Alice Oseman
“D’you want any food?” I ask as I’m about to go downstairs.
I always ask him this after school. Charlie had anorexia pretty badly the year we started going out. He had to go to a psychiatric hospital for a couple of months and it really helped, but I guess he still sort of has it. Stuff like that doesn’t go away very quickly. But he’s nowhere near as bad as he used to be and he’s better in lots of other ways too. He’s usually fine with main meals now, even if he doesn’t eat snacks, like, ever.
“Nah, I’m good,” he says, as usual.
I always make sure to ask though. I think he might say yes one day, if I just keep asking.
Once I’ve made my way through two slices of toast and a glass of lemonade, I come back upstairs to find Charlie frowning at the laptop screen.
I fall on to my bed next to him. “What’s up?”
He glances at me and then back at the laptop before clicking on something. “Nothing. Just reading something on Tumblr.”
I don’t have Tumblr, despite Charlie trying to make me use it many times. I don’t really think it’s my sort of thing.
Charlie rolls on to his back to make room for me and takes out his phone. I lie down next to him and pull the laptop towards me. He’s already exited Tumblr, so it probably wasn’t anything I would have been interested in.
On another tab is the page I started reading this morning about the University of Leeds’ rugby team, which I’m gonna try and join when I get there, if I’m good enough.
That’s where I’m going in September – the University of Leeds. It’s pretty far away; like, two hundred miles or something, and me and Charlie have obviously talked about the fact that we’ll be long distance. While it’s not ideal and no way near as great as the way we hang out every day at the moment, we’re both completely fine with it. Charlie has a Saturday job at Topman now and they pay pretty well, so he reckons he can get the train to see me every few weeks, and I can get the train back every few weeks, and that means we’ll definitely see each other at least every two weeks, if not more. And we’ll text and call and Skype all the time anyway.
I start telling Charlie all the facts about Leeds’ rugby team – how many tiers there are at the university and whether I think I’ll be able to get in (I honestly do, I mean, I’m pretty good at rugby, in my opinion), how much their gym membership is and whether I’ll be able to get a job somewhere when I get there, whether it’s worth trying to get a sports scholarship, whether I’ll be really crap compared to everyone else, and how nice their uniform is (green and white).
Charlie stays still on his back and listens and asks a few questions, but after I’ve been rambling on for a while I can tell he’s getting bored because his voice quietens and he starts fiddling with my sweatshirt sleeve, and then, as I’m in the middle of a sentence, he rolls on to his side and pulls me down by the back of my neck for a kiss, which sort of takes me by surprise because we’re long past the stage of needing to make out every time we’re alone.
After a few seconds I go to move backwards, but he just pulls me further down. I laugh against his lips and I feel him smile too, but neither of us stop and after a minute or so I feel my hand subconsciously reach to run through his hair. This is a bit of an odd time of day for us to be doing this, but it’s difficult to care, especially when he surges forward so he’s lying on top of me.
“Did you want to talk about something else?” I murmur, wondering where this has come from. I push his hair back from his forehead. I probably have a thing for Charlie’s hair.
He meets my eyes. Then he sits up, leans back and switches on the radio. The Vaccines are playing. He moves back down, tilts his head and says, “Not really,” and then his lips are on mine.
CHARLIE
Basically, I hate hearing Nick talk about university.
I’m a horrible person.
He’s ridiculously excited about going to uni. And he should be. I’m glad he is.
But lately he’s been talking about it all of the time. And every single time he mentions it, it just reminds me that we’re approaching the end of this. That come September, I’m getting left behind.
Basically, I’m scared.
People keep messaging me on Tumblr about it too and they haven’t been helping. I’ve got quite a lot of followers on Tumblr and many of them are weirdly interested in Nick and I. I think it’s probably because we’re both boys. Everyone on the Internet’s obsessed with same-sex couples. I delete questions about our sex life on literally a daily basis.
So as soon as I mentioned that we’d be long distance from September, I was flooded with asks about how I should be prepared for all the horrible things that come with long-distance relationships. And they’re pissing me off. I stopped answering them a couple of days ago, but people are still sending them. I don’t even understand why all these people care that much to make the effort to send me messages about it.
Thankfully, Nick doesn’t mention university for the rest of the day, not when we take his dog Henry for a walk, not during dinner, not while we’re watching Alien. When he wanders off to have a shower at around ten o’clock, I check my Tumblr inbox again, and there are even more now.
Anonymous said:
Have you talked to Nick about what it’s gonna be like when he goes away? I know so many couples that tried to make it work when one of them went to uni and they all ended up breaking up. You should really at least talk to him about it.
Anonymous said:
isn’t it weird u’ve been together so long tho??? like 14 is so young to get into a relationship.. u shouldn’t feel like u have to stay in ur first relationship forever…
Anonymous said:
Dude long distance never works, trust me it’s better to end it now and save yourself the pain
Anonymous said:
Everyone should go into uni single!! University years are your sexiest years!! Gotta bang as many people as you can!!!!
I don’t really want to bring this up with Nick because I don’t want him to feel bad for going to university. He’s completely right to be excited about it.
