The Un-Vented Life

The Reinforcement Trap

The Failed Deadline

The email arrived at 16:47 on a grey Tuesday afternoon, and Liam felt the heat hit him instantly. Not metaphorical heat. Actual, physical heat that flashed behind his eyes and spread across his scalp like someone had turned on a grill inside his skull.

Regrettably, your mock portfolio submission for the Engineering Foundation module does not meet the minimum standard for progression. Resubmission deadline: Friday 17:00.

He read it three times. Each time, the tightening band around his chest cinched a notch tighter. His A-Levels were in six weeks. Six weeks. This mock portfolio was supposed to prove he could handle the Engineering course at Imperial. It was supposed to be the easy part. Aerospace Engineering. He'd wanted it since he was twelve and spent an entire summer building model rockets in the back garden, each one flying higher than the last. The idea of designing systems that left the planet, that touched space, had felt like the only thing worth the stress.

'Bastards,' he muttered, then louder, 'Absolute bastards.'

He didn't consciously decide to find Ellie. Their mum was on the evening shift at the hospital again. Wouldn't be home until past midnight. Dad lived in Manchester now with his new wife. The house was theirs until late, which meant Ellie was the only available audience for his fury. His feet just carried him from his bedroom down the narrow hallway to the kitchen, where his sister sat at the small table with her laptop open, highlighter poised over a printout of contract law cases.

'They failed it,' he announced.

Ellie looked up from her work. Her face did that thing it always did when he came in hot, a kind of careful neutrality, like she was bracing for impact.

'Failed what?'

'The portfolio. The mock Engineering portfolio I've been working on for three weeks.' The words came faster now, the heat spreading down his neck. 'Three weeks, Ellie. Do you know how many hours that is? And Jenkins, that smug git, he writes "does not meet minimum standard" like it's nothing. Like I didn't spend every night last week on those CAD drawings. You saw me. You know I did.'

'I know you worked really hard on it.'

'Hard? I barely slept. And now I've got until Friday to redo the entire thing, and I've still got the Mechanics mock on Thursday, and Jenkins won't even tell me what's wrong with it. Just "does not meet minimum standard". What does that even mean? It's deliberately vague. It's designed to be vague so they can fail whoever they want and not have to justify it.'

He was pacing now, three steps to the cooker, three steps back to the fridge. The kitchen was too small for proper pacing. Everything was too small. Too hot. Too tight.

'Maybe you could email and ask for specific feedback?' Ellie suggested carefully.

'Oh, brilliant. Yes. Email the man who just failed me and ask him to pretty please explain why my work is rubbish. That'll go well. He'll love that. Probably fail me again out of spite.'

'I don't think...'

'And it's not like I can just resubmit the same thing with minor changes. No. I have to prove I've "engaged with the feedback", except there is no feedback. Just a verdict. Guilty. Three weeks of work, completely wasted. And if I don't get this right, that's it. No Imperial. No Engineering. All of this, all of these months of stress and studying and not sleeping, all for nothing.'

The heat was everywhere now. His hands. His face. The back of his knees. He could feel his heart hammering against his ribs like it was trying to escape.

'You'll figure it out,' Ellie said quietly. 'You always do.'

'Will I? Because right now it feels like I'm drowning and everyone keeps throwing me anvils instead of life rings.'

He continued for another ten minutes. The unfairness of the marking system. The impossible workload. The way Jenkins always seemed to have it in for him specifically. The state of higher education in general. Every grievance, every injustice, every sharp edge of his fury, he laid them all out in the cramped kitchen while Ellie sat very still and listened.

When he finally ran out of words, he felt marginally better. The heat had dispersed a bit. Still there, but diffused. Manageable.

'Right,' he said, running a hand through his hair. 'Right. I should get back to it.'

'Good luck,' Ellie said.

He didn't notice how small her voice had become, or the way her shoulders stayed tense even after he'd left the room.

Emotional Shrapnel

Two days later, Liam sat on the sofa with his laptop balanced on his knees, rebuilding the portfolio from scratch. Ellie was at the other end, headphones on, her own laptop open to a document titled 'Contract Law Essay Draft 3'.

