It was gloomy in the stall, with only a small window high up in the wall, and it smelled like damp and a mix of leather, grain, sweat and peppermints. I felt suddenly trapped, being in such a close, dark space, and I closed my eyes for a moment. I could still hear a rustling, snorting sound, and when I opened my eyes and peered around Freddie’s back I could make out a dark chestnut stallion picking restlessly at straw in a feeder. He was tall, with an extremely broad, glossy chest and a heart-shaped patch of white on one thigh. I knew horses were designed for speed and grace, but I found it hard to imagine as we stood in the stall – all I could see was the mountainous torso, the knobbly knees and delicate ankles, and I wondered how his legs didn’t snap underneath all that bulk.

Freddie moved forwards and patted Wiley Scot on his muscular neck and the horse threw his head back and began stamping his legs. My heart was hammering.

‘Be good now,’ Freddie said quietly. The horse breathed out loudly, then stopped stamping.

‘He’s a beauty,’ Freddie said. ‘Do you ride?’

‘No,’ I said.

‘Never?’ He looked back at me. ‘I wouldn’t have taken you for a city boy.’

‘I’m not.’

Freddie laughed. ‘You’re very mysterious.’

He turned to face the horse again. He looked so natural in these surroundings, but then he’d looked easy and confident wherever I’d come across him. I could picture him at school, mobs of admiring boys following him down the lane and laughing at his jokes. I felt a smile form on my face – I would never have got within five yards of him there, and here we were now, alone as friends.

‘Introduce yourself,’ Freddie said.

I went to stand next to him, and ran my hand along the horse’s flank. I could feel his muscles trembling under his coat, and smell something coming off him that was almost bitter, like the taste in the back of my throat when my mother was on the warpath. The phrase, ‘His blood is up’, was circling my brain – this must be what that means, I told myself, and realised I was trembling too.

I placed a finger on Wiley Scot’s nose, between his wet, dilated nostrils, and stroked downwards. He rolled his eyes until they were mostly white, then shook me off.

‘He’s nervy today,’ Freddie said. He pushed his hat back on his forehead, and I followed the bead of sweat that trickled down from his temple to his collarbone, until it disappeared beneath his shirt. I felt sweat start to form in sympathy on my upper lip, and brushed it away quickly with the back of my hand. ‘Let’s leave him to it.’