It doesn’t matter how I feel about it.
Nick returns from the bathroom in just pyjama shorts, rubbing a towel over his hair. “What’s up?”
“What?”
“You’re frowning again.”
I quickly close the Tumblr app. “Am I?”
He walks over to the mirror and picks up his hairdryer. “Yep.”
“Maybe that’s just my face.”
“Nah, your face is usually way nicer.”
I hurl a pillow in his direction, but he steps to one side to dodge it, laughing.
I can’t tell him about this. He’d feel awful. He’s had enough of feeling bad because of me. I’ve already been the most annoying boyfriend in recorded history, what with all my mental health stuff.
“Come take a selfie with me,” I say. “I want to piss off my Tumblr followers.”
Nick grins and puts down the hairdryer. “Why would that piss them off?”
“Selfies piss everyone off.”
“So passive aggressive.” He walks over to the bed and flops down next to me.
I open the camera on my phone and before he has the chance to say anything about it, I kiss him on the cheek and take the photo like that.
Nick laughs again. “Oh, you’re doing that on the Internet now, are you?”
I wrap my arms around him. “You know it’s what they all want.”
“At least let me sort out my hair.”
“It looks good when it’s wet.”
We lean our heads together and I make a peace sign with one hand and take another picture. Then I take one of us actually kissing, but I don’t put that one on Tumblr. Some things are nicer if they’re just for us.
NICK
The next morning I wake up to the sound of Charlie’s phone alarm – he always sets it to an annoying un-ignorable beeping sound, rather than music like I do. Despite this, waking up next
to Charlie is definitely better than any other way of waking up. I don’t really know why. My bed always feels sort of cold when he’s not there.
Charlie’s still insisting he has to go to school today because he’s crap at revising at home, so he’s making me get up at seven o’clock in the morning to drive him. While I could go to school to revise, the idea of trying to revise on the first day of my study leave kind of makes me want to burn all of my revision notes, and also we’re both crap at doing schoolwork when we’re together anyway.
I open my eyes to see him stirring. A line of sunshine falls across his chest through the gap in the curtains, and even while I’m still half-asleep I get another sudden urge to take a picture of him. Then I remember that I used up the film yesterday afternoon, and I already took one of him asleep last night anyway, when I found him curled up in my bed after I’d gone to get a glass of water.
Charlie rolls over to turn off the alarm and then goes to climb over me to get out of bed – my bed’s situated against the wall – but as he does I slide my hands round his waist and pull him down on top of me. He lets out a surprised noise and then a small laugh, his voice still sleepy. “I have to go shower—”
“No, stay here.”
“I can’t, I’ll fall asleep again.”
“Don’t go to school.”
“Nick!”
“Stay here with me.”
“I can’t, I’ve got to… I need to revise.”
“Mm, fine.” I loosen my arms so Charlie can wrestle himself out of them. As soon as he’s gone, my bed feels cold and empty again. It’s pretty dumb, really. I sleep alone most of the time.
TWO
CHARLIE
I sort of hoped Nick might have picked up on how I’ve been feeling. Normally he’s pretty good at that; like, weirdly good, actually. And I’m not exactly subtle in my attempts to get him to stop talking about uni. But by third period, after I text Nick to see whether he’s awake again (after dropping me off at school, he said he was going back to bed), the excited text onslaught begins.
Nick Nelson
(11:34) We should go uni shopping soon!!! Is it weird I’m excited about buying kitchen utensils?
Nick Nelson
(12:02) Dyou think I should email to check whether I’ll have a double bed?? Like how do people know which sheets to buy?
(12:05) I’d better have a double bed lol your bed is bad enough
Nick Nelson
(12:46) Dyou think I should take my xbox or is that too unsociable? I need people to like me
Nick Nelson
(12:54) Is Kaleem in school?? If he is can you ask him whether he knows about the beds?
Nick Nelson
(13:15) I’m way more interested in home furnishing than I thought.. the ikea website is a dangerous vortex
I reply to all his messages and really try to be enthusiastic, but I can tell my texts sound a bit flat. Nick doesn’t seem to notice though. He just keeps texting me about university and buying stuff for his room and the modules he thinks he wants to take and all sorts of other things that just make me feel increasingly more awful by the second.
We’ve talked about it before. Quite a while ago, actually, back when Nick was looking round universities last summer and when he was applying to them in the autumn. I admitted I was pretty worried about him leaving. I said I was scared of being on my own all the time. It was kind of embarrassing, really. Stupid. Scared of being on my own. I sounded like I was three-years-old.
Nick obviously reassured me we’d talk all the time anyway and everything would be fine. We haven’t talked about it much since then, but only because there’s not much more to say about it.
Everything is going to be fine.
I sit in the common room and listen to Muse’s ‘Origin of Symmetry’ album on repeat and focus on my classics revision, trying to memorise some Latin vocab, getting Aled to test me every now and then, since he’s the only one of my friends in school today. I just need to stop thinking about it all. Everything’s fine. I’m worrying about nothing.
