“I have been going out with Nick Nelson since I was fourteen. He likes rugby and Formula 1, animals (especially dogs), the Marvel universe, the sound felt-tips make on paper, rain, drawing on shoes, Disneyland and minimalism. He also likes me.”
Charlie is a first-person narrator of the book. It is no longer as easy to identify a character's gender by name as it used to be, so it may be important for some readers to know that Charlie is also male. So, yes, this is a story about love between male teenagers which may be a point of significance for some. The reference by Charlie to his age is also of some importance and worth noting. This book is set a few years after he and Nick first met, meaning they are no longer in their early teens. Older means more experienced and so this is not just—as advertised just below the title on the cover—a love story, it is a story about the physical expression of that love. The description of Nick here is one that speaks to the youth of the two main characters and so one should expect this love story to be not quite as mature as an adult love story.
"Instead, I load up my Tumblr inbox, just to see if there’s anything interesting in there, but there are only a few new messages asking whether I’d thought properly about how long-distance works, about whether it’s really worth the pain, about whether Nick’s really not going to meet anyone else at university while I’m not with him all the time. I don’t mean to let this stuff get to me, but it still does. I even feel myself start to well up a bit, so I exit the Tumblr app and delete it from my phone."
The crux of the conflict in this story is one with which many readers of the same age as the characters can instantly sympathize. High school education is about to give way to college education for Nick, but not yet for Charlie. So, this quote is all about the "friendly advice" that comes Charlie's way on the subject of the viability of relationships when geographical distance is introduced into the complicated mix. The reference to Tumblr gives the reader a general idea of the chronological timeline in which the story takes place within the constantly evolving world of social media preferred by teenagers. Charlie's admission to being near tears is also a signal to readers. Although this is probably already suspected, he is definitely not your typical teen male obsessed with expectations of masculinity and gender-role conformity.
"Everyone is talking about uni. I don’t think I’ve ever been so excited for something, or so ready. And everyone else going to uni seems to agree. It’s the start of freedom. Doing things because we chose to do them. Finally being treated as adults. But I get that, like, Charlie might not want to talk about it all the time."
Charlie is not the only first-person narrator in the book. Nick also his say. And this passage really brings into stark relief the reason why a long-distance relationship of this particular type at this particular moment is so special. It is not just about the geographical distance. It is very much about other types of distance. Nick's going away to college—or "uni" as it is commonly referred only by the British—is also about the distance between childhood and adulthood. High school is the last point of childhood despite being older teens. Nick's being away at college thus becomes in his mind a kind of chasm between across which there is no bridge he can cross.
