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Back Afterlove
Chapters (86)
  1. Title Page
  2. CONTENTS
  3. Love
  4. Before
  5. One
  6. ONE
  7. Two
  8. TWO
  9. Three
  10. THREE
  11. Four
  12. FOUR
  13. Five
  14. FIVE
  15. Six
  16. SIX
  17. Seven
  18. SEVEN
  19. Eight
  20. EIGHT
  21. Nine
  22. NINE
  23. Ten
  24. TEN
  25. Eleven
  26. ELEVEN
  27. After
  28. One
  29. ONE
  30. Two
  31. TWO
  32. Three
  33. THREE
  34. Four
  35. FOUR
  36. Five
  37. FIVE
  38. Six
  39. SIX
  40. Seven
  41. SEVEN
  42. Eight
  43. EIGHT
  44. Nine
  45. NINE
  46. Ten
  47. TEN
  48. Eleven
  49. ELEVEN
  50. Twelve
  51. TWELVE
  52. Thirteen
  53. THIRTEEN
  54. Fourteen
  55. FOURTEEN
  56. Fifteen
  57. FIFTEEN
  58. Sixteen
  59. SIXTEEN
  60. Seventeen
  61. SEVENTEEN
  62. Eighteen
  63. EIGHTEEN
  64. Nineteen
  65. NINETEEN
  66. Twenty
  67. TWENTY
  68. Twenty-One
  69. TWENTY-ONE
  70. Twenty-Two
  71. TWENTY-TWO
  72. Twenty-Three
  73. TWENTY-THREE
  74. Twenty-Four
  75. TWENTY-FOUR
  76. Twenty-Five
  77. TWENTY-FIVE
  78. Twenty-Six
  79. TWENTY-SIX
  80. Twenty-Seven
  81. TWENTY-SEVEN
  82. Twenty-Eight
  83. TWENTY-EIGHT
  84. Eleven Months Later
  85. ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
  86. Copyright

Sometimes she pushes it, trying to persuade me to stay another fifteen minutes or to go to the cinema with her so that we can sit in the back row and kiss through the film. I’m tempted, but this only works if I’m home by dinner. It was a hard-fought battle – not having to come straight home if I’m doing school stuff– that I won long before I met Poppy. And while I’m not actually doing ‘school stuff ’, as long as my parents continue to think that I am, she and I can have our afternoons together.

It’s not enough, though.

Poppy hasn’t said anything, but I know it’s annoying her, not being able to spend more than a couple of hours with each other. She keeps saying that she wants to see the Jean-Michel Basquiat exhibition at the Tate Modern so, one afternoon, I suggest we go and she’s thrilled.

I leave it until the last minute to tell my mother, of course, waiting until my father is in the shower and she’s heading out to work to remind her about my school trip. It’s a Saturday so I’m ready if she objects, a speech prepared about how we’re so busy preparing for mocks that Miss Otwell doesn’t want to lose a whole day of lessons, but luckily she’s so distracted by trying to find her door keys that she doesn’t even notice. She just gives me a tenner when she finally finds them and tells me to have fun as she sweeps out the door.

I meet Poppy at the station and we run hand in hand to the train. We find a two-seater and sit, curled into one another like a couple of commas, all the way to London, playing songs for each other on our phones.

When we get to Blackfriars, we run down the stairs and out, out on to the Thames Path, Poppy’s red hair as wild as ever in the bright December sunshine. It’s so cold that the air puffs out of me in great clouds as I try to keep up with her, but I don’t feel it, my cheeks hot as I watch her run away from me.

I don’t like much at school, but I like art. I like Magritte’s pipe that’s not a pipe and Hokusai’s curling waves, so I’ve always wanted to go to the Tate Modern. I’ve seen photos of it, of course, so I know it’s not like the other art galleries I’ve been to with their polished floors and sharp white walls, but as we head down the slope to the entrance, I’m still not sure what to expect.