The Boy from the Sea by H. L. Macfarlane

Author:H. L. Macfarlane [Macfarlane, H. L.]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Macfarlane Lantern Publishing
Published: 2020-08-09T16:00:00+00:00

Chapter Seventeen

I hadn't thought it possible. Really, it felt as if the end was never within my grasp. But, as we moved into the third week of April, haunted by Terry’s stabbing, the attacks on the news and the theft of my parents’ car, I finally finished my thesis.

I wanted to celebrate but I didn't know how. It's not as if I had a group of friends to get riotously drunk with at one of the university unions or a bar in the city centre. I didn’t exactly have the money to do that, anyway, even if such a group of friends had existed. If Louisa were here she’d have borrowed money from her mum – who doted on her baby girl – to fund our festivities. But she wasn’t here, and I had to be capable of celebrating without her.

I sent Josh a text to tell him I’d finished my thesis, though he was working and therefore unlikely to reply. Since his impromptu visit to my flat last week we’d messaged each other almost every day, slowly but surely getting back onto ‘banter and insulting Louisa’ ground. It was nice to have that again, though I was constantly a little on edge that Josh would say something that would take things too far.

When my phone buzzed a few seconds later I was surprised to see that he’d responded to my message. There was no stopping the snort of laughter I emitted upon seeing that he’d sent me a photo of himself in full scrubs and a face mask giving me a thumbs up. He followed this up with a message that we had to celebrate in person when he next had a weekend off.

Then I sent a similar message to David and to Louisa, hoping that the former would reply and that the latter’s response wouldn’t involve telling me to celebrate with people who were not my boyfriend. But when David replied simply saying ‘Congrats’ and Louisa replied exactly the way I’d hoped she wouldn’t I sagged onto my couch, thoroughly deflated.

“Should I go home?” I wondered aloud, thinking that my parents, at the very least, would be happy to celebrate with me. But the notion felt pathetic, especially because I knew I was but a few days away from giving into the urge to ask them if I could stay in Largs with them for a few months whilst I applied for jobs. It’s not even like I wanted to specifically move back home; I didn’t want to live so far away from Lir, for one. But I was fairly certain I couldn’t stand to stay in Glasgow anymore…at least for a while.

Not wishing to feel sorry for myself – and full of too much restless energy to continue sitting on the couch – I wandered over to the terrace door and slid it open. When the wind blasted me back an inch or two I grinned. It was blowing from the west, and smelled faintly of salt. The combination of the smell and thoughts of my parents made me homesick.

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