Love Lessons by Nick Sharratt

were now scrabbling at my hem, exposing my thighs.
    â€˜There are boys in the room, for God’s sake!’ I shrieked.
    They all fell about laughing, making silly ‘Ooooh!’ cooing noises, like demented doves. One of the bigger boys was lounging on the teacher’s desk, legs dangling. He looked over at us.
    â€˜Leave her alone, girlies,’ he said.
    They backed off immediately, giggling and grinning. I stared, surprised. He was the only boy in the class who was remotely good looking. He was tall and slim, with longish fair hair. He’d customized his school uniform, his shirt hanging loose, his sleeves rolled up, and he was wearing cool pointy boots instead of scuffed trainers like the other lads. It was obvious all the girls tormenting me fancied him like mad.
    â€˜So why have we got to back off?’ said one of the girls. She was the fiercest, and probably the prettiest, with carefully curled dark hair and heavy black eye make-up like Cleopatra. She narrowed her outlined eyes at the boy. ‘Are you waiting to have a shufty at the slag’s underwear yourself, Toby?’
    â€˜Give it a rest, Rita,’ he said, laughing at her.
    He was called Toby! He did look just a little like my Tobias, though this was a real rough lad, not an ethereal boy with an angel for his best buddy.
    I gave him a shy little nod. He winked at me and then carried on chatting to his mates. I knew he’d just taken pity on me. I was new and weird and hideous in my home clothes. He’d put me in the same category as smiley Sarah. He’d protected me automatically without even thinking about it.
    It didn’t look as if Rita saw it that way. She glared at me.
    â€˜Stupid little tart,’ she hissed in my face. ‘Don’t you dare go making eyes at my Toby.’
    â€˜Don’t worry about it,’ I said, picking up Jane Eyre again.
    My hands were shaking. I hoped they wouldn’t notice. I dropped my book and hunted for my new timetable instead. I looked to see when I had an art lesson. It wasn’t until the afternoon. It seemed as far away as Christmas. I had God knows how many terrible lessons to get through first, plus a session in the Success Maker.
    It was the Portakabin we’d taken our tests in. It was clearly for pupils who were currently utterly un successful. Most of them were refugees, with an obvious excuse for their lack of ability in a completely foreign language. Even so, they mastered basic maths and science quicker than I did.
    I was the worst student in the entire unit at IT. I couldn’t even initially tell the difference between a television and a computer. Mr Widnes the tutor thought I was being deliberately insolent when I sat down in front of the unit television and struggled to switch it on.
    â€˜All right, Miss Clever Clogs, stop taking the mickey,’ he said, sighing. Then he saw my expression. ‘OK, you’re obviously not into computers. But surely you’ve got a television at home.’
    â€˜We haven’t, actually,’ I said miserably.
    It wasn’t for want of trying. Grace and I had begged Dad year after year to let us have a set. Mum had stressed that it would be highly educational, and we’d just watch the arts and nature programmes.
    â€˜Educational, my bottom,’ said Dad, though he’d put it more crudely. ‘They’d just gawp at cartoons and sleazy rubbish – and you’d all get hooked on those wretched soaps.’
    So we’d gone without, and consequently felt more out of touch than ever with the modern world. Mr Widnes clearly thought I came from a bizarrely impoverished background and treated me very gently from then on. I was so stupid trying to do the most basic things and I couldn’t even move the mouse around properly. His patience must have been severely tested.
    It was a relief to escape the Success Maker at lunch time, but then I had to steel myself for English with Mrs