Just The Way I'm Not (Prince Harry Fanfiction)

Chapter One

I ruffled my hair and smiled at myself in the mirror. Clearing my throat, I began to speak “I, Holly Longford, am making a promise to myself. When I start University I will be a new person. I’ve spent too many years off my life being the underdog, being the one who nobody notices, nor cares about. At eighteen years old it should be my time to shine now, I want to say goodbye to the bullies and hello to the popular girl. I’m using this boring and pointless summer holiday as a type of boot camp. Every day I will work on making myself more confident, I’ll talk to new people at work and I’ll be cheerful and friendly. Forcing myself to be more sociable will make me more outgoing. Then I’ll work on my image, dying my hair and spending my money on more expensive makeup. When I get to Uni people will be begging to be my friend and all the boys will-”

“Holly!” Typical. I roll my eyes and try and block out the sound. No one is going to ruin my moment. “All the boys ask me out and everyone will know my name!” I really start to get into it; I jump up onto my bed and throw my arms about “Holly Longford! Popular, beautiful!”

“HOLLY!”  For. Fucks. Sake. I slam my hands down I my thighs angrily and yell back “What Mum?!” When she doesn’t reply (in that annoying way she does) I know it means she doesn’t want us to have ‘Non face to face communication’ as she calls it. Swearing and moaning I drag myself down stairs. When I walk in, Mum’s sitting on a bar stool in the kitchen, consoling a woman crying into her hankie. “As you can see” Mum says in her soft therapeutic voice “Jane is a little upset. I think she’ll be staying here for today.” Jane is one of Mum’s clients; she has several of those, being a therapist. If that’s what you call her. I call her barking mad. She’s not even a proper therapist, she’s one of those stupid ones, who make you meditate and burn incense. The most stupid thing is that people actually pay for her services. They pay quite a lot actually, that’s why we can afford to live in a nice house. I mean don’t get me wrong, it’s nothing special or anything; it’s a three bedroom house in Craster Village in Northumberland. (Don’t worry if you don’t know where that is. No one does. All you need to know is it’s a tiny village by the sea. Where absolutely NOTHING happens.) But a three bedroom house is good for us, seen as my mother is the only one bringing in any income. My Dad doesn’t work. Okay, well he does. He runs a lifeboat charity; you see my dad’s lived in Craster all his life and there are tons of keen sailors around here but there’s nothing to help them and for some reason he feels passionate about helping them. It doesn’t bring him any income, all donations go to the charity, apart from a little that goes to paying the workers (Craster isn’t the type of place where people can afford to volunteer). So about 10 years ago he set up ‘Save The Sailors’ and has counted on Mum to earn money ever since. I think he’s plain lazy, whereas Mum thinks he’s some kind of selfless hero. Either way my family is barking mad and I’ve dealt with crying women in the kitchen many times before. “So” my mother smiles “I’m a little caught up this morning, so I can trust you’ll make your own breakfast?” I’m not quite sure why she feels the need to ask me this; I always make my own breakfast. We never eat as a family, Dad will always be busy talking to some do-gooder and Mum will always be with some hysterically crying person. It’s almost always Jane. She’s is nothing new, she’s always here, crying about her husband who ran off with the milkman. Seriously she needs to move on. But instead of offering my wisdom I just nod my head and grab a diet coke out the fridge, heading back upstairs.

