Dot (Araminta Hall)

would think to himself, as his father offered up silent prayers that you only knew he was making because his lips were moving. It wasn’t even as if soldiers got paid much and the only way they got their faces in the papers was once they’d died and what the hell was the point of that? His father often talked about the value of money and the pleasure of a good day’s work or a job well done but Clive would only roll his eyes into his head. It’s all bullshit, was one of his favourite phrases, something he and his friends would say to each other about any and everything. They were against the system, but never even considered that when something is knocked down something else has to be put in its place. A sense of righteousness and being owed pervaded them like the cheap aftershave they had recently taken to wearing.
    Clive’s sister, Natalie, made no attempt to hide her disdain for her brother and his girlfriend, but his parents were annoyingly tolerant. They liked to talk about things like self-expression and individuality and respect for teenage boundaries, which made Clive bubble over with rage at the lack of things he had to fight against in his life. Not that he fully understood that this was the reason for the rage which seemed to overtake him so frequently. He could only identify his malaise in the simplest terms, by looking at those of his classmates who lived on the Cartertown estate or had only had one parent; a few had even been arrested. Clive found it stomach-churningly unfair that they should be given the opportunity of a life worth exploiting in song, whilst he had to put up with a vicarage, of all places, as well as understanding parents.
    His parents’ understanding, however, crashed into a brick wall when they came back from the last parents’ evening of the lower sixth to be told that he was probably on course to fail maths A Level. Clive never should have taken maths, but his father had balked at politics, saying it wasn’t a proper subject, and Clive had relented and now it looked as though he’d only be getting two A Levels, which wouldn’t even get him into an ex-poly. We’ll have to get you a tutor, said his father, but Clive had stood up at this, twisting his baseball cap on his head; No man, he’d said, I’ll sort it, promise I will. And no more MTV Base or Xbox till your exams are over, his father had shouted as he’d stormed out of the room. Even Clive thought maybe he should cut down on the incessant porn he watched on the laptop in his bedroom if he was going to stand any chance of passing his exams.
    Mavis Loveridge was easily the cleverest person in their year and maths was her specialist subject. Plus she was a geek, which meant she didn’t speak to any of his friends and so wouldn’t tell, and no doubt was in love with him, so would lick the gob off his shoe if he asked her to. Clive knew he had been right in his estimation when he cornered her in the playing fields one lunchtime and the look of exhilaration on her face had been impossible for her to hide in time. Of course she agreed to give him a few lessons, at her house, for free, no questions asked and telling no one.
    Clive had gone to her house once a week and found her to be a great teacher. She talked about numbers in a way which almost made him wish he’d paid a bit more attention over the last six or so years. After a few weeks he realised that Mavis didn’t see numbers as boring stretches of problems, but as puzzles that were as intricate as some of his favourite lyrics. And she was pretty if you looked at her while she spoke and ignored her dreadful old school DMs and long skirts and ginger hair. She was also so accommodating, studiously avoiding him at school and not even glancing his way when Debbie shouted ‘Ginga’ after her as she waited for a bus.
    So when she turned up to the sixth-form disco looking so unexpected Clive felt as if he didn’t have a choice. He wanted to tell her that she should always wear her hair up and that using an oversized man’s T-shirt as a dress was far sexier than all the other girls’ bum-skimming skirts and high heels that looked as if they might snap off their ankles. Besides, Debbie was being a prize pain that night, sulking because he’d gone to Taj’s house first to help with the tunes; generally dissing him and giving him the bum’s rush. No doubt it was her time of the month, he thought.
    Initially he’d only started talking to Mavis and Dot because of