Torn

  Dinner came and went and it was just the same as lunch.

  Then Daley told us. They were working on the theory that Tara had got into difficulty swimming in the loch. The search had been called off for the night. Our parents had been informed, and we’d be travelling back to London overnight.

  I sat with Saira on the coach. She was upset, but in a strange, excited sort of way. The horror of it all was fascinating to her, and I was disgusted. Still, it was better than sitting next to Cass. She sat near the back with Polly. Rae sat by herself.

  All the parents were in the school car park when we arrived at dawn. Dad gave me the kind of fierce hug he used to give me when Mum was dying. Those hugs always scared me a little.

  I saw it on the news two days later. ‘The search has been called off for missing London schoolgirl Tara Chambers. Police divers have been combing Loch Dunochar for the past three days, but this evening Detective Inspector Marshall, the officer in charge of the investigation, announced that the search would not continue. It’s thought that Tara went for an early-morning swim in the loch and got into difficulty in the water. Although a strong swimmer, Tara suffered from asthma, and there’s been speculation that her condition could have played a part in this tragedy.’

  Then there was an outside broadcast with a correspondent standing on the shore of the loch. He was standing next to the craggy, laser-eyed policeman.

  ‘Detective Inspector Marshall, are you saying that you believe Tara is dead?’

  Ouch. That was blunt. Marshall gave the stupid reporter a hard look before answering.

  ‘I’m saying that the search has been called off. Unfortunately we believe that the most likely scenario is that Miss Chambers drowned while swimming in the loch.’ His voice was soft and his eyes were sad. ‘This is not the first time a tragedy like this one has happened here. Fifteen years ago a man in his twenties was lost in Loch Dunochar. His body was never found.’ Cass would be relieved – there was a precedent. I was not relieved. A part of me wanted them to keep looking and realize she wasn’t there and … and what?

  The reporter asked DI Marshall a few more questions before handing back over to the studio. They’d set up some kind of debate about safety on school trips. A woman with red poodle hair tried to blame Tara’s death on the teachers. She kept saying the words in loco parentis, and you could tell it made her feel clever.

  ‘Al, you shouldn’t be watching this.’ The screen faded to black and Dad slumped down next to me, remote control in hand.

  ‘It’s OK, Dad. I’m OK. Really.’ I held his gaze and tried my best to transmit my okayness straight into his brain. It didn’t work; it never worked.

  ‘I just wish you didn’t have to go through this. You’ve had so much to deal with already. It’s not fair.’

  Dad put his arm around me and I nestled into him. His sympathy was hard to bear, but the thought of him knowing the truth was much, much worse.

  17

  I finish talking and Jack says nothing. He’s picking at his fingernails. The weight of everything I haven’t told him is like a thousand tonnes on my shoulders. Except that’s not where I feel it. It’s there in the pit of my stomach, as if I’ve swallowed a boulder.

  Jack will never know about Duncan, or about how hideous Tara was to Polly after she got stuck in the cave. And he’ll never know how his sister died. Maybe it’s better that way. A tragic swimming accident has got to be easier to deal with than the truth. Yeah, nice try, Alice. You keep telling yourself that. The voice in my head isn’t mine. It’s Tara’s.

  My hot chocolate has gone cold and gross, but I take a sip anyway just for something to do.

  Jack looks up at me and his eyes are shiny. There are tears there, but he’s not going to cry them. I don’t know what I’ll do if he cries them. ‘Thank you. I really appreciate you talking to me. It … it helps.’

  ‘How?’

  ‘Well, I feel like I can picture her there now, doing all that mad outdoorsy stuff. I bet she hated it, didn’t she?’

  He smiles, and all I can do is shrug.

  ‘Alice, it’s OK. You don’t have to pretend with me.’

  ‘What … what do you mean?’

  ‘I know you didn’t exactly get on with Tara. Not many people did.’

  ‘What are you talking about? She had loads of friends.’

  ‘Not anyone close though. Not the way you two used to be.’

