by Saci Lloyd
He caught my eye. “Laur, I don’t want you to be miserable at school. If you don’t want to be there, then I understand.”
“Excuse me. One of us taking time off is all we need in one house.” Mum smiled, but her face looked like an old lemon.
I glanced at Dad. I know he’s trying to be nice, but what am I going to do without an education—stay at home like a weird spinster daughter with bottle-end glasses and thick ankles?
Wed., May 13
I can’t believe what’s happening. When I got home Kieran and Kim were deep in talk on the sofa. I stopped dead when I saw them.
Kieran looked up. “Ooh, good! We need you to look at something.”
“We?”
Kim rolled her eyes. “Yes. We. Kier’s asked me to help set up Carbon Dating. Got a problem with that?”
“C’mon and sit down, Laura.” Kieran patted the sofa.
I crossed my arms.
“Please? This is really important to me. I’ve traded in my Alfa and everything.”
“You sold your car?”
“Yep, for a G7, five thousand flyers and six months’ rental at the Leopard in Soho.”
He dug into his pocket and brought out a business card. “Like it? Kim did it.”
Thurs., May 14
It’s happened. Thames Water’s putting London on a garden hose ban from next week. No watering the garden, no washing the car. Dad was dead upset. “It’s not like I’m growing roses out there now. It’s real food, things we need to live on.”
“You could always get another job, darling,” said Mum.
He stuck his hands in his pockets. “Where? You know there’s a recession on.”
“Well, you could get yourself on one of those gov retraining courses—y’know, for renewables engineers, turbine fitters . . . there’s a massive skills shortage . . .”
“Hmm. Well, maybe. But first I want to get the house self-sufficient.”
Mum glanced at the shriveled-up lettuces but said nothing.
Sat., May 16
Kim has just been in my room. She came in, shut the door, and leaned up against the wall. “Listen, don’t rock the boat.”
“What boat?”
“Just don’t rock it, little sis, or it’ll be bad for you.”
“Why don’t you just piss off?” I hissed.
“With pleasure,” she hissed back and left.
Wed., May 20
So bored. Mum still won’t let me go out with my mates, cept to school, till I start Offenders. Did stupid revision for the environment exam. Later I went around to Arthur’s for him to test me.
“Hmm,” he said at the end. “The general environmental impact stuff is okay, but let’s just pray you don’t get any questions on air travel. Very weak. Why’s that?”
I shrugged. “Dunno. It’s just stupid. I mean, all this stuff’s going on around us for real—and it feels weird doing an exam on it. Like if you were married and someone made you sit down and write an essay on love.”
Arthur glanced at me, sharply.
Thurs., May 21
Flopped it. Opened up the exam paper and went all cold inside. The whole exam was about air travel. When is my luck gonna change? Ravi was in the hall at the same time doing some triple math paper. When my row got up to leave, he glanced up for .46 of a second, grinned, then put his head down again.
Came home and found this on the kitchen table. Huh.
Fri., May 22
I’m not going to panic, I’m gonna write out key revision points for the Crit Thinking exam on individual memory cards. Like that will turn me into a normal teenager who can pass exams.
Sat., May 23
Interactionalism—dramaturgical model.
The society is constructed like a play or drama. The society operates through the dramaturgical scene. You learn the part you play. Socialization.
Mon., May 25
Feminism.
The society is constructed by men dominating women, with a hierarchy with men at top and women at bottom. Social change happens due to the uprising of feminism. There are no apparent conflicts because men deny it.
Tues., May 26
Globalization—has world become smaller?
Nothing will stay in my head. I read it and 2 minutes later it’s gone.
Wed., May 27
On top of everything else I’ve got this stupid bloody Offenders meeting tomorrow.
Thurs., May 28
10 P.M. Oh, Jesus, I just got back from Offenders. Too exhausted to write more now. Exam tomorrow morning, which I am going to 100% fail.
Fri., May 29
Critical Thinking
2450/1
Paper 1
Friday, May 29, 2015
Morning
Time: 1 hour 30 minutes
Instructions to Candidates:
• Write your name and candidate number in the spaces provided on the answer booklet. Do not write on both sides of the paper. (Mr. Harris, the fat PE teacher, cracked a joke about us being sure to write on at least ONE side of the paper. Like he’s ever had to take an exam in his life.)
• There are three questions—you must answer either A OR B AND C. (What?)
• Read each question carefully and make sure you know what you have to do before starting your answer. (Yeah, right)
A. Critically evaluate the argument below.
Having a “gap” year between A-level tests and university is now very popular. However, a number of questions need to be raised about the practice in the rationing era.
The year-long luxury of a gap year is so radically different from the way life is organized in our current society that it might prove difficult for students to readjust to normality. Fifty percent of Ibiza carbon exiles are individuals who have never managed to readjust after taking a gap year. As a result they have attempted to permanently drop out. Such a dose of freedom is a poor preparation for the disciplined routines that the modern world demands—and, indeed, may be a direct cause of socially unacceptable behavior.
