I open my exercise book to page sixty-three.

Simultaneous equations.

Complicated equations.

Too-hard-for-me-to-do equations.

The Amazing Spider-Man?

Fortnite?

Angry Birds on my phone?

I shake them all out of my head. I have to concentrate, all my teachers say it. I must concentrate. I must sit still. But I can’t. Last week in cookery, Mrs Lennon said I’m so easily distracted I’d follow a bee out of the window.

I push the maths books aside and switch to history.

Question 1: Imagine you are a suffragette. Write an account of what it would be like if people did not have the right to vote. What would it feel like not to be heard or have a voice? What actions would you take so that people took notice of your opinion?

I wonder what’s for tea?

Oh. I already had it.

Imagine you are a suffragette . . .

Granddad turns the TV up louder.

It’s still raining in Germany. The floods are getting worse.

Imagine you are a suffragette . . .

I hear a faint tinkle of a bell and look up. Samson slinks through the hall.

‘Would you like me to feed Samson, Granddad?’ I say this like it’s the most exciting thing I could do.

‘No.’ Granddad shakes his head. ‘I think you should work.’

I sigh. It never used to be boring like this when Grandma was alive. I glance at the picture of her smiling face on the mantelpiece and imagine her voice when she used to sing along to the radio in the kitchen in the mornings and her hugging me every time I walked through the door, even if I’d only gone to the shops for bread. I’d go to give her the change and she’d press the coins into my palm, telling me to save them for a rainy day or spend it on sweets, spend it on one of those computer game things, spend it on anything you like. But since she’s been gone it’s like it’s raining all the time, like the closed curtains have drained all the colour and her laughter from the house. All that’s left is her pink car, German TV and the tick-tick-ticking clocks. She didn’t look like my grandma when she was ill, not even in her pink dressing gown. But she still smelled of roses and told me stories about when I was born, when I was growing up, how she and Grandma used to dress me in a furry zip-up suit that made me look like a seal and then take me for a walk in the park.

Granddad doesn’t talk about things like that. All he does is talk about the news or the weather, or spend his time cutting the garden hedge or mending the hinges on doors.

Imagine you are a suffragette . . .

Imagine . . .

Imagine . . .

Imagine the person you loved loads isn’t around any more.

Writing for Dummies