“So, that weekend, we’re going swimming.”
Max winced. “Um, I don’t really swi—”
“Sea swimming. Not the leisure centre; that sucks.”
Max shook his head doubtfully. “People—stare.”
“There won’t be people.”
Max cocked his head.
“I can’t exactly wear appropriate swimming clothes. You know what I mean?” Cian said as they passed into the park. “So I know a place you don’t get other people very often.”
Max’s brain stalled and he coughed.
“Uh. So…by appropriate, you mean…”
“I mean, I should wear a bikini or a one-piece. But I can’t. So I don’t.”
The mental image of Cian skinny-dipping on some lonely private beach was enough to shut down anything resembling thought, and Max made a strangled noise as Cian laughed.
“Nice to know that’s what I can do to you.”
“Excuse me,” Max mumbled, “but were you there Friday night?”
“Ooh, true…”
They flirted—there was no other word for it but flirting—all the way home. And when Cian didn’t let go of his hand and followed Max into the hall, Max’s heart skipped several beats.
“Maybe I can come up for five minutes,” Cian said, shrugging, and toed his shoes off.
“Maybe ten?”
“Don’t push your luck.”
Thankfully, Mum had a habit of invading and cleaning Max’s room for him, so it wasn’t a bombsite of crisp packets and biscuit crumbs. Cian flopped down in his desk chair, apparently very intent on no fooling around, so Max resigned himself to changing and finding something niceish to wear. The favourite jeans had been returned, but he had to rustle up another belt.
When he came back from getting his best T-shirt from the tumble dryer in the kitchen, Cian was holding his options form between finger and thumb.
“That’s nothing,” Max said quickly.
“Well, yeah, it’s blank. What did you pick?”
“I—” Max coloured faintly. “I didn’t. I’m going to go work in Aunt Donna’s shop.”
“A shop?” Cian said and frowned. “Oh. Sorry. I just thought you would be…doing something else. You know, you seem pretty clever, and you’ve got all these books…”
He ran his finger down the spines of the Aubrey-Maturin series stacked on Max’s desk, and Max bit his lip.
“I like reading,” he mumbled.
“They look heavy.”
“They are. Kinda. But they’re really cool too. It’s all naval history and the secret service in the Napoleonic era, and—”
“And I barely manage a whole season of the same TV show,” Cian said and laughed. “You’re a dork. Why aren’t you doing sixth form if you’re such a dork? Does the shop pay good?”
“Well…no. It’s…an apprenticeship really, and Aunt Donna’s so…”
Cian frowned a little again. “Huh. So you’re just…doing that?”
“I hate school,” Max said. “I’ve been chased out of them constantly for being bullied.”
“I still can’t get my head round that,” Cian said. “You have size twelve feet. I wouldn’t have the balls to bully you.”
Max glanced at the picture of his parents, now pinned to his corkboard.
At the behemoth that was his laughing father.
Fatso Farrier, Sr.
“Screw those idiots,” Cian said and then hauled himself out of the chair. “C’mon. You want to go down to the harbour?”
“Sure,” Max said.
The form fluttered back to the desk.
Blank.
THAT EVENING—LONG after Mum and Aunt Donna had gone to bed—Max got out of bed and sat down at the desk.
At the blank sheet of paper sitting where Cian had dropped it.
Max chewed on his lip.
What if—
He powered up the computer. Went to the Royal Navy website, so often perused for news and history and pictures of great hulking warships.
But this time, he clicked on the button he’d always avoided.
Recruitment.
Farriers weren’t just Navy men. They were officers. Even Uncle George was an officer, and Max had it on good authority that Uncle George was charming, charismatic, and as dumb as a sack of soup.
So—
If Uncle George could do it…
Qualifications.
Max held his breath. Read the requirements. Counted points.
Only two.
He only needed two A-Levels to be over the threshold. One B, one C grade. Or an A and a D, even.
History would be easy. Mrs Pellow was always telling him so. He was good at history. And geography. And English, much as he hated Shakespeare. Or maybe he’d need something more maths and science-like? He was pretty good at chemistry. He got all A’s in his practice exams for chemistry…
He put pen to paper and paused.
Two more years.
Jazz. Aidan. Maybe Tom. Fatso Farrier, bumbling his way through two more years, wasting his time so the Navy could turn down a qualified loser instead of an unqualified one.
He swallowed.
Glanced up at the picture of his parents.
Glanced down at the paper.
Closed his eyes—and after a long minute ticked by, put the pen down.
And breathed out.
Chapter Twenty-One
“GOOD LUCK IN your exams, everyone, and I’m sure I’ll see some of you next year.”
Hubbub broke out in the classroom, but Max didn’t move. Waiting until the last bag was slung over the last shoulder before standing up, he slowly made his way to the front.
“Mr Ryhill?”
His form tutor—and, more coincidentally, his religious studies teacher—glanced up from gathering his things.
“How can I help, Max?”
“I—I want to talk career options.”
Mr Ryhill’s look of complete surprise was like a punch in the gut.
“Really?”
Then the man seemed to gather himself and gestured for Max to pull up a chair.