1. Identify the overall conclusion of the argument. (2 points) The person who wrote this exam paper is probably a middle-aged parent who has reached the overall conclusion that they want their teenage snot bag to grow up and stop sponging off them.
2. Construct an argument that either challenges or supports the conclusion. Your answers should include a developed discussion. (8 points)
I am going to challenge the conclusion with reference to a real-life example—that of my sister, Kim Brown.
Challenge:
If my sister Kim had been allowed to go on her gap year to New York to work in a designer clothes store, like she was meant to, then she would NOT have gone off the rails and dragged my family into carbon bankruptcy. Following this, she would NOT have been sent for reprogramming at Carbon Offenders, where she would NOT have become involved in Tracey Leader’s carbon crime ring.
Although I have no definite proof as yet, my suspicions were aroused last night on my first visit to Carbon Offenders. I was forced to sit in a circle of offenders and throw a ball to the other members and say my name and my offense each time I caught the ball. And then a girl next to me leaned over and whispered, “Laura Brown, you’re not Kim’s sister are you?” When I nodded, she looked at me with great respect and asked me if I could “introduce her.” When I expressed surprise at this request, she gave me a hurt look, and said, “Oh, right, I’m not good enough for you” and turned away.
When the meeting was over, I was about to leave when I saw a small group of people huddled around a familiar-looking 4×4 in the dark outside. I sneaked over. They were all nice educated people, their whispered conversation was all about how they really needed this holiday, how they simply couldn’t survive without the car, etc.
Suddenly, I heard the slam of a door. I looked to see a woman of my mother’s age emerging from the 4×4. She came over to a friend in the group and whispered, “Tuscany, what luxury!”
I remained in my concealed locat
ion for more than an hour, hoping to catch sight of my evil sibling, but she did not appear. After a while, I began to believe that I had made a mistake and I set off for home, but as I tramped the lonely streets, the 4×4 appeared at the stop light alongside me. I ducked behind a trash can and saw my sister and a laughing Tracey Leader. Then they disappeared into the night. Coincidence?
All I have to say in conclusion is that it is clear from this example that in my sister’s case a gap year would have been a VERY GOOD THING. She would have gone to New York, clubbed, snorted cocaine, gone anorexic, dated a record producer, etc., like a normal, fricked-up, spoiled, twenty-year-old from the West.
Instead of this, she is at home and somehow involved in peddling black-market carbon to the corrupt middle classes in alliance with Tracey Leader, new friend to the bourgeoisie. The same Tracey Leader who will ditch her like a piece of dog shit on her shoe if the pigs come knocking on the door.
I realize this is maybe not the answer you are looking for, but the fact is if you were living my life right now, you’d fail this exam, too. Sorry.
Sat., May 30
Urggh, I woke up with my head full of trouble. I haven’t got any real proof, so there’s no point telling anyone. I don’t even wanna tell Adi—I mean, what if it’s true?
I saw Arthur outside weeding, so I went and sat on the grass.
“Arthur . . . was there a black market in the war?”
He tugged at a dandelion. “Course. Couldn’t have survived without it.”
“Didn’t you feel guilty?”
“No time for guilt. You were hungry and if you could get something to fill your belly you did it. Within reason, of course.”
“But . . . what about now? Carbon fraud. Isn’t it kind of different . . . I mean, it’s not about starvation, it’s just about wanting it easy.”
Arthur looked at me. “Hmm. Well, I wouldn’t be too hard on people. It’s such a difficult thing we’re doing, there’s always going to be some rule bending.”
“I bet it wasn’t like this in the war. People had more style back then.”
“Well, I don’t know. In some ways it was easier—we had a clear enemy—but this time it’s almost like we’re fighting ourselves. It was difficult in other ways then; the whole country was turned upside down. Poor people and rich were forced together, y’know, eating the same food, wearing the same clothes. City children were evacuated to much richer families and all the old rules were broken.”
“But at least everyone worked together. They weren’t rioting and looting just cos they couldn’t get what they wanted.”
Arthur shook his head. “Don’t believe all that government whitewash ‘Spirit of the Blitz’ stuff, Laura. I remember one time when there was a direct bomb hit on the Café de Paris in Piccadilly—it had a famous underground ballroom, as I recall, so couples would go there for a night on the town because it was supposed to be safe. Anyway, it turned out it wasn’t so secure, and when the military police got to the scene it was like a tomb—all the elegantly dressed people still sitting at tables without a mark on them, but stone dead—I suppose from the shock of the blast. But the really awful thing was the looting. Gangs had sneaked in there before the rescue crews and cut the fingers from the dead to steal their rings.”
“What, they stole whole fingers?”
“Yes. Gruesome, isn’t it? But, Laura, what we’re going through now is very extreme. It wasn’t supposed to be like this, it was meant to be a more gradual reduction to 60 percent. But the Great Storm changed all that forever and now we’ve got to do the best we can.”
Arthur sighed. “At least we’re not at war. War is awful. I hope we never have to go through anything like that again.”
Summer.
