BRAD - London, 12th October 2038

I sit while twiddling my thumbs, eyes as wide as the moon. Chad sits opposite me, staring outside of the window with a lost gaze I can't place.

"If only you could make problems disappear with alcohol," Chad mutters, sipping his whiskey as he talks.

"If that were the case, we'd be having this conversation on my yacht."

Chad smiles sarcastically at the thought of me owning a yacht. Idiot.

"What you grinning like that for? Think I'm not man enough to get me a big ol' boat?" I snap at him. He chuckles then, deep and sexy. I sense a weird swirling feeling in my stomach as he does, my mind spinning like a carousel from the many whiskeys.

"It's not that," he says, speech slurred drunkenly, "It's just... You're so simple. You used to be different, you know? All about that bling lifestyle. But now... It's like you'd rather have a cheap li-"

"Hold on there," I interrupt, my gaze swindling. I can't concentrate – my head feels like a heavy log barely balancing on my neck as it swings from side to side. Isn't that what you wanted? A bit of alcohol to knock you out of this reality? The voice whispers to me, like poison rubbing against wounds.

All I remember is that we came here to talk, and now we're talking. Drinking, and talking. Maybe a lot more drinking.

"Are you trying to say I can't afford nothin'?" I slur, attempting to narrow my eyes onto him intimidatingly. Instead I simply look like a blind old man squinting at faraway parking signs.

"N- No, no... I don't mean... I'm tired, Braddie. I've had too much whiskey,"

"What's whiskey?" I chuckle, downing another glass, then looking down at the emptiness of it disappointedly, wondering where the contents of it had disappeared.

Chad tries to get up out of the booth seats but instead he ends falling right back down, blinking like a confused child.

I laugh at him, but then my chuckles become a gurgled mess because he lunges at me in pretend fury, pummelling me with a delighted frustration.

"Get off!" I snap, but I'm smiling and laughing just as much as he is. When he does finally get off of me, he sits on the seat beside me. Now that he's closer, I gaze at the stormy seas of his eyes – the pure, dark blue that has entranced me so many times. I feel the world melt away as I stare into them with an enchanted fascination, feeling the rough of his hands against mine. Slowly, I edge closer, willing myself to be closer to him, to sate my burning desire to feel his breath on my neck, his lips against mine, the urges swirling like a tornado in my head as the hunger burns like an inferno within me. I close my eyes, ready for it to happen, to finally happen, after so long of craving it...

I wake with a jolt. Slowly I inspect the room around me. Grey, bare and monotone, the walls are cracked and the ceiling dripping as per usual. The curtains are ripped and thrown onto the floor, which is cold and hard as stone. My bed itself is like solid wood panelling against my back. The mattress is practically paper-thin.

I get up, shaking, before looking myself in the mirror with a disgust I've never seen on myself before.

What's wrong with me? Three days in a row, I've had the exact same dream. Chad and I, back in our hometown, at our old hang out joint; the Black Mare. Drinking and chatting about nothing in particular, and before I know it, we're about to actually kiss.

I blush now, somehow remembering every little aspect of the moment.

When Chad and I were kids, the Black Mare was a pizza place called Jimothy's Saucy Slices. But then it got shut down because the owner – Jimothy – got sued for calling a lawyer's twenty-year-old daughter "a saucy little beast" and winking at her. It got turned into a pub that my dad often visited, the Black Mare. I tagged along with him once, when I'd first started secondary school, and there he was.

A skinny little blonde boy, his dirtied hair flopping over his forehead, almost hiding his dark thunderous eyes, hiding behind his dad because he was too shy to talk to me.

I sigh, remembering it now. The good old days. And now look at us; bone-tired and old, like... Old people or something. I know, gross. Shaking my head, I try to smooth out the wrinkles on my skin as I glare into the mirror. Thirty-two and living on benefits with no parents, no girlfriend, no money, no nothing – just stuck in this stupid council flat.

I look out of the small window.

One day, things will change. I'll treat my stupid recurring dreams, my alcoholism, I'll get a good stable job. And I won't need any more of those stupid ex-girlfriends that Chad can't stop bugging me to get back with.

Little does he know, he's the reason I can't seem to find and take a liking to a girl.