Losing Grip.

“Hey baby,” smiled the dark haired boy. I grinned and hurried to greet him, my school bag weightless on my back. He slid off the wall he was perched on as I got up to him and kissed me softly on the lips.

“Hey,” I smiled, keeping one hand on his waist, basking in him for a moment or two.

“How was your day?” He questioned, starting to shuffle me along so we could walk together.

“Oh, it was pretty good,” I shrugged. “Yours?”

“Ha, yeah, it was fun. I met Lee’s new girlfriend. She’s a bit…”

“Weird?” I guessed.

“Yeah. No. No, that’s harsh. I only just met her, after all. But she just seems a bit…”

“Odd?”

“Yeah. She is a bit.”

I shrugged. “You know what Lee’s like.”

Ian chuckled.

“I do indeed. That boy has been out with half of the freaks of all of south Wales, I should think. I’ve never known him to have a girlfriend who was… well, normal.”

“How about that Mia girl?” I suggested, thinking back to the tiny dark haired girl who I’d actually only met about twice.

“Nah, she was too into S & M; that’s why they broke up,” He laughed.

“Oh my god! You serious?” I laughed, squeezing Ian’s hand as it found mine. “She looked like such a gentle girl.”

“Well, the gentle girl obviously turned into a bit of a dominatrix when the two of them got past the tonsil tennis stage,” Ian smirked.

“Nice,” I shuddered. “What about the last girl he went out with? Sal- no, Sarah. What was wrong with her? I thought she was quite nice looking.”

“Oi! Don’t you fancy me any more?” Ian poked me hard in the rib and mock pouted.

“Oh no,” I said, holding my straight face, amazingly. “I’m gonna go back over to the dark side… Heterosexuality!”

He dropped my hand dramatically and buried his face in his hands.

“Oh no. Sean, how could you do this to me? Now I’m gonna have to date Stu!” Ian yelled. I doubled over with laughter and tried to picture Stu and Ian holding hands and going out.

“I’d love to see you flirt with him,” I gasped, holding my side.

Ian scrunched his nose up, thinking.

“I reckon I’d rather keep my face where it is, to be honest.”

“Fair point,” I nodded. “Stu does look like he could get pretty… scary.”

“He’d massacre me.”

“Aw,” I giggled, “I think you could make a good go of a fight with him,” I said encouragingly, reaching for his hand again.

“Ooh, so you want me now then do you?” Ian giggled, raising his eyebrows at me.

“Yeah, well, I’ve got no better offers…” I sighed dramatically.

“So you’ll put up with lil ol’ me,” Ian nodded, making a face of delight, then sticking his tongue out and going crossed eyed.

“Well, how could I resist that?” I smirked.

Ian proceeded to pull even more of a face in response, then ran down the road waving his hands around. I shook my head, laughing, as I walked down the road behind what was apparently the demon offspring of Ian Watkins and… a troll. Wow. For once, I was the more attractive of the two of us. Maybe.

Ian got bored of being a monster quite quickly and turned round to face me, hands on hips, pouting, for the entire world a supermodel. I laughed out loud, staggering slightly as I reached him. He swung his hips and then slowed it down, slowly sliding one hand down his own hip. To be honest, I found it intensely attractive. But he didn’t need to know that.

“Oh, sod off, Ivy Levan,” I mocked him, pretending to just walk past in contempt. Ian made a hissing noise and tossed his hair instead.

“Bitch, please!” He exclaimed in a camp American accent, “Betch, puhh-layse!”

I cracked up laughing again.

“God, you’re so camp! Anyone would think you were gay!” I said, in mock horror.

He wrinkled his nose as if in distaste.

“Yuck. That’s disgustin’. Anywaaaay, what you on about, Ivy Levan?!”

“You were actin’ a bit like her,” I shrugged.

“I hate that woman,” Ian scowled. “Could I at least not be a cool model, like... uh... Kate Moss?”

“Kate Moss isn’t cool!”

“Yeah she is. She’s got a rockstar boyfriend.”

“Pete Doherty’s not a rockstar, he’s an indie twerp.”

“Whatevs. I still think she’s cool.”

Ian’s phone rang; a bad eighties pop tune played out through the air. He answered it almost immediately.

“Hello? Oh all right mate, how are you doin’? Mmm. Tidy. I’m with Sean. Nah, sorry. I’m no- Ohh? Is he?”

