The Secret Place

Chapter 19

We went to the bedroom door, watched Selena down the corridor and safe to where she was supposed to be. The sing-song was over; when Selena swung the common-room door open, the silence surged out at us, tight and brittle, thrumming.

Conway watched the door click shut. ‘So,’ she said. ‘You think Chris raped her?’

‘Not sure. Gun to my head, I’d say no.’

‘Same. But there was more to the breakup than she’s saying. Who dumps a guy because they kissed? What kind of reason is that?’

‘Once we get those texts, they might give us something.’

‘If Sophie’s guy’s gone home for his dinner, I swear I’m gonna get his address and track the little bollix down.’ A couple of hours earlier, it would’ve come out like she meant it. Now it was auto-pitbull, too tired to clamp down. She checked her watch: quarter to seven. ‘Fuck’s sake. Come on.’

I said, ‘Even if Chris didn’t rape Selena, someone could’ve thought he had.’

‘Yeah. They break up, she’s all upset, crying into her unicorns. One of her mates knows she was seeing Chris, figures he did something to her…’

I said, ‘She thinks one of her mates killed him.’

‘Yeah. She’s not sure, but she thinks so, yeah.’ This time Conway wasn’t pacing: slumped against the corridor wall instead, head back, trying to rub the day out of her neck. ‘Which means she’s out. Not officially, but out.’

I said, ‘She’s not outside, but. She’s…’ That vortex pull of Selena, things spinning round her axis, I didn’t know how to say that. ‘When we get the story, she’ll be in it.’

Talking like an eejit, and in front of one of the Murder squad, but Conway wasn’t sneering. Nodding. ‘If she’s right and one of her mates did the job, it was because of Chris and Selena. One way or another.’

‘That’s what she thinks, too. At least one of the mates knew all about her and Chris, and didn’t like it. And Selena knew they wouldn’t; that’s why she didn’t tell them to start with.’ I leaned on the wall beside Conway. Fatigue kicking in, me too, the wall felt like it was swaying. ‘Maybe they knew he was a player, thought he’d end up hurting Selena. Maybe he’d done something shite on one of them – just casually, like what Holly told us about – and he was the enemy. Maybe one of them was into him. Maybe one of them had already been with him, earlier in the year.’

‘OK,’ Conway said. Rolled her neck, winced. ‘Say we pull them back in, one by one. Tell them we think Selena did it, we’re getting ready to arrest her. That should shake them loose.’

‘You think if one of them’s our girl, she’ll come clean to get Selena off the hook?’

‘She might. That age, self-preservation isn’t high on their list. Like we were saying before: nothing matters as much as your friends. Not even your life. You’re practically looking for a good reason to sacrifice it.’

Beat of pain at the base of my throat and in the crooks of my elbows, places where veins run near the surface. I said, ‘That cuts two ways. If one of them confesses, doesn’t mean she did it.’

‘If they all go bloody Spartacus, I swear I’ll take them up on it. Arrest the fucking lot, let the prosecutors sort it out.’ Conway pressed the heels of her hands into her eye sockets, like she didn’t want to see the corridor any more. We’d been there long enough that the place was starting to look familiar, in a glitchy way, something you saw in a stuttering DVD or when you were too hammered to see straight. She said, ‘We’ll go at the three of them as soon as we get those full texts. I want some clue what went down between Chris and Selena – the breakup, and after. See her face, when she looked at those records? The ones for just before the murder?’

I said, ‘Startled. Looked like the real thing to me.’

‘You think everything’s the real thing. How you got this far…’ She didn’t have the energy. ‘It did, but. She didn’t expect to see all those texts. She might’ve just flaked out and forgotten them; she’s spacy enough to start with, and she says herself she’s not too clear on those couple of weeks. Or else…’

‘Or else someone else knew about her phone. Used it to send some of those texts.’

Conway said, ‘Yeah. Joanne must’ve figured that Selena had a special Chris phone, same as she did. Julia must’ve, too, since she knew about Joanne’s. And did you see Selena clam up when I asked about finding the phone in the wrong position? Someone was at it, all right.’

I said, ‘We need those texts. Even if they’re not signed–’

‘They won’t be.’

‘Yeah, probably not. But there might be something that gives us a hint who wrote them.’

‘Yeah. And I want to ID the other girls Chris was texting, before he hooked up with Selena. If another one of our eight was in there, things are gonna get interesting – specially if she’s the one he was juggling with Joanne. Bet you anything the special phones were never registered, but we could get lucky, find a name somewhere in the texts – or there could be something in the photos they sent, if we can get them. Any girl with the brains of pet food would’ve cropped out her face, but I’m gonna bet on at least one idiot. And someone might have a mole on her tit, a scar, something identifiable.’

I said, ‘OK if I leave that part to you?’

Conway still had her hands on her eyes, but I saw the twitch of her mouth, what might have been a grin if she’d been less wrecked. ‘I’ll look at the girls’ pics, you look at Chris’s. No one needs brain bleach.’

‘We hope.’

‘Yeah.’ The grin was gone. ‘OK: I’ll go ask McKenna to let that lot outside for a while. Seeing as I promised Selena.’ I’d forgotten. ‘Then we’ll head down to the canteen, see if we can find something to eat while we wait for Sophie’s guy to pull his finger out. I could murder a dirty great burger.’

‘Two.’

‘Two. And chips.’

We were straightening up, smoothing down, when it came: buzz from Conway’s pocket.

