But he wasn’t. School was the last thing on his adolescent hormone-filled mind. He was walking along the beach at Sheringham, heading towards the Runtons with a girl from his school who was in the year below him. He was a tall gangly youth with dark hair and a goth style about him that made him think that he looked like a hero out of a Twilight film. It didn’t. Emma Brundle beside him, had curly red hair and was wearing more make-up than was recommended in the guidelines from Brussels. She was wearing a shirt that was too small for her but she thought it would make her look like a member of her favourite girl band. It didn’t. And the fact that she kept her coat open to show the effect was probably not the wisest thing to be doing, given the weather conditions. But Ashleigh Ryan certainly wasn’t objecting. He was sixteen, she was fifteen – and young Ashleigh had decided he didn’t want to wait any longer. There were plenty of nooks and crannies on this stretch of the coast and Ashleigh, with a gesture towards the romantic, had brought along a couple of bottles of strong cider, a pack of fags that he had nicked off his older brother, and a blanket in a basket that his mum used for storing logs in the lounge by their wood-burning stove.
