All that day I couldn’t stop thinking about the protest, and the camper van full of militant teddy bears. As I daydreamed through each period, I realised I was desperate to go. In the free period before lunch, when I ought to have been doing revision on the role of Edmund Cartwright’s power loom in the mass production of textiles, I went to the library, got a roadmap down from the shelf marked ‘Maps of Britain’ and worked out which trains I’d need to take to get me to Newbury, where RAF Greenham Common was. It was only an hour away, with one change at Westbury. Easy. And I had Uncle Mike’s birthday money to buy the ticket with. Of course I didn’t have any more details, like, what time this protest was, where the rendezvous point would be; because the whole camp surely couldn’t be dressing in bear costumes – it must only be a breakaway faction. I had no idea of the size of it, but I knew it must be pretty big.

At lunchtime, as was our wont, my friends Julie and Charlotte and I set off down the path to the back of the school to sit in Julie’s ancient two-tone 2-CV and drink Baileys (I only had one swig, since I did actually want to do well in the mock history exam). They’d bought me a piece of lardy cake on a paper plate from the baker’s – my favourite – and stuck a candle in it, which Julie lit and I blew out. Then they sang ‘Happy Birthday’ lustily and tunelessly while Julie fluffed her perm in the rearview mirror. Charlotte lit a cigarette mid-refrain.

‘Guess where I’m going later?’ I announced indistinctly, my mouth full of dough and sugar, unintentionally echoing Caitlin’s earlier words.

They thought I was insane when I told them. Julie, in the driver’s seat, puckered her lips in horror. ‘With all those … old lesbians? Why?’

‘I’m sure they aren’t all lesbians. Lots of them have kids living there with them. And they definitely aren’t all old. Caitlin’s only twenty-six. Anyway, that’s not important. What’s important is…’

I paused. Why were they doing this? Did they really think it would make them take all the nuclear weapons away?

‘Being part of something,’ I said vaguely.

Julie and Charlotte looked at each other and rolled their eyes.

15

Present Day
Emad

Gemma and Emad bumped into one another on the steps of the police station; he was coming in, she was going out. He recognised her immediately, and was unable to believe his luck that their paths had crossed again, a good ten years after they’d last seen each other.

‘Gemma McMeekin – Meeks!’ He grabbed her sleeve then blushed puce and dropped it, thinking how presumptuous he was being. ‘It’s me, Emad. Emad Khan. Do you remember me?’