Claire would call him every day after school and at weekends they would meet and study in the library together and kiss and hold each other and then she would say to him, Paul, you’re the one. You’re the one I want to be with. And he would look deep into her eyes and hold her and although she hadn’t said specifically, he would know exactly what she had meant, that he wanted him to take her and he would whisper back to her, Soon, I promise you, very soon.

Suddenly, Paul felt a sharp pain in the back of his head and heard a hoot of laughter as his neck catapulted forward and he heard the bounce of a rugby ball as it rolled away from him, like a discarded peanut shell in a bar.

‘Oi, Paul – watch where you’re going, you twat!’ While the laughter from the group of boys drowned out the voice, he knew it was Gavin. He reached behind his head, feeling his scalp, and walked quickly away, his head down to try to deflect any more attention. But while his body may have given the impression he had given up, he had only one thought about Gavin. Just you wait.

*

‘Excellent work, Paul, as always,’ said Mrs O’Leary.

‘Excellent work, cocksucker, as always,’ snickered a voice behind him imitating Mrs O’Leary as she walked away out of earshot. Paul didn’t dare look behind him, but he knew it was one of Gavin’s gang again. He’d always been relatively safe in the top-tier classes as Gavin and his mates were in the middle or lower sets but clearly Gavin had found a few more people to make his life hell in the classroom as well as outside of it.

Paul sat in his chair looking resolutely ahead as if the physics paper in front of him held no interest at all. Five minutes to the bell and he was going to make sure he was the first one out of the door. He would leg it to his bike, hop on, and get home as quickly as possible. Paul felt his heart rate speed up in anticipation. He discreetly put his books and the paper in his school bag, leaving only a pen and a slip of paper on the desk to write down the homework. But Mrs O’Leary was determined to take her time, stopping at every student to give verbal feedback on the paper.