Can there be anything more appealing than the sultry intermingling of cheap perfume and piss – the heady scent that so encapsulates the very essence of femininity? I think not, and any thoughts I had of leaving St Claire’s disappeared in a masturbatory haze. Everyday I would arrive a few minutes before first break and slip into cubicle three - my cubicle, my brilliant, beautiful cubicle - and prepare myself for the talent to come. Who would it be? I never knew. And that was the point! It could have been a princess, a whore, or even Miss Stoople; all are the same when pissing! True equality at last for the sisterhood!

       However, it was not all about masturbation. Women gossip, none more so than when they accompany each other to the toilet, and it soon became evident I had access to the thoughts, fears and desires of practically every girl in school. Often it was difficult not to laugh as they bitched about their friends or described the various inadequacies of their partners, and once I almost choked as a first year described her conquest of the outwardly asexual Mr Singh. Of course I was a regular topic of conversation, and it seemed the nastier I was, the more adored I became. Women!

       Ah, I had such good times in that cubicle. I learnt more about human nature than a sociologist could in a thousand years of uninterrupted study, and it profoundly influenced the way I both viewed and interacted with people - all whilst wanking like a madman. It wasn’t very nice when someone went for a shit though.

“I need someone to talk to” she moaned, “There must be someone that can help me.”

       “Who exactly? Your father is a social worker and your mother is a community youth officer. They are the kind of people you would end up with – maybe worse. What you really need is pain. Pain will take away your worries. You’ve already admitted as much. Look, I’ve got something for you.” I went to the corner of the room and retrieved a selection of knives I had bought whilst she was being arrested. “This is your salvation Nicola. Through pain you will find the peace you crave.” I sat down next to her. “Hold out your arm.” She complied. “Are you ready?”

       “Yes.”

       I pierced the skin under her elbow with the tip of a seven-inch knife and sliced along the underside of her arm. Blood immediately began to drip from the wound and splatter on the floor.

       “It hurts” she gasped, “It feels hot and cold and wet and wonderful.”

       I held her arm up to my face and licked along the lazily graceful laceration.

       “What are you doing?” she whispered.

       My eyes searched for hers and locked them in an unexpectedly generous horizon. “Kissing you.”

       I drew her close and, for the first time in my tawdrily squalid existence, willingly surrendered my sense of self into a gloriously pure and uncorrupted moment. Our souls; so reticent, so thin, distended majestically to reticulate in each other’s eternally amaranthine grandeur, and as our lips connected I shuddered; an exhalation of unimagined, inconceivable, delirious release.

       Then I tasted her. Prawn cocktail flavour crisps and spunk. Kind of ruined the mood.