Misspent Youth by Peter F. Hamilton

Author:Peter F. Hamilton
Language: eng
Format: epub, mobi
ISBN: 9780345495518
Publisher: Random House Publishing Group
Published: 2008-09-15T16:00:00+00:00

THE FINALS FOR PSE (progressive secondary education) courses had started. More than seventy-five percent of England’s eighteen-year-olds were currently fretting their way through them. You couldn’t fail if you got a low mark on the finals—that would be tremendously unfair after spending two years performing the course work—but the exam did make up twenty percent of the overall course mark, which decided a pupil’s grading and therefore which university they went to.

All told, Annabelle had eight exams to work her way through (Tim had fifteen). It meant she was going to have her PCglasses glued to her head for hours at a time during the two weeks of the finals, reviewing and running through previous exam questions. She didn’t plan on spending much time with her friends in that period; they were too likely to distract her (she hadn’t decided about Derek; admittedly it would be a good way of letting off steam). But she couldn’t study the whole time; there had to be periods when she could chill out. That wasn’t going to happen at home. Which made the manor just about perfect, and Tim was ever eager to make amends for the après-Jet Ski party.

The afternoon she went up there they splashed around in the swimming pool for half an hour before dragging a couple of sunloungers out onto the patio. It was a hot afternoon, with no clouds and no wind; the forecasters were predicting the high would last at least three weeks. Annabelle toweled herself off, then sprayed on factor forty sunblock. She was wearing her navy blue bikini, a copy from the one in Stephanie’s range. It was a shame because she would have preferred an all-over tan, but going topless in front of Tim right now would give him the wrong idea. As far as she was concerned he was still on probation.

So they lay side by side, with only a small table between the sunloungers. Tim lay with his head resting on the cushions so he could look at her the whole time. The talk was almost as relaxed as it had been a week ago. Tim was starting to accept his father going out with other girls, though Annabelle wrinkled her nose with distaste when she learned about him going out and crawling around the clubs each night. But it was nice to see Tim returning to some sort of equilibrium. She told him how devastated she’d been when her own mother left.

When it came to the finals, he was cool about them, which sparked not a little envy in her. He apologized, and said he understood about her wanting to get to university and away from her home. They daydreamed together about what it would be like if she went to Oxford or Cambridge with him. He still hadn’t decided which one he’d choose.

The radio they had on in the background, tuned to an eighties music station, began a news report about Rob Lacey’s campaign. He was in Spain, speaking at rallies there and trying to make alliances with regional politicians, eager for their endorsement.

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