She grabbed for the phone. ‘The texts.’ She was straight-backed and alert as morning, fatigue tossed away like a wet jacket. ‘Ah, yeah. Here we go. Swear to God, I’d marry Sophie.’

This attachment was even longer than the last one. ‘Sit down for this,’ Conway said. ‘Over there,’ and jerked her chin towards the window alcove at the far end of the corridor, between the two common rooms. The window had gone a clear lit purple, dusk that looked like thunder. Fine clouds shifted, restless.

We pulled ourselves onto the sill and sat shoulder to shoulder. Started at the beginning of the attachment and skimmed fast, trying to pay attention to the early stuff. Kids on Christmas morning, able to think about nothing but the big shiny package we were saving for last. Silence drumming at us, from the doors on both sides.

Lots of flirting. Chris flattering, Saw u down at d court 2day, u were looking gorgeous;the girl coming back coy, OMG cant beleive u saw me looking sooo crap my hair was a total mess lol. Chris straight in there, Wasn’t looking at ur hair, not with the way ur tits looked in that top:-D. You could practically hear the girl squealing. U r so dirty!

Bits of drama: some girl on a high-strung high horse, Don’t listen 2 what ppl r saying abt Fri evening they weren’t there! Ne1 can make up whatever shit they want but there was only the 4 of us there so if u want to know the truth then just ASK ME!!! Lots of making appointments, but all of them were legit, mostly after school at the shopping centre or in the park; no one had been sneaking out at night, not back then. One chain text: If you love your mother then text this to 20 people. A girl ignored this and 30 days later her mam died. Sorry I can’t ignore this because I love my mother!

You forget what it was like. You’d swear on your life you never will, but year by year it falls away. How your temperature ran off the mercury, your heart galloped flat out and never needed to rest, everything was pitched on the edge of shattering glass. How wanting something was like dying of thirst. How your skin was too fine to keep out any of the million things flooding by; every colour boiled bright enough to scald you, any second of any day could send you soaring or rip you to bloody shreds.

That was when I really believed it, not as a detective’s solid theory but right in my gut: a teenage girl could have killed Chris Harper. Had killed him.

Conway had caught it, too. ‘Bloody hell. The energy.’

I said, before I felt it coming out, ‘Do you ever miss that?’

‘Being a teenager?’ She glanced over at me, eyebrows pulling together. ‘Fuck no. All that drama, wrecking your own head over something you won’t even remember in a month? What a waste.’

I said, ‘It’s got something, but. There’s something beautiful there.’

Conway was still watching me. That morning’s tight hairdo was wearing out, glossy bits coming out of the bun to fall in front of her ear, and the sharp suit had wrinkles. Should’ve made her look softer, girlier, but it didn’t. Made her look like a hunter and a fighter, ragged from a bare-knuckle round. She said, ‘You like things to be beautiful.’

‘I do, yeah.’ When she waited: ‘So?’

‘So nothing. Good luck with that.’ She went back to the phone.

Bits of low-level smoochy talk, back and forth: Cant wait 2 c u again. Had THE BEST TIME with u yesterday. U r something special u no that?

‘Gag,’ said Conway. ‘God rest, and all that shite, but what a sleaze he was.’

I said, ‘Or he wanted to believe it. Wanted to find someone he felt that way about.’

Conway snorted. ‘Right. Sensitive soul, our Chris. See these?’

One girl, back in October, had been scraped raw when Chris dumped her. The other one got the message quick enough, sent Chris a fast Fuck you and moved on, but this one: avalanche of texts, begging for answers. Is it bcos of that time in the park???… Is it bcos your friends don’t like me?… Was someone spreading rumours abt me?… Please please please I’ll leave you alone I just need to know…

Chris never got back to her. ‘Yeah,’ Conway said. ‘Just a poor lonely heart looking for love.’

No name, but the girl would need ID’ing. No names anywhere. OMG did you see Amy fall of the skateboard right on her ass thought I was going to get sick lauhging so hard! That was it.

Conway had been right about the photos: not fluffy kitties.

Chris: Send me a pic:-D

Another girl we needed to find: U already no what I look like lol

Chris: U no what I mean:-D So I have sthing nice to tink about til i see u again

No way!!! + have it go round the whole of Colms?? Hello don’t tink so???

Chris: Hey I would NEVER do that. Thought you knew me better than that. If you think I’m such an arsehole then maybe we should call it quits

OMG I was just messing! So soooo sorry, didn’t mean that at all, I know ur not an arsehole:-(

Chris: OK just thought you of all people would know I’m not like that. Thought you trusted me.

I totally do!! [attachment:.jpg file]

‘Go Chris,’ Conway said. Wry, but the undercurrent made me look up. ‘He doesn’t just get his tit pics; he gets an apology out of her for not sending them faster.’

‘He was good, all right.’

‘Always got what he wanted, Julia said.’

I said, ‘He could’ve been telling this girl the truth, though. At least about keeping the pics to himself. Any of his mates mention them, last year?’

‘Nah. Like they would’ve? In front of Father Whoever? “Yeah, Chris was passing around underage tit shots, now please expel me and arrest me for kiddie porn thank you very much-”’

‘They might’ve done, if they copped that one of the girls could’ve killed him over it. Chris was their mate. Maybe they wouldn’t say it in front of Father Whoever, but all it would’ve taken was an anonymous text to you, an e-mail, whatever. And you said Finn Carroll was no thicko.’

‘He’s not.’ Conway sucked her front teeth. ‘And him and Chris were close enough that if Chris had been sharing the pics, Finn would’ve seen them. Why would Chris keep them to himself?’

