Flo

Chapter One

Chapter One

The leather grey chair I'm seated in is the cage that prevents the rush of wanting to leave.

Whatever had lead me to believe I could do this really had a sense of false hope. I'm a nervous wreck, but it's the kind of nerves you get when going to new places and being surrounding by people in all ages and genders. Or, in this case, just going to new places.

Let's just put it this way: it's a new environment, and one I'm not accustomed to accepting on my own.

There was only two people in the kitchen, but I still felt suffocated.

Saying this, the head count did kind of depend on whether you counted my auntie as a single person; as she leaned back in the chair, stomach jutting out alarmingly over her jeans, this was certainly debatable.

The abundance of clutter in her tiny kitchen wasn't really helping the whole suffocation thing. Recipe books were stacked in the most random places - on top of the microwave, shoved between jars of pasta and flower, and a couple even functioning as doorstops - which made no sense at all.

But then again the strange fetish for everything weird did seem to fit in with our surroundings - the town I mean.

Or should I say village.

From what I could see of Thorpness as we drove in from the station the small town harboured nothing but a few multi-coloured houses, some off shore lagoons and a windmill.

My mother had left and hour ago. My parents had split, hated the guts out of each other. And yes, hated one and another that much that they couldn't face seeing the other in court to decide who got custody of me over the summer.

Pathetic.

So now I'm stuck in the remotest part of Great Britain with nothing except a beach ball for an aunt and the unusually sweltering English heat.

Tipping my head up I pile my blond hair onto my head, hoping to give my neck a little breathing space. Or rather just coping my aunt who had her Blond curly hair piled on her head as well. I mean she has lived here for donkey's years, and besides she looks perfectly content with the surrounding heat.

"How about an ice cream?" my auntie smiles sweetly "there is this super cute place on the high street, and the guy who works there is a life guard!" She giggles pushing herself out of the chair.

About five minutes later we had some how manoeuvred her and the baby out of the chair - using an alarming amount on energy on my part.

The high street was literally only a few steps down the road. And that's if you had the nerve to call it a high street. Basically Thorpness's only shopping facilities consisted of and ice cream parlour, a 24 hour Tesco, a bakers, green grocers, chippy and finally some random clothes boutique.

All painted sea-side pastel shades.

My aunt had already started striding purposefully towards the yellow painted Ice cream parlour, bun bouncing up and down with the strides. I set off into a jog, catching her as we slipped onto the end of the que.

Oh how very British.

Somehow I seem to get extraordinarily enthused my freckly arms as my auntie begins to jabber on about some Thorpness history.

"Hello Alfie!" the boy at the counter smiles at the two of us. "I will have three scoops of chocolate fudge, with sprinkles"

The boy laughs "Hello Rachel! How's it going?"

"Oh brilliant! If you are meaning the art work! And just as brilliant if you are meaning the baby!" she chirps nudging me, "what do you want Flo? The Chocolate Fudge here is a-maz-ing!"

"As I can tell," glance at the menu board above the boys head "uh, just vanilla please"

"Just vanilla! Nothing wrong with vanilla is there Rachel? To be honest I think it is one of the best flavours around" I sneak a peek at Auntie Rachel who I nodding enthusiastically.

"ooooo, I forgot to introduce you two!" auntie Rachel gestures between us "Flo this is Alfie! Alfie this is Flo!" I look up and smile at the boy, who actually does return the smile, plus I think it's genuine.

Not that my social skills reach that far or anything.

"She is my niece and over here for the summer! She is the same age as you, doing a-levels next year." She looks at me "you are 17 aren't you?"

"16, auntie Rachel, my birthday is on august the 27th"

"Oh yes I forgot! You are young in the year!" I nod and grimace.

"Alfie?" a girl's voice bounces through the shop "where are the flakes?"

"oo Anna! Meet my niece Flo!" Auntie Rachel cooes, I take in a breath: how embarrassing can my first day here be?

"Hi Rachel!" then she glances at me "do not get the wrong impression... Flo, is it?" I nod and smile slightly "I never work here!" I laugh and let my mouth split into a grin. "Hey, me and my friends are meeting up at the beach later, for a bonfire, wanna come?"

"I... ugh"

"Oh thank you Anna!" Aunt Rachel cuts in "Florence would love too!"

I bite my lip, taking the ice cream Alfie was handing to me.
Not only did Aunt Rachel call me by my full name, she also signed me up to an almost certain town new girl embarrassment.

Of course I did not take into account the size of this town.