  ‘But Danni and Sam and …’

  ‘Dopey and Sneezy and Bitchy?’ We laughed and it felt good. ‘I’ll let you in on a little secret. That’s if you promise not to tell anyone …’

  I nod, and he leans in close.

  ‘Tara didn’t even really like that lot. In fact, I’d even go so far as to say she kind of despised them.’ He’s understandably pleased with this little nugget of information.

  ‘What? No way!’

  ‘It’s true, I swear!’

  I take a moment to roll this idea around in my head. Half of my brain thinks this makes no sense whatsoever, and the other half is nodding along as if it’s always suspected as much. ‘Why does she … I mean, why did she hang out with them all the time then?’ I wince at my mistake, and Jack waves it away like it doesn’t even bother him. I suppose he’s been making the same mistake a lot over the past couple of weeks. I know I did after Mum died.

  ‘Maybe she didn’t have any better options. Not since you two fell out anyway.’

  ‘That’s ridiculous. She was the most popular girl in the whole school. She could have been friends with anyone she wanted.’

  ‘Even you?’

  ‘What are you trying to say?’ I don’t like the way this conversation is heading, and considering where it’s already been, that’s saying something.

  ‘She missed you. It really upset her when you two stopped being friends.’ He sees me wince. ‘Sorry, I know it was a long time ago and everything. I just thought you should know. The Tara that the rest of the world saw was different to the Tara I knew. God, I miss her so much.’ He rubs his face with his hands. ‘Does it get any easier? I can’t imagine ever not missing her.’

  ‘It will get easier, I promise. You’ll always miss her, but there’s nothing wrong with that.’

  He reaches for my hand and squeezes it. ‘Thanks for this. I owe you, big time.’ I can’t speak. His hand on mine has pushed all coherent thoughts out of my head.

  He doesn’t let go of my hand, and all of a sudden he looks shy as anything. ‘Maybe, I dunno … maybe I could take you for a pizza or something sometime? I mean, it doesn’t have to be pizza … Just to say thanks, y’know.’

  Did he just ask me out? Not a chance. He just feels bad for grilling me about Tara. Of course he doesn’t want to go out with me. His sister’s just died, for Christ’s sake. But all I can think about is holding his hand and what it would be like to kiss him. He’d never be interested in me. Not in a million years. Stop this train of thought right this second.

  He’s looking at me strangely and I realize I need to actually say something out loud. ‘Pizza’s good. I like pizza. As long as there’s no anchovies.’

  A perfect smile from Jack, followed by a perfect grimace. ‘Urgh. Anchovies are the food of the devil. No worries there. We’ll make an anti-anchovy pact. Let’s shake on it.’

  We both look down at our hands and they’re still entwined, so we kind of move them up and down in a lame handshaking action. We laugh, and all of a sudden it’s not awkward at all. Just the opposite in fact: it feels like the most normal thing in the world.

  She’s there when I get home. Scaring the crap out of me when I open the wardrobe. She’s tucked away in the corner next to some shoeboxes. I slam the door, and turn on the radio as loud as it’ll go.

  But I can still hear her. ‘You fancy him, don’t you?’

  I sing along to the song that’s playing, even though I don’t know the words. It’s some crappy ballad with a lot of warbling in it.

  ‘I said, “You fancy him, don’t you?”??
?

  More singing from me. Louder and louder.

  ‘You should audition for the school choir. Who knew that beneath that mousey, incredibly average exterior lurks the voice of an angel? Truly.’

  This shouldn’t hurt me. Insults from a figment of my imagination should bounce off me like bouncy things. But they don’t.

  Suddenly she’s not in the wardrobe any more but sitting cross-legged on my bed. ‘I can’t believe I’m sitting here, all dead and gross, and you’re creaming yourself over my little brother. It really doesn’t bear thinking about.’ A shudder runs through her – a big fake shudder. ‘Haven’t you got anything more important to think about than getting into Jack’s pants?’

  I know I’m blushing. I must be blushing. ‘Shut up!’

