I Don't Care

         The wet, slippery stones tried to smile up at me, tried to make me feel better. But the atmosphere on the morose pebble beach of Brighton was less than encouraging. The dark grey clouds huddled together and seemed to be placed ever so perfectly over my head, as if God was trying to tell me something by doing so. I don’t know why I came to the beach – if you can even call it that. I think it’s just the place I find best to escape everything, run through what’s in my head. I squinted out at the dull, dreary-grey waters that seemed to dance and thrash viciously in the wind. The beach was empty, probably how you’d expect it to be on a cold October morning, but today it seemed really empty. Maybe because I was feeling so lonely, maybe because my head was so full it made up for it; there were a million reasons why it might be, but I couldn’t put my finger on one specifically.

         That’s when the first raindrop fell. Well, it probably wasn’t the first. I’d had the hood of my dark grey hoodie up over my dark, long hair since I’d come out, so I wouldn’t be able to feel the rain even if there was any. I knew because it landed on my notepad. I’d had it rested upon my bony knees that were kitted up in black skinny jeans, and I saw the ink run when the raindrop landed. I tried to wipe the cold water off, but I just smudged it more. I cursed to myself; though I didn’t know why I cared so much, all I’d written was ‘Jess.’ She was the reason I was here, and I planned on writing a song about her. About how she’d broken my heart and torn me to pieces – but I didn’t. Instead, I ripped the paper from my notepad and let it fall to the floor. It moved gracefully in the breeze, which I contrasted by stamping on it furiously with my green and yellow high-top trainers.

         I started to walk down the beach. Pebbles crunched under my feet, like they were screaming in the pain of it all. I didn’t care; they couldn’t be hurting as much as I was. The sea that was once roaring and shouting at me was drowned out by the deafening screeches of ‘Jess’ that my mind was playing on repeat. It built up and built up until I scrunched up my eyes and held my hands to my ears like it would block out the sounds – it didn’t. I found a bench, a large piece of driftwood placed carefully on two iron poles. The wood was twisted and tangled, I decided we had enough in common and took a seat. I tried to take my mind off Jess, concentrate on other things. Two seagulls fought over a dropped chip on the pier a good 10 meters from where I was sat. They looked at each other with venom and fury, like the chip was a matter of life or death. Their feathers were matted and rough due to the weather, and their beady, yellow eyes cried out for better care. I wish I was a seagull. I wish all I had to worry about was chips.

         The rain was quite heavy now, less of a spitting and more of a drizzle. I took in a deep breath of salty sea air, it smelt like home to me. I’ve lived here all my life. Somewhere in the distance, I heard the sound of an Ice Cream Truck – and I laughed at the irony of it. I shook my head and laughed out loud; here I was, wallowing in my own misery, on Halloween, the weather was awful and even the birds couldn’t sing with happiness – and here’s an ice cream truck. The soundtrack to my entertaining escapade of a childhood, the sound that used to brighten up my day, the sound of happiness itself. I took my notepad back out of my black satchel bag and drew a picture of the beach in front of me. I drew the miserable sea, the depressing pebbles, the pugnacious seagulls, the haunting clouds. Right in the middle, I drew myself when I was seven years old, holding an ice cream. Underneath the picture, I wrote my favourite lyric (and my new life moral): “The best of us can find happiness in misery.”