“Well, I’m no Connexions counsellor, but I’ll have a stab at it,” he said. “What kind of thing do you have in mind?”
Max took a deep breath.
Then blurted his dream, for the very first time, into a space where it might actually matter.
“I want to join the Navy.”
“I…see.”
“I—I printed out their recruitment pages for officers. My dad was an officer. And his brothers were…were all officers, and my grandpa. And—”
Mr Ryhill took them, flipping through them easily.
“Hm, I see. These are quite generic, Max. Do you know what kind of role specifically you’re after?”
“Maybe—maybe navigation. But I’m not sure yet.”
“Well, from my limited understanding, the Navy is going to need people with skills in maths and science.”
“Okay…”
“First step, I would say, is talking to a recruitment officer. Get a feel for what kind of roles there are, and then you can tailor your qualifications.”
“My—my options form is late. Is it too late?”
Mr Ryhill’s eyes softened.
“Officially, yes. Between you and me, I’m sure Mrs Pellow and I can rustle up an exemption for you.”
“Really?”
“She’s really very keen for you to go into history, you know.”
“The Navy might not want history.”
“No, but research and analytical skills will be a big bonus,” Mr Ryhill said. “If I were you, Max, I would get some nice broad options for A-Levels. History will be an easy A for you, and that’s a hundred points right off the bat. Then you only need another eighty for these general entry requirements. Now, I’m not sure your maths will be strong enough for the full A-Level, but maybe the AS?”
“Okay.”
“Your chemistry grades have always been excellent—I
know Mr Fraser is disappointed you didn’t sign up for the A-Level—and perhaps PE?”
Max winced.
“I take it that’s a no?”
“I hate PE.”
“You’ll have to pass the fitness requirement too, you know.”
“Aunt Donna has me going to Muay Thai.”
“Is that like kickboxing?”
“Kind of.”
Mr Ryhill smiled again. “Well then, if you could demonstrate a commitment to sport, then that would certainly count in your favour. Tell you what. If you bring your options form to your exam on Monday, we’ll make sure it gets processed. I’ll give the recruitment office a call on Monday on my lunch break, and have a chat with them about any advice they can offer. You come and see me after your RE exam on Thursday, and we’ll bash out a little plan, eh?”
Max fisted his doughy hands on his knees.
“D’you reckon I can do it, sir?”
Mr Ryhill scrutinised him.
“Honestly, Max? I would say no, for the way you’re in the room but never here during my lessons,” he said, very gently. “But Mrs Pellow—and Mr Fraser, for that matter—both consider you an excellent student. And Mr Fraser especially is not given to faint praise.”
Max squirmed. Mr Fraser, the stony, humourless ghoul who taught chemistry, was not exactly Max’s favourite.
“Given that? Yes, I do.”
Max swallowed.
“Okay,” he told his knees.
“Get the form in, Max. Do your best in your exams. Prove me wrong, and Mrs Pellow and Mr Fraser right, eh?”
Max cracked a faint smile.
“Thought teachers didn’t like to be wrong.”
“In this case, I would be glad to be wrong,” Mr Ryhill said and then stood and gathered his things. “Go on, get out of here. You have to pass your GCSEs before you can jump at the A-Levels, you know.”
Max shadowed him out of the building, not missing the sight of Jazz and Aidan loitering by the main gates, but Aunt Donna’s van was idling on the side of the road, and his kit bag was on the passenger seat.
Screw Jazz and Aidan. He had a class to get to.
THEY ARRIVED EARLY. And Cian wasn’t there yet.
Lewis was clearing up from his last class, whistling through his teeth as he stuffed pads back into a net, and Max automatically bowed at the edge of the mats in deference to Lewis’s tutelage before approaching.
“Can I ask a favour?” he said before he could chicken out.
“You can ask,” Lewis said with a dark chuckle.
“Don’t tell Cian?”
“If this is something to do with him, I do not want to—”
“It’s not, but…I just…don’t want him to know yet.”
Lewis eyed him warily.
“I—I’m looking into joining the Navy.”
The wary side-eye didn’t diminish.
“I talked to my form tutor today about which A-Levels to do, and he said I’d do well to do PE. But I hate PE, so—would you write me a reference for boxing? Like a record I can take to them when I need it?”
Slowly, Lewis put down the bag.
Folded his arms over his chest.
And grinned.
“Now where’s that sulky little shit Donna brought to my classes, eh?”
Max reddened.
“I’ll do you a deal, Farrier.”
The use of his last name made Max jump.
“I will write you a reference if—and only if—you pass at least one grading in a class environment.”
Max bit his lip.
“You do a grading class and pass it, the reference is yours. And it’ll make ’em jump at the chance to have you. But only if you do that for me.”
“Why?” Max asked honestly.
Lewis grinned.
“I told you, kid. There’s a good boxer in there trying to get out. I think once you get your first armband and you feel that little weight round your bicep when you’re trying to clobber Cian in the face again, it’ll give you the boost you need.”
The door banged. Cian’s bag hit the wall and his top followed. Max eyed the mats, considering.
“We have a deal, Farrier?”
Lewis’s hand hovered in the air, the wraps glowing white against his dark skin.