The Wi-Fi icon in the corner of his screen flickered. Once. Twice. Then disappeared entirely.

'Oh, for...' Liam didn't finish the sentence. Instead, he released a sigh that came from somewhere deep in his chest, aggressive and hollow, the kind of sound a kettle makes when it's boiling dry. He slammed the laptop shut with more force than necessary, the crack of plastic on plastic sharp in the small room.

'Fucking thing.'

He grabbed his Mechanics textbook from the coffee table and flipped it open with violent efficiency, even though he wasn't actually going to read it. His jaw was clenched so tight his teeth ached.

From the corner of his eye, he saw Ellie flinch. Just a small movement, a tightening of her shoulders, but he saw it. She pulled her headphones off slowly, closed her laptop without looking at him, and stood up.

'Just going to my room,' she said quietly.

'Yeah, fine.'

She left so quietly, he almost didn't hear her door click shut. Through the thin walls, he heard the muffled sound of her Spotify starting up. Taylor Swift. Always Taylor Swift when she was upset. The volume crept up, louder than she usually played it, as if she could drown him out retroactively. It was only when he looked up five minutes later, the heat in his chest already cooling into something like embarrassment, that he noticed her coffee cup still sitting on the table. Half full. Still warm.

The Guilt

Liam stared at the cup. Ellie never left things behind. She was meticulous about cleaning up after herself, had been for as long as he could remember. Even when they were younger, she'd always been the tidy one. Meticulous to the point of being slightly annoying, if he was honest.

Except she'd left her coffee. She'd left it because she'd wanted to get away from him quickly enough that she forgot to take it with her. Her essay was due tomorrow. Contract law, formation of agreements, 3,000 words she'd been trying to finish for three days. Every time she sat down to write, Liam erupted about something. Her cursor had been blinking on the same paragraph for an hour before the Wi-Fi dropped. She'd have to finish it tonight now, after he'd gone to bed. When the house was finally quiet. It was always after he'd gone to bed.

The heat of his anger gave way to something colder. A quick, sharp shard of guilt that lodged itself somewhere under his ribs. He thought about going to her room, apologising, but for what? He hadn't done anything to her. The Wi-Fi had dropped. He'd been frustrated. That was allowed, wasn't it? He was under enormous pressure. She knew that. She understood.

He picked up the cup and took it to the kitchen, poured the coffee down the sink, and tried not to think about how quickly she'd retreated.

The guilt stayed, small but insistent, like a stone in his shoe.

The Failed Boundary

The next morning, Ellie caught him in the hallway before college.

'Liam, can we talk for a second?'

He was already running late, bag half-packed, trying to find his calculator.

'Yeah, what?'

She took a breath, the way she did when she'd rehearsed something.

'When you get stressed, and you need to vent, could you maybe... I don't know, give me a heads-up first? Ask if I've got the space for it?'

He stopped searching for the calculator.

'What?'

'It's just, sometimes I'm in the middle of something, and it's hard to just drop everything and...'

'Are you serious right now?' The heat was instant. 'I'm falling apart trying to get into Imperial, and you want me to schedule my breakdowns around your convenience?'

'That's not what I...'

'I thought you understood. I thought you got how much pressure I'm under.'

'I do, but...'

'Fine. Fine. I won't talk to you at all. Problem solved.' He found the calculator, shoved it in his bag. 'I'll just deal with everything on my own, shall I?'

'Liam...'

But he was already out the door. Ellie stood in the hallway, the words she'd practised for two days dissolving uselessly in her mouth. She'd tried. She'd actually tried. And somehow she was the one feeling guilty.

The Counterproductive Crisis

The Aggressive Outlet

The mock results came back on Thursday morning. Mechanics. The exam he'd been dreading. The one that counted for thirty per cent of his A-Level grade.

58%

Not failing. Not quite. But nowhere near the 85% he needed for Imperial. Nowhere near good enough.

The heat returned instantly, familiar now, almost welcome. At least anger was something he could feel, could hold onto. Better than the creeping dread that had been living in his stomach for weeks.

