Camping Dorks, chapter 1, Intro

Theo sighs, long and dramatically.

“I’m the biggest fucking idiot you’ll ever meet.”

Lying on the sofa, he grumbles into the cushion he’s holding tight against his chest.

Mathilde stops herself in her book -one of those boring required reading that school asks you to complete before the start of the year- and sighs too. Here we go again, she thinks, certain that her beanpole of a friend only irritates himself more by bringing up this story again and again, and complaining about it than she is while listening.

But that’s what friends are for: listening. So she waits but he says nothing more, cushion now out of his face, eyes unfocused.

Theo came back from his holidays two weeks ago, and all of his camping memories were still vivid enough for him to replay everything in his mind almost exactly like he’d lived it. Alas, it saddened him to notice that slowly the pictures attached to his experiences were running away from him and that things and faces started to blur in his head.

It has been only two weeks... it was too soon for it all to fade away. The situation was irritating, and painful. He was not ready to let go, and certainly not ready for class to start again.

In fact, Theo’s mind was stuck in summer love feelings and deep, salty regrets of him having cold feets in the most fatidic moment. But… it wasn’t like he really fell in love, right?

It was just a summer thing...

A nice, sweet, ‘could have been perfect’ summer thing that he liked to think about, again and again, until he felt sick about it. Telling the story to Mathilde a hundred times over helped to make it more real because some parts, he still couldn’t believe, and somehow he hoped to delay the fading memories. 

The huge undesirable effect of this relentless treatment was the anger he felt at himself for being a total coward in the end.

Quentin will certainly kill him if he learns about that whole story. He perhaps already knows. Theo swears that his best friend has a sixth sense about his love affairs.

Love?

That last consideration pulls him out of his train of thought, and he lets out an angry, frustrated cry.

“... fucking idiot.”  

Mathilde turns a page of her book. “I won’t disagree.”

Theo whines again. The lack of empathy thrown at his face isn’t as painful as HIS DAMAGED HEART, but he secretly likes to play Mathilde’s game, and she certainly knows it. Their friendship works like that.

And, she wasn’t wrong: he is indeed a huge idiot. An idiot who ruined a unique opportunity, and Mathilde, trying to be as concerned as she had been with the last hundred retellings, won’t miss a chance to tease him about it.

“If this guy was... is?” She smirks. “If he is real and not just the result of your abuse of alcohol... or whatever you smoked on this beach...”

“It was a lake…”

“Whatever.”

“And I don’t smoke. Ever.”

She glances over her book again. “Yes, right. So, if this guy is real and anything like you described him: handsome, muscles, hot cocky smile, flirty...”

“And funny. Don’t forget how funny he was.”

“You’re making my work here easier, how sweet, but can you just let me finish my sentence please?”

“Mathilde! I couldn’t stop myself from laughing. Do you understand that?”

“God damn, ok, ok... Theo laughing.” She answered irritated, throwing in the towel. She forgot what she wanted to say anyway. “You should have made your proposal right away.”

“I knooooooow.” He whines dramatically, then quiets again.

Looking straight at the ceiling, Theo’s face is inexpressive and with a low and hesitant voice, he says, “Why... do I feel like my life is over, even if it wasn’t serious? I mean… it’s not like I fell in love... or anything.”

“Yes you did, dude, and this is what love does: makes you feel like shit.”

He turns on the couch so he lies on his side, and hits his childhood friend with his cushion. “Cold.” 

“Hey!” Mathilde closes her book. “I... haven’t got over my disastrous breakup yet, and you can’t stop telling me about some perfect prince charming you met and almost kissed on a beach at sunset. How ridiculously cliché is your life? Can’t you have at least some consideration for my own distress?”

He sits up and grins wide and annoyingly. “You are drowning in jealousy.”

“I’m drowning in your bullshit! Theo I’m supposed to read! YOU are supposed to read, or study, or whatever! Class starts next week, and all you’re doing is acting like a pre-teen falling in love with whatever star is trending. Pull your shit together! It’s not like you’ll see him again anyway, you refused to take his phone number for fucks sake!”

Theo’s heart stops. He did, that’s right.


Or more accurately he didn’t… take the phone number. Neither did he give his own. It didn’t feel right at the moment. 

All that remains from this ‘Could-Have-Been-Perfect summer love’ is his memories of those weeks of camping, the lake shore at sunset, the stinging tingle of pine needles digging in his arms, the brush of lips against his own, and the name of his so cliché prince charming… David.

He sighs… No use thinking about the collateral damages.

Mathilde is right, he as to forget about him. About everything. He has to move forward.

That’s what friends are made for, listening and kicking your ass when you’re crying for too long about unachieved life goals. Soon class will start again, and then he will have a lot more to deal with. Real life things. Unpleasant ones. 

Again.

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This text is not the final version but it has already been checked by my friend Laura once.
I will certainly fix it more later, when the first chapter will be done entirely. (I still have 5 scenes to write)

I hope it's not too bad haha xD;;; I'm still learning how to speak english so... maybe you can feel it in the text. I hope this project will help me improve faster!

So, what do you think? :3