Max bunched his fat fingers into a fist.
One grading, which would form the baseline of all the others so was, by Cian’s words, practically un-fail-able.
Just one. In class with all the other newbies. He could just get Cian to tell him when one with lots of newbies was coming up. Then he wouldn’t be so embarrassingly out of shape.
And Lewis would write him a reference.
“Deal,” he said.
His knuckles bumped Lewis’s, and the instructor grinned.
“All right then,” he said and raised his voice. “Thanks to Max’s flash of ambition, today is going to be a fitness drill! Forget the gumshields, girlies, this is going to be a sweat day!”
Cian, loudly, called Max a soulless son of a bitch.
Chapter Twenty-Two
SOMETHING WAS SUPPOSED to happen Friday.
Max knew it, sure as he knew the sky was blue and Aunt Donna was psycho if her brother Damian was in town. Friday was the end of the summer term, the end of the school year—and the end of school always meant something happened.
Jazz and his bookends had traditions.
At the end of the winter term, they’d broken open Max’s locker, put all of his things in the urinals, and pissed on them. At the end of the spring term, they’d put Max’s head in the urinals, and pissed on him. This term—
It would be far worse than being pissed on, Max was certain. The last two terms, nobody had been expelled. Or even suspended. He’d denied he knew anything about who’d ruined his things at Christmas, and nobody even knew that Easter had happened at all.
This time—
He took precautions. Emptied his locker between first and second period, and carried his things from class to class. Texted his mum asking to be picked up at three thirty on the dot. Got out the bare minimum of things for his final lesson so he could escape as soon as possible.
But he was sweating his way through the film that was put on for them to watch. His armpits felt sticky. His fingers were trembling.
It wouldn’t be enough. None of it would be enough.
The bell sounded like the downward swing of an executioner’s axe.
He lurched up from his desk and was first out of the door.
The route to Mum’s car was down two flights of stairs, along the main corridor, out of the double doors, across the courtyard between the humanities block and the science block, and out of the main gate.
The throng protected him. Everyone else wanted to do the same thing—get out, now, and start the summer.
But it would also betray him. Because Jazz and Aidan would be in the throng. And nobody would stop them. A crowd wouldn’t prevent anything.
Max squared his shoulders and pushed.
And in carving his way through the gaggle of students, literally shouldering them aside, felling them like a tree crashing down through the undergrowth to the dirt below, Max realised Lewis had been right.
He was a big man. Big shoulders.
Not fat, but—big.
Fat didn’t create this ripple effect of people moving round him. It wasn’t dense enough. But he was shouldering his way through, and people were moving. Scowling and muttering, calling him an arsehole, but moving.
And there was Aunt Donna’s van. Not Mum’s car, but Aunt Donna’s van, shuddering and stinking on the street. Idling. Waiting.
Safety.
“Oi, Fatso! What’s your rush?”
The shout came from over his shoulder, and Max powered on. Sweat was starting to drip down his back. His thighs hurt. He was almost—almost—running. His lungs reeled as he shot past the gate—and then the door handle was cool in his hand and the cracked leather of the seat sticky and clinging to his unifo
rm.
He slammed the door and shut out the school.
“Hello to you too,” Aunt Donna said dryly, flicking on the indicator and peeling out into the mess of people and traffic. “Bad day?”
“No,” Max said. They hadn’t caught him. He’d escaped the end-of-term ritual for the first time ever. “Nothing happened. Just, you know. Summer holidays now.”
“You say that now,” Aunt Donna said. “Wait until you’ve been cooped up with your mum and her pre-wedding jitters for six weeks. You’ll be begging to start early at the shop.”
“Uh—”
She threw him a glance. “What?”
“I’m—maybe…not.”
“Not what?”
“Shopping. I mean, apprenticeshopping. Shipping.”
She cackled at his thick tongue.
“I mean,” Max huffed, “that I talked to Mr Ryhill about putting in my options form.”
“Oh?”
“And, um. He said it’s late but…he’d try and sort it for me if I brought it in when I do my exam on Monday.”
Aunt Donna said nothing at all for a long minute.
“I—I know it kind of—I should have said. Sorry.”
“Sorry?” she muttered and then shook her head. “God, Max, you’re a bright boy, but you’re dense sometimes. I’m proud of you, you berk.”
“Um—”
“Get your options form in, and to hell with the shop. What have you picked?”
“Not sure yet,” Max mumbled.
“Well, history has to be one of them, right?”
“Yeah. Yeah, it is. But the N—”
He stopped himself, and Aunt Donna squinted at him as she flung the van round a turn.
“The what?”
“The Navy don’t care about history,” he mumbled, pressing his chin into his chest as though he could hide the words from her.
She breathed out.
“Oh.”
“I just—I thought—I just had a crazy moment.”
“Yeah,” she agreed. “You had a crazy moment for years after your grandpa died that you’d let him down somehow and were a failure before you ever even tried. You had a crazy moment when you gave up on your Navy dream, when you turned your back on the sea and that salt water in your veins. And now maybe the crazy moment’s over, huh? Maybe you’re waking up at last?”
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