I said, ‘Selena said he was complicated.’

‘Yeah, girls always think arseholes are sooo complicated. Surprise, kids: they’re just arseholes.’ Conway was flicking at her screen again. ‘If he didn’t pass the pics around, it wasn’t because deep down he was actually a knight in shining armour. It was because he figured the girls might find out, and his supply of wank material would dry up.’ She held the phone between us. ‘Here we go. Joanne.’

Joanne started the same way as all the others. Chris playing cheeky, seeing how far he could go, Joanne slapping him down and loving it. Lots of meetings. He got pics off her, but she made him work hard for them: Say please. Now say pretty please. Good boy lol now send me a pic of something nice youd like to buy me. Now send me a pic of where youd like to take me on holiday… You could see her huddled snickering with her mates, working out the next demand.

‘Fuck’s sake,’ Conway said, lip curling. ‘High-maintenance little bint. Why didn’t he give her the heave-ho right there? Plenty more tits in the sea.’

‘Maybe he liked a challenge,’ I said. ‘Or maybe Joanne was right, and he was genuinely into her.’

‘Right. Chris being sooo complex again. He wasn’t all that into her. Look.’

Pics, more flirting, more meetings, smoochy talk getting smoochier. Then Joanne started hinting hard about going public – Cant wait 4 the xmas dance!! We can ask the DJ to play our song… I dont even care if Sister Cornelius throws us off the dance floor lol ‹3 ‹3 ‹3 – and Chris was gone.

Joanne: Hey where were you this eve? We were suposd to meet!

Joanne again: Did u get my text?

Hello?? Chris whats going on??

Just 2 let you know I had something special planned for this wkend… If your curious text me quick;-)

If someone said something to you then ask urself WHY… Plenty of ppl are mad jel of me… didnt think you were stupid enuf to fall for it

Excuse me I dont let guys treat me like this… Im not some stupid slut you can treat how ever you want… If you dont answer by 9.00 then we are OVER!!

Do you want me to tell everyone your gay?? I’ll do it

Surprise I was about to dump your arse anyway. You cant kiss for sh1t… and I dont do it w guys who have tiny dxxxs!!! You make me want to puke I hope you get aids from some slapper

Chris if you dont answer this + apologise to me YOU WILL BE SORRY. I hope your reading carefully because this was a big BIG mistake… I dont care how long it takes YOU WILL BE SORRY.

OK you asked for it. Bye.

‘Now there’s a beauty of a hissy-fit,’ Conway said.

Joanne again. Motive, opportunity and now mindset.

I said, ‘This was five months before Chris got killed. You think she’d hold a grudge that long?’

‘“I don’t care how long it takes…”’ Conway shrugged. ‘Maybe not. Maybe. You heard her: still stings now, and it’s been a year and a half.’

I still didn’t see Joanne in a midnight grove with a hoe in her hand. By the look on her face, neither did Conway. I said, ‘Any chance she got someone else to do the job for her?’

Conway shook her head, regretfully. ‘I was thinking the same thing. Great minds. I doubt it, but. It’d have to be one of her girls – if she’d shagged a guy into doing it, he’d never have managed to keep his gob shut this long – and who? Alison would’ve fucked it up, so would Orla, and even if somehow they managed to get the job done and not get caught the next day, they would’ve let it slip by now. Gemma could’ve got it done and kept her mouth shut, but Gemma’s got plenty of cop-on and a healthy sense of self-preservation on her. She wouldn’t do it to start with.’

I said, ‘One of Holly’s lot might.’

Conway’s eyebrows shot up. ‘Blackmail.’

‘Yeah. Joanne had that video. She could’ve got Selena expelled – probably the other three, too.’

‘Not without dropping herself in the shite as well.’

‘Sure she could. Put the video on a memory stick, post it to McKenna. Or upload it to YouTube some weekend, e-mail the school the link. McKenna might guess who made the video, but she couldn’t prove it.’

Conway was nodding, thinking fast. ‘OK. So Joanne gets the video, takes it to… who? Not Selena. Joanne’s got more sense than to give a job like that to a spacer like her.’

I said, ‘And Selena wouldn’t’ve done it anyway. She was mad about Chris; she would’ve been grand with getting expelled for his sake.’

‘Right. Romeo and Juliet, middle-class version.’ Conway was concentrating too hard to get her snide on properly. ‘If I was Joanne, I wouldn’t go for Rebecca, either.’

‘Nah. Too unpredictable; she looks all meek, but I’d say she’d be more likely to lose the head and tell Joanne to fuck herself than to take orders off her. And Joanne’s good at gauging people, or she wouldn’t be the boss bitch. Not Rebecca.’

Silence, while the rest hung waiting in the air. Conway said, when someone had to, ‘Joanne said she had a chat with Julia, told her to make Selena back off. Maybe that’s not all she told her to do.’

Julia. The eyes of her, watchful. The way she’d jumped to protect Selena. The slam of stillness when she’d seen that postcard.

Conway said, ‘Julia knew about Joanne’s secret phone. I can’t see any reason why Joanne would let her in on that. Except to show her what to look for.’

The silence came back bigger and stronger. Said it for us: neither of us wanted it to be her.

I said, ‘Julia’s got better sense. Getting expelled isn’t the end of the world.’