He didn't rant this time. Ellie was at a lecture at her university, and besides, something about the coffee cup incident had left him reluctant to seek her out. Instead, he pulled on his running gear with grim determination. Trainers laced tight. Earbuds jammed in. Volume turned up until the music was almost painful.

'I'll run it out,' he muttered to the empty house. 'Run the fury out.'

It was what he'd always done. Since he was fourteen and his parents had divorced badly, running had been his release valve. When things got too big, too overwhelming, he ran. Hard. Fast. Until his lungs burned and his legs screamed and there was no room left in his head for anything but the physical demands of movement.

He hit the pavement at a sprint.

The afternoon was cold and damp, the kind of grey October weather that made London feel like it was wrapped in wet wool. He didn't care. He welcomed the sting of cold air in his throat, the shock of it in his lungs. He pushed harder, faster, his trainers slapping against the wet pavement in an aggressive rhythm.

58%. Not good enough. Never good enough.

He ran past the park, past the Tesco, past the bus stop where he'd waited this morning before deciding to skip his tutorial. His chest was heaving now, his heart rate spiking into zones his fitness app usually marked as dangerous. He ignored the warning buzz against his wrist.

Three weeks wasted. Two more to go. And still not good enough.

The heat in his head wasn't dissipating. If anything, it was intensifying, feeding off the adrenaline flooding his system. He felt like he was burning from the inside out, every muscle taut, every nerve firing. This was war. War against the stress, against the failure, against his own inadequacy.

By the time he made it back home, he'd run eight kilometres in under thirty-five minutes. His personal best. He doubled over on the doorstep, gasping, drenched in sweat despite the cold.

The Collapse

Liam stood in the shower until the hot water ran out, then stood under the cold until he couldn't feel his fingers. When he finally emerged, wrapped in a towel, dripping onto the bathroom mat, he expected to feel better.

He didn't.

The fury was still there. Worse than before. Stronger. Sharper. It sat in his chest like a living thing, clawing at his ribs, demanding release.

He pulled on tracksuit bottoms and a t-shirt, his hands shaking slightly. Not from cold. From rage. From exhaustion. From the horrible, creeping realisation that his ultimate coping strategy had completely failed him.

Ellie was in the kitchen when he came out, unpacking Sainsbury's bags.

'Hi,' she said, not quite looking at him. 'I got those tortellini you like. Thought we could...'

'Not now.'

It came out harder than he intended. He saw her freeze, a packet of pasta suspended halfway between bag and counter.

He needed to get away from her before he said something worse. Needed to get away from everything. He turned and walked quickly to his room, shutting the door with just enough force that it made a statement without quite being a slam.

Once inside, alone, he sat on the edge of his bed and put his head in his hands.

He'd run eight kilometres. Eight. He'd pushed his body to its absolute limit, and the anger was stronger now than it had been before he started. That wasn't how it was supposed to work. Physical exercise was meant to be cathartic. Everyone said so. Work out your aggression. Blow off steam. Healthy outlet.

Except it hadn't worked. It had made everything worse.

And he'd nearly snapped at Ellie again. Sweet, patient Ellie, who'd gone out and bought his favourite food, who'd done nothing wrong except exist in the same space as his rage.

'I can't even fix my own anger,' he said aloud to the empty room.

The fury at himself was the worst kind. Recursive. Anger about being angry. A snake eating its own tail.

The Scientific Discovery

The Frantic Search

At 23:17 that night, Liam sat at his desk in the dark, the blue light from his laptop the only illumination. He'd been searching for over an hour.

How to stop feeling angry all the time

Why does anger never go away

anger management techniques that actually work

The results were predictable. Meditation apps. Mindfulness blogs. Articles about counting to ten and taking deep breaths that read like they'd been written for children. He'd tried most of it before. None of it had ever made a dent in the real, bone-deep fury that had taken up residence in his chest.

He clicked through page after page. A Reddit thread where everyone just complained without solutions. A blog post about punching pillows that made him want to punch his screen. An expensive anger management course he couldn't afford. A breathing exercise that was just "breathe in, breathe out" with no explanation of why that would help. He was about to close the laptop, defeated, when he saw it. Not a glossy wellness site, but a plain university psychology department page, buried on the fourth page of results.

