By the end of the month, both Miles and I have learnt to relax at Hannah's Pantry. Unlike I expected, the amount of antagonising I receive hasn't increased since we started frequenting it, even if Lysander, and therefore the whole year, thinks that I'm the one being tutored, nor does Miles report any threats to his position in the hierarchy. I guess everybody's too absorbed in revision to have time to care much about anybody else's business.

Sonia never had any issues to start off with but on Monday she did state that she's glad we're "not on edge all the time anymore since it leaves more time for actual tutoring". Another remark she made entirely out of the blue and moved on from, wholly oblivious to the embarrassment it drenched us in, like beer cans discarded from boats by millionaires who never once look back to see them tarnish the ocean view.

Nonetheless, as most things she says, it's true, because it is much easier to focus on the task at hand when it's not necessary to blaze through stifling tension first. Tutoring turns out more enjoyable than I'd expected.

On several occasions, like during Zuhr today, I've even found myself looking forward to it.

'What you keep gettin wrong is you're not realisin it's two separate functions.' I underline each within the trigonometric integral. 'You have to do the chain rule and then the product rule within that. The issue is that you're not identifyin all the separate parts of the composite function accurately.'

I glance at Miles for signs of understanding, only to find him dewy-eyed. He leans against his hand, elbow perched on the desk, and stares at me without noticing that I stop talking and frown.

He's not even listening. Daydreaming about football, no doubt.

'Oi, hello.'

When I snap my fingers in front of his face, he jerks upright and nearly knocks over his coffee. Once his mug is stable, he attempts to look at me, fails, and glances around the other tables instead.

I fling my pencil onto the notepad. 'You know, I've got my own exams to study for. I'm not gonna spend time tryna teach you if you ain't even listenin.'

Miles grips the back of his neck and forces eye contact, though he interrupts it with rapid blinks. 'I am— I am listening... Sorry. I'm just reet rubbish at this.'

'I've got places to be, crimes to commit.'

Sonia snaps her head up. 'What?'

My hand rises to the knot of braids gathered at the top of my head as if to check the scrunchie hasn't torn without my notice. 'That was a joke.'

'Oh...' She scratches the eczema scars on her forearm before her wrist starts to flick repetitively. 'I can never tell when you're joking. It makes me feel like an idiot.'

'Sorry.' My voice remains heightened when I turn to Miles and repeat myself, putting in immense effort to stop a sigh from weaving into my voice. 'You're not identifyin all the functions within the first.'

I explain the chain and product rules to him again and when he nods, I push the notepad back to him.

I watch him solve them again with a gentle knit in his brow. Miles has an odd habit of running his tongue along his upper canines when he concentrates. His hair has grown past its awkward phase and now falls into his eyes. He pushes it back at each hitch in his calculation which makes his hair perennially messy.

From all this time together, I've learnt one thing about Miles for certain: he's really not good at maths.

'Um... Have you already picked your unis then?' Hopefully, my voice is only nonchalantly curious and doesn't give away my desperation for someone else to be as clueless as I am.

'I'm going to Bath. I've told you that.' Rather than statement-like, Sonia's voice is dazed, because she has told me and such basic information can be expected to be remembered.

A selfish part of me hoped she'd changed her mind, or at least be a little less certain.

Nodding, I mumble an apology, and turn to Miles.

'Leeds is my first choice. Bradford's my insurance.'

A pang in my chest reverberates against the inside of my ribcage as if it's entirely hollow. 'Back north, then?'

Did I expect him to stay here? He must despise our antics as much as I hate his northerisms.

Miles spins the frayed friendship bracelet around his wrist. 'Leeds is where my dad went so...'

'Your dad went to uni here?'

'Aye. My mum too.' Glancing down, he adjusts his notepad and coursebooks so they're all parallel to the edge of the table. 'Is that... bad?'

'No! Sorry. No. I didn't mean... Sorry. I always assumed your parents moved here for work.'

'No, my parents were born here.'

