Lucy is crouching beside her
Ribena-coloured beach hut,
scribbling something on to the concrete
with a piece of chalk.
Her dog bounds from the hut,
licks my knee.
Lucy stands.
The skin on her lips is dry;
a vertical crack on the bottom lip bleeds a little.
You’re back.
She points to the ground –
a scrawl of numbers and letters
under her feet.
It’s algebra. Also known as
complete and utter crap.
Got about four hundred
equations to get done.
You can’t hand that in.
She finds her phone and snaps some photos.
Actually, I believe in impermanence.
I’m well into philosophy.
Right.
I stare down at a miscalculated equation,
wondering whether to swipe the chalk, correct her.
I’m bullshitting.
I just like pissing off my maths teacher.
He’s a twat. And he’s shagging the deputy.
I scuff at her scrawl with the toe of my trainer.
Her dog sniffs my feet.
I’ve got a load of history to do too
but I’ll wait and write that up on my laptop
like a normal person.
She pauses.
Your face looks well sore.
I’m fine.
I paste my hair
across my cheek
to cover it.
Do you wanna go somewhere?
I clutch the coins in my pocket,
my last four quid.
If we can walk then yeah.
Cool. I know a great place for kissing.
I stare.
It’s a joke. Relax.
It’s a joke.