Never Summer Again

Chapter Forty-Seven - You're Both Losers

Score: Creep - Radiohead

Lydia

"Ouch!" I yank my head forwards, pulling my hair out of Alex's grip. She's raking a brush through my wet hair and she's obviously come across a particularly nasty knot.

"Sorry," she mutters, but gathers my hair in her hands again and starts brushing it, more gently this time.

It's been two weeks since Mark and I came back from Greece. I've been staying with Alex since. I went to meet my dad a couple of days after that horrible night at Gloria's. I knew it wasn't going to be easy, but was I not prepared for what happened.

It seems that Celis's moved out of the flat. My dad told her that he can't afford to pay for her tuition and she just left him.

I can't say I'm surprised, but this situation does scare me a bit. Clearly, it is is bad, and we're getting tight on money.

Colin was drunk again, and our chat wasn't very...er...productive. He said he won't be paying for my tuition, which was what I had expected to hear anyways, but I still had hope.

Why did I, though? It's been proven time and again to me that hope is fucking useless.

After listening to him calling me a failure for, well, failing Chemistry and not getting into Psychology for twenty minutes, I just left the flat and came back to Alex's. Her mum saw how upset I was and made a pitcher of watermelon Margaritas, and the three of us watched movies and ate chocolate fondue all night.

Why can't all parents be cool like Alex's mum? 

Then, after carefully considering my options, I reached out to the university and asked them for funding options. It seems that I've missed all the deadlines for applying for loans, though, so, the only path left open for me was to defer my offer. So, I did.

No university for me this year, then.

I never considered a gap year before, but maybe that's not such a bad idea. I need to figure my shit out, and I'd like to have the time and space to do it, without having to worry about settling into university life and studying for exams.

I need to figure out what I am going to do. I need to figure out what I want to do. I feel like I don't know who I am anymore.

Everything that I used to think I was has been taken away from me. I was certain I'd be going away to Edinburgh to study Psychology. Not gonna happen. I used to think I was rich and maybe a little spoilt. Not anymore. I used to be this determined, driven, opinionated, outgoing girl. I used to think I knew exactly what I wanted in life. Now, I question everything there is. I used to be Patrick Casterly's girlfriend, Mark Carter's best friend, and then, lover.

Now, I am neither of those things.

What are you left with, if you give up everything you think you know, for love?

It feels like fucking nothing. I feel like fucking nothing, not gonna lie.

"You know what's even more frustrating?" I raise my eyebrow, meeting Alex's eyes in the mirror-panelled wall in front of us. "I risked and lost everything, Alex, and he didn't. I lost my relationship, I am homeless and broke, for fuck's sake, and I lost my dream about Edinburgh and Psychology...My entire life's gone to pieces and I don't even know how to start picking them up...I can't see my future, like, at all, right now. And he didn't even lose a night's sleep... He still got to get back at Patrick, he still fucked me throughout the summer, but, at the same time, he also gets to keep his relationship with his father, and now that we're not together anymore, he'll just go back to LA. Just as his father wanted. He's going to take over Peter's company or whatever. He's going to go back to school and his life will continue as if nothing happened."