By 10:00am Jane has stopped crying and is drinking a cup of tea with my mother rambling on and on “I mean I had no idea!” she cries, shoving a digestive in her mouth “I’ll never drink milk again!” I smirked to myself whilst I slipped my converse on, this was one bright side to mum’s job, it attracted a hell of a lot of weirdos most of which were pretty funny. It’s a Monday morning which means, I’m off to work. It’s not really a proper job, I work at my Dad’s charity in the summer and I used too at the weekends during term time. You may be able to suss by now that my parents suck the fun out of everything, we never go on holiday or do anything interesting. Still at least I get paid. I pull the Save the sailors polo shirt over my head and make my way to the building which is situated just off the beach and about 50 metres away from our house. The building is no bigger than my sitting room and is full of badges, cards, mugs and other useless tat. It is a charity shop, people come in and buy stuff, all the profits go to our charity, it’s pretty simple. It also gets barley any business and brings in no money; the real money we get is by my Dad’s fundraising. This is just an extra, it was originally a place where they kept the lifeboats and the lifeguards hung out but now they keep the boats outside and the guards are reduced to an office in the back of the building. As per usual, when I arrive, I find myself a seat behind the counter and read a gossip magazine. This is what I’ll be doing for the next two hours until I can have a lunch break, then again until 4:00pm. The magazine contains its usual drivel. Someone from a reality TV show is getting fat, some couple have split up and Prince Harry is doing something un-royal. I smile to myself, I’ve never been that mad about the Royals, but I guess I’ve always admired Harry for doing normal stuff, like going clubbing and dating normal people, it shows that the Royal Family are still normal people, that their still human. All in all everyone in this magazine has a more interesting life than me. They seem to be out there, going to events, shopping, getting married, having children, partying or just generally doing something fun. And how am I spending my summer? Sitting in the same village that I was born in, grew up in, went to school in and work in. For eighteen whole years on this planet, I have nothing to show for it. Well, except my reluctant charity work of course. I’m going to University after the summer and, although this should kickstart my life, it isn’t enough. I don’t want to leave him completely uncultured and having never left England. I want to be interesting.

That night when I get home, I vow that by the time Summer’s over, I will have completely changed my life.

*

I sit at the breakfast table and groan. I’ve just seen the paper for that day and it’s not good. I’m in it, smiling in my uniform outside the Charity Shop. The small article headline reads ‘Eighteen year old has devoted her entire life to Charity’. The article then goes on to explain how I have been helping out at the charity since I was just eight years old. It totally exaggerates everything I’ve done, claiming I live to help those at sea. None of it is true, I was forced to work at that place the moment it was set up, because my parents thought I didn’t ‘contribute’ enough and wasn’t part of any kids clubs. I should’ve known, this type of thing has happened before, this village is full of old ladies who always come into the shop, thinking the sun shines out my bum, that’s not even mentioning the local newspaper reporter who’s always sniffing around. I feature in the paper every few years or so, wishing me a ‘well deserved happy birthday’ or as part of promotion advertisement for the charity. But this article is about young inspirations, it’s about teenagers who have done some amazing things with their short lives. They must be having a laugh; seriously you could fit what I’ve done with my life on a postit note. It’s not that I particularly mind having these articles written about me, it’s just I always get people congratulating me or local radio stations wanting an interview.  On the other hand, getting my face out there might help my new plan of changing my life. It may make something happen to me. “Oh it’s a lovely article isn’t it?” Mum says when she strolls into the room “You should be proud.” She smiles dreamily, and puts the kettle on. “It’s not that good” I mumble modestly. Trust my mother to blow things out proportion. “Oh no” she dismisses, she waves her hands and makes all her bangles bang together “This is a good sign. The stars are telling me so, I was watching them last night, Holly, and they foresaw wonderful things happening.” I roll my eyes, I wish I had some excuse that she’s mentally unstable or something but I don’t. She’s always been like this. I’m in no mood to humour her, so I pick up my book and head to work. The day drags on, just like the one before that and the one before. My friend Niall pops in around lunchtime, when I say friend, I mean like stalker. He’s had a crush on me since we were five and doesn’t seem to quite understand I don’t feel the same way. I’m sweeping the shop floor when he comes stumbling in, removing his bike helmet. “Hey!” he says a little too cheerily. I look up and roll my eyes “Hi Niall” I sigh. I drop the broom and go behind the counter, creating as much space between us as possible. “So I guess you’ll be going to University soon” he states sadly.

“Yes” I reply. He looks at me for a moment and I pray he’s not going to hug me or say he’s going to miss me. “Right” he smiles awkwardly “I’ll be off now then” and with that he opens the door and closes it behind him. Well that was the most pointless conversation ever. Day one of improving my life is going exceptionally bad. There is no way I change this. Well or so I thought. Because that night something strange happened. When I got home there was a letter waiting for me, a letter that got both my parents sitting down at the table waiting for me to come home.