Jimmy sits in class next to me with his hands down his pants. I try not to notice him, but the guy behind him leans over and calls out in a loud voice, 'Hey Jimmy! playing pocket billiards again eh?' and laughs. It is Eddie. Always laughing, never seems to be afraid. I like Eddie; he's the only boy in this class that I like. His face is open and his eyes, well, I am able to look into his eyes without fear. Jimmy goes on playing with himself, proud to be page 16 caught with his hands down his pants. The boys in this class, this low stream class, are streetwise, trouble makers, loud. If the girls in the class act loud and are proud of their bodies, proud to be living in such fine bodies, the boys call them sluts (if they are pretty) or slags (if they are plain); if girls are shy or absorbed in one thing or another they are called cockteasers or snobs (if they are pretty) or just ignored if they are not. And we, the girls, pickup these terms, testing them carefully, like scraping a match gently against the flint. 'She's a slut,' we say, feeling the push of power behind those words. 'She's a slut,' we say more definitely, dismissively, with a toss of our heads.

The boys sit on the heaters under the coat hooks in the morning. I walk slowly into C Block, dreading them. My locker is on the top row, and when I put my bag into my locker, each movement taking hours, the bag jamming half way, or falling back out into my arms, the boys sit, looking and commenting. I walk away burning with shame, for my high locker, my short dress, my tied tongue. At the end of the day I rub the chalked obscene comments off the door of my locker with the sleeve of my cardigan.

'So the little mouse got herself a tail today?' Eddie smiles as he walks beside me. I don't mind this from him. His wide open smile and clever eyes allow that we are both strangers here, only he has the happy knack of breathing the air on offer without panic, with seeming unconcern. His words are carved out of rock and wood and sunshine. And the wisdom is there, like the grain of wood, beneath the bark The whole history beneath the skin—and in old age the wisdom creeps out in lines, in tiny loops and crevices, showing to the world what wisdom looks like. In old age, or in felling, when the grain faces the light too soon. On our science trip to the beach to study the rocky shore (what do they study in inland places?), Eddie drives up in his brother's car. He pulls up by our ragged group hunched against a chill wind on the grey beach. 'Hey, Miss Parker,' he calls out to our teacher through the open window, 'I live real close, so I thought I'd meet you here.' Miss Parker looks at him half in despair and half in amusement. 'Are you going to join us Eddie?' she asks, straightening the collar of her scholarly authority. 'Well, only if you're not going to join me Miss Parker,' he replies. 'Actually I've seen some interesting specimens of the rocky shore already, Miss, is it OK if I take them back to college with me?' While we hunch over mini oceans suspended in grey rock, touching the waving feelers of the anemones and trying to catch the limpets unawares, Eddie drives up and down, giving his mates a turn at driving. The teacher ignores him. His page 17 car is battered and old and noisy, and they rev it and rev it, startling the old people who live by the sea, who were just falling into sleep after eating their lunches.