A Girl Called Shameless. Laura Steven

Which I totally get. But selfishly I’m still super excited to see him this morning.

      We haven’t even exchanged gifts yet. We set a ten-dollar limit on account of our severe brokeness, but I think I knocked it out of the park nonetheless.

      I mean, I think I did. No matter how well you think you’ve nailed someone’s gift, the moments before you actually hand it over are hardcore nerve-wracking. And you suddenly think, oh my God, I took it too far, they’re going to think I’m a crazy stalker, this is too much, it’s too thoughtful, please can a giant seagull just swoop overhead, nosedive onto my face, and carry me away in its beak. Or something.

      Since we don’t have first or second period together, we’ve arranged to meet by my locker for a smooch and a gift-giving ceremony. And I’m kind of . . . nervous? Well, it’s more like anticipation. Either way, the butterflies are real. Except butterflies makes it sound cute, whereas in reality it feels like my insides are being squashed through a colander and made into pasta sauce. Anyone for some fettucine al intestino?

      The hallways are even more hubbuby than normal, with tons of other reunions and gossip sessions taking place. I wave goodbye to Ajita, take a drink at the water fountain, rub a stubborn smear of dirt off my Doc Martens, and try to steady myself for seeing Carson again. Honestly, why am I so nervous? He’s my boyfriend. He’s into me. That won’t have changed in the last three weeks. Will it?

      Jeez. I was never this insecure pre-scandal.

      I’m rummaging around in my locker, looking for a peanut butter cup I know I left here before the holidays, when two arms snake round my waist from behind. “Hey, you.”

      And just like that the butterflies melt away, joining my intestines in pasta sauce heaven. [Another strange sentence. I’m not even sure context helps us here.]

      I twist round in his arms, and our faces end up startlingly close together. Not that I’m complaining. Because his face is my second favorite face. [Ajita would literally flay me alive if I in any way suggested hers did not occupy the number-one spot.]

      He kisses me softly on the lips, smiling as he does, so it’s really more of a bumping together of grinning mouths. A tooth clash, if you will. He smells of acrylic paint and fresh air, like he always does, and his head isn’t as freshly shaven as usual, so there’s a short layer of black fuzz everywhere. I’m very into it.

      “Hey,” I murmur in what I hope is a seductive voice, but in reality I probably just sound baked. “Long time no see.”

      “It’s been what, a decade?” he asks, and he’s grinning so wide, and it makes me really happy that the sight of my face and the sound of my weird stoner voice is enough to make him do that.

      “At least two, I’d say.” I take a deep breath and then add, “So I got you something!”

      Except he says the exact same thing at the exact same time, like they do in movies, and it’s all so cringeworthy but I just do. Not. Care. Because all those cheesy romance tropes I used to take the piss out of? Turns out they’re pretty great.

      “You first,” Carson says, ever the gentleman. [Or probably just because he wanted to receive his gift first, to judge whether or not the one he got me was better. I see your game, Carson Manning.]

      “Okay, hang on a sec.” I reluctantly wriggle free of his half-hug and rummage around in my locker. My hands hit pay dirt. “Found it!” Triumphantly I emerge with the rogue peanut butter cup I’d been hunting down before he arrived.

      He gasps extravagantly and claps his hands to his cheeks. “Your last peanut butter cup? I know you’re into me and all, man, but . . . you really like me that much?”

      I scoff. “Absolutely not.” I quickly unwrap the cup in under 0.2 seconds, seasoned professional that I am, and shove the entire thing in my mouth before he can protest.

      Then, mouth full of claggy peanut butter, I bring out the actual gift, and the butterflies return with a vengeance. The gift is wrapped in tinfoil, because a) do you even know how expensive wrapping paper is? and b) tinfoil saves you money on Sellotape, and c) your gift looks like a spaceship. So it’s a win all round.

      He snorts, actually snorts with laughter, and pulls his gift out of his backpack. And wouldn’t you know, it’s also wrapped in tinfoil. Romance, Gen Z style. We’re broke, woke, and unusually innovative when it comes to gift-wrapping solutions.

      Plus our presents are also almost exactly the same size and shape. Like. What.

      As he unravels the tinfoil on his present my chest pounds. It’s the moment of truth. Is he going to think I’m the ultimate weirdo? Or is he going to be charmed by my lunacy?

      The tinfoil drops to the floor, and he squints as he tries to read the handwritten Post-it note I’ve stuck on the front of his gift in explanation. To be fair, since I type basically everything, my handwriting is more akin to ancient hieroglyphics than the Latin alphabet, so it does take him some time to decipher.

      What I’ve attempted to write: “To share with Colbie and Cyra”.

      Colbie and Cyra are his youngest brother and sister – they’re five and three respectively.

      Carefully he peels the Post-it note off the cover of the handmade picture book I’ve made him, and the moment he reads the words on the front cover, he collapses into a fit of laughter.

       Where do you hide a poo in a zoo? by Izzy O’Neill and Carson Manning

      “Man, that’s hilarious,” he cackles, shaking his head in astonishment.

      I had the idea last time I visited Carson’s house before the holidays. Even though there are ten kids living there, and it must be crazy difficult to keep them all fed and watered and clothed, Carson’s mom Annaliese has curated the most awesome collection of kids’ books.

      Arranged by age group on the bookshelves in the living room, she’s picked up funny picture books for her youngest, magic realism and middle-grade fantasy for the primary-school kids, a ton of sci-fi for the older teens. She’s even got well-worn book box sets of both Lord of the Rings and Harry Potter.

      And honestly, it made me so emotional to see it. Because I never had that. Betty did an incredible job raising me, don’t get me wrong. I’ll never stop being grateful to her for all the sacrifices she made just to make sure I had a good life. But a mini library in my house? I can’t even imagine how cool that would have been.

      When I spoke to Annaliese about it, her face lit up. She told me about how a lot of the books were hers from when she was a kid – all the Enid Blyton originals, all the Roald Dahl classics, the full Chronicles of Narnia – and how, over the years, she’s always tried to pick up one book a month from a thrift store. No matter how broke she was, she could always find a quarter somewhere to bring home a new book, even if it meant she went without dinner that night.

      Isn’t that the most amazing thing you’ve ever heard in your life?

      So while I was agonizing over what I could possibly get Carson for under ten dollars [and also the fact that I didn’t even have ten dollars], I thought . . . why not write a kids’ book for him to share with his siblings?

      I bought a landscape A4 notebook with a hard cover and blank pages, did some word art on the cover – as best I could with my non-artistic abilities – and then wrote all the text throughout the notebook. Due to my abysmal handwriting, it took me days to write it all out in neat block capitals with a black sharpie, but, honestly, it looks pretty cool.

      Each page is told from the perspective of a different zoo animal who’s done a poo and wants to hide it inside their cage. So it’s kind of educational, because kids learn what every different zoo animal’s poo looks like [because this is the kind of important wisdom the education system neglects to impart], and also interactive, because the kid gets to help the animal find the best place to hide its poo according to its surroundings.

      [I know. My brain is weird.]