Free Summer's Edge by Noël Cades

least she has a reputation, your name’s just dirt everywhere."
    Things devolved into a vicious slanging match ending with Becky and one of Maddy’s friends having to physically pull the two of them apart.
    The Biology teacher arrived back and sent both of them off to Mrs Paddington with a note.
    Alice approached the Senior Mistress’s door with dread in the pit of her stomach. She envied Maddy the fact that the she didn’t even seem to care. She was just furious at Alice.
    "Look what you’ve got us into now."
    "You started it," Alice said. "You had no right slagging off Becky."
    "She’s just a stupid little slag."
    Alice ignored her this time - if only she had managed to do so the first time - and they went in together after knocking.
    "Why are you here, girls?" Mrs Paddington asked.
    Alice handed her the note.
    "Fighting? In the Upper Sixth, just weeks away from your exams? Surely one would hope for better behaviour than this. No, there’s no excuse Madeleine, I don’t care who started it or whether you’re stressed over exams or not. It’s unacceptable."
    Not for nothing was the Senior Mistress called the Padlock. She gave them both a detention for the following afternoon which was Friday. This was pretty bitter as everyone liked to leave as early as possible at the end of the week.
    "Better still you can report to Miss Symons for clean-up. Getting outdoors and some exercise will do both of you good."
    Alice thought this was far worse. Regular detention just meant sitting back in a classroom and revising. With exams nigh, no one would make them waste their time writing lines.
    Clean-up, which was a weekly sweep of the school grounds by those being disciplined for various offences, meant that everyone would see them. It was humiliating. Which was probably the point. At least Maddy, with more social prestige to lose, would hate it even more than Alice did.

    * * *

    Jules laughed her head off when she found out. "I’ll bring a camera, this must be the last chance I’ll get to photograph you in public disgrace. Pity it’s too late for the yearbook."
    "And the first actually, as it happens," Alice said. She had never been condemned to clean-up before. It was nearly always only juniors that got roped into it, making it all the more humiliating for them. Which was probably Mrs Paddington’s aim.
    Becky felt guilty and upset that Alice had ended up getting punished for her sake but Alice assured her it wasn’t her fault. "I went off at her, I didn’t need to."
    "I’m glad you did," Jules said. "I’ve been wanting to slap her for over a year."
    "How do you think she knew about Brett?" Becky asked. "I haven’t seen her out anywhere."
    "No idea. Maybe her sister saw us, she works in the Dog & Duck," Jules said.
    "She wasn’t there that night, I’m pretty sure I didn’t see her."
    "Maybe one of the other bar staff told her. If not that, then maybe someone saw us all at Selsley. I don’t know."
    Alice hoped it was the latter. If not, it meant Maddy might also have heard about her kissing Mr Walker. Maddy Pullen was absolutely the last person on earth she wanted to know about something like that.
    Maddy’s source would have to remain a mystery for now. Becky wasn’t doing anything wrong dating Brett, and she was known as a sweet girl generally, so Alice wasn’t too worried on her behalf. Getting involved with a staff member though was quite a different story.  
    It gave her more sympathy for Mr Walker’s reluctance, not that she planned to let it go. She liked him too much for that and she was pretty sure, after confronting him this week, that he felt the same attraction.
    "You seeing Leafy this weekend?" Becky asked Jules. Gloucestershire were playing away in Yorkshire so Becky wasn’t seeing Brett. Which worked out well as she and Alice planned to spend the weekend revising for their Biology exam next week.  
    "Probably."
    "What do you guys actually do? I mean is he always out of it?"
    "No." Jules sounded