Page 103 of Love at First Fright

“I used to live with housemates who felt like family,” I continued. “We’d stay up all night playing video games, arguing about music, cooking elaborate meals that always ended in disasters. But they all moved away. Got proper jobs in other cities or moved in with partners. Now it’s just me and the guy who thinks I’m some kind of serial killer.”

“London, though!” Bat’s face lit up, eyes bright with excitement. “I loved visiting London. Couldn’t imagine the excitement of actually living there. All those venues, the gigs every single night…”

“It was fun in my twenties,” I admitted. “Gigs and clubs and house parties that lasted until dawn. Meeting new people constantly, everything feeling electric and possible.”

I paused, searching for the right words.

Loneliness was a funny thing. It crept up on you slowly, like moss spreading across stone. You didn’t even notice until one day you looked down and realised you were covered in it.

At first, you didn’t feel lonely at all. You were busy. You had plans. You turned down that invitation because you were tired. Let that text go unanswered because you’d reply properly tomorrow. Didn’t return that call because what would you even talk about?

Tomorrow became next week. Next week became never.

The thing was, I’d lived with Marcus, Javi, and Ben for four years. Four years of chaotic Sunday roasts and impromptu kitchen dance parties and arguments about whose turn it was to buy toilet paper. We’d shared everything—meals, secrets, that one horrific bout of food poisoning from Marcus’s experimental curry. They’d been my family, no question about it.

Then Marcus announced he was moving to Bali to teach surfing.

Just like that. One conversation over beers and he was gone three weeks later, posting photos of turquoise water and sun-bleached hair while I packed his room up for the landlord.

Ben moved out next. He got a promotion, was suddenly in with a new crowd at work. Could now afford a fancy studio by himself in Canary Wharf.

Javi lasted another six months before he met Jessica. Sweet, brilliant Jessica who worked in marine biology. They got married in a tiny ceremony in Edinburgh, then relocated to Scotland for her research position.

I was invited, obviously. Stood in the front row wearing a fancy suit, smiled through all the photos, gave a speech about the time Javi tried to rescue an “injured” pigeon that turned out to just be extremely fat.

But afterwards, I’d felt something crack open inside my chest.

Not anger. Not even sadness, really.

Just this vast, echoing awareness that they’d moved forward and I’d stayed exactly where I was.

Strange sort of heartbreak, that. Losing friends not to arguments or betrayal, but to life simply pulling them in different directions. No dramatic ending. No closure. Just gradually diminishing texts and promises to visit that never quite materialised.

The worst part? I couldn’t even blame them. They’d found their paths. Their purposes. Their happiness.

And I was still here, stumbling through jobs I hated, living in a flat that didn’t feel like home, wondering when exactly I’d stopped being the person I thought I’d become.

Bat’s thumb brushed across my knuckles, dragging me back to the present.

“Charlie? You alright?” he asked softly.

“Sorry… it’s just, I’m thirty-four now. Most of my friends have either moved on to become proper boring adults—mortgages and children and dinner parties—or they’re still living that party lifestyle and I’m just… too tired to keep up. Does that make sense?”

“You’re in your thirties?” Bat stopped dancing, staring at me. “Seriously?”

I laughed. “Yeah. Thirty-five in a few months. I’m just lucky I have a baby face.”

“You don’t look thirty-four.”

“Is that a compliment or…”

“Definitely a compliment.” Bat grinned. “Besides, I’m probably still ancient by comparison.”

I raised an eyebrow. “You’re way older than me?”

“Well, technically, stuck at twenty-three forever.” His voice carried something wistful. “Lucky me.”

The words landed oddly.