Even now the thought of Isobel laughing is helping me block him out. He’s still hammering. What the hell can he be doing in there? I can’t let myself think about it. I’ll think about Isobel instead.

Well, after a minute or so she stopped laughing and she put her head to the side and looked out on to the lake. ‘Do you ever go swimming in there?’ she asked. The truth was I hadn’t been able to bring myself to even look at the water after what Sarge did to me that day with the boat. I’ve been having nightmares, horrible vivid ones where I’m being held under the water and it’s all black and I wake up gasping for breath. But I didn’t tell Isobel this because she’d think I was a weirdo so I just said that I wasn’t a very good swimmer. She smiled then and said that it was such a shame to have a beautiful lake right on the doorstep and not be able to use it, so how about we just have a little bathe. My heart sank when she said this because the last thing I wanted to do was get into that water, but she looked so happy and she’d been so kind bringing me the thingamabobs that I didn’t want to let her down so I said, yes, I’d love to.

Isobel clapped her hands then and made a little whooping noise which I think meant that she was pleased. Then she started undressing. I stood there like a spare part trying not to look but I couldn’t help noticing that she was wearing matching underwear: a pretty white lace bra and pants. And she had round breasts that filled her bra, not like mine that just sat there on my chest doing nothing. When she was ready she stood with her hands on her hips and told me to come on. What she meant was ‘take your clothes off too’ but I was mortified. My manky T-shirt and Sarge’s old combats were bad enough but my underwear – if you can even call it that – was even worse. I tried not to catch Isobel’s eye as I slowly pulled down my combats and yanked off my T-shirt to reveal a pair of baggy shorts and a vest.

I expected her to say something, ask me why, at my age, I wasn’t wearing a bra, but she just smiled again, held out her hand and led me down to the lake.

When we got to the edge Isobel bounded straight in. She reminded me of the golden Labrador that got loose from its lead a few years back and jumped into the water. I remember Sarge and I looked out and saw a pair of red-socked ramblers running past our window, calling for the dog to stop. I’d run out too to see if I could help but when I saw the dog I stopped because it just looked like it was having fun. It didn’t want to be on a lead following the usual path, it wanted to be free. That’s what Isobel wanted too by the looks of her. I watched as she lay on her back with her eyes closed and let the water lap at her face. It was all so peaceful and so different to what had happened to me last time I went in that lake.