The Infinite YA Playlist

Marks to Prove it.

Over the summer a lot changed

And they all changed

To keep up with it

Too complicated, too complex

To talk to anybody

 [Marks to Prove It - The Maccabees]

It had been the longest summer of my life. The days stretched out in months rather than minutes; the minutes in seconds. I might as well have scratched out the numbers of the clock and used a dandelion to tell the time: time meant nothing.

It really was the longest summer of my life and I couldn't wait for it to be over. They said that summer is what all high schoolers look forward to. And I did, usually anyway. Especially the last summer of high school, before we entered college and A-Levels and university and angst. Rewind six weeks and I had been surrounded by historical cartoons trying to sort my propaganda from jingoism. My hands had been covered with chemistry equations and my head had been full of Shakespeare quotes.

The summer holidays couldn't have looked more glorious, filled with promise and adventure. It hadn't turned out like that though. It never did, did it? On the night of my last GCSE, when my dad had let me have a beer in celebration, and we were sat around having Shepherd's Pie my parents told me they were getting divorced.

We had been a close family, all things considered. Especially when I considered what my school friends had told me about their families. We did things together. Willingly. My mum and dad stayed in the same room and even in the same bedroom, but I didn't want to think about that.

But sometimes that isn't enough, I guess. It was unbearable and I couldn't wait to go back to school, start my A-Levels, meet new people and take my mind off things.

The last six weeks were filled with tense silences, screaming matches, tearful frustration, packed boxes, forced friendliness and finally watching my dad move out.

There was only one thing that got me through the summer and he was texting me right now.

Phil was a new addition to my life. Well, relatively. He was the son of one of my dad's friends and he'd kind of always been there but not there there. Our dads worked in event security and we had both often been dragged to random events instead of a babysitter. One time, a sporting event in the city, my dad had forgotten his phone so we'd given Phil's dad my number and for some reason Phil ended up with it.

I didn't hear anything else from him until about six months ago when I got a text:

Hey, I've got a new phone & lost all my contacts. Who's this?

Now we talk every day. At least. He made me so happy. He was about to start university, doing French. French. I mean, come on, how was I not supposed to fall for him? He was full of jokes and film recommendations and eyelash wishes and he was so good. Like nothing bad ever touched him. Like it didn't dare. Except I knew it had and still... he was golden.

We'd meet up whenever we could. We'd go for coffee, though he'd always order tea, and we'd get lunch or we'd meet in the small art gallery in town. Sometimes we'd go for walks and we'd branch off the main road and scramble up to the wood just behind our house. That was where we had our first kiss; surrounded by trees still dripping and glittering with the last rainfall.

And that was another reason why this summer needed to be over and I needed to go back to school. I had plucked up the courage to tell my mum that I was gay and she had, well, she'd been less than impressed.