My heart thumps in the heat. I haven’t put enough deodorant on. I’m going to smell awful by the time I get to the party. If I make it. My legs are covered with grey dust and my ankle already stings where I clipped it, stumbling off that stupid yellow autobus.
Katya hasn’t messaged the final directions. I was an idiot to think she would. To agree to the dare in the first place. To think it meant something. It was just a chance conversation after all. For a moment, talking to her in the bar, I felt like a warrior. I’m only a child, in her eyes. Everyone here treats me like a child.
I hate Berlin and Mum’s latest stupid Summer job. I want to be back home with my friends, having a normal weekend, pretending to be happy on Instagram. The tarmac hurts through these rubbish plimsols. I’m wearing the wrong clothes. Everything about me is wrong.
It always has been.