Chapter 49

“Just call him. He’ll understand” Eleanor shrugs, trying to convince me to apologise to Jack.

“What will he say though?”

“I don’t know but it’s worth a try. Look, you forgave him easily for what he did so I’m pretty sure he’ll forgive you for telling him to ‘fuck off’”

“Right, I’ll do it. But you have to back me up if anything goes wrong” I tell her and she nods. I type Jack’s name in my phone and press call, he answers on the third ring.

“Hello?” he sighs.

“Hi, it’s Lucy”

“Oh, hey?” he says but it comes out as a question.

“Speaker!” Eleanor whispers and I quickly put the phone on speaker. She stares at the phone as if we can actually see Jack through it.

“I’m really sorry about earlier, I was just really angry” I sigh.

“It’s fine, I understand” he accepts my apology. Wow, that went better than I planned. I give Eleanor a confused look and she just shrugs. “What were you so worked up about anyway?”

“Ugh, it’s a long story” I moan.

“Well best friends tell each other everything so you can’t be my best friend if you don’t tell me”

“Very mature” I say sarcastically and he just laughs. “I’ll tell you tomorrow”        

“Fine” he sighs. “Are you packed for tomorrow?”

“We’re just about to do it” I hesitantly laugh.

“You’re so unorganised. Conor and I finished packing just before you started giving us death threats” he refers to me storming past his house.

“They’re hardly death threats, Jack” I laugh.

“Nearly” he laughs. “Right, I’m gonna leave you two to pack”

“Ok, bye!”

“See you!” he ends the call.

“That went better than I thought” I tell El and she just laughs.

We spend about 2 hours packing... Well, I do. Eleanor’s technically already packed seeing as she came packed to come here. I gave her a massive gym back to put the stuff she needs in because I know she doesn’t need to bring everything she brought to mine.

When I’m finished packing, I put our bags to one side of the room and lie on the bed.

“I’m starving, we need a take away” I sigh.

“Chinese?”

“Yes!” I shout and jump up from the bed, running downstairs to find a menu. When I find one I give it to El so she can choose something while I go get my phone. “Have you chosen?” I ask, walking downstairs.

“I think so” she nods. She tells me her order and I start to call up the take away.

“Mum and Dad won’t want anything will they?” I ask quickly before the people on the other line pick up. She stares at me for a bit before speaking.

“They can have the prawn crackers” she whispers and I nod.

-

Our take away finally comes and we sit on the floor in my room dishing it out. I’ve never got a take away at 10pm.

“Don’t tell Mum and Dad, they’ll probably want some” I say and she nods, when I hear a knock at the window. “Shit, it’s either Jack or Conor” I whisper and Eleanor’s eyes grow the size of golf balls.

“What are they doing here!?” she gasps.

“I don’t know. They always do it” I shrug. “They’ll eat all our food though so just stay quiet”

We sit in silence for a bit until he knocks again.

“Give it up, I can smell that Chinese from here” Jack calls. I look at Eleanor and roll my eyes before walking to the window. I open it and he walks in. “Give us some” he gasps.

“No way! You can have the prawn crackers, we don’t like them” Eleanor throws the bag at him and he starts smiling. He sits on my bed and starts demolishing the bag before we’re even half way finished.

“Why are you even here?” I ask him.

“I got bored” he shrugs. “And you need to tell me about Ben” he raises his eyebrow.

“How do you know?” I sigh.

“He told me” he looks me straight in the eye and I can tell he’s upset with me. “Don’t go mad at me for saying this but I know this isn’t the end for you and Conor. Why do you go to Ben all the time? I know that you know you and Conor will make up so why are you being so stupid? It just messes up their friendship and your relationship”

“Well maybe I don’t want a fucking relationship with Conor. Don't come over here and start telling me what to fucking do” I snap and walk out of my room. I remember hearing my parents going up to bed about half an hour ago so I know they won’t be anywhere in the house. I run down the stairs two steps at a time and throw myself on the sofa in the living room, curl up in a ball and just cry.

I hate how right Jack is. Even he knows that I’ll forgive Conor and it makes me so angry that I'm so predictable. I don’t want to forgive Conor. I want him out of my life forever, all he’s ever done is mess it up anyway. Ok, all that was a lie, I’m just really angry. I want my old life back so much, a nice simple life where I was never frowning. I hate all this drama that’s in my life.

