Disclaimer: I do not own the Tribe (Cloud9) or any of the immediate stories
this involves. Nor do I own the song "You look wonderful tonight".
I wish I could say sorry.
Grace Owen ran her pretty blue eyes back over what she had just written, and then crossed it out with a flourish.
She sighed looking out of her window onto the sandy beach and turquoise lace-topped water. Everything that had happened in the last two years had happened so quickly, so feverishly, so wonderfully, that now she found herself wishing that she could tell someone – anyone – what she was going through.
Her mind flicked to him, and stopped dead in its tracks as a warm blush coloured her cheeks. She shook her head, she couldn't tell him that would ruin everything …
With a determined sigh, Grace picked up her pencil again and in neat loopy handwriting began again…
In the summer I was fifteen my parents changed my life forever.
At the time it upset me, I was angry with them for taking me away from my home, my friends and a city I loved. I was a teenager – the world was against me…but lately, as I see my parents getting older and sicker, I begin to feel sorry for all the bad things I said back then – things I don't even remember now.
We moved here, to the beach, mum, dad, Sara and I, to a pretty little house on the shore, and over the long, hot summer that followed I couldn't help but fall in love with The Little Valley just as my parents said I would.
I tried to fight it at first, made regular trips back to the city to see my friends and locked myself in my room and away from the glorious surroundings. The only problem with this was that being so far away from my old gang, made me see just how little we all had in common, they were selfish and conceited and if I was perfectly honest with myself, none of them were real friends to me.
After this brutal realisation Grace pulled back from the leather-bound diary and furrowed her brow in concentration, struggling to conjure up the memory.
But it was lost.
I don't even remember how I know that they weren't my real friends, it was just one of those feelings, a deep down voice which told me I wasn't fitting in anymore – moving away from the city opened my eyes.
The pencil hovered above the pages for a brief moment, long enough for a re- reading of that paragraph.
Jay wasn't one of those guys that you look at and think wow, not back then, when we first met, but when he looked at me with warm eyes and smiled shivers ran icy fingers up and down my spine.
It was autumn when we first met, and I remember it as if it were yesterday.
I was fifteen, a girl, shy, innocent, untouched by life or love…
I was having one of those wonderful dreams, where you are weightless, and everything is made of chocolate and marshmallows when the voice swam into my thoughts…
"Grace?" It was mum tapping lightly on the door. "Gracey sweetie – it's time to get up…"
"Mmmm.." I turned over and pulled the warm duvet back over my head. "Five more minutes." I whispered softly. "Just five more minutes…"
The tapping came again though and louder. "Grace, you've had five more minutes – I'm off to work in two, and Sara's playing downstairs, I don't want her left on her own."
The concern dripping from my mother's voice pulled my out of bed and forced me to get ready…
Sara was my younger sister and for her age she seemed unaffected by the move. Sara liked it as much as any of us, as far as we could tell - she didn't say much but still I saw the happiness deep in her eyes when she looked at the waves crashing on the sand. She was seven and a sickly child, she'd been in and out of hospital about a million times – more times in two months than I'd been in my whole life - but no one really knew what was wrong with her…or if they did they never said.
I feared that she was getting sicker every day; she seemed to drain of colour with every moment that passed. I knew my mother thought living by the seaside would help her to somehow get through it and I hoped with all my heart that she was right because I loved Sara more than anything.
I wish I could say sorry.
Grace Owen ran her pretty blue eyes back over what she had just written, and then crossed it out with a flourish.
She sighed looking out of her window onto the sandy beach and turquoise lace-topped water. Everything that had happened in the last two years had happened so quickly, so feverishly, so wonderfully, that now she found herself wishing that she could tell someone – anyone – what she was going through.
Her mind flicked to him, and stopped dead in its tracks as a warm blush coloured her cheeks. She shook her head, she couldn't tell him that would ruin everything …
With a determined sigh, Grace picked up her pencil again and in neat loopy handwriting began again…
In the summer I was fifteen my parents changed my life forever.
At the time it upset me, I was angry with them for taking me away from my home, my friends and a city I loved. I was a teenager – the world was against me…but lately, as I see my parents getting older and sicker, I begin to feel sorry for all the bad things I said back then – things I don't even remember now.
We moved here, to the beach, mum, dad, Sara and I, to a pretty little house on the shore, and over the long, hot summer that followed I couldn't help but fall in love with The Little Valley just as my parents said I would.
I tried to fight it at first, made regular trips back to the city to see my friends and locked myself in my room and away from the glorious surroundings. The only problem with this was that being so far away from my old gang, made me see just how little we all had in common, they were selfish and conceited and if I was perfectly honest with myself, none of them were real friends to me.
After this brutal realisation Grace pulled back from the leather-bound diary and furrowed her brow in concentration, struggling to conjure up the memory.
But it was lost.
I don't even remember how I know that they weren't my real friends, it was just one of those feelings, a deep down voice which told me I wasn't fitting in anymore – moving away from the city opened my eyes.
The pencil hovered above the pages for a brief moment, long enough for a re- reading of that paragraph.
Jay wasn't one of those guys that you look at and think wow, not back then, when we first met, but when he looked at me with warm eyes and smiled shivers ran icy fingers up and down my spine.
It was autumn when we first met, and I remember it as if it were yesterday.
I was fifteen, a girl, shy, innocent, untouched by life or love…
I was having one of those wonderful dreams, where you are weightless, and everything is made of chocolate and marshmallows when the voice swam into my thoughts…
"Grace?" It was mum tapping lightly on the door. "Gracey sweetie – it's time to get up…"
"Mmmm.." I turned over and pulled the warm duvet back over my head. "Five more minutes." I whispered softly. "Just five more minutes…"
The tapping came again though and louder. "Grace, you've had five more minutes – I'm off to work in two, and Sara's playing downstairs, I don't want her left on her own."
The concern dripping from my mother's voice pulled my out of bed and forced me to get ready…
Sara was my younger sister and for her age she seemed unaffected by the move. Sara liked it as much as any of us, as far as we could tell - she didn't say much but still I saw the happiness deep in her eyes when she looked at the waves crashing on the sand. She was seven and a sickly child, she'd been in and out of hospital about a million times – more times in two months than I'd been in my whole life - but no one really knew what was wrong with her…or if they did they never said.
I feared that she was getting sicker every day; she seemed to drain of colour with every moment that passed. I knew my mother thought living by the seaside would help her to somehow get through it and I hoped with all my heart that she was right because I loved Sara more than anything.