But it’s not Shane. It’s Rob.

I look again. There’s another boy. Their jackets move together on the other side of the pool. Rob’s going ah-ah-ah. Half singing, half sighing. I pick my way through a tangle of twigs and holly leaves so I can get a closer look. Then I crouch down and watch, still as a twitcher. I watch. I wait.

Rob is leaning on a trunk right by the water’s edge, and Luke is standing in front of him, very close. They’re staring into each other’s faces as if they’re going to fight. They’re focused, wide-eyed, squaring up to one another, chests puffed out, feet planted on the floor.

I think Rob must be about to make his move, because he twitches his arm. But he moves it so slowly towards Luke I know he’s not going to make any impact. Not at that speed. Then Rob stretches out his hand and slips all his fingers into the front pocket of Luke’s jeans. He slips them in, easy, like I slipped into the pool when I’d torn my palm. Luke doesn’t flinch. He leans back against the trunk, as if he’s relieved, and I see them kiss.

When we get back, Mum says, ‘That boy came round for you.’

He’s never done that before.

‘He stood on the step and just gawped at me. There’s no light on in there, is there? No one’s home.’

‘Who’s this?’ asks Simon, shaking out his Barbour jacket with a clacking noise. Mum raises her voice. ‘That boy. The backward one. You know.’

‘Oh,’ says Simon, with a look at me. ‘Him.’

‘I told him you were out with your boyfriend,’ Mum says. She lets out a tinkly laugh and flings her arms around Simon’s waist, beaming up at his glasses. She’s probably inspecting her reflection in them. Her perm’s dropped out now, but she’s wearing a new shoulder-padded cardigan and full eye make-up. Simon clamps her round the middle and she gives a squeal. ‘Ripe for the plucking,’ he says, winking at me.

nine: Howard, November, 1985

nine

Howard

November, 1985

I hadn’t been in the library for years, but nothing had changed. The heavy door still kept the outside world out, and sealed the silence in. The boiled wool doormat was a little thinner than before, the returns counter a little more scuffed, but the thick lettering of the signs, ‘Issues’, ‘Reference’, ‘Quiet please’, remained.

When I walked in, I was met by a blast of warm air from the overhead heater, and I remembered sweating beneath such a blast when I’d asked Kathryn on our first night out. That she’d said yes had felt like a miracle back then.