Dexter didn‘t like to think of himself as vain, but there were definitely times when he wished 

there was someone on hand to take his photograph.

They  kissed  again,  and  he  wondered  vaguely  if  there  was  some  moral  or  ethical 

dimension to this situation. Of course the time to worry about the pros and cons of sleeping 

with a student would have been after the College party, while Tove was perching unsteadily 

on the edge of his bed and unzipping her knee-length boots. Even then, in the muddle of red 

wine  and  desire  he  had  found  himself  wondering  what  Emma  Morley  would  say.  Even  as 

Tove twirled her tongue in his ear, he had conducted his defence: she‘s nineteen, an adult, 

and  anyway  I‘m  not  a  real  teacher.  Besides,  Emma  was  a  long  way  away  at  this  moment, 

changing the world from a mini-bus on the ring road of a provincial town, and what was all 

this to do with Emma anyway? Tove‘s knee-length boots sagged in the corner of the room 

now, in the hostel where overnight visitors were strictly forbidden.

He shifted his body to a cooler patch of terracotta, peering out of the window to try to 

gauge the time from the small square of vivid blue sky. The rhythm of Tove‘s breathing was 

changing as she slipped into sleep, but he had an important appointment to keep. He dropped 

the last two inches of cigarette into a wine glass, and stretched for his wristwatch, which lay 

on an unread copy of Primo Levi‘s If This is a Man.