October 7th 2013.
As I looked out at twilit London speeding away beneath my feet, for some reason, I couldn't help but feel inexplicably morose.
As the small glass lift accelerated up 40 stories above the twinkling lights and winding streets, my spirits too, should have been soaring.
Well they were, undoubtedly - it was my 21st birthday.
What now?
Was this the end?
Had I fulfilled the ambitious prophecy that I had uncovered one winter's night with Pistol by my side?
My shoes clattered across the marble as I stepped out onto the 40th floor of Heron Tower in the heart of The City of London. The bar was dimly lit and inexplicably extravagant; chandeliers, fairy lights, a sprawling cocktail station on the centre - and of course, entirely surrounded by breathtaking views of the greatest city in the world.
I perched on a stool at a table closest to the window on my left and that overlooked the rest of the bar on my right, and a waiter promptly bought us two tall, theatrical-looking peach cobbler cocktails.
And that's when I turned to Oliver, who looked somewhat lost in my sudden forlornness, and I realised that I was not sad that this was it, that this was the end. The lump in my throat was not because I was unhappy.
It was because I'd done it.
I'd actually bloody done it.
I took Oliver's hand with a quivering yet genuine smile which I hope did not betray the sudden wave of emotion I was trying to desperately to swallow inconspicuously.
I cast my mind back 365 days to my 20th birthday celebrations. It had been after an awful year of being lost then the mind-alteringly silver summer with Ariella and Florentine, in the Italian restaurant where I worked.
Then my mind caught up with the present.
I was sat in the tallest bar in London, overlooking the city of my dreams, with a job at a fashion label and an internship at Cosmopolitan starting next month, whilst living 4/5 days and week in the most unbelievable flat in my favourite place in the world, East London. I'd travelled to Paris, Krakow a tiny little village in Somerset by chance, and was now off to New York City, and Scarphelia had gone even further virtually - Barcelona, Australia, Sweden, Japan, The USA.
And my god did all go so beautifully out of control. In ten months, I've racked up over 100,000 views from Scarphelia and my Youtube alone, being written about in the Independent and Cosmopolitan, interviewed on the radio and hosting my own masterclass to an auditorium of 100 people, and I'd even, despite my bold and defiant claims of reveling in independence and never ever wanting to belong to another person... I'd even found love.
Now, I would say forgive me for sounding a little self-righteous, but fuck it. I'm saying it.
I did it.
I set out on a bold mission to make something of myself before I turned the big two-one, and... I think I actually did it.
I became remarkable.
What started out from one lonely, bored and frustrated young girl with an abject fear of the future, waking up one day and deciding to make a change, has resulted in a magnitudinal adventure all across the world and a multitude of different fateful chances, coincidences and meeting the most extraordinary people, and all of my wildest dreams actually coming true.
So I say just this one thing to you now, on a fundamentally serious and sincere tone.
Do.
Not.
Wait.
If you want something out of your life, if you crave the more, if you believe that you are silver,
Make.
It.
Happen.
Because a dream without a plan is always going to remain just that. A dream.
Only when you wake up and realised that you can start making a difference, starting to make progress even from just slightly altering the way you perceive the world, then boy oh boy. I can tell you first hand.
The world becomes yours.
Scarlet-Ophelia.
P.s
I would like to say a massive, humongous thank you to everyone has been with me on this journey. I would be a fool to think I could ever have done it without you all. You are all what has been keeping me going. As you may have been able to tell, my posts lagged toward the end, but I intend to go back and fill in the gaps before leading up to a final mammoth post about my 21st birthday. So don't let go of me just yet, I still have a lot more adventures to say.
Love to all eternally,
Katie.