‘I think this might be a spliff,’ she said, breathing in the familiar smell, which took her back to pretending to inhale in the school car park.

‘I think it might be.’

‘Do you want to share it with me?’ she blurted, trying to recover.

He cast a glance back at the group. ‘Go on, then. I’m Rav, by the way.’

‘Chloe.’

‘Nice to meet you.’

They sat on the wall at the bottom of the garden, taking turns to drag on the spliff while watching the scene unfold in front of them. Chloe could feel the dampness of the stone soak slowly through the thin material of Zadie’s dress. Her mother would have told her she was bound to get piles. She giggled, thinking about it, then looked at Rav’s profile, trying to see whether he had noticed her laughing. Chloe hadn’t ever given much thought to a person’s profile before, but now she studied Rav’s in the half-light. His jaw was a perfect right angle and his nose had clearly been broken, presumably playing rugby, like Max did, but somehow it only added to the symmetry of his face. He had the slightest hint of stubble – proper adult, not the sad, downy stuff that so many boys his age seemed inexplicably proud of.

‘It’s like a play,’ said Chloe. ‘All lit up, all of them playing, us sitting here, watching.’

‘Do you like plays?’

Chloe nodded. ‘I wanted to go to drama school. But Greg said I didn’t stand a chance, and my mum does whatever he says. So I’m here. Studying English. Sorry. Reading English. Why do they say that? Reading? What if you’re doing a course like Maths or Engineering, where there isn’t any reading?’

‘I’m doing Engineering. Trust me, there’s reading. Who’s Greg? He sounds like a twat.’

‘Greg is a twat, you are so totally right. He’s my stepfather. Well, he’s my mum’s boyfriend. My mum had me when she was nineteen. That’s like us having a baby right now.’

‘I think I should at least take your number first.’

Chloe dictated her number, and then, giddy with the excitement of how well this was all going, almost slipped backwards off the wall. Rav caught her around the waist. ‘Careful!’

‘You saved me.’

‘I did.’

‘That’s quite romantic.’

‘It is, isn’t it?’

Chloe blushed and avoided making eye contact. But when she looked up Rav was staring straight ahead at a pretty girl standing a few metres away with a group of friends.

‘That’s her!’ shouted the girl. ‘That’s the bitch who stole my spliff.’