Ben’s pissed me off by telling Jack about what’s happened. Conor might know now because of his big mouth and that’ll just mess things up even more. I don’t even want to go to Portsmouth now after all this commotion. I didn’t want Jack to know about me and Ben because he’d just get involved and make me feel 10 times guiltier than I already do. I feel guilty about always going to Ben when me and Conor have a serious fall out. And I feel guilty about splitting Ben and Conor up. I know Conor still doesn’t see eye to eye with Ben but he actually tried to build their friendship back up for me.

Jack only came round here to ask me about Ben and he knew that I’d just put the phone down on him if he called me. He’s really annoyed me. Everyone’s annoying me. I need to stop over thinking all this.

“Turn on the light so we actually have a chance of finding her then” Eleanor whisper/shouts.

“I don’t know where it is!” Jack says in the same tone as her. The light suddenly switches on and I think I’m lucky I have my hands over my eyes because it probably would’ve blinded me. Jack gasps, “Lucy, are you alright?”

I don’t respond, I just stay curled up in my ball.

“I’m sorry, I didn’t mean it to sound like that” he sighs. I feel a dip in the sofa, instantly making me move away from it. “Lucy, please talk”

“I don’t know what to do” I start to cry even harder. I feel him move closer to me and put his arm around me. I instantly move into him, put my legs over his lap and rest my head on his chest to cry.

“Shh, it’s ok” he rubs my back. “Do you want to talk about it?” he asks and I nod.

“Lucy, I’m gonna go up to bed. I’ll leave your food in the microwave okay?” El says. I look up at her and smile slightly before nodding. “Hope you’re alright” she smiles before leaving the room. Jack and I stay silent for a little bit while he just rubs my back.

“What’s wrong?” he asks.

I sigh, “I just don’t know what to do. I’ve fucked up really bad Jack, I don’t even want to go to Portsmouth”

“You haven’t done anything wrong”

“I messed up mine and Conor’s relationship and then I went off with Ben”

“Don’t even say that. You know that Conor’s the one that messed up. Don’t blame yourself” he frowns.

“I know” I sigh “I just feel like I need to forgive him. He’s always saying sorry, and I want to forgive him so bad but I know that if I forgive him now, he’ll think he can just walk all over me”

“I know what you mean. I think you should give it some time. He says he’s sorry but he hasn’t really done anything to show he’s sorry. Let him prove it to you Lucy” he nods.

“But I’m broke without him. I cry all the time because he’s not there to make me happy. I f-feel empty”

“Lucy, you have your family, Eleanor, the whole group, and you know I’m always here for you. You don’t need him. It’ll get better I swear”

“I just want him though. I need him” I hug Jack tighter and he rubs my back again. I don’t know why I’m telling him all this but I’m a mess and I’m not thinking straight. He’s giving me good advice though and it’s nice to get all this off my chest. "I hate how attatched I am to him and how my happiness revolves around him"

He sighs, “Just sleep on things, yeah? It’ll be better tomorrow. Please tell me you’re still coming to Portsmouth”

“I will”

“Good. Talk to him when we’re there ok? It will help”

“Ok” I mumble, not fully agreeing with what he’s asking. The plan was to stay well away from Conor all weekend but when I think of it over and over, I know that’ll be an impossible task.

“Come on, you need to go to bed. We’re going at ten” he laughs. Waking up at 8:30am is going to kill me. Mind you, it wouldn’t surprise me if I woke up at 6am considering how early I’ve been getting up lately.

We walk up stairs as quietly as possible and I change into my pyjamas before getting into bed.

“I want you to stay” I tell Jack.

“I would but I really can’t. Not tonight” he tells me.

I sigh, “Thanks for coming, it helped”

He leans down and hugs me. “You know I’m always here for you, no matter what, okay?” he whispers into my hair and I nod. He kisses my forehead before walking towards the window. “See you tomorrow” he smiles, jumping outside and shutting my window behind him.

-

I was right when I said I’d wake up at 6am. Well, I woke up at 7:30am. Close enough.

I’m already showered and have done my hair and make-up, and said bye to my Dad because he’ll be at work when I leave. I’m just getting changed now. I decide on wearing my high waisted leggings, my plain beige t-shirt that I tuck into my leggings and my black doc martins ((picture of the outift is in chapter 50)). I’ll probably put on my leather jacket when we leave. I add a few bracelets, rings and a necklace to finish my look and I pack some stuff I might need for the hour and a half drive (phone, headphones, purse, etc) in my brown satchel. My hair’s in a pony tail and my make-up is pretty light. I also painted my long-ish nails coral pink.

