I arrive at the island at the same time as the Canoe Club party, but it would be too dangerous to go back now because the tide’s on its way in. They’re piled into two Land Rovers, which take the recognized route across the estuary, coming ashore just before Middle Hilbre and following the track onto the main island, bouncing too fast over the rocks. They’re shouting and laughing as if they’re already drunk, although it’s not yet nine in the morning.

I’m reading The Great Gatsby for my exams and I take the book to the north of the island. Sometimes you find birdwatchers there, sitting in the wooden hide that’s built on stilts over the slipway, but they like stormy weather, north-westerly gales. Today it’s still and sunny, with the hint of a mist over the mainland. The tide slides in like oil. I can hear the noise from the Canoe Club, even from where I’m sitting, and I’m drawn to it, half-fascinated and half-disgusted. They’ve set up the gramophone and some of them are dancing an old-fashioned waltz on the grass. Again I’m trapped between two worlds, between the Long Island parties of Gatsby and this strange gathering on the Wirral. Then a group of men start talking about Margaret Thatcher and what a wonderful woman she is, and I come back to earth and hate them.

Peering over the wall, I catch the eye of a girl of about my age. She’s wearing white trousers that are tight around her bum and her legs and reach halfway between her knee and her ankle, and a red and white striped shirt. Not trendy, but she looks good. She walks through a gap in the wall to meet me.

‘Come in,’ she says. ‘We don’t bite.’ From the way she speaks those words I can tell that she goes to the girls’ equivalent of my school, or somewhere even posher. A classy accent and the confidence that comes with money and education.

I shake my head. The last thing I need is to be patronized by those tossers. She obviously understands what I’m thinking because she nods. ‘Just wait there.’

She goes into the wooden building and comes out with a nearly full bottle of wine and two glasses. The adults are all steaming by now and nobody challenges her. We find a sheltered hollow on the west side with a view across the estuary to Wales. It’s past high water, and Hilbre is a real island. Her name is Vicky Macfarlane and her dad is commodore of the West Kirby Sailing Club. She lives in a big house in Hoylake and she has a younger sister. When I reach out to touch her, her skin is warm. I expect her to push my hand away because that’s what usually happens with posh girls, but she doesn’t. We kiss and she tastes of white wine. There’s a smell of crushed grass and of salt, and we feel as if we have the whole place to ourselves.