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“Guess what happened yesterday!” said Amy to Lily, as soon as their mums had said goodbye at the school gates. She grabbed her friend’s hand and towed her over to a bench in a quiet corner of the playground.

“What?” Lily’s eyes sparkled excitedly.

“The kitten came back again and I touched her! She came walking along our back fence when I was up in the tree house. She was really shy, but she sniffed my fingers, and sort of nudged me, you know how cats do?”

Lily nodded.“Stella does that, it’s really sweet. Oh, I’m so glad I’m coming to your house tonight, maybe I’ll see her too.”

“The thing is, I definitely think she’s got thinner since I last saw her.” Amy sighed. “I’m really worried about her.” She looked up at Lily. “Do you think I should feed her? I know she might belong to someone else, but I just don’t see how she can. She’s awfully thin.”

Lily was practically bouncing up and down on the bench.“You should! You have to! But what are you going to feed heron?”

Amy smiled.“When you come home with me tonight, do you think you could ask to stop at the pet shop so you can buy some cat treats for Stella? I’ve brought some of my birthday money.”

Lily nodded eagerly.“Of course. Stella really likes the salmon ones, we should get those.”

Amy laughed.“I’m not sure this kitten would care about the flavour as long as it’s food.”

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“I’ll tell your mum I need a couple of extra tins of cat food, too,” Lily added. “You can’t just feed her on the treats.”

“That would be brilliant,” Amy told her gratefully.

“I can’t wait to see her – can we go up in the tree house tonight and wait to see if she comes?”

Amy nodded.“I thought maybe if I put some food out, she might smell it.”

“Good idea. We definitely need to get the fishy flavours then, they stink! My mum won’t buy the tuna and prawn cat food, she says it makes her feel sick! A hungry kitten would smell it a mile off, I should think. Oh, Amy, this is so exciting.” Lily gave her a hug. “It’s almost like you’re going to have your own cat after all!”

“She might not come,” Amy said cautiously, but she hugged Lily back, unable to keep the smile off her face.

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“You definitely want this kind!” Lily took a foil pouch of cat snacks from the shelf. “They smell really strong. The kitten won’t be able to resist them.” She placed the cat treats in her basket. “I’ve just thought, you’ll have to give her a name. What are you going to call her?”

“I named her the first time I saw her,” Amy admitted. “She’s called Misty. Because I saw her coming towards me out of the mist, you see.” She picked up a different packet of cat treats and added them to Lily’s basket.

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“Let’s get these too – if this cat on the front was a kitten, it would look exactly like Misty.”

“Very, very cute,” Lily said.

“She is.” Amy nodded. “I really hope she comes back this afternoon so you can see her! Oh, look, Mum’s waving at us to hurry up.” Amy’s mum was waiting outside the pet shop for them.

“Goodness, you needed a lot of cat food!” she said to Lily, as the girls came out of the shop.

Lily giggled.“Stella is very greedy,” she said, winking at Amy, or trying to; she wasn’t very good at it, and had to screw up her face.

“Lily, are you all right?” Amy’s mum asked. “Is there something in your eye?”

Amy burst out laughing, and her mum shook her head.“You two – sometimes I think it’s a good thing I don’t know what you’re up to.”

Amy and Lily grinned at each other. Secrets were such fun– and this was definitely the best one they had ever had.

They sneaked the cat food out into the garden while Amy’s mum was preparing their tea.

“Wow!” Lily looked up at the tree house. “Your dad built that? He’s brilliant!”

“It’s cool, isn’t it?” Amy agreed.

Lily hauled herself up the ladder and gazed around the inside of the tree house, admiring the bookshelf and the big purple beanbag.

“Come on, let’s open these.” Amy tore at the foil packet of cat treats eagerly. “I thought we could spread them out along the branch that almost touches the fence. I’m pretty sure Misty could jump on to it.”

Amy carefully leaned out of the doorway to sprinkle some cat treats on to the wide branch below.“Now we need to wait,” she said, edging backwards. She emptied the rest of the packet in the doorway just in front of her, then sat hugging her knees and staring over the gardens, searching for a little black figure.

Amy and Lily had meant to be totally silent, so as not to scare away the kitten, but they couldn’t resist chatting. They were deep in a discussion of exactly why Luke Armstrong in Mrs Dale’s class was so mean, when Amy suddenly clutched Lily’s arm.

“Look!” she ordered, in a hissing whisper.

“Oh!” Lily gave a little squeak of excitement. “Is that her?”

“I think so.” Amy leaned out to look further along the fence, where a black shadow was clambering over the ivy branches. “Yes, it’s her! Oh, I hope she can smell the cat biscuits.”