Johanna was going to a Jewish high school where the boys and girls had totally separate buildings on different streets, and had already shown Matty the maroon blazer in her wardrobe. She shrugged, fiddling with her candy bracelet. ‘Dunno.’ She glanced over. ‘We have to learn how to do spinning and weaving.’ Pulled a face.

She didn’t seem to mind too much really. Matty had no idea what to expect about St George’s, except that it was massive, and further away, and that in PE the girls did netball and the boys did football.

Johanna was rewinding the video. ‘I want to watch Duran Duran again,’ she said, grinning.

***

It wasn’t fair.

Night. Matty lay awake, everything feeling heavy and horrible. A sticky, hot anger. Thoughts were all mixed up together, Freddie Mercury in his vest, Johanna’s fanny hairs, Nicks, Dad, the pondwater. Matty rolled over and put a fist between both thighs, pushed against the bed. A gentle bruising throb.

‘Fuck.’ The word seemed especially loud in the thick air of the bedroom. If Matty was a rapper, there’d be a volley of words, tumbling out easily. ‘Fuck fuck fuck.’ It wasn’t fair. ‘It’s not fucking fair.’ Pyjama bottoms off. T-shirt off.

Less of that, Dad would have said. Less of that right now, you tyke. Think of your mamma’s ears. He wouldn’t have thought much of Nicks and all his swearing.

Pants off.

‘Fuck you.’ Fuck him. He wasn’t here, and Nicks was. Nicks and Johanna and even Daz and Gegsy and all the men who would say hello at the pond. The South African lifeguard, whose name was Alexander.

Dad, singing Kris Kristofferson songs in a twangy American accent. ‘Cause this morning, she’s just leavin’, but come sundown, she’ll be gone.’

‘You’re gone.’ A louder voice, to drown him out. ‘You’re gone. Fuck fuck fuck.’ Matty grabbed a handful of the wall walkers that were on the desk by the bed and threw them at the wall. They monkeyed down, one at a time, as if falling down into hell, their hearts too heavy and being missed by St Michael, who was too busy eating Mini Milks in his posh house by the Heath.

Chest pain. Matty let both knees sag and bounced onto the bed, lying down again. It hurt on both sides so it wasn’t a heart attack, like you’d get if you were drowning in seawater, going hypertonic.

A pillow, over eyes, nose, mouth.

‘Matty.’ The door had opened. Mamma’s voice.

‘Go away.’ Spoken through the pillow.

‘Go to sleep.’

‘Go away.’

She sat down at the foot of the bed. A hand on one bare thigh. Stroking a bit. She used to sing a lullaby and brush Matty’s hair before bedtime. Fa la ninna, fa la nanna, nella braccia della mamma.

Matty moved it. ‘You don’t care.’

‘What?’

‘You don’t care.’