She was wearing a white T-shirt, a blue pleated skirt and white sandals. Her hair was tied back so I could see her face properly. It’s a lovely face. Her skin is so clear and light. Unlike mine. Mine’s dark and oily and I’ve been getting horrible spots on my forehead recently. I can’t imagine Isobel ever having spots or tangled hair or anything like that.

Anyway, I’m talking round things again. It’s my nerves. I can hear Sarge banging about in the room next door. He’s hammering something into the wall. If I just keep scribbling and thinking about Isobel then maybe I can block it out.

I stayed standing by the window watching her for a few moments. Then she waved her hand at me like she was beckoning me to come outside. I was a bit embarrassed because I wasn’t dressed yet. I had a pair of Sarge’s old army fatigues on and a grubby T-shirt that hadn’t been washed for days. I didn’t want Isobel to see me like this but I didn’t want her to go away either. So I pulled my fingers through my hair and straightened my clothes as best I could then tiptoed past Sarge’s room – he’d been out in the woods all night so would be asleep for another few hours – and went out to see Isobel.

She smiled so brightly when she saw me. I’ve never had anyone smile at me like that. It warmed me right through, like the sun on my face when I stand at the top of Harrowby Crag. Then she hugged me and that felt really weird. Nice weird but weird all the same. She asked me if I’d had another period and at first I had no idea what she was on about but then she said, ‘You know, the bleeding.’ The truth was I’d forgotten all about it but then I remembered her saying it happens every month and I realized that it was almost that time again.

She asked if I’d been to the village to get supplies and I told her I hadn’t had a chance. That was true. Sarge has had me working hard in the house these last few weeks. She said that she thought that would be the case so she’d brought me some. Then she opened the bag she was holding and pulled out a blue box. ‘You can have these,’ she said. ‘I’ve got loads of them.’ She handed me the box and I read the word ‘tampons’ then ‘light to medium flow’.

I had no idea what that meant. As far as I’m concerned flow is something a river does. I didn’t show Isobel my confusion though. Instead I shook the box and held it to my ear. It sounded pretty hollow. Isobel looked at me funny when I did that so I stopped and tucked the box under my arm like it was the most normal thing in the world.

Then she asked me if I knew how to use them and I said I’d probably just do what I did with the newspaper and she said it wasn’t quite that simple. I asked her what she meant and she smiled. Then she pulled me close to her and whispered something in my ear. I couldn’t believe what she was telling me. I had to stick whatever it was in that box up my privates. I must have pulled a face then because she started to giggle and she looked so funny that I started giggling too and any worry I was feeling about the bleeding or Sarge’s moods or whatever just disappeared into the air.