Forked Roads Back

PROLOGUE part 1 - MATT

"OI, MOPEY. EYES FORWARD."

I clip Archie round the ear as I pull onto the motorway. He's been quiet since we left and I don't want him being Upset Central all the way to the airport. He was about to spend the next four years in New York, which was something to be excited about, not miserable.

When he turns towards me his eyes are glassy and I have a horrible feeling he's about to cry on me. But thankfully, once he sniffs, he seems to have his emotions under control.

"She's coming to New York in December, mate, and you'll be wondering why you even acted like this." Archie looks at me with daggers but I just laugh it off. "She'll still be the same annoying Tess she's always been."

"She's not annoying," he huffs and turns away from me.

I scoff. "Come on, Arch." I punch his shoulder. "Can we please not have two hours of moping as the last experience I have with you before you leave?"

He sighs and I know I'm not going to get what I want so it's time for some tough love.

"You can pine all you want once you're on that plane."

"I'm not pining," he snaps.

"Sure you're not. But maybe I can go with distraction to help this journey go a bit faster."

He looks at the speedometer in front of me and I notice he grips the door handle. "Matt, I think you're doing that all by yourself. Can you please slow down?" I follow his gaze and realise I'd managed to drive above ninety.

"Ah sorry." I take my foot off the accelerator and the engine stops racing, and if I'm not mistaken, I swear the car says thank you.

"Okay, now that we're not going to take off, what were you thinking?"

I think about it for a moment and the cheesiest thing comes to mind. Although it might backfire on me if I don't set some ground rules.

"Top ten things that happened to you this year."

"Matt, what?" He complains.

"And no Tessa examples. She's off limits. This game has to be strictly Tessa-less."

"This is a really stupid game," he huffs, crossing his arms.

I look at him quickly before looking back at the road. "It's not a game. And it's not stupid. I can think of ten things already."

He sighs exasperatedly and starts picking at a piece of fluff on his shorts. "I can't think of any," he says sullenly, even though I know he's got his fair share of happy memories this year, even ones without Tessa.

"Nothing?" I scoff. "Not even one?" I laugh. "Arch, come on, you're being obtuse."

It's his turn to laugh. "I'm not being obtuse. And since when do you know what that means?" he retorts, sounding surprised.

I shrug, "Dating Chloe has its uses."

He shakes his head. But when his smile disappears I'm thinking he isn't going to play.

I understand how much he's hurting, because he's going to be spending his four university years three-thousand miles away from his girl, and all of his friends, and I know he misses Tessa a lot already. After what they've both been through, and how much of a crutch they'd been for each other, I'm not surprised he's scared. But I also know that Tessa wouldn't want him to be down in the dumps about all of this, especially given this was something they'd both decided to go through with. If she knew he would be this down she probably would have fought harder for coming with us. To be honest, I'm starting to wish she had because at least he'd be more talkative.