When I was sixteen, my friend Dagmar decided that we would go on tour of our country when we were older. A date was decided; when we were both almost twenty, and our birthdays would hopefully overlap into the time during which we would travel. She was a German; lived there until she was almost sixteen and still had the accent when we went away.

We had the whole tour planned; we would somehow acquire a bright red Volkswagen, and stay nowhere else but that and the canvas tent we would have tucked conveniently away in case it was nice out. We'd eat in cheap cafe's, spend whole days on the beach and make a load of friends, writing all their names in a book we found in the Camden Market stand in Norwich.

We didn't ever say it would just be us though, which came to be something I regretted on the first few days of the journey.

Because, here's the thing.

Dagmar was dating this guy who had gone to our school, and conveniently went to the same college, Darius Grant. They were pretty serious, so she asked if he could come too, considering we would be away for a while. The problem with that was that I had been in love with Darius since I started secondary school. And I would be sharing a camper van with him. For possibly a year, which was the time Dagmar and I had calculated early on.

I would have told Dagmar early on in our friendship that I liked Darius, but so did she, and I knew that he was much more likely to pick her over me. Mostly because I was a guy, and he wasn't gay.

So for the beginning of the journey, I suffered.

"Where are we heading first?" Darius asked, opening the door and throwing his navy holdall under a seat in the back. The van had been gutted, and a bench covered with a cushion was fitted to the sides. This meant that we would each have a bench to curl up on, albeit a small one, but we always had the tent if it got too cramped.

I checked the map. "Down near Ipswich," I replied, folding it back up carefully and stowing it in the glove box.

"'Kay," he responded, slamming the door shut and hopping up into the driver's seat. "Where's Dagmar?" I put my thumb in her direction.

"Saying bye to her 'mama'" I answered, and pulled my bag up onto my lap from the foot well. It was a multicoloured Criminal Damage one, recently bought online for a disappointingly large price. But I liked it, and so did Darius, so that was all that really counted.

Dagmar threw the door open, smiling broadly.

"We're gonna go now?" she asked, her accent putting a beautiful smile on Darius' face. I nodded, moving my legs out of the way for her to climb in between me and her boyfriend.

"Off to Ipswich," he smiled. "You better both have everything, because we are not going back."

"Of course I do Darius," she responded. "I am not stupid like you." I laughed. This was the third time we'd been back; first off to get Darius' iPod; secondly to get his glasses; and this last one was for his holdall. Dagmar had gone to see her mother all of those times, because we all knew Karo would be mad if she couldn't wave her daughter off as we drove into the dim grey light of the March morning.

Darius started the engine and reversed out of the car park, swinging onto the road in an entirely irresponsible action.

By the time we reached Ipswich, we drove into an unknown town and parked the van in the car park. Dagmar ran off to use the toilet and left me and Darius alone, hovering outside the toilet block.

"You looking forward to all this?" I asked him. He lit up a cigarette and inhaled immediately.

"Of course," he smiled, offering me the packet. "Me and Mar in a little van together," he inhaled so that he whistled at the same time. "Gonna be hot." I tried to mask my disappointment; after all he was talking about my best friend in such a way that I knew he would never talk about me. I mustered up a little laugh.

"Yeah," I replied, taking a cigarette out of the packet and taking the lighter that was poking out of his pocket. "Alright for some."

"Maybe you'll meet someone along the way," he said, watching me light up. "It's not like you're ugly or anything." I smiled, a genuine one. At least he didn't think I was ugly. Which was a definite step forward, I decided.

"I hope," I returned, passing the lighter back. "It would be nice for someone to take a genuine interest in me." I looked up at him wistfully, inhaling on the cigarette. He let his own stream of smoke out, opening his mouth for the cloud to come out in an undeniably sexy way.

Darius was a completely gorgeous person. He had the best looks of anyone I've ever seen; every aspect of his face was perfect in my eyes. And in the eyes of most of the people he met. Pale blue eyes, and light brown hair shorn at the sides and long on the top, gelled into this amazing style that I knew I could never achieve. And he had tattoos. Lots of tattoos, all up his arms. Gorgeous ones, bright, beautiful, all around his muscles and the words "Die Young, Save Yourself" in swirly writing under his collarbones, various patterns covering his chest, down to the gun pattern on each hip, pointing down to his crotch. On his ankle was a tiny bluebird, and that was all. He was completely stunning.

I, myself, was not so interesting to look at. My hair was choppy around my face, silky blonde, eyes both blue, the left eye half brown. I wasn't particularly tall, although I was slim, with hip bones that protruded from my skin that I was proud of. All my bones stuck out, pretty much, but I wasn't anorexic or anything, I was just really bony. My face was thin with high cheekbones, and I didn't find myself incredibly attractive, but I know other people did, on the odd occasion. It was an ego boost to find out that Darius didn't think I was ugly.

"Maybe he can even join us?" He added. I knew that neither Dagmar or Darius knew that I wasn't completely gay; I was bisexual, but I didn't want to tell them for all the times she'd changed in front of me, because I knew it would wreck our friendship.

"Be a bit cosy," I said, trying to imitate the way he exhaled, succeeding only in surrounding myself in a cloud of smoke.

"Well, that's a good thing," he replied. "God knows I love getting cosy with Mar." I hated it when he talked about her like that; she was my best friend so any talk like that was just weird, but I knew he'd never talk about me like that.