‘Wasn’t where we came from, maybe. It is for most of this lot. You should’ve seen the faces on the Colm’s guys when they heard Finn Carroll was out. They looked like he was gone gone, like they’d never see him again; they were practically as upset about him as they were about Chris. You know what they think? Schools like this are the whole civilised world. Outside, it’s wilderness. Teenage mutant skanger smackheads selling your kidneys on the black market.’

I could see it. Didn’t say it to Conway, but I could see so clearly. Thrown out of here would feel like thrown over a wall into blackened rubble and air made of grime. Everything gone; everything golden and lit, everything silken, everything carved in delicate curlicues to welcome your fingertips, everything made to chime in sweet spacious harmonies: gone, and a flaming sword to bar your way back forever.

Conway leaning back against the wall and watching me at a slant, through those streaks of warrior hair. One dark eye, hooded.

I said, ‘Let’s see the rest.’

The texts between Chris and Selena started on the 25th of February, and they were different. No flirting, no sexy talk, no wheedling for pics; none of that feel, speed and fever.

Hi

Hi

That was it, their first conversation. Just feeling the other one there.

Over the next couple of days they started telling each other stories. Chris’s class had made some gadget that beeped at random intervals, stuck it under a desk and watched their Irish teacher lose his mind. Selena’s class had been messing with Houlihan’s head by inching their desks forward, too gradually to spot, till she was practically pinned against the blackboard. Small stories, to make each other laugh.

Then – carefully, step by step, like they had all the time in the world – they moved into personal stuff.

Chris: OK so this wknd I get home n my sister’s cut her hair in one of those emo fringes. What do I do??

Selena: Depends, does it look good?

Chris: Actually not bad… or wouldn’t be bad if she’d got it done at the hairdresser instead of doing it herself with nail scisors:-0

Selena: LOL! Then take her to the hairdresser + get it done right!

Chris: I might actually do it:-D

Late-night texts, typoed, hurrying in the jacks or texting blind under covers. Chris’s sister loved her pro haircut. He and his friends got locked at someone’s brother’s party, shouted insults at some girl on their way home, Chris felt guilty about it in the morning (Sooo complex, Conway’s eye-roll said, such a sensitive soul). Selena wished her dad and her mum would talk when one of them dropped her off at the other’s place; Chris wished his parents would stop talking, because they always ended up yelling. They were getting close.

Feeling their way closer. Chris: Nothing intelligent to say, was just thinking about you

Selena: That’s mental, I was just going to text you to say I was thinking about you

Chris: In fairness I think about you alot so not that crazy of a concidence

Selena: Don’t be like that

Chris: I know sorry. I actully mean it. It just comes out sounding fake

Selena: Then don’t say anything. You know you don’t have to say stuff to me right?

Chris: Yeah. Just I don’t want you thinking this doesn’t matter to me

Selena: I won’t. I promise

Nothing like Chris’s flirtations, overused words from telly scripts, with empty space underneath. This was something else; the real thing, confusing, thrilling, script going out of the window. Sappy stuff, once-in-a-lifetime stuff, stuff to make you cringe and break your heart.

I said, ‘You think he’s faking that?’ Got that hooded dark eye again, and no answer.

Then, from Chris: I wish we could talk properly. This is stupid.

Selena: Me too

Chris: We could try meeting after school in the field or in the park??

Selena: Wouldn’t be the same. Like we said before. And someone would see us

Chris: Then somewhere else. Like we can find a cafe in the other direcion.

Selena: No. My friends would want to know where I was going. I’m not going to lie to them, this is bad enough

Conway said, ‘This isn’t like with Joanne and the others, where Chris wants to keep them under wraps and they’re pushing to go public. Selena wants to stay on the down-low too.’

‘Like we said: she knows at least one of her gang wouldn’t be happy.’

‘Julia knew Chris was a dog. And Holly didn’t like him one little bit.’

In the second week of March, Chris found the answer. Ok guess what. Finn worked out a way we can get out at night. If you can still do it would you be on for meeting up? Don’t want to get you in trouble, but I’d love to see you

Silence for a day, while Selena tried to decide. Then:

I’d love to too. Have to be late like 12.30. Meet me at the back gate of Kilda’s and we can find somewhere to talk.

Chris, fast and bubbling over: Yeahhhh!!! Thursday?

Selena: Yes thursday. I’ll text you if I can’t get out. Otherwise see you there

Can’t wait:-)

Same:-)

The meetings started and the texts changed. Got shorter, less of them and less to them. No more stories, no families and friends and deep feelings and daydreams. Hi:-) and Tonight same time same place? and Can’t, thurs? and Yeah see you then. That was it. The real stuff had grown too huge and too powerful to fit in little lit rectangles; it had come alive.

Noise from the fourth-year common room, roll of thuds like a heap of books tumbling. Conway and I whipped round, ready, but it vanished under a burst of laughter, spattering like bright flung paint, too hard.

And then the bit we’d been waiting for.

April 22nd, Chris and Selena arranged to meet, just like we’d thought. Same time same place. Can’t wait.

That night, the video. The kiss.

Early the morning of April 23rd, Chris texted Selena. I’m going to get in trouble cos I cant stop smiling:-)

Before school, Selena got back to him. Epic text. Chris I have to stop meeting you. I promise it’s nothing you did. I should never have met up to start with but I genuienly thought we could be just friends. That was really really stupid. I am so sorry. I know you won’t understand why, but if this hurts you, maybe it will help to know it hurts me so much too. I love you (another thing I should never have said).

Conway said, ‘What the fuck is she on about?’

‘That doesn’t sound like a rape victim,’ I said.

