‘You’ve blown my mind, Charlie,’ Tom said to me after the third song. He sat the guitar to the side and shook his head. ‘I could seriously listen to you, and look at you, all day. You’ve got it, Charlie. You’ve just got it!’

He was in genuine disbelief. I tried to absorb all this unexpected praise from him.

‘And you know what? The most beautiful thing is you have no freakin’ idea just how good you are!’

I tried to catch my breath in the intensity of it all as we stood there in the middle of this tiny, smelly, hormone-filled student sitting room, our breath patterns moving to the same rhythm. As Monday to Friday university accommodation to my brother, me and our friend Kirsty, the room had hosted many booze-filled parties and late nights over the past four years, but never had I experienced electricity in the air as I did right then with him.

‘You can sing too and play guitar as well as drums,’ I managed to stutter. ‘You’re a mighty fine talent in yourself, so I can’t take all the credit for what just happened.’

I tried to divert the compliment back to him, but he wasn’t having it.

‘No, no, Charlie Taylor. I can play, yes, but you have star quality. You’re on a totally different level and I don’t say that lightly. You’re amazing.’

My bottom lip quivered, and I pushed my hair behind my ears.

‘You really think so?’

‘I really know so,’ he said, holding my gaze. I didn’t know whether to laugh or cry at all this attention from someone so gorgeous and talented who seemed to be so much in awe of me.

Matthew had always been known as the creative one in our family. He was the colourful one who wanted to sing in a band as well as study to be an architect, so he was the one we all looked up to, cheering him on along the way. I was going to be a teacher and any musical notions I had were brushed under the carpet when we were growing up. It just wasn’t how my family saw me. Matthew was the cool, talented one, Emily was the middle child, the quiet, sensible one who obeyed all the rules, and I was the quirky, hippy dippy baby, the rebellious clever kid, and the one with brains to burn whose way with words would be best suited to a classroom where others would benefit from my wisdom. I just dressed a little funny and sometimes found myself in hot water, but that could all be fixed. Or so my parents hoped.

‘I’ve never properly sung these songs for anyone before,’ I confessed to Tom. It was dropping dark now outside, so I walked past him and pulled the curtains closed.

He gently took my hand on the way back.