That night I lay awake in bed. Mr Smith hadn't been able to tell us much about the girl, though there were one or two intriguing things he found. One was a needle, one imbedded in her right was one of the ones hospitals use as drips. This could, he said, have been used to provide the girl with nutrients. It must have snapped off in her arm at some point and not have been removed. The skin had healed over it, making the only way to take it out cutting her arm open. We didn't think it could harm her, so we would leave it in there for the time being.

The important thing was that the wound she had sustained on her back was not life-threatening. It was certainly very blood and there was a mild infection running its course, but nothing that couldn't be healed. We had deemed it safe to carry her again and so had put her in the spare room. I had though to set up a small laboratory in that rrom in the near future, but it would most likely become the girl's room. It was the only other bedroom.

Sarah-Jane had redone her bandages so she wouldn't bleed through the old ones and onto the sheets, Rani had gone back to her house across the road and Sarah-Jane and I decided to go to bed. No good would come of waiting for her to wake up. It would be a long time, Mr Smith had said, before she would wake up. Maybe more than a day or two. Her body had to heal itself and could do it while it was up and about. It would be better if it healed while she was asleep.

I often find it hard to go to sleep. So many ideas and formulars race through my head at night and I can't go to sleep until I can find answers for them. Tonight it was so much harder because I had the added questions about the girl weighing me down- and of course they were the ones I couldn't answer.

Finally, I drifted to sleep and a dreamless night. (Of course I don't really ever dream).

I woke up to another rainy day. Unlike yesterday, it was more of a drizzle than a downpour, but somehow this made it even more dismal. The sky was a grey so boring I felt like yawning at it and so I dressed and went downstairs for breakfast. I always woke up early on Mondays, excited about another day of school. Rani and me would see Clyde and we could tell him about our discovery. He would be mad to have missed out on such a big thing, but he would get used to it.

Sarah-Jane slouched down the stairs a few minutes after I poured myself some cereal. She declared it too early to be up and smiling when I wished her good morning and slouched back upstairs again to have a shower. Grinning, I looked over my maths homework I'd done in two minutes the night before. I couldn't find any mistakes, so I put it in my schoolbag.

Rani came over to walk with school with me ten minutes later. I looked at my watch. We didn't leave for another twenty minutes.

"Hi!" she greeted me with. "How is she?" I didn't have to know who she was talking about to know who she meant. "You know, you never even told my who she is."

I could I have overlooked something like that? I had been to caught up in carrying her all over the house, I hadn't told Rani about the significance of those clothes. She must have known about the bellybutton though. I had shown her that in the past.

I explained as Rani as we walked up the stairs to the first storey. I stopped briefly in my room to show her the clothes I had hanging at the back of my wardrobe.

"They're exactly like hers!" she exclaimed, shocked. Then she looked sheepish. "Well... hers are a bit smaller.." she turned to grin at me as we carried on down the hallway. I poked my tongue out at her, (something I have never done before, but thought it looked fun. I was right- it was quite fun!)

When we reached the door and opened it, I half expected her to be up and about, sitting on the bed, walking about, but she was just lying there again, unmoving. From far away, she appeared to look the same as she had done yesterday, but as Rani and I edged closer, I saw a slight tinge of colour to her cheeks I hadn't noticed yesterday and her long, curling hair had a shine it that yesterday it had lacked. Rani had tied it up yesterday into a scruffy bun to get it out the way as we had carried her upstairs. Her soft, full lips had more colour in them and the lids of her eyes did not seem quite so dark. Rani and I watched her for a little bit in silence.

"I suppose she'll walk with us to school." Rani said. I nodded, though I hadn't thought about this. I could picture this girl in school with us. She looked to... fragile. Rani smiled. I think she liked the idea of having another girl in our little group as me and Clyde were both boys. Now she would have someone to talk about girly things too. Like how she fancies Clyde, I though. She was so obvious.

"What do you think she'll want to be called?" asked Rani. I hadn't thought about this either, thought it was obvious we couldn't keep on called her "The Girl" as we had been doing. I remembered my own naming session. I had wanted to be called Maria. I still didn't really get why I couldn't, though Sarah-Jane had tried to tell me about boy's names and girl's names. I don't really see the difference. The ones that really confuse me are the Alex's and Jo's which can be used for both genders. Why make up a rule if you're not going to stick to it? It's so lazy.

"I'm not sure." I answered Rani. We were joined by mum.

"I changed her bandages again this morning." she informed us. "Good thing too as they were sodden." she looked and sounded worried. "I think that the blood's clotting though." she added, sounding a little happier. I smiled at her in encouragement. She smiled tiredly back.

"Shouldn't you be off to school now?"she asked. "Don't worry, I'll look after her while you're gone. I don't think she's going anywhere at the moment." I nodded and we set off down the stairs again.