The only response I manage is a feeble and pathetic "oh" before I slump into my chair. I shouldn't care about this. I don't care.

But somehow this reveal has torn the single string I'd managed to tie us together with. When did I sew it? It must've been in my sleep because the first time I'm consciously aware of it is now that it's cut like the ribbon to the opening ceremony of my own gullible sabotage.

If he's not a second-generation immigrant like I am, we have nothing in common, and if we have nothing in common, I have no sensible excuse to desire his presence.

He's known this all along. Has he been laughing at me, laughing as he watched me sew a connection, too preoccupied with not knotting the string that I didn't notice it's my skin alone the needle ever pierced?

There's never been anything between us. We've never had anything in common. I shouldn't want us to. I don't.

He doesn't want us to. He certainly wouldn't if he knew.

If he knew...

The hollowness in my chest expands. My lungs disappear to lend space to it. I'm not breathing. My hand shivers as I reach the top of my head to check my hair is still there and I haven't hallucinated it this whole time.

Dr Colas's voice manages through the fog. "Violet".

Violet: the covers of our maths books, the flowers on Sonia's tea mug, my tie, the braids which fall in front of each of my ears, the veins faintly visible on the inside of his wrist as he massages his neck.

My lungs return. I exhale only half of the smog locked into them so Miles nor Sonia notice the malfunction in my breathing abilities.

'I was only askin cause I've still not accepted any, and the deadline's comin up.' To ensure they don't think this is a serious conversation, I pick up my pencil and toy with it as if my own speech is as boring as Richards's lessons. 'Kinda hoped I'd only get into one so I wouldn't have to choose, but I got offers from everythin I applied to.' What a ridiculous thing to complain about: the curse of too much choice.

Sonia adjusts her octagonal glasses to stare at me better. 'You're going to Oxford, aren't you? I heard you got into Oxford.'

'Why does everyone know everythin about my life?'

What if somebody knows everything? I tighten every muscle in my abdomen to grip my lungs before they can flake on me again.

Palms clammy, I swab them on my trousers. 'I have an offer. I'm not gonna accept it.'

Miles laughs. A full, unrestrained laugh that makes his head fall forward. 'You're joking.' That's a statement: I'm joking. 'It's the best school in the country.'

I shrug, a painfully fake gesture of nonchalance. 'It's too far. I can't commute that every day but I'm not allowed to move out till I'm twenty cause of juvie. Also, my parents are African so I probably won't be moving out till I'm forty-eight.

'Can't afford it neither. And I know scholarships exist, but it's not just the tuition. It's the rent and the travellin and the clothes and the food and the laptop and everythin else, innit. And I don't want to go there cause I'll never feel comfortable.'

Though Miles has stopped laughing, humour lingers on his features. Sonia is looking at me like an arithmetic puzzle, trying to figure out if this is a joke.

'I'm perfectly happy with Sussex. The courses I've got are media and journalism, international relations and anthropology, ecology and conservation, and fashion communication and business marketing which is at Brighton.'

I don't tell them that I want to move to Brighton because it's the "gay capital" of the UK and I've always wanted to live there. Dal took me to the Pride parade the summer before I tried to clean my insides with bleach and even at the age of fifteen, I felt welcome in a way I never have anywhere else. Maybe it'll be easier there for me. To make friends and to exist.

It's Miles's turn to be confused. 'Those are all... completely different. Just pick the one you're most interested in.'

Oh, thanks, I'd not thought of that.

'I don't have one. They're all fine.'

Sonia turns back to her maths equation with the kind of grimace that says if she's going to be confused, she might as well be confused by the task at hand. 'You should make a pros and cons list.'

'They've all got the same pros: interesting. And the same cons: I've got no clue what career I'll have after.'

A grin regrows on his lips and Miles shakes his head. 'Grand. Go to Oxford. Why would you go to such shit unis when you could go to Oxford?'

I sink further. 'I don't want to go to Oxford.'

Notes

Zuhr: Noon prayer 

Reet: Very, really