He skimmed the introduction, impatient, looking for something, anything, that might actually help.

Then he found it.

A section titled 'The Catharsis Myth'.

'Contrary to popular belief, engaging in aggressive behaviour to "vent" anger does not reduce angry feelings. Research consistently shows that cathartic activities, such as hitting a punch bag, aggressive exercise, or venting to others, often increase feelings of anger rather than diminishing them. This is because these activities elevate physiological arousal, which the body interprets as continued threat or provocation.'

Liam read it again. Then a third time.

'To reduce anger, you must reduce the physical heat—the physiological arousal. Techniques that lower heart rate, blood pressure, and muscle tension are far more effective at diminishing angry feelings than attempts to "release" the emotion through expression or physical exertion.'

He sat back in his chair, the words rearranging something fundamental in his understanding.

The jogging. The ranting. All of it had been actively sabotaging him.

He'd been throwing petrol on a fire and wondering why it kept burning.

The New Path

Liam clicked through to the resources page. There was a downloadable guide on diaphragmatic breathing. A video demonstration of progressive muscle relaxation. A list of activities classified by their effect on physiological arousal. Things that increased it: vigorous exercise, venting, angry rumination. Things that decreased it: slow breathing, gentle stretching, cool temperatures, quiet environments.

He downloaded a free app the page recommended. It had a simple interface, no nonsense. Just a breathing guide: a circle that expanded and contracted on the screen, with instructions to breathe in for four counts, hold for four, out for six.

He pressed start.

Breathe in. The circle expanded. He filled his lungs.

Hold.

Breathe out. The circle contracted. He exhaled.

It felt ridiculous. Useless. Too slow, too gentle. Every instinct in his body was screaming at him to move, to do something, to take action. Sitting still and breathing felt like surrender.

'This is rubbish,' he muttered.

But he kept going. Because the alternative, the running and the ranting, had stopped working. And he was desperate.

In for four. Hold for four. Out for six.

After five minutes, he noticed something. The tightness in his chest had loosened. Just slightly. Just enough to notice.

He kept breathing.

Implementation and Resolution

The Small Win

Saturday morning, Liam made a decision. Instead of his usual aggressive run, he pulled up a yoga video. 'Slow Flow for Beginners', it was called. The woman in the video had a soothing voice and an irritatingly serene smile, but he pressed play anyway.

The movements were gentle. Deliberate. Every transition came with an instruction about breathing. Inhale as you reach up. Exhale as you fold forward. The focus wasn't on exertion but on control. On breath.

It felt wrong. But he did it anyway.

Afterwards, sitting on his yoga mat in the living room, he felt something unfamiliar. Not exactly calm. Not quite peace. But a kind of quiet. A space between stimulus and reaction that hadn't been there before.

That afternoon, working on his resubmitted portfolio, the Wi-Fi dropped again.

He felt the instant spike of heat. The aggressive impulse to slam something, to swear, to let the fury leak out into the room. His hand moved towards the laptop lid.

Then he stopped.

He put the laptop down. Gently. Deliberately. He closed his eyes and took three deep breaths, counting them out the way the app had taught him. Four in. Four hold. Six out.

When he opened his eyes, Ellie was standing in the kitchen doorway. She'd been reaching for a glass from the cupboard, but she'd frozen, watching him.

Their eyes met.

'Sorry,' he said. 'Wi-Fi's down again.'

'Oh,' she said. Then, after a pause, 'Are you okay?'

'Yeah,' he said, and was surprised to find it was almost true. 'Yeah, I am.'

Her shoulders relaxed. Not a lot. Just enough that he noticed. She got her glass of water and sat down at the kitchen table with her laptop, and this time she didn't put her headphones on.

The Wobble

Two days later, Liam's phone buzzed during breakfast. Email from school. Another student had been given an unconditional offer to Imperial. For Aerospace Engineering.

The heat came roaring back, instant and enormous. Before he could think, he was on his feet, the kitchen chair scraping violently across the floor.

Ellie looked up from her cereal, her spoon frozen halfway to her mouth. Her shoulders went up. Her eyes went to the door. Calculating escape routes.

