Spending every summer with his grandmother in the south of England isn't Ryan's idea of a good time, and when he finds someone his own age to hang out with, he doesn't much care who that is. Alex might not say much, but company is company when there's nobody else to choose from, and Ryan will simply have to make do. It isn't, after all, like he really needs a friend. But Alex is more than just a kid with a thing for smashing up greenhouses, and Ryan finds himself dragged further and further into a dark, uncertain world of alcohol, bruises, a mother's madness, and a father's anger. Worst of all, Alex is dragging Ryan into a world of lust, attraction, and midnight kisses that Ryan is struggling to keep confined to southern summers. This thing with Alex can't go further than summer -- but Alex, and the shadows that surround him, are not so easily forgotten. Ryan can't forget Alex, but the longer he hangs on, the more he discovers ... not just about Alex, but about himself, his future, and the things that really matter. But eventually, summer must come to an end.

Our Last Summer

The online records give him very little, but when he digs around the family a little more, he can do the rest himself. She was actually nineteen years old, not in her twenties as the pictures in the house suggested, which put Alex at thirteen or fourteen years old. Which means he is Ryan’s age, and in his school year—if he still goes—and…


The records—and the basic maths—makes Ryan hesitate.


Lizzie’s death was recorded in March—and in March, fourteen years earlier, so was Alex’s birth, in Romford.


Of course, the records do not give him the exact dates, but still…


He sits back, and stares blindly at the screen.


Quite suddenly, he feels sorry for Alex. It is a strange thing to admit, but he has not felt that yet. Angry on his behalf at the beatings? Certainly. Confused by his mixed-up reactions to everything? Definitely. Concerned about him, when he speaks of storms or looked at that noose in the house in the fields? No denying it.


Chapter 17