New start, new account. My other public account has been shedding followers faster than Mr Fowler (geography teacher) sheds dandruff. Plus, my old account was full of pics of Dylan. I set up this new one last night after Nate finally agreed to everything, and it already has a good handful of followers, even though we haven’t posted anything yet.
When Dylan and Tariq discover it – which they will because as soon as we’ve got our first pic I’ll follow them both, so they’ll get a notification – they’ll start to get a taste of their own medicine. They started this thing, and while they might, possibly, have won round one, that’s where it’ll end. I’m not going to return to school in September as the loser. Nope. Dylan or no Dylan, I’ll be back happier, more fulfilled and more successful than ever. Even if I have to fake it. Gonna have a good summer, are they? Well, we’re gonna have a spectacular one.
CHAPTER FOURTEEN
NATE
Happy. Out there. Living life. If that’s what Tariq sees when he scrolls through our pics, maybe he’ll feel differently about us. Am I deluded? But Tariq was my boyfriend before he went off with Dylan, so why can’t I win him back? I want him back. Despite everything, that’s what I want. As soon as I agreed to the idea, my parents and Jack immediately swung into action, and before I knew it, everything was packed, everything was happening. And now here I am, rammed in the back of the camper van among all the bags, already way too hot because there’s no air-con and it’s nearly thirty degrees outside, with Rose asking a series of questions that are going to be awkward if she carries on after we’ve picked up Jack:
“Who is Jack, exactly?”
“He’s a … friend.”
“Boyfriend?”
“Just friend. You remember him.”
“No, I don’t.” Pause. “Do you love him?”
“Definitely not.”
“Will you marry him?”
“Why would I marry him?”
“Boys can marry boys.”
“Rose, I know they can, and that’s great, but just because we’re both boys doesn’t automatically mean we’re going to marry each other.”
And that was all before we’d even reversed out of our driveway.
But I have to do this thing. I want Tariq to see “happy, fun-loving Nate”. All smiles and… And whatever else happy people are when they’re busy living their lives. Sunshine and rainbows, I don’t know.
We pull up outside Jack’s, where he’s already waiting with a collection of Louis Vuitton suitcases of varying sizes, one of those bags you carry suits in, a smaller holdall thing (also Louis Vuitton), and sitting on top of it all, a pack of six cartons of chocolate milk.
“Jacky-boy!” my dad says, like they’re already best mates.
“Mr Nate!” Jack replies. Then he nods at my mum. “Morning, Mrs Nate.”
Jack always used to call my parents Mrs Nate and Mr Nate, because that’s what he did when he first met them, when he was five, and it stuck because everyone deemed it hilarious.
“Travelling light, I see,” Mum says.
Jack nods gravely. “I know. I think I’ll be able to get by, but I have had to make a lot of sacrifices.”
Mum gives him a tight-lipped smile.
Dad starts loading Jack’s stuff into the camper van, while I remain in my seat, staring into the middle distance, wondering what Tariq and Dylan are up to right now, until Jack starts tapping at the window to my right. I turn to him. “What?” I mouth through the glass.
“Get out!” he tells me. “We should Instagram this!”
“Instagram what, exactly?”
“The start of the trip! Get out!”
I shake my head in disbelief. I’m on board with giving this a go, faking an amazing summer or whatever, but I’m not sure a picture of me and Jack outside his house (expensive and nice as it is, thanks to having a lawyer mum) is going to achieve that.
“Nate!” Jack shouts. “Come on!”
I sigh and scramble out of the camper van and round to the front, where Jack is brandishing his phone, experimenting with potential angles for our first photo. “So, what? Just a selfie or something next to the bush?”
Jack squints at me. “A selfie next to the bush?”
“Seems like a … nice bush? Nice flowers on it.”
“Next to the bush?”
I sigh. I’m so crap at social media – that’s why I usually don’t bother with it. And I realize now that fact puts me entirely at the mercy of Jack and his whims, but this scheme is happening, I agreed to it, so I guess I have no choice but to go along with whatever he suggests. “OK, so what, then?”
Jack looks around, pulling his mouth in various directions as he contemplates options. “On top of the camper van,” he finally says.
“Really?” That seems like a lot of effort.
“First pic, Nate! It’s gotta be a good one! Both of us, sitting atop this fine, majestic beast!” He gives the camper van a firm slap, and a large piece of rust falls off. “The sun’s in the sky and the boys are on the road! Actually, that’s a great caption for it, remember that; god, I’m good at words.”
I shake my head. “Fine—”
“Up you get!” Jack says. He laces his hands together in front of him. “Here, I’ll give you a step up.”
I place my left foot on his hands.
“One, two, THREE!”
And he thrusts upwards so I smash, splat, into the side of the camper van, nowhere near the roof.
“Pull yourself up! Swing your leg!” Jack tells me.
I laugh to myself at the very idea. Pull myself up? With these arms?
“Nate, what are you doing?” I hear Mum ask.
“He wants to get a photo,” Jack tells her, which is really irritating, because obviously this was all his idea. “He wants to sit on top of the van!”
“Ooh, good idea!” I hear Mum say. “I can send it to Auntie Karen – she’s always bombarding us with photos of her kids being happy and successful!”
I can feel myself slipping off. Physically