It’s nearly 9am and Eleanor’s just come out of the shower. When she’s finished getting ready, we go downstairs with our bags and sit in the living room to wait for Olivia to arrive. She just texted me saying she’s setting off in 5 minutes so we shouldn’t be waiting long. I’m really excited for this trip actually. I’d be kicking myself if I decided not to go.

My Mum sits with us while we wait and talks to Eleanor about life in Cheshire.

“Are you excited to go to Portsmouth then?” she asks us both and we nod. “I’ll barely see you after this Eleanor” she pouts.

“Aw I know!” El says, pulling my Mum in for a hug. “I’ll miss you so much, we never see each other anymore”

“I know! Well you’re welcome round here anytime and I’m sure we’ll be coming back down to Cheshire soon” Mum smiles and Eleanor nods. “Lucy, you better look after Eleanor on this trip”

“No Mum, I’ll leave her on her own and make sure she doesn’t interact with any of my friends” I say in a monotone voice before rolling my eyes.

“Don’t get cheeky” she points her finger at me and El just laughs. We get interrupted by a knock at the door and me and El start squealing. We walk to the door with our bags and see Olivia stood there with a smile plastered on her face.

“Hey!” I smile and give her a hug. She does the same to El before walking towards her big car and adding our bags to the rest of the collection in the boot.

“Ok, the boys are already on the way down there with Olivia’s Dad, and I’m taking all the girls” Olivia’s Mum smiles at me.

“Ok” I smile back and say bye to my Mum before sitting on the black, leather seats in the car. Lois, Leila and Charlotte are already in here so I say 'hi' to them and buckle my seatbelt.

The drive there is mad. It was probably better than the drive to London. The girls were making me laugh the whole way and her Mum was even joining in the conversation and was singing songs with us which was hilarious. We sang so many songs, either without music or with the radio that was blasting for most of the journey. We stopped at the service station because we needed a wee from laughing so much, and some of us wanted to get loads of sweets, although they all feel sick now. Charlotte even threw up at the side of the motorway.

We eventually get there after all the stops and see that the boys are already sat on Olivia’s Dad’s car waiting for us. I look at the place where we’re staying and it’s literally perfect. I can’t even describe how perfect it is.

It’s just a massive house in front of some tree’s that’s made out of wood. The roof is tiled and there’s a large chimney sticking out at the side of it. I can’t take my eyes of it. It’s beautiful. I’m lost for words. I get out of the car and see Alex and Mike walking down the long path to the house.

“Your Dad owns this!?” I gasp.

“Yeah, he rents it out” Olivia tells me.

“It’s so nice”

“I know” she laughs. “Come on, do you want to go inside? The boys look bored shitless waiting”

“Oh, yeah!”

We make our way inside after Olivia’s parents leave, and Olivia gives me and Eleanor a little tour of the whole house. It’s even nicer on the inside... Everyone already knows what room’s they’re getting because they come here every year so me and El take the only one that’s left.

It’s really big, just like the rest of the rooms here so we didn’t exactly pull the short straw. Except, I noticed in Conor and Alex’s room that they have a balcony, and Jack, Ben and Mike’s room has an en suit. Trust them to get that room. But we get one of the attic room’s so I’m happy with that.

Conor and Alex are sharing a room, Jack, Ben and Mike share one, Lois and Charlotte share one, Olivia and Leila share one and El and I share the last room.

I walk downstairs after unpacking and see everyone except Conor and Alex down here on the sofas. I join the rest of them and start talking about nothing.

“Who wants a drink?” Olivia asks, referring to the alcohol she told me she has in the fridge. I think her Dad bought it earlier. She opens the fridge, stares at it for a while before slamming it shut. “Who the fuck stole all the alcohol!?” she shouts.

“I swear it wasn’t me” Lois puts her hands up in defeat and everyone else agrees with her.

“It’s them two bastards” Liv spits, running down the hall and banging on Alex and Conor’s door. Everyone runs after her, excited to see the fight and we all watch her bang the door furiously. “I know you both have it. Unlock the fucking door now”

“What’s the password?” Alex asks and I hear Conor burst out laughing.

This is going to be a long weekend...