Ah, the past. A safe space. A place with no unpredictability because it’s already happened. It’s like your own personal film... or documentary, I guess? Anyway, I love it. I love looking back on the happy moments and wishing I could experience them all over again. Does it make me a little sad that I can’t? Yeah, it does. Do I enjoy that? Honestly, yeah, I do a little bit. I quite enjoy sticking a sad, acoustic song on – like Band of Horse’s I Like To Go To The Barn Because I Like or The Fray’s How To Save A Life - and just letting it all out whilst thinking of a better time.

Wow, okay, that was not the start I wanted. That was a little depressing. I’ll turn it around now.

The year was 2014. The month was September. The day was... I don’t remember but it was maybe the 9th? What I’m trying to say is: it was my first day. I remember standing in front of those rusted golden gates – bronze gates? Yeah, bronze gates and feeling super nervous. I moved up from primary without any of my close friends and only a handful of other classmates. In the year of 120 of us, there was 15 people I recognised. As an 11-year-old, that’s pretty scary stuff. I was super quiet to begin with. I still am quite quiet if you ever meet me. I’m not exactly a people person.

I had History first. It was alright but I sat next to a raven-haired girl and there was not a chance in hell that my chubby, socially awkward self was going to talk to her. So, I didn’t. I stayed pretty much silent in History. I did the same in Maths, which was next. Then came break and this is when I met Patrick. We were in the queue for a snack at the canteen and he made conversation with me because I was in front of him in the queue. He didn’t need to but he did. I’ll always be grateful for that. He’s always been there for me, even when I didn’t think I wanted him. He’s a good – nope, great friend. Anyway, we quickly hit it off over our mutual love for the newly debuted Flash CW show. The rest is history. We sat next to each other in the lessons that we could and he introduced me to his friends. Without him, I don’t have a clue how I’d have turned out or who I’d have ended up.

Okay, next story. My first kiss. Get ready because this is pretty weird, cringey and just overall as bad as a first kiss story usually is.

It started on a lovely late summer’s evening in, let’s say 2017. I could be wrong but I don’t think I am. I was out with two of my other friends, one who’s now my ex (remember me telling you about this weird pattern I have of having crushes on my friends? Yeah, well, this story is around the time that happened for the first time), and we were about to go home. It’d been a great day and the sun was setting. Perfect, storybook stuff. Typical of what you’d expect from a coming-of-age film. It was all good until Alex, my friend who knew about my crush on our other friend – Hannah, asked Hannah what it’d take for her to kiss me.

I told you, it’s weird. Just keep going. It doesn’t get any better but keep going.

After very little time to think, she said she wouldn’t need anything and would just kiss me quite happily. I was super taken back by this, and it was a good month or two before we dated, but I went with it. I asked her, in a very cringey way, whether I could kiss her now then and she went with it. I’d never kissed anyone before so s we both leant into it, a million things rushed through my head. Do I go in straight on? Do I tilt my head? Tongue – yes, or no? Should my eyes still be open? Half of which, I still am not too sure on. I’ll let you choose which two. But I didn’t pull back or stop or anything and we kissed. There was no tongue. It was pretty brief. It didn’t feel too special really, but it made a 14-year-old me very happy. Maybe a little too happy... I managed to quickly fix the situation but I think she may have known. If she did, she was super respectful about it and didn’t say anything but, God, it’s embarrassing to look back at. Especially after what came next.

We dated. It went quite well for the most part. Well, that’s what I thought at the time. Looking back, I was super awkward, only spoke to her online, didn’t take her out a single time, and stuck a little too much to the old primary school ways of teasing her to show her I liked her. She deserved better and has had better since, thankfully. I do still look back and wish it had gone differently. I wonder what things would be like if we dated again. What would I do differently? Would I be able to do anything differently? I don’t know. But it certainly crosses my mind sometimes. I think all us single peeps (I regret saying peeps but I’m going to roll with it) think about things like that from time to time. I guess it’s just part of life.

Okay, this is, again, taking quite a sad turn. Gimme a sec to think of a more light-hearted story to tell to finish this little catch up off with. What else do you need to know?

Ah, I know. It might help for you to know that me, Patrick and Olivia weren’t always as close as we are. In fact, before Year 11, we weren’t close at all. We were friends and Patrick and myself were close but Olivia just wasn’t someone we saw ourselves hanging out with.

I don’t remember the specifics of it. At this point it feels like it’s always just been us three. But I think it started with Patrick, and the fact he fancied one of Olivia’s friends. We were just finishing off our GCSE exams when Olivia, her friend Emily, me and Patrick all started hanging out. Because he had a crush on her, Patrick kinda naturally gravitated towards Emily. Leaving me and Olivia to chat. I’d hear all about her crushes and love life, as well as family problems and we quickly stopped needing Emily and Patrick to hang out. Actually, we realised we were in the same Graphic Design and Photography class and that gave us even more time to chat. By the time we’d finished the exams and were done with school, me, Olivia, Patrick and Emily had become a pretty inseparable group. We went round to Emily’s house that year for Patrick’s birthday. We all drank maybe a little too much but it was great fun. It was also the day Patrick and Emily finally got together and had their first kiss. They stuck together for a while after that, but nothing lasts forever and they split up after 5 months of dating.

It just wasn’t Emily’s scene at the time and she wasn’t looking for something as serious as Patrick. This was a big deal for us, as a group. It was like Zayn leaving One Direction. The group survived a little longer but not much. Emily faded from the picture and then there was just me, Patrick and Olivia. That was the group we started College with and it’s the same one we’re ending with. We’ve been through a helluva lot together. From the time I nearly lost my virginity on a family holiday to Germany to the time Olivia tried weed and was not okay with it. We’ve shared a lot of crazy times together and I hope we keep it up. I know we’re moving to different cities and we’re all going to be really busy with uni and jobs and life... but I just hope that this next week isn’t the last for us. I’d hate to lose them. I really would.