abyss ↣ joe sugg au

fifty two

The eight of them were more drunk than sane as they ran into the water fully-clothed. Each person had a half-empty bottle of champagne in their hand and they held them high above their heads as they wade in.

Alfie pushed Troye right into the water, emerging shortly after with hair stuck flat to his head and spluttering.

"Don't touch my baby boy!" Tyler slurs drunkenly, pressing the side of Troye's head onto his shoulder and attempting to bob them both away from everyone else.

"Hey Char," Joe says from a little behind Charlotte and she turns away from the show to see Joe kicking back the last of his champagne. "Will you come here a second?"

Charlotte jumps through the water, splashing Joe with little grace. She stopped thrashing when he wrapped his arms round her waist.

When their laughter subsided, they found themselves in a passionate staring contest and Charlotte lost eventually, ducking her head down to rest it on Joe's shoulder so the water touched her nose.

"I like who we are out here," Joe announced finally, leaning his cheek heavily on Charlotte's damp hair.

"Me too." Charlotte agreed, dusting flecks of water over Joe's back with her free hand.

"Wish we could feel this free forever," Joe hums and it's all Charlotte can do to nod in the crook or Joe's neck.

"Do you have any regrets?" Joe asked, like the question had been a heavy weight on his shoulders and now was finally the time to give it to the waves.

Charlotte pulled back, so she could look Joe square in the eyes and admire the way they always matched the water.

Despite the alcohol making her head muggy, she'd never been able to see clearer. She thought hard, about shampoo bottles and locked doors, about paved doorsteps and children's homes and autumn leaves she tried to count. She thought about creating a home in Andrea's playhouse and begging Andrea's parents out of taking her into care. She thought about having to get some air because Kian and Andrea were so suffocating back then, sitting in a cafe with thread-bare gloves wrapped around a cup of coffee. She thought about that kind boy that offered her a way out and the offer she took. The lies she told, the way she bullshitted herself into a respectable job and saw the same boy there on the first day, the boy who was now screaming with laughter in the water a few metres away, in between kissing his not-quite-girlfriend. She thought about wanting to die, sectioning out the differences of then and now in her head. She thought about Joe, her precious boy who had galaxies behind his eyes yet he was told he could not shine. She thought about how her Mum came back, how she's on holiday with the people that make her so happy she finds it hard to breathe. She thought about the people who left her behind, her father, Andrea. She thought about the water surrounding her that she once both craved and feared and she thought about the stars, how they'd seen it all.

"No."

A smile spreads across Joe's lips and Charlotte couldn't help but kiss it.

"How about you?" Charlotte asked eventually, "any regrets?"

Charlotte knew the question had a whole new meaning for Joe, there was someone else's life to consider - it's why it was a shock when he kissed Charlotte once more and whispered, "No, even though my bollocks may say this is one."

Charlotte bites her lip in order to suppress a laugh and winds her arms around Joe's neck, "it's okay you know, to have regrets," she assured.

Joe smiles, a little sad but he shook his head in dismissal, "she never had any."

 It was all they could do then, to discard their empty champagne bottles in the sea which probably wasn't beneficial for the environment but Charlotte had never been a fan. In the water, Charlotte felt weightless and it was easy enough for Joe to wrap her legs around his waist. 

Charlotte took time to admire, scratching her nails lightly through Joe's shaggy wet hair and pushing it back so she could see the eyes she could probably write poetry about if she really put her mind to it. She ran her thumb over the ice metal that detailed Joe's lip and she blames it on the champagne when she leans forward and takes the small ring between her teeth and tugs ever so lightly.

"Please, keep it PG. There are children present!" Caspar shouted, looking pointedly at Troye who just flipped him off and went back to making out with Tyler with determination. 

Joe scowled, pointed out how Caspar was hypocritical and then lowered both himself and Charlotte underneath the water suddenly, Charlotte's scream muffled by the ocean around them.

Better, Joe thought, cupping Charlotte's cheeks through the moon-lit water and kissing her thoroughly, well it was more like breathing into each other's mouths but like, same thing. 

In the past year, there had been many moments that Charlotte remembers as important. Whether it was meeting Joe for the first time, running a race after smoking a whole packet of cigarettes, buying take-out and watching relationships stutter on the sidewalk, leaning against the bathtub and thinking yeah I think I might love him. Whether it was sitting on a roof of a beat up car and watching flames turn to fairy dust, sitting in an audience and feeling so proud she wanted to scream. Whether it was moving in, jetting off, they were all important. And this moment, Charlotte thinks might be important too. 

It wouldn't of been hard for Charlotte to believe this was all a dream. That she actually did jump that night and here she was, hands on her cheeks, lips to her own and this was her heaven. 

But they surfaced eventually, when drowning became a possibility and she began to breathe, and live, and every moment took her to a place where goodbyes were hard to come by. She looked into Joe's eyes again, real proper this time, wanted to try hard and she came to a conclusion, that Joe was the type of poem you wrote on your heart, not paper.