Hi everyone- this is one for all you pessimists out there. It is purely a bit of fun, and is a rest from my more serious writing at the moment.

Enjoy!

A Step-by-Step Guide to a Disastrous Summer

Step one: fail your exams.

Oh my gosh. Oh my bloody gosh.

Now I've gone and done it. I've failed my English exam. I've failed my A-levels. I'm not going to get into University. I'm going to have to go through clearing, or worse yet, work in a dingy kebab shop that stinks of chip fat.

The invigilator peers at me as she takes the exam paper from my desk. The paper's crumpled from my anxious page-turning, I'm fiddling with my pen and my face is set in a horrified expression. She can see that I'm a failure. She can practically smell the chip-fat in my hair.

"Alright then, all the papers have been collected, you can now leave the exam hall in silence," I hear a voice boom from the front of the hall, after what seems like hours.

I stand up and trawl my way down the aisles, leaving the hall with my head held low and the funeral march music lingering.

"We're finished!" Daisy practically screams in my ear once we reach the common room. "No more exams! Ever! Well… at least not until university anyway."

"That's if I even get into uni," I mumble lamely, flopping onto one of the seats and shutting my eyes. If I close them tight enough I'm bound to wake up soon, right? Right?

"What on earth are you talking about?" She asks me.

I open one eye, she's sitting on the floor so that her own face is level with mine and her big blue orbs are gazing at me inquisitively.

"I messed up."

"How do you know?"

"My essay was a joke. The examiner will actually laugh when he reads it."

"Or she."

"What?"

"The examiner could be a woman."

"Whatever," I grumble, shutting my eye.

"I bet you haven't done badly." Daisy's seemingly knowing voice buzzes in my ears. "Besides, it's only one exam, it's not like your whole future depended on that one paper."

I try to shut her out. It's only a dream after all.

"I've failed."

"Stop being so negative, Cerise."

UGH. If there's one phrase that I think I've heard more than 'hello', or 'goodbye', it's 'stop being so negative, Cerise.'

"I'm not," I protest. "This is it- clearing is on its way, I may as well not even show up on results day."

Daisy ignores me and grabs her bag from nearby.

"Are you going to grumble and mope all day or are you actually going to celebrate the end of your exams like any normal A-level student would?" She chucks my folder at me. "Forget Chaucer, think about Temptation instead- and the 2-for-1 drinks offers tonight."

She stands beside me with her arms folded, looking at me expectantly. I take my time to stand up and pack away my pencil case.

"You're free, Cerise, it's the summer, at last!"

She almost skips out of the common room and I follow her, shuffling my feet and forgetting to smile as Mrs. Carter waves us goodbye from the front door.

***

When I get home Mum's in the kitchen, reading the paper at the table with a mug of coffee beside her waiting to be sipped. The sight is so familiar I sometimes think I imagine it.

"Hi Mum."

She looks up and her dark eyes scan me through her thick-rimmed glasses.

"Hello, darling. How was your exam?"

"I failed."

Mum laughs at me and shakes her head, continuing to read the paper. Typical.

I wander over to the counter and grab a chocolate bar from my favourite drawer, humming along to the song on the radio as I blissfully take a nice, chocolaty bite and munch away.

"AAAAAAAGH!"

Before I have time to register what's going on a tiny little figure slams into my unassuming frame and makes me drop my chocolate bar. I stand horrified for a second, staring at the chocolaty goodness that has now sadly crashed to the floor.

"Get off me, Alana!" I yell at her, trying to shake her tight grip away from my legs.

"Make him go away!" She shouts back, tightening her grip even further so that I feel my bones might break.

I wait for the taller- but only slightly taller- figure of Eli to run into the room. His little dark hands are clasped in front of me and he's got the devilish grin that he borrowed off his older brother etched onto his face.

"Oh for goodness' sake- drop the spider, Eli."

"It's not a spider," he says cheekily.

"It's a Daddy long legs!" Alana screams with her eyes tightly shut and her face buried in the material over my left thigh, her black curls bouncing as she shakes her head.

His grin widens further and he walks a little closer to the two of us, so that Alana starts screaming at an altogether more deafening level and my kneecaps are crushed together.

"Mum," I groan.

"Eli," she warns, not looking up from her paper, "take the silly creature back outside."

"But Mum, why does Alana have to go outside?"

A muffled scream of outrage comes from out of my leg. Mum looks up and narrows her eyelids so that Eli takes a step backwards.

"Do it."

He frowns, takes one last look at the two of us and then opens his hands out to reveal nothing but space between his palms and a tiny thing I can't even see properly.

"It's nothing, just a little leaf I found on the floor. I lied the whole time- you're such a baby, Alana."