Ian bit his lip and seemed to dither between options. From what I could gather, Lee or Stu was trying to get him to come out and he wasn’t planning on it but somebody was around… I wasn’t quite sure though.

“I don’t… ooh… you know what Lee, I’ll call you back. A’ite? Cool. See ya.” He hung up and looked at me, slowly. I looked back innocently. I knew he was going to leave me now.

“Are you going to Lee’s?” I mumbled.
“I-I dunno. Mike’s in town.”
“Oh, right…” I murmured.

Mike was an old friend of Ian’s who moved to New Zealand when they were in year eight. He came back to Wales a couple of times a year, but rarely told anyone in greater advance than a day that he was coming. I’d only met him once; he’d had a neck brace from a skateboarding accident at the time. He was “pretty hardcore,” according to Stu.

“So… you’re going to go and… meet them.”
Ian bit his lip, looking angsty.

“Um… would that be alright?”

I nodded.

“Go for it,” I said bravely, trying to act like I didn’t care.

“I’m sorry, I’ll... I’ll catch you later and all, yeah?”

“Yeah. Sure.” I shrugged it off.

“Unless… Well, do you want to come? Yeah, you should come with me,” Ian suggested, his face lighting up. My heart leaped.

“You’re sure?”

“Yeah, no reason why not. Lee and Stu like you, I’m sure you can get along with Mike, and Lee’s new girl is…bearable.”

I grinned.

“Ok then.”

----

I actually had a really good time. I hadn’t ever realised quite how funny Mike had the ability to be, but somewhere around the time when I was literally rolling around on Lee’s living room floor I noticed.

The fact that I could roll around quite happily on Lee’s living room floor was an indication of how I felt around him, I supposed.

My mum’s always said how you feel when you’re around a person shows what they mean to you. I was starting to understand what she meant. When around Ian, my heart fluttered, my breath caught in my throat and at the same time, I felt like everything was going to be all right.

Around Matt it was comfortable; things were familiar. We didn’t need to fill up the space with words, we just tended to sit quietly and watch films. With Aled I laughed and cringed equally whilst he babbled to me about his adventures. Lee and Stu, I guess I just… I don’t know exactly, I used to sit next to Ian nervously on Lee’s sofa, but now I rolled around on the floor with tears of laughter rolling down my cheeks… I guess it showed I felt all right around Lee and Stu. And Mike, too, though I didn’t know him properly yet.

I sighed as I sat at the dinner table, pushing food around my plate. I shouldn’t get more attached to these people than I already was. Ian was going to leave, and Lee and Stu probably were too. Everyone had to grow up and move on eventually.

I just wished they wouldn’t sometimes. I wished I were worth staying for.

“Something wrong, love?” My mum asked, looking over her own plate at me concernedly. “You normally love spaghetti.”

“I know,” I mumbled, “I...just...yeah. I’m ok.”

“Is this about Ian, by any chance?” she asked gently.

I just shrugged.

“I guess. I’m just…”

“What?”

I sighed. You don’t tell your mother about all your feelings. It’s not something that you can just do when you’re a teenager.

This applies to all teenagers unless you are Matt. In which case your innermost feelings are probably about your favourite batman comic; in any case even he likes to tell them to weirdoes in Japan who he talks to through the Internet.

“It’s nothing really Mam. I’m just tired and… stuff.”

She nodded and picked up our plates, before leaving the room. I smiled to myself, thinking of Matt furiously tapping away at his laptop, arguing about whom was better: Batman or Catwoman.

I got up to leave the table and head to my room. I was planning on lying on my bed and pretending to do Science coursework. I really hated being in year ten. Ian was lucky getting to do whichever subjects he wanted at college, and now he was going to Uni he’d get to do just the one subject.

There I went again! Everything comes back to Ian, I thought. It proved how fixated I was really; plus reminded me of just how hard it was going to be when he left. I sighed, moving slowly past the kitchen door.

“Sean, love?” My mum popped her head out of the doorway.

“Yeah?” I asked, trying to look bright and smiley.

“Just a thought. If you were upset about Ian leaving, I think I’d like to mention to you that you should just enjoy what you have now and not worry too much about the future. Don’t worry about where he’s off to in the summer, because things might be totally different then. You might have different feelings then. You might do, you might not. Nobody can know.”

She paused and smiled at me.

“But the important thing is to enjoy the time you’ve got now together. Make the most of being with your friends Sean, because you only get this time once.”