Sorry my first email arrived out of the blue. You must have had a shock! Thanks for taking the time to reply. No, it doesn’t seem like five minutes since we were at St Peter’s, never mind five years! I wasn’t really in that ‘cool’ group at school for long—they ditched me as soon as they found out I bought my uniform from the second-hand shop. But you weren’t to know any of that. You seemed to stay out of our way a lot. I guess we didn’t have much in common back then, and that group really was a collection of little bitches. But yeah, your mum said you’d signed up for the army graduate officer scheme and been gone two years already! As I said in my last email, I knew you were into war gaming, but I couldn’t believe you’d actually joined the army. Hero! Shame we lost touch when we left school. I remember how you and I used to have a laugh in concert band back in Year Seven. I have to be honest, though, I haven’t touched the clarinet since!