He wanders out of the kitchen and Alana finally and thankfully lets go of my legs, also exiting the room, but in a more dramatic fashion, as if she's just been threatened with a ten-inch knife rather than an ugly crawling thing that turned out to be a leaf.

"So, Mum, I'm going out tonight," I say once there's a peaceful silence, going closer to Mum's space at the table and pulling up a stool.

"I thought you would," she smiled, keeping her eyes on the finance article that she's reading. "Where are you going?"

"Temptation."

"Oh right, Sage is going there tonight too."

Oh no.

"You're joking, right?" I ask in horror.

"No, why would I do that?" she asks, turning to look at me with a confused expression.

"Because that's just wrong!" I exclaim loudly. "He finished his A-levels last year, why's he coming to our party?"

"It's not exclusively for you lot," Mum answers, "he had exams too."

"At uni!" I shout. "He partied at uni! There is no need for him to be at our party! He could go to any other club where there will be plenty of other university students and I'm not there." I groaned and buried my face into my hands. "He's done this to spite me, I know it."

"Don't be so silly, Cerise."

I ignore her comment.

"Is he here?"

"He's in his room, I think."

I stand up and leave the kitchen in a close to furious rage.

I can't believe it. It's not like I don't have to see enough of my brother's ugly mug every day now that he's back from uni, but now he wants to come and bring it so that it's in full view when I'm out as well? All he ever lives to do is annoy me! I bang on his door.

"What?" a voice calls.

"What's all this about you going to Temptation tonight?"

There's silence and I want to smash his door down.

"I'm going to Temptation tonight. Why, are you?"

l can visualise his grin.

"You know I am!"

"Well, that's just swell, Cerise, it'll be like a family outing."

He starts laughing and the noise just infuriates me further. If I wasn't such a pathetic weakling I probably would have picked the door off the hinges and chucked it right into his smarmy face.

"Do you really have to?" I groan in despair.

"It's not like I'm purposely following you, it's just where the boys wanted to get smashed tonight. End of exam parties are always mental."

"This is just going to be disastrous," I growl through the door.

"I'm not going to come anywhere near you." He shouts. "Don't be so damn dramatic, Cerise."

I don't bother saying anything in response and go to my room.

It's alright, if I just pretend he's not there, then he won't be there. I'll make sure I stay well away from him, and try not to do anything stupid in a drunken state that will end in non-stop teasing.... since that could in turn result in a serious casualty. Hopefully, I won't even notice the sod.

***

By the time I get to Temptation our pre-drinks at the pub have already started to take an effect and all thoughts of Sage had vanished. I say had for a reason. Some sick twist of fate meant that I ended up being behind him in the queue.

"My little sister's drunk," he tells all his friends the minute he sees me. "I always knew she couldn't take her alcohol."

"Why don't you just shut up?" I retort, waving my hand dramatically and accidentally hitting the wall.

The pain was upsetting- my friends all start giggling, which is annoying, but it was hearing the booming laughs of five or six lads at the same time that made me suddenly feel embarrassed. Especially since I wasn't drunk yet.

"You sure you're not drunk?" one of Sage's friends, Ian, asks. Sage just shakes his head and looks at the lot of us like we're idiots.

"She's not that bad," Sharma answers for me, patting my head as if I'm a little child. "Just tipsy, that's all."

For some messed up reason all my friends adore my brother, and therefore they tend to make me feel even more stupid than I already believe I am in situations where he, me, and they are all in the same room. It's even worse when his friends are around. You'd think the guys were all from July's issue of Vogue the way they act up around them.

"She wants to get really drunk cause she thinks she failed her English exam," Cat adds as if it's the most pathetic thing to do in the world.

There is just no point in telling them to shut up. No point at all.

"Typical Cerise, thinking the worst again," a voice that's not my brother's says.

My eyes look up and scan the selection of friends that Sage has come to Temptation with. Louis' eyes catch mine and a little smirk comes to his face. My face is slightly frozen for a second while I take in his familiar, annoyingly attractive appearance.

"I'm not thinking the worst," I say defiantly. "I did terribly."

"By terribly you mean really well, right?" he asks, his smirk still positioned on his face while he's talking to me.

"No."

"Thought so. You're such a cynic."

I want to tell him to bugger off but no one allows me to because all of a sudden Sage is talking to my friends about university and they all hang onto his conversation like a bunch of fifteen-year old school girls whenever an attractive older guy comes along. And my brother's not even attractive.

***

"Is your brother still single?" Jenny asks me while we're at the bar, once inside the nightclub.

"What's it to you?" I ask her in shock.

She shrugs. "He's fit."

"Excuse me, but this is my brother we're talking about!" The music is so loud by the bar that I have to shout.

