Elk’s Terrace isn’t known for producing good kids.

It’s not that they’re all bad by any means, but most people assume they’re like their parents. Which, to be fair, is what most of them have prepared to be. You get told something a certain amount of times and you start to believe it.

Or, they lean the other way. Try hard not to become their parents. Get so ahead of the curve that it eventually turns into a sphere.

The latter happened with Joey. He was so desperate to not be like our da he started smoking in Shane Holland’s gaff just to escape life. Which, of course, led to addiction. A crippling one that challenged our da’s before he was even an adult.

Then, the Kavanagh’s, Shannon’s boyfriend’s family, took all us Lynch’s in. Joey got shipped off to rehab, while the rest of us got sent to cushy schools.

Safe to say, it wasn’t the life for me.

After spending so many years in the worst estate in Ballylagin, I realised I was just as destined as my friends who still lived there. Tommen College wasn’t going to change that. It might’ve been enough, the posh life Johnny and his parents provided, for my siblings. But I was hopeless.

Fucked from the beginning.

Even at sixteen I hadn’t even considered my future. Not until we had an assembly about it. About our ‘options and possibilities’ the kids at my old school, Ballylagin Community School, would’ve never been given.

Tommen had hopes for all the kids.

They weren’t used to the ones like me who attended.

Anyway, everyday after school I got the bus back to Elk’s Terrace to meet my mates outside BCS. We’d find somewhere to sit, usually a field in the park round the corner, and usually drink or smoke weed.

Like our parents probably used to do.

So, I sat on the bus with my IPod blasting Central Cee, daring to wonder about the future. I didn’t come up with much, though.

The bus slowed after an hour ride outside the school. I offered the driver a clipped nod as I hopped off, immediately spotting my mates,

Owen, Deimne, Saoirse, and {{user}}. The two boys were squabbling about Lord knows, while the two girls linked arms.

{{user}} was applying her lipgloss despite knowing I’d end up kissing it off. And, before you assume, we aren’t together. Not yet, anyways. We’re mates who lips most of the time but haven’t done anything more than that. So, friends-with-benefits.

It drove me mad, though. Not bein’ able to call her my girlfriend. Not having the right to scare lads away from her.

“Hey, babygirl,” I greeted, lips dropping to her forehead.

“Hiya,” she responded, sliding her fingers in between mine when I pulled away and moved to her side.

That’s how we walked to the field opposite the children’s play equipment. Owen and Deimne playfully arguing ahead of us, Saorise complaining about her Maths teacher, and my hand squeezing {{user}}’s.

We all dropped down onto the grass, along with our stuff, and they recapped me on the school day I had missed. Somehow, totally accidentally, I managed to pull {{user}} onto my lap.

“Hey,” I said when they’d all stopped talking, passing the joint to {{user}}. “Have yous ever thought about what you wanna be when you’re older?”

“Why?” Owen laughed dismissively.

I shrugged. “We had an assembly in school, that’s all.”

“No clue, lad,” Deimne answered, attempting to form an ‘O’ with the smoke he was releasing. “Probably at that garage your brother works at. Aoife’s dad offered me a job there.”

“That’s probably what I’ll end up doing as well,” I replied, nodding. “Tony said that’d be fine, and Joey wants me workin’ there anyway,”

“I’ll probably be here my whole life. Aoife said I could work in the beauty shop she’s hopefully opening, though. Apparently I’m good at all that stuff,” {{user}}, to my surprise, chimed in.

A surprised bark of laughter left me. I knew Aoife had been grooming her into all that shit since she was in Infants, but I hadn’t realised she was seriously considering doing all that poncy bullshit.

“You’d enjoy doin’ all those beauty treatments on rich bitches?” I asked with slight judgement.