She shoved stray hair out of her face with the heel of her hand, hard. ‘Sounds like a nutter. I’m starting to think Joanne and them were right about this lot.’

‘And it doesn’t sound like Selena wanted time to think, the way she told us. The way that reads, she’d done all her thinking already.’

‘Why the fuck shouldn’t she go out with Chris? You’re so in love with each other, you go out together. Tell the world. Simple. What’s wrong with these people?’

Chris came back fast and wild. WTF?!!!!? Selena wgats going on??? If th4s isnt Selena then FUCK OFF. If it is then Selena we have to talk. Same time same place??

Nothing.

After school: Selena if you want to be just freinds then we can do that. I thought you wanted to or I would of never even tried you know that. Please can we meet tonite. I swear I won’t even touch you. Same time same place I’ll be there.

Nothing.

Next day he was back. I waited for you like a fucking plank til 3am. Swear to God I would of bet my life that you’d come. Still can’t believe you didn’t.

A couple of hours later: Selena are you serious about this? I don’t get it what HAPPENED? If I did something wrnng I’ll do whatever you want to aplogise. Just tell me what the fucks going on.

That evening: Selena you have to text me.

Nothing.

The Thursday, the 25th of April, Selena finally texted Chris. 1 o’clock tonight. Usual place. DON’T text me back. Just come.

‘That,’ Conway said, and tapped her screen, ‘that’s not Selena.’

I said, ‘No. Selena would’ve said, “Same time same place”, like they always did. And there’s no reason why she wouldn’t want him to text her back.’

‘Right. Someone else didn’t want him answering, in case Selena saw the message.’

‘She didn’t worry that Selena would spot her text? One night Selena gets a bit nostalgic, has a look back through her old chats with Chris, and all of a sudden she’s going, Hang on, I don’t remember writing that.’

‘Mystery Girl didn’t leave it on the phone. Wait for it to send, go into the Sent folder, delete.’

‘So,’ I said, ‘Selena’s texts after the breakup, Chris wasn’t ignoring them because he was in a strop with her. He was just doing what he was told.’

Conway said, ‘Some of the time, he was. Not all. Look at this.’

Five days later, 30th of April, Selena’s phone to Chris’s: I miss you. I’ve been trying so hard not to text you and I don’t blame you if you’re raging with me but I wanted you to know I miss you.

I said, ‘That’s the real Selena again. Like she told us, she couldn’t stand to cut him right off.’

Conway said, dryly, ‘He’s got no problem cutting her right off. No answer. He was ignoring her, all right. Chris hadn’t got what he wanted, for once, and he wasn’t happy.’

I said, ‘Here’s the other thing about that text. It says Mystery Girl didn’t actually nick the phone. She used it when she needed it, then put it back in Selena’s mattress.’

Conway nodded. ‘Joanne and her lot didn’t have that kind of access – even if they knew where Selena kept the phone, and how would they? Whoever set up that meeting lived in that bedroom.’

Almost a week later, 6th of May, someone using Selena’s phone texted Chris: I’ll be there. No answer.

I said, ‘They’d already set up the appointment; Mystery Girl’s just confirming. Chris must’ve shown up, the week before.’

‘Yeah. But that time, he went because he thought he was meeting Selena. This time, he knows he’s not. And he’s going along anyway.’

‘Why?’

Conway shrugged against the glass. ‘Maybe Mystery Girl says she’s going to sort things out between him and Selena, or maybe he figures banging Selena’s mate would make a great revenge. Or maybe he just thinks he’s in with a chance at more tit pics. Chris liked chicks, any chicks. There’s no “why” there. The question is why she’s meeting him.’

The long day had my mind moving like porridge, bits of thought taking forever to find each other. The corridor stretching away in front of us looked unreal, tiles too red, lines too long, something we’d never be able to stop seeing.

I said, ‘If she was going to kill him, why not do it straight off? What were the extra meetings for?’

‘Working up the guts. Or there’s something she wants to find out, before she decides whether to do it – whether he actually raped Selena, maybe. Or she’s got no plans to kill him, not at first; she’s meeting him for some other reason. And then something happens.’

Selena to Chris, the 8th of May, late at night: I don’t want us to be like this forever. Maybe this is completely stupid but there has to be some way we can be friends. Just hold on to each other till maybe if you’re not too furous with me we can try again someday. I can’t stand us losing each other totally.

Conway said, ‘She’s dying to get back with him. She can talk about just friends all she wants; that’s what she’s after.’

I said, ‘She said she was saved from doing it. This is what she meant. If Chris had texted her back, no way she would’ve stayed hardline about not meeting up. They would’ve been back together inside a couple of weeks. Maybe that’s what Mystery Girl was at: keeping them apart.’

‘If you were a teenage girl,’ Conway said. ‘And you wanted to keep Chris away from Selena, for whatever reason. And you were fairly sure she hadn’t been shagging him. And you knew what Chris was like.’

Silence, and the long red stretch of the corridor, tiles shifting queasily.

‘He brought a condom.’

I said, ‘Not Rebecca. She wouldn’t think of it.’

‘Nah.’

Julia would have thought of it.

13th of May: I’ll be there.