After lunch, after I’ve failed for the third time to remember what ‘latrocinium’ means (fraud or robbery), Aled puts down my pack of cue cards and looks at me. Aled Last doesn’t have a load of friends – he’s extremely shy so not many people try to talk to him – but I’d say he and Tao were two of my best.
“Ugh, sorry,” I say immediately. “Wow. I need to revise more. God.”
Aled blinks at me, and then glances out the window. It’s another intensely sunny day. I probably should have just stayed in bed with Nick this morning.
“Maybe we should stop revising now,” he says in his tiny voice. He chuckles and looks down at his own revision – more colourful maths cue cards. “Not that I’ve been doing much anyway.”
“Haha, yeah, same.”
“You okay though?” he asks. “I feel like you’ve been really down today.”
I pause, a little taken aback. “Oh. Yeah. No. I’m fine.”
“Yeah?” He fiddles with his fingers and gives me a look.
“Yeah. I don’t know. Nick’s just talking a lot about uni, it’s kind of… just makes me feel a bit crap… I don’t know.” I groan and run a hand through my hair. “That sounds so bad when I say it out loud.”
“No, you’re allowed to feel things.” He smiles. “I get it.”
“It’s not really fair on him though; like, he has a right to be excited.”
“Maybe you should talk to him about it. You’ve already talked about long distance and stuff, right?”
“Yeah, we’ve talked about it… I just don’t think he realises how much it’s…” I don’t really know how to finish my sentence. “It’ll make him feel so bad though.” I shake my head. “I don’t want him to stop being excited about it.”
“Well…” Aled struggles to find something to say. He looks down at his desk and fiddles with his cue cards. “I don’t think you’ve got anything to be worried about. I mean, you know, you’re… you’re Nick and Charlie. You’re not going to break up… I don’t think… I mean, even Elle and Tao aren’t breaking up and you know what they’re like.”
Tao’s been going out with Elle Argent, a girl from Nick’s year, for almost the same amount of time Nick and I have been going out. They do seem to argue a lot but this is only because they’re practically the same person.
“Yeah.”
Aled doesn’t say anything else, so I stand up and say I’m going to the bathroom. But I don’t go to the bathroom. I walk all the way down to the locker room, just so I can lean against a wall in a locker row and take out my phone and try and think of something to say to Nick, some way of telling him what I’m feeling. But there isn’t any way to say it, not without making him feel guilty. And that’s the last thing I want.
Instead, I load up my Tumblr inbox, just to see if there’s anything interesting in there, but there are only a few new messages asking whether I’d thought properly about how long distance works, about whether it’s really worth the pain, about whether Nick’s really not going to meet anyone else at university while I’m not with him all the time. I don’t mean to let this stuff get to me, but it still does. I even feel myself start to well up a bit, so I exit the Tumblr app and delete it from my phone.
We’re fine. Why am I getting upset about this now?
NICK
When Charlie slumps into my car at 3:15pm, I can tell something’s up. I say hi but all I get is a tiny grumble in response, and as soon as he shuts the door he leans on the window and closes his eyes.
I stay still for a moment, waiting to see if he’s going to say anything. But he doesn’t. “You okay?”
“Mm,” he says, unmoving.
“Bad day?”
“Mm.”
I drive off without pushing it. If he wants to talk about it, he will. That’s one thing I’ve learnt about Charlie. If you try and make him talk about stuff he doesn’t want to talk about, there’s even less of a chance he’ll eventually
tell you.
By the time we get to Charlie’s house he seems a bit better, so I don’t bring it up. But something’s still kind of off with him. He sits on his laptop in intense silence while I’m catching up with his mum. He spends at least half an hour choosing what to wear for Harry’s party, even though he wears the same jeans and checked shirts everywhere anyway. It takes him significantly longer than normal to eat dinner, which is always a sign he’s stressed about something. In the car on the way to Harry’s house, his knees bob up and down.
Maybe he’s pissed off at me for some reason. I have no idea why he would be.
We park down the road and he walks a little way ahead of me and Tori, Charlie’s sister, who we gave a lift to.
“Have you argued?” Tori asks. “Seems like he’s pissed off with you.”
“Not that I know of. I don’t know what’s wrong.”
“Hm.” She doesn’t say anything else.
Harry Greene lives in a townhouse near the high street. His massive parties are pretty much the main reason he’s the most famous guy at Truham. We know that by eleven almost everyone will be in the basement dancing to some crappy dubstep remixes. By twelve, people will be throwing up in house-plant pots and on the pavement outside. By two, people will be asleep in corridors, breaking away into different rooms to mess around, getting high in the garden.
And sure enough, Harry’s got music blasting from the basement making the floor vibrate and there are people everywhere, mostly Truham sixth formers, but definitely a few Year 10s and 11s too, and people from the secondary school across town. I think we were all supposed to be in the garden, but it’s absolutely chucking it down with rain. So much for summer.
As soon as we’re inside and Tori’s gone off to find her friends, Charlie speed-walks towards the kitchen for drinks. The kitchen table, as expected, is covered in bottles and plastic cups, and once we reach it Charlie downs a vodka shot, and then another one. I think this might be the point where I need to actually say something.