And seeing that, seeing her flinch, was like cold water.

He was still standing. Still angry. But he saw himself from outside: the aggressive posture, the clenched fists, his little sister making herself small across the table.

'I need...' his voice came out strangled. 'I'm going to my room.'

He walked, didn't storm. Closed the door, didn't slam it. Sat on his bed and pulled out his phone, opened the breathing app with shaking hands.

Four in. Four hold. Six out.

It took fifteen minutes this time. Fifteen long minutes of wanting to throw his phone at the wall, wanting to run until his legs gave out, wanting to scream until his throat bled.

But he kept breathing.

When he came back down, Ellie was still at the table. She'd made him toast. It sat on a plate in his spot, going cold.

'Thanks,' he said quietly.

She nodded. Didn't smile. But she didn't leave the room either.

Progress, he thought. This is what progress looks like. Uncomfortable and uncertain, and nothing like victory.

The Final Test

The email arrived on Monday at 14:23.

Final Mechanics Mock Result: 61%

Liam stared at the number. Three per cent higher than last time. Three per cent. After all that work, all those extra hours, all that stress. Three per cent.

It wasn't enough. It would never be enough.

Behind him, someone laughed. Connor from his Mechanics class, looking over his shoulder at his screen.

'Sixty-one? Mate, that's rough. Guess some of us just aren't cut out for Engineering.'

The heat arrived like an explosion. Not a flash this time. A detonation. It flooded every cell in his body, turning his vision white at the edges. His hand curled into a fist before he'd consciously decided to make it. The urge to punch something, someone, was overwhelming. Visceral. The desk. Connor's smug face. The wall. Anything.

His whole body was tensing, preparing for impact.

Then, from somewhere underneath the rage, a thought surfaced.

To reduce anger, you must reduce the physical heat.

'I need a timeout,' Liam said abruptly, standing up. His voice sounded strange, tight. 'Ten minutes.'

Connor blinked, confused. 'What?'

But Liam was already walking away. Out of the computer lab, down the corridor, into an empty stairwell at the end of the building. He sat down on the bottom step, put his head between his knees, and started breathing.

Four in. Four hold. Six out.

His heart was hammering. His hands were shaking. Every muscle in his body was screaming at him to do something, to fight, to move, to release the pressure building behind his sternum.

He kept breathing.

Four in. Four hold. Six out.

Slowly, incrementally, the heat began to dissipate. Not vanishing. Not evaporating. But draining away, like water out of a bath. He could feel his pulse slowing. The tightness in his chest easing. The white edges of his vision clearing.

The rage was defusing. Not exploding. Not expressing itself. Just... diminishing.

After ten minutes, he stood up. His legs felt shaky, but his head was clear. Clearer than it had been in weeks.

He walked back to the computer lab. Connor was gone. He sat down at his laptop and opened a new document.

Subject: Request for Detailed Feedback - Engineering Portfolio

Dear Mr Jenkins,

I was disappointed with my recent mock result and am committed to improving. Could you provide specific feedback on which elements of my portfolio did not meet the required standard? I want to ensure I understand the expectations fully before resubmission.

Thank you for your time.

Liam Foster

He read it twice, then hit send before he could second-guess himself.

Then he opened his calendar and started planning a realistic revision schedule. One that included breaks. Sleep. Time to breathe.

The Quiet Connection

When Liam got home that evening, Ellie was making pasta. The kitchen smelled like garlic and tomatoes. She looked up when he came in, wary.

'Hey,' he said.

'Hey.'

'I need to apologise.'

She put down her wooden spoon. 'For what?'

'For making this house feel unsafe. For making you feel like you have to retreat to your room every time I'm stressed. For turning my anxiety into your problem.' He took a breath. 'I've been venting at you, and I thought that was okay because you never complained. But it wasn't okay. It was selfish. And I'm sorry.'

Ellie was quiet for a long moment. When she spoke, her voice wasn't careful. It was sharp.

'Do you know how many essays I've written after midnight this term? Because the house is only safe to work in after you've gone to bed?'

