Carnage: Book #1 The Story Of Us (Volume 1)(42)

My parents desperately wanted me to go back to school in September and start my A levels, I got outstanding results in my O levels and knew that my A’s would be no problem. The problem was, I was terrified of going back, I didn’t know how I’d be received and I would be all alone for the first time in my entire secondary school life, I would just be Georgia Layton and not Sean McCarthy’s girlfriend and I knew there would be plenty of nasty little bitches that would be over the moon about that.

I finally agreed with my parents that I would go and give it a try and as it turned out, the years of not being a bitch to the other girls at school paid off, there were a few spiteful comments but mostly people were still okay with me just because I still had links with the band. I spent the next two years studying for my Maths and English A levels, as well as a business studies course. I threw myself into my studies and completely shut out the rest of the world; the only person I really had anything to do with at school was Ashley. She had stayed on to re-sit her maths and English O levels as she had failed them miserably last year, we weren’t in any classes together but it was nice to have at least one person to talk to around the school, she asked me to go out with her practically every weekend but I always said no.

All of my time was taken up with studying, going to the gym that my Dad had just bought in Brentwood or helping my Mum out in the shop my Dad had bought for in the local high street. My Mum had always had fantastic fashion sense and absolutely loved clothes so when my Dad came home and told her he’d helped out a mate by taking his struggling business off his hands, she barely listened. My Dad seemed to have so many businesses on the go it was hard to keep track, but then my Dad happened to mention that it was a frock shop as he called it, my Mum was all ears.

The following day was a Saturday so my Mum and I went down and had a look, it was a good sized shop in a fantastic location but it had a terrible range of stock. We lived in an affluent area, the shop had a high end hairdressers and beauty salon on one side and a bespoke furniture designers on the other, the shop itself sold absolute crap, cheap, nasty ‘fashion’ items; just the name ‘Hollywood Fashions’ would be enough to put off most of the women who would frequent the shops either side.

By that afternoon, my Mum had one of my Dad’s draughtsmen who worked for his building company around, giving her advice on the changes she wanted to make. It took her around two months to have the place re-fitted, re-named and stocked with an up to the minute range of designer labels, by the time I’d finished with college, between us we were running a very successful business and had extended into the furniture shop next door. My Dad having somehow convinced the owners to relocate to another shop he owned, further down the high street. I’d been on numerous buying trips with my Mum, spending time in Europe and Asia and in the summer of 1987 we opened our second shop in Chingford; while my Mum took over the opening of the new store, I took up the reins of the Brentwood store. Not only were we selling clothing but we now offered a full range of accessories, including, shoes, handbags, scarves and sunglasses and had seven girls working for us. Despite the fact that I had zero social life, I was always busy and had little time to think about how dead I was inside; it had been over two years since I’d seen or heard from Sean but it still hurt like it was five minutes ago. I’d come to terms with the fact that it would probably always hurt but I still wasn’t ready to face the world. I’d barely spoken a few words to Marley in that time and that was only because I was being polite at the Christmas dinner table last year, a few days before then, Lennon had asked me if it would be okay to invite Sean to have lunch with us as he had nowhere to go. I apologised to Len but explained that I just couldn’t, just the thought of seeing him made me want to vomit, not because I disliked him but because I still loved him so very, very much, Len said that he understood, but I doubt that he actually had any idea.