14th of May, Selena again. Don’t worry, I know you’re not going to answer this. I just like talking to you anyway. If you want me to stop, tell me and I will. Otherwise I’ll keep texting you. We had a substitute today for Maths, when she smiled she looked exactly like Chucky – Cliona got mixed up and called her Mrs Chucky and we all almost died laughing:-D

Rewinding, back to the small stories for laughs, trying to bring Chris back with her to a safe place. I said, ‘For a while, Mystery Girl’s able to convince Chris to stay away from Selena. Wouldn’t be hard: he’s pissed off with her anyway, and if Mystery Girl’s giving him something Selena wasn’t… But Selena keeps texting him. If he cared about her, if that was the real thing, then those texts had to get to him. After a while, it doesn’t matter what Mystery Girl’s bringing. Chris wants Selena back.’

Conway said, ‘And Mystery Girl has to come up with a new plan.’

16th of May, 9.12 a.m… The morning before Chris died.

Selena’s phone to Chris’s: Can you meet tonight? 1 in the cypress clearing?

4.00 p.m. – he must have checked his messages after school – Chris’s phone to Selena’s: OK.

Whoever had set up that meeting had killed Chris Harper. We had room for a crack of doubt – interception, coincidence. No more than that.

‘Love to know who he thinks he’s meeting,’ Conway said.

‘Yeah. Not Mystery Girl’s usual day, not her usual MO – this time she asks for an answer.’

‘It’s not Selena. “Cypress clearing”, Selena wouldn’t’ve said that. That was their spot. “Same time same place,” she’d’ve said.’

Selena was out, again. I said, ‘But Chris could’ve thought it was her.’

‘Could be what Mystery Girl wanted him to think. By now, she’s planning. She breaks the routine to get Chris wondering, make sure he shows up. Takes the risk of having him text her back – maybe she does nick the phone outright, this time. She knows no one’s gonna be using it from now on.’

Conway’s voice was level and low, rough-edged with fatigue. Small eddies of air nosed around it, curious, carried it away down the corridor.

‘Maybe Joanne’s twisting her arm; maybe she’s doing it off her own bat, for whatever reason. That night she sneaks out early, takes the hoe out of the shed – she’s wearing gloves, so no prints. She heads for the grove, hides in among the trees till Chris arrives. When he’s mooning around the clearing waiting for his twue wuv to show up, our girl hits him with the hoe. He goes down.’

The lazy drone of bees, this morning, long ago. Seed-heads round my ankles, smell of hyacinths. Sunlight.

‘She waits till she’s sure. Then she wipes down the hoe, puts it back where she got it. She takes Chris’s secret phone off his body and gets rid of it. Gets rid of Selena’s, too. Maybe she does it that night, goes over the wall and ditches them in a bin; maybe she hides them somewhere in the school till the fuss dies down. Now there’s nothing to link her or her mates to the crime – except maybe Joanne, and Joanne’s got enough cop to keep her mouth shut. Our girl goes back inside. Goes to bed. Waits for the morning. Gets ready to squeal and cry.’

I said, ‘Fifteen years old. You think any of them would have that kind of nerve? The murder, OK. But the wait? This whole last year?’

Conway said, ‘She did it for her friend. One way or another. For her friend’s sake. That’s got power. You do that, you’re Joan of Arc. You’ve gone through fire; nothing’s gonna break you.’

Shiver building dark in my spine, the way it does when power comes near. That beat of pain again, deep in the palms of my hands.

‘There’s someone else who knows, but. And she hasn’t been through fire for her mate; she hasn’t got that kind of nerve. She holds in the secret as long as she can, but it finally gets to be too much. She cracks, makes the postcard. Probably she genuinely doesn’t think it’ll go further than that board, corridor gossip. The bubble again: you’re inside it, the outside doesn’t feel real. But your Holly’s been to the outside before. She knows it’s there.’

Sound from the fourth-year common room, sharp and sudden. Something heavy thudding to the floor. A squeal.

I was half off the windowsill when Conway’s hand clamped round my bicep. She shook her head.

‘But–’

‘Wait.’

Murmur like bees, swelling and bristling.

‘They’re going to–’

‘Let them.’

A wail, rising above that murmur, high and trembling. Conway’s hand tightened.

Words, a terrified cry too garbled to catch through the thick door. Then the screaming started.

Conway was down and hitting the combination lock before I realised her hand was gone off my arm. The door opened on a different world.

The noise punched me in the face, sent my vision skidding. Girls up and on their feet, hands and hair flying – I’d been seeing them through texts for so long, just narrow snippets of minds shooting through dark, it felt like a double-take seeing them real and solid. And nothing like I’d seen them before, nothing. Those glossy gems, watching us cool-eyed and assessing with their knees perfectly crossed: gone. These were white and scarlet, wide-mouthed, clawed and clutching at each other, these were wild things.

McKenna was shouting something, but none of them heard her. Shrieks launched off them like birds, battering against the walls. I caught words, here and there, I see him oh my God oh God I see him it’s Chris Chris Chris-

It was the high sash window they were fixed on, the one where Holly and her mates had been sitting an hour or two earlier. Empty now, blank evening sky. Heads back, arms open to that rectangle, they were screaming like it was a joy, a physical one. Like it was the one thing they’d been dying to do, for years and years, and the time had come.

It’s him it’s him look oh God look– Conway’s ghost story had paid off.

Conway dived in. Aiming for Holly and her lot, pressed together in a far corner. They weren’t screaming, weren’t gone, but they were huge-eyed, Holly’s teeth sunk into her forearm, Rebecca crouched in an armchair gasping, hands pressed over her ears. Get them now, we might get them talking.