"Your fit brother," Helena suddenly butts in noisily, playing with her hair and not lifting her green eyes to look at me. She knows how many times we've had this conversation, but it doesn't stop me being any the less disturbed.

"Please just stop talking," I groan in exasperation, waiting to order another drink. No one says anything for a while and I let the pounding music fill my head until I think it might explode. I definitely need another drink.

"So is he still single or not?"

Oh for the love of-

"Yes, he's bloody single!" I answer irritably.

I try to push my way to the front of the queue but it fails and I end up standing in the same spot for ages. The girls begin to get irritated and Cat starts trying to slip through miniature gaps between bodies but only ends up being pushed further back. Sharma gives up and says she's going to try the other bar, pulling Cat with her. I think about leaving myself, I'll never get to the front at this rate, and the guys either side of me keep trying to barge in front and end up hitting me with some part of their anatomy.

"Oi!" A voice shouts. My head turns and I spot Louis' familiar head of sleek black waves a little further ahead in the queue. He shouts something.

"What?"

"I SAID- DO YOU WANT A DRINK?"

"Oh. YES PLEASE!" I shout back, and he looks at me expectantly. When I don't say anything he raises his eyebrows- while trying to elbow someone beside him out of the way.

"WELL WHAT DO YOU WANT THEN?"

"Um.... A VODKA AND COKE PLEASE."

"Make him get me a vodka and lemonade!" Jenny demands.

"Oh and another one," Daisy adds.

"And a Bacardi and coke," Helena's voice calls.

It takes around two whole minutes of shouting and signalling to get this order to Louis, but somehow he managed to hear and he got all our drinks for us, paying for them himself, which I must admit is quite nice, for one of Sage's friends. Mind you, Louis' never been too bad, but that might just be because he's been Sage's best friend for ages and I've got used to him.... and I consider him to be the best-looking of all of them. Not that I'm shallow, of course.

"Thanks," I say when drinks have been handed out. I'm waiting for the girls to come back from requesting a song from the DJ and we're in a little bit of a quieter area - well, one where I don't have to shout so loudly that my throat hurts. Plus I'm safely away from the bar queue. Two more minutes in there and I would have got a black eye.

"It's alright," he shrugs. "You seen your brother anywhere?"

"No," I answer sharply. Louis starts laughing.

"Not one for spending quality time with your older brother, eh?"

"No," I repeat, just as sharply.

There's a little glint in his eye and a familiar smirk comes back so that he has a slightly amused expression.

"And what about one of his best friends?"

I stare at him blankly.

"Well, you're alright," I shrug.

This time he shakes his head as he starts laughing again and the sleek black waves are lightly dancing around his face.

"Well it's close to getting a tick of approval in Cerise's book," he says, taking a sip of his drink.

"Boy, you're going to have to work a lot harder to get a tick of approval. You're Sage's friend," I say flatly.

"I'll make the effort," he laughs. There's a moment of silence.

"How was uni?" I ask him.

"Awesome," he replies, "you'll love it."

"If I get in."

"You will."

"I'm not so sure."

"Just like you're not so sure that you did amazingly well in your English exam today?"

"I know I didn't do anything near amazingly well in my English exam today."

He laughs again, and then his eyes stare into mine with an almost serious look. I don't know what he's going to say, but I always did wonder how his eyes managed to get to be such an impressive shade of green. I'm almost fixated every time I look into them.

"Whatever, don't be so pessimistic, Cerise."

UGH! Here we go again with the 'don't be so negative, Cerise', 'don't be so silly, Cerise', 'don't be so pessimistic, Cerise'.

"You know, if people spent as much time telling me how to behave rather than how not to behave, then maybe I wouldn't be the way I am."

He looks on at me in bemusement for a moment, and then he simply takes a sip of his drink and looks away.

"There's nothing wrong with the way you are," he says as he gazes towards the various people grinding and groping on the dance floor. "You should just aim to be more positive, that's all."

I stare at him until he looks back at me, and he raises an eyebrow as if to ask what my problem is. I say nothing and take a sip of my drink, before almost spitting it back out again.

"How much vodka is in this?"

The smirk returns once more.

"I asked for a triple, because they're on special offer, and I just want to see you a little merry." He looks over my shoulder and I don't need to follow his eyes to know that Helena and Jenny have returned, I can hear Jenny's excitable giggle form a mile off.

"Positivity, Cerise," he mocks, "a little bit of that, and you may have a good summer."

He winks, slyly grins at me and then walks away casually. I just watch him in bemusement.

Well, that's easy for him to say. If he knew what was in store for my summer, he would easily see that it's going to be disastrous.

That's it for now, but there's plenty more on the way hopefully. Reviews please? It would only provide more fuel for the old writer's brain :).