  ‘Shut up? Jesus, Alice, you are so pathetic it hurts. It actually physically HURTS. And it takes a lot to hurt me now, trust me on that one. All I’m saying is that I can’t believe you’re obsessing about Jack when you really should be spending at least one hundred per cent of your time feeling bad about me. And don’t forget the whole working-out-exactly-howI-came-to-be-quite-so-dead thing. It’s important, Alice.’ Her voice has changed. It’s slower and lower somehow. Her eyes are steady on mine. They don’t look dead. Not like they did that night. These eyes have a spark: a bright, fierce spark that won’t let me go.

  ‘I don’t fancy him.’

  ‘Liar, liar! Pants on fire!’ She giggles like a small child and then launches into that god-awful Kings of Leon song. She always loved to sing. When we were nine years old we formed a girl band called 2 Awesum. Our singing voices weren’t all that great, but that didn’t stop us performing at Dad’s fortieth birthday party. He danced and laughed and said it was surely only a matter of time before we signed a recording contract.

  ‘Admit it! You like him, don’t you? It’s nothing to be ashamed of – it’s perfectly natural. Although he IS younger than you, which is a bit ick. But it’s about time you got some action. I was beginning to think you’d be a virgin forever.’

  I can feel my cheeks burning burning burning. ‘What makes you think I’m a virgin?’

  She doesn’t even dignify that with a response, unless you count a classic Tara eye roll. Which I don’t.

  ‘I’ve had … boyfriends.’ I couldn’t sound less convincing if I tried.

  ‘Yeah, I hate to tell you this, but snogging Neil Bagshaw round the back of the bowling alley when you were twelve doesn’t count as “having a boyfriend”.’

  I hate her. She’s dead and I’m sorry about that, but I HATE her.

  My phone rings and I pounce on it. A teeny-tiny part of me hopes that it’s him. It’s not. It’s Cass – which is almost as surprising. Cass doesn’t do phone calls. Texting and emailing and Facebooking and IMing, but not phone calls. I’ve stopped bothering to phone her – monosyllabic doesn’t even begin to cover it.

  ‘So, did you do it then?’ Straight to the point. Typical Cass.

  ‘Did I do what?’ Let’s see if I can make her say Tara’s name.

  ‘Talk to her brother.’ Nope, guess not.

  ‘Yeah, I saw him after school.’

  She waits for me to continue, but I won’t. I don’t know why, but I’ve suddenly come over all stubborn. Maybe Ghost Tara is rubbing off on me. Speaking of Ghost Tara, she’s gone of course.

  ‘And?’

  ‘And what?’ I think I’m actually starting to enjoy myself – just a little.

  Cass sighs a huge long staticky breath down the phone. ‘What did you tell him?’

  ‘I told him we killed his sister and chucked her down a well.’ I don’t mean to say this out loud – honestly I don’t.

  ‘You’re fucking hilarious. I can’t believe you’re joking about this.’

  ‘Oh, so it’s OK for you to joke about it, but I’m not allowed. Yeah, fine, that makes total sense.’

  She says, ‘Alice, please …’ with just enough imploringness to make me feel guilty.

  ‘I told him about the trip. Nothing bad – obviously. It was fine. Sort of nice actually.’

  ‘Oh God.’

  ‘What? Everything’s fine. He doesn’t suspect a thing.’ Saying those five words brings it all crashing back down on me. I lied to him. I can never not lie to him. Even if we …

  ‘You like him, don’t you? He’s her fucking brother, for Christ’s sake! How can you like him? How can you even think about liking him? Nothing can ever happen with him – you do realize that?’

  Of course I realize that. Mainly because he DOESN’T FANCY ME. He doesn’t. He just wants to take me for pizza to thank me for talking to him about Tara. And he probably wants to talk about her some more. There’s no one else to talk to. I am The Last Resort. Nothing more.

  ‘Alice? Are you still there?’

  ‘I’m here.’

  ‘You have to stay away from him. It’s way too risky. You’d have to lie ALL the time.’

  ‘I lie every day – to everyone. We all do.’

  ‘Yes, but this is different, and you know it. I’m warning you, Alice, you have to stay away from him. For all of us.’