I stayed put. To guard the door, I told myself. In case anyone made a break for it; the state those girls were in, one of them could do something stupid, down the stairwell before you know it and then we’d be in trouble-

Load of shite. I was afraid. Cold Cases takes you to bad motherfuckers, these were just little girls, but these were the ones that stopped me dead. These were the ones that would smell me stepping over their threshold and turn, hands rising, come for me in a rush of streaming hair and silence and rip me into a thousand bloody gobbets, one for each reason they had.

Oh God oh God oh-

The overhead bulb exploded. Sudden rush of dimness and slips of glass firing like golden arrows through the light of the standing lamps, a fresh burst of screams; a girl clapping her hand to her face, blood black in the shadows. The window burned pale, lit their upturned faces like worshippers’.

Alison was on her feet on the seat of a sofa, spindly and rocking. One skinny arm stretched out, finger pointing. Not at the window. At Holly’s four: Rebecca head back and white-eyed, Holly and Julia grabbing at her arms, Selena glazed and swaying. Alison was screaming on and on, screams huge enough to rise up over all the rest: ‘Her it was her I saw her I saw her I saw her–’

Conway’s head came round. She clocked Alison, scanned frantically for me. Caught my eye and gestured over the whirl of heads, yelled something I couldn’t hear, but I saw it: Fucking come on!

I took a breath and I dived in.

Hair slicing across my cheek, an elbow ramming my ribs, a hand clawing at my sleeve and I wrenched away. My skin leaped at every touch, nails or for a second I thought teeth raked the back of my neck, but I was moving fast and nothing dug in. Then Conway’s shoulder was against mine like protection.

We got Alison under the arms, lifted her off the sofa – her arms were rigid, brittle, sticks of chalk, she didn’t struggle – had her back through the boiling mess and out of the door before McKenna could do anything but see us go. Conway slammed the door behind us with her foot.

The sudden quiet and brightness almost turned me light-headed. We got Alison down the corridor so fast her feet barely touched the ground, dumped her on the landing at the far end. She collapsed, heap of arms and legs, still screaming.

Faces in the white stairwell, craning over the circling banister-rails above and below us, open-mouthed. I called out, deep official voice, ‘Attention, please. Everyone go back to your common rooms. No one’s been hurt; everything’s fine. Go back to your common rooms immediately.’ Kept going till the faces pulled back, slowly, and were gone. Behind us McKenna was still shouting; the noise level was slowly going down, shrieks starting to crumble to sobs.

Conway was on her knees, up in Alison’s face. Sharp as a slap: ‘Alison. You look at me.’ Snapping her fingers, over and over, in front of Alison’s eyes: ‘Hey. Right here. Nowhere else.’

‘He’s there don’t let him please nononoooo–’

‘Alison. Focus. When I say, “Go,” you’re gonna hold your breath while I count to ten. Ready. Go.’

Alison cut herself off in mid-scream, with a sound like a burp. Almost made me start laughing. That was when I realised if I started, I might not stop. The scrapes down the back of my neck throbbed.

‘One. Two. Three. Four.’ Conway kept the beat ruthlessly steady, ignored the noise still bubbling down the corridor. Alison stared at her, lips clamped shut. ‘Five. Six–’ A swell of squealing in the common room, Alison’s eyes zigzagged– ‘Hey. Over here. Seven. Eight. Nine. Ten. Now breathe. Slowly.’

Alison’s mouth fell open. Her breath came shallow and loud, like she was half hypnotised, but the screaming was gone.

‘Nice,’ Conway said, easily. ‘Well done.’ Her eyes slid up over Alison’s shoulder, to me.

I did a double-take out of a cartoon. Me?

Flare of her eyes. Get a move on.

I was the one who’d made it work with Alison earlier. I had the best chance. The biggest interview of the case, or it could be if I didn’t fuck up.

‘Hey,’ I said, sliding down to sit cross-legged on the tiles. Glad of the excuse: my knees were still shaking. Conway slipped away sideways, into a corner behind Alison, tall and black and raggedy against the smooth white wall. ‘Feeling better?’

Alison nodded. She was red-eyed, more white-mousey than ever. Her legs stuck out at mad angles, like someone had dropped her from a height.

I gave her my big reassuring smile. ‘Good. You’re grand to talk, right? You don’t need the matron, more allergy medicine, anything like that?’

She shook her head. The chaos at the end of the corridor had ebbed to nothing; McKenna had the fourth-years under control at last. Any minute now, she was going to come looking for us.

‘Lovely,’ I said. ‘You said, in there, that you saw one of Selena Wynne’s gang do something. You were pointing at one of them. Which one?’

We braced and waited, me and Conway, to hear Julia.

Alison let out a little sigh. She said, ‘Holly.’

That easy. On the corridors above us and below, the older girls and the younger ones had gone back into their common rooms and closed the doors. There was no sound anywhere, none at all. That white silence came sifting down again, piling into little drifts in the corners, slipping down our backs to collect in the folds of our clothes.

Holly was a cop’s kid. Holly was my star witness. Holly was the one who had brought me that card. Even after I’d seen her here, deep in her own world, I had somehow thought she was on my side.

‘OK,’ I said. Easy and loose, like it was nothing, nothing at all. Felt Conway’s eyes, on me, not on Alison. ‘What’d you see?’

‘After the assembly. The one where they told us about Chris. I was…’

Alison was getting that look again, the one from earlier: slack and dazed, like someone after a seizure. ‘Stick with me,’ I said, smiling away. ‘You’re doing great. What happened after the assembly?’

