She collapsed on her side, laughing so hard it sounded like she’d suffocate. The more I looked at my revolting socks, and the more she repeated the word shoes through her guffaws, the funnier it seemed. I rolled on to the ground and slapped at the gravelly surface.

‘You’re such an idiot,’ she said as she pulled herself together. ‘God, I’ve missed laughing.’

‘I’ve missed you.’ I lit another cigarette and we sat in silence as I smoked it. ‘Do I really look like a knob?’

‘Just being a bitch, Ollie. It’s what I do.’

‘What can we do to cheer you up? Want to burn down a classroom? We shouldn’t let my lack of appropriate footwear hold us back. The night is young.’

‘Not really in the mood. Good third-date idea, though, I’ll give you that.’

We exchanged a smile. ‘Would we call them dates?’

‘They’re much better than dates.’

I stopped myself from reminding her that I had no experience to draw on for comparison.

She stared blankly across the park, her eyelids flinching in the cool wind that tore in waves over the grass. ‘You want the truth? I didn’t want you to see me like this. Looking like shit. Feeling like shit. Didn’t want to spoil the illusion for you.’

‘You don’t look like shit.’

‘Don’t you get tired of it, Ollie? Everything being shit.’

‘What’s happened?’

She looked at me like she was about to say something, then stopped.

My pulse was quickening. I knew the question was going to escape.

‘Have you had sex with Nate Mackie?’

‘What?’

‘I heard something at school.’

Her face was a picture of disgust. ‘Is that what you think of me?’

I dodged the glare that bore down on me and scratched at a non-existent itch behind my ear. ‘He said you did.’ My face twisted as I said it. I felt my words land like blows from a hammer, obliterating something delicate. Something perfect.

‘And you believed him?’

‘No.’

‘Then why fucking ask me?’

‘Sorry. I’m really sorry.’

‘This place is so fucked up. God, I’m sick of it.’

I reached my hand out towards hers.

She snatched it away. ‘Don’t touch me.’

‘Don’t be angry. Please. I didn’t mean –’

She squinted and looked deep into my eyes. ‘You won’t be seeing me around here any more, Ollie.’ She climbed to her feet and yanked her handbag off the roundabout rail. ‘I really did think better of you.’

I grabbed my temples, desperate to take back the conversation as I watched her powering across the grass away from me.