The words hit him like a slap. 'Ellie...'

‘No, let me finish.' Her hands were shaking slightly. 'I've been so worried about not making things worse for you that I've made myself smaller and smaller. I eat breakfast before you wake up. I do my work in my room with headphones on. I pretend everything's fine when Mum asks how we're getting on. And I'm tired, Liam. I'm so tired.'

He felt his throat tighten. 'I didn't know. I didn't realise... ‘

‘I know you didn't. That's the problem.' She wiped her eyes roughly. 'You've been so inside your own head, you couldn't see what was happening to me.'

'You're right.' His voice came out hoarse. 'You're completely right. And I'm sorry. Not just for the stress, but for making you feel like you couldn't tell me. For making you feel like you had to protect me from my own behaviour.'

She looked at him properly for the first time since he'd come home. Assessing.

'Are you actually going to change? Or is this just because you feel bad right now?'

'I don't know,' he admitted. 'I want to. I'm trying to. But I might mess it up. Probably will mess it up sometimes.'

Ellie was quiet again. Then: 'Can we sit?'

They sat.

For a moment, neither of them spoke. Liam found himself remembering a summer years ago, before the divorce, before A-Levels, before everything got complicated. They'd spent an entire afternoon trying to build a treehouse in the garden with scrap wood and determination. It had collapsed within an hour, a spectacular failure that had left them both in hysterical giggles.

'Remember the treehouse?' he said suddenly.

Ellie's mouth twitched. Almost a smile. 'You blamed the wood.'

'The wood was rubbish.'

'You didn't measure anything.'

'Measuring is for people without vision.'

This time she did smile, just slightly. 'It was a death trap.'

'It was ambitious.'

The silence that followed was different. Softer

Liam told her about the catharsis myth, about the research, about learning that everything he'd been doing to manage his anger had actually been making it worse. He told her about the breathing exercises, about the timeout in the stairwell, about how strange and uncomfortable and necessary it all was.

'So the jogging was making you more angry?' Ellie asked.

'Yeah. Turns out elevating your heart rate and flooding your body with adrenaline doesn't actually help you calm down. Who knew?'

'Everyone who's been telling you that for years?'

He laughed, surprised. 'Fair point.'

'I'm proud of you,' Ellie said quietly. 'For figuring it out. For trying something different.'

'It's early days. I'm probably going to mess it up a lot.'

'Probably,' she agreed. Then, after a pause, 'I've been looking at some resources for people supporting someone with anger issues. There's actually quite a lot about setting boundaries, about not enabling the behaviour by being a constant audience.' She smiled, small but genuine. 'I should have done it sooner.'

'I'm glad you're doing it now.'

They sat in comfortable silence for a moment. Then Ellie said, 'So. Engineering at Imperial. Still the plan?'

'Still the plan. Jenkins emailed back, actually. Gave me proper feedback this time. Turns out I'd formatted half the portfolio wrong. Nothing unfixable.'

'That's good.'

'Yeah.' He paused. 'I was thinking, if you're not too busy with uni work, maybe you could help me make a study schedule? Something sustainable. You're better at planning than I am.'

Ellie's smile widened. 'I'd like that.'

She went back to the kitchen to finish the pasta, and Liam stayed on the sofa, feeling something he hadn't felt in months. Not quite calm. Not quite peace. But something close. A sense that the pressure cooker of his life had finally found a release valve that actually worked.

And for the first time since he'd started his A-Levels, the heat behind his eyes stayed at a simmer rather than a boil.

Outside, the October evening had turned dark and cold. Inside, Ellie brought two plates of pasta to the sofa and they ate in front of a terrible reality show neither of them were really watching.

Liam's phone buzzed. Another A-Level reminder.

He felt the familiar spike of heat, the tightening in his chest.

Four in. Four hold. Six out.

Ellie glanced at him. 'You okay?'

'Getting there,' he said.

She nodded and turned back to the television, where someone was crying about a failed soufflé. She didn't move to her room. Didn't put her headphones on. Just sat there, close enough that their elbows nearly touched.

It wasn't perfect. It wasn't fixed. But it was a start.

And for now, that was enough.