‘We were coming out of the hall, into the foyer. I was right beside Holly. She looked round, just quickly, like she was checking if anyone was watching her. So I noticed that, you know?’

Observant, just like I’d told her that morning. Prey animal’s fast eyes.

‘And then she stuck her hand down her skirt, like in the waist of her tights?’ A snigger, limp and automatic. ‘And she pulled out this thing. Wrapped in a tissue.’

Making sure she wouldn’t leave prints. Just like Mystery Girl had done with the hoe. I nodded along, all interested. ‘That’d catch your eye, all right.’

‘It was just weird, you know? Like, what would you keep down your tights? I mean, ew? And then I kept looking because some of it was sticking out of the tissue, and I thought it was my phone. It was the same as mine. But I checked my pocket, and my phone was there.’

‘What did Holly do next?’

Alison said, ‘The lost-and-found bin’s in the foyer, right at the door of reception. It’s this big black bin with a hole at the top, so you can put things in but you can’t get them out? You have to go to Miss O’Dowd or Miss Arnold and they have the key. We were going past reception, and Holly kind of ran her hand across the bin – like she was just doing it for no reason, she didn’t even look at it, but then the phone wasn’t in her hand any more. Just the tissue.’

I saw Conway’s eyes close for a second on the Should’ve searched. She said, from her corner, ‘How come you didn’t say this to me last year?’

Alison flinched. ‘I didn’t know it had anything to do with Chris! I never thought–’

‘Course you didn’t,’ I said soothingly. ‘You’re grand. When did you start to wonder?’

‘Just a couple of months ago. Joanne was… I’d done something she didn’t like, and she said, “I should call the detectives and tell them your phone used to text with Chris Harper. You’d get in sooo much trouble.” I mean, she was just saying it, she wouldn’t have actually done it?’

Alison was looking anxious. ‘Course not,’ I said, all understanding. Joanne would’ve dropped Alison in a shredder feet first, if it had suited her.

‘But I started thinking. Like, “OhmyGod, what if they actually did look at my phone, they’d totally think I’d been with Chris!” And then I thought about that phone I saw Holly with. And I went, like, “What if she was getting rid of it because she was scared of the same thing?” And then I was like, “OhmyGod, what if she actually was with Chris?”’

I said, ‘Did you talk about it to Holly? Or anyone else?’

‘OhmyGod, no way, not to Holly! I said it to Gemma. I thought she’d know what to do.’

‘Gemma’s smart, all right.’ Which she was. Alison hadn’t worked out that the phone might have been Selena’s. Gemma would have. ‘What’d she say?’

Alison squirmed. Down to her lap: ‘She said it was none of our business. To just shut up and forget the whole thing.’

Conway shaking her head, jaw clenched. I said, ‘And you tried. But you couldn’t manage.’

Head-shake.

I said, ‘So you made that card. Put it up on the Secret Place.’

Alison stared, bewildered. Shook her head.

‘Nothing wrong with that. It was a good idea.’

‘But I didn’t! I swear to God, I didn’t!’

I believed her. No reason she would lie, not now. ‘OK,’ I said. ‘OK.’

Conway said, ‘Well done, Alison. Probably you were right to begin with and it’s nothing to do with Chris, but Detective Moran and I will have a chat with Holly, clear it up. First we’ll take you back down to Miss Arnold. You’re looking a bit pale.’

Keep her isolated, so she couldn’t spread the story. I stood up, kept my smile nailed in place. One of my feet had gone to sleep.

Alison pulled herself up by the banister rail, but she stayed there, holding onto it with both thin hands. In the white air her face looked greenish. She said, to Conway, ‘Orla told us about that case you did. With the–’ A shudder twisted her. ‘The, the dog. The ghost dog.’

‘Yeah,’ Conway said. More hair had come out of her bun. ‘Nasty one, that was.’

‘Once the guy confessed. Did the dog – did it keep coming back for him?’

Conway examined her. Said, ‘Why?’

Alison’s face looked bonier, fallen in. ‘Chris,’ she said. ‘In there, in the common room. He was there. In the window.’

Her certainty hooked me in the spine, pulled a shiver. The hysteria rising up again, somewhere behind the air: gone for now, not for good.

‘Yeah,’ Conway said. ‘I got that.’

‘Yeah, but… he was there because of me. Earlier, too, out here in the corridor. He came to get me, because I hadn’t told you about Holly with the phone. In the common room’ – she swallowed – ‘he was looking right at me. Grinning at–’ Another shudder, rougher, wrenching at her breath. ‘If you hadn’t come in then, if you hadn’t… Is he… is he going to come back for me?’

Conway said, stern, ‘Have you told us everything? Every single thing you know?’

‘I swear. I swear.’

‘Then Chris won’t be coming back for you. He might hang around the school, all right, because there’s plenty of other people keeping secrets that he wants them to tell us. But he won’t be back for you. You probably won’t even be able to see him any more.’

Alison’s mouth opened and a little rush of breath came out. She looked relieved, right to the bone, and she looked disappointed.

Far away down the corridor, through the silence, a long soft wail. For a second I thought it was coming from a girl, or something worse, but it was only the creak of the common-room door opening.

McKenna said, and I know a deeply fucked-off woman when I hear one, ‘Detectives. If it’s not too much trouble, I would like to speak with you. Now.’

‘We’ll be there in ten minutes,’ Conway said. To McKenna, but she was looking at me. Those dark eyes, and the silence falling like snow between us, so thick I couldn’t read them.

To me: ‘Time to go.’