June
Mon., June 1
No rain for weeks and weeks. Dad tried to hand out a load of new house rules at dinner today. He wants us to shower in a bucket for 1 minute max and then throw the water on the garden. No more dishwasher, no more washing machine, one clothes wash per person per week, by hand. The toilet rule’s the most disgusting part: Basically—if it’s yellow let it mellow, if it’s brown flush it down. Dad tried to make a joke out of it. I saw Mum give him this look like she wondered how she’d ever fancied him. She went over to the cooker.
“So what are you learning at Offenders, Laura?”
I could feel Kim’s eyes burning into me. “Umm, dunno. Stuff.”
“Honestly, darling, do try to articulate better. . . . Well, what about you, Kim? Are you doing anything exciting?”
Kim blinked. “Umm, yeah—we like went into a prison and gave a lecture on staying clean in the new world.”
“Oh, marvelous! And aren’t you doing something with Kieran now, too? You see, your gap year worked out in the end!” Mum began to off-load huge mounds of lumpy mashed potato onto our plates. She glanced at Dad. “Did you hear that, darling? She’s doing so well!”
He grunted.
“Laura, surely you’ve got something to tell?”
She fixed me with her biggest positive smile; it was like being under a massive sunlamp.
My forehead began to prickle with sweat.
“Lumps.”
Her smile slipped. “Excuse me?”
“This mash is full of lumps,” muttered Dad, poking at it with a fork.
“Well, I’m sorry, Nick, there wasn’t time to finish it properly, what with everything else . . .”
He pushed it to one side.
“Don’t like lumps.”
Are they starting to fall apart again already?
2 A.M. Wide awake, drenched in sweat from yet another mare—this time I was being chased all over the Leaders’ estate by a pig-dog beast with slavering jaws. It was wearing a little dog jacket with KIM embroidered on it. Huh. Interpret that, Mr. Freud.
I couldn’t get back to sleep, so I went into the kitchen, opened the fridge door, and just sort of gazed inside for a few minutes. Even the fridge has had a revolution; it used to be stacked up with frozen dinners and plastic packaging—and now it’s like looking into my granny’s fridge in Devon. There was leftover stew, 5 spuds, a bottle of milk of magnesia (??), a beetroot, some wizened apples, and a bag of old carrots. All very British—the exotic stuff just costs too many points. I could have murdered a slice of really tacky Domino’s pizza—salami with extra jalapeno.
Suddenly the front door slammed. I froze. It could only be Kim. I stood there, willing her to go straight to her room—but when did she ever do anything I wanted?
“Oh, God, you gave me a shock,” she gasped, standing in the doorway.
I just stood there.
She fixed me with a level stare. “So, how was Offenders the other night?”
“Whatever.”
“What does that mean?”
“Well, it was kind of weird, cos as soon as they knew I was your sister, everyone wanted to know me. Why’s that, Kim?”
There was a pause. I stood there, waiting for the explosion, but instead Kim just sighed. “Yeah, okay. It’s true. I fix people up with a bit of extra carbon.”
“It’s more than a bit, Kim—there were women getting fixed up with enough black market stuff to fly to Italy.”
Kim scowled. “No way! I deal in gas bills and bus passes, just a few chillers. Nothing more.”
“And what about Tracey—you reckon she stops there?”
“That’s her business. Don’t get involved.”
“Oh, right, too late. I am involved, cos I’m your sister and if you mess up then I’ll end up paying for it cos that’s how it works around here.”
“Listen, you have to believe me, I am not involved with what she does.”
“Then why were you in the Jeep with her later?”
“Jesus. You’re quite the little spy aren’t you? She gave me a ride, that’s all. It’s all right for you, little miss radical, all that anti-capitalism bullshit—but what about me? My whole life’s been taken off me. . . . It’s not like I ever wanted an
ything bad—just to work in fashion, travel, you know, the usual shit . . . and now it’s over.”
“You’re breaking my heart.”
“You don’t know anything about it, you don’t know anything about me. At least I live in the real world, instead of some little moral fantasy. . . .”
“Why shouldn’t I tell Mum and Dad?”
Kim laid a hand on my arm. “Don’t be stupid, Laura. Look, you’re really overreacting here. I am going to stop soon, anyway.”
“When?”
“Soon. That’s why I’m doing this thing with Kier.” She looked at me hard. “Trust me.”
I stared back at her.
“Just this once?”
I sighed.
She smiled. “C’mon, little sis! It’s not so bad—it’s kind of underground, y’know, like two fingers up at the state.”
I went back to bed and thought about it. The trouble is, right now I am the state. I don’t want spoiled pigs to go to Tuscany, I want them to clean up and sort their shit out once and for all. Can I trust Kim? Almost definitely not. But I want to.
Wed., June 3
Me and Adi gave out flyers for the angels gig around school. Loads of kids say they’re coming. . . . We were standing in the link, talking to a bunch of people, when Thanzila cruised by with Ravi.
Adi held out a flyer. “Hey, you wanna come?”
I hissed, “Adi!”
Thanzila stopped and looked at him like he was a bug crawled out from under a log. “Oh, right, your band. That’s sooo cool.”