  18

  All anyone can talk about at school is Tara. Still. By lunchtime on Friday I’ve gleaned the following information from various sources:

  1. The swimming team wore black armbands at the weekend – in memory of Tara.

  2. Two pages will be reserved in the yearbook for some kind of Tara-related memorial thing.

  3. The school dance WILL go ahead after all, much to the relief of everyone. (Apart from me, of course.)

  4. Polly Sutcliffe is forming something called the Tara Chambers Memorial Society.

  This is the one that floors me. What is she playing at? Could she possibly draw any more attention to herself? On my way to lunch I see her putting up pastel-coloured flyers on the noticeboard outside the cafeteria. There are loads of people milling around, so I can’t do what I want, which is to shake her – hard.

  ‘What are you doing?’

  She turns and I notice that her hair really does look a lot better than it used to. Her eczema seems to have cleared up as well. Either that or she’s discovered some new miracle foundation. She looks like a different person almost.

  ‘Putting up flyers. Why, do you want one?’

  I lower my voice. ‘No, I do not want one! What exactly is the Tara Chambers Memorial Society?!’

  ‘It’s a charitable foundation. Anyone can join. The plan is to raise money for Tara’s favourite charities. It’s going really well already – I’ve arranged with Daley for us to get the proceeds from the dance.’ I do not recognize this person. It’s not the hair or the skin … it’s everything.

  ‘Why are you doing this?’ I don’t even try to hide the fact that I’m looking at her like she’s a crazy person.

  ‘Don’t you think it’s a nice thing to do?’ She looks all serene and weird. She staples a duck-egg-blue flyer right next to a baby-pink one. She’s careful to make sure the edges match up exactly.

  I’m finding it hard to find the words I want to say. ‘I think it’s a lovely thing to do.’ This is sort of true, even though I find it hard to believe that Tara had one favourite charity, let alone charities plural. I lower my voice. ‘I just … don’t think you should be doing it. I thought we were all going to lay low for a while?’

  Polly laughs. At me! ‘Lay low?! You’re being a tad over dramatic, don’t you think? There’s no harm in it at all, silly. In fact, do you want to join? So far I’ve got Sam and Gemma, and Danni’ll definitely join, won’t she?’ She pauses and puts her hand on my arm. ‘I’m just trying to do the right thing, you know?’ Her eyes are glistening, like she’s about to cry on me. I can’t be doing with that.

  ‘I’ve got to go.’ I turn so abruptly I practically bump noses with Cass.

  ‘What are you two whispering about?’ I have no idea what possesses her to say something like this. There’s only one thing I would be whispering about with Polly Sutcliffe.
r />   ‘Nothing. Let’s go.’ I drag her away, leaving Polly and her perfectly symmetrical flyers.

  The cafeteria is pretty much full, but I manage to find a free table for Cass and me. Rae is sitting a few tables away. She’s spread her bag, coat and some books around her to make sure no one sits too close.

  I bring Cass up to speed on the Polly situation. She’s as surprised as I am. After a bit of speculation over what charities Tara could possibly have been involved in (during which Cass wonders if giving blowjobs to half the sixth-form at Knox Academy counts as charity), we fall into silence. I munch on some sad-looking iceberg lettuce. Cass eats her lasagne – with chips.

  ‘You know, it may not be such a bad thing after all,’ she whispers as she squirts yet more ketchup onto her plate.

  ‘How can it be anything but a bad thing?’ I try (and promptly fail) to resist nabbing a couple of her less ketchup-splattered chips.

  ‘Well, I mean, it sort of puts them off the scent, doesn’t it? Not that there IS a scent, but if there was … if someone thought there was something suss about what happened, they’d hardly suspect someone who was the president of the Chambers Appreciation Society or whatever it’s called.’ She looks almost impressed with the idea. ‘Maybe we should join?’

  I can’t tell if she’s joking. ‘Don’t be ridiculous. We’re supposed to be staying away from each other, remember?’

  ‘Then why are you having lunch with me, eh? Quick! Someone might see! Run away!’ We’ve discussed this a hundred times already. It’s OK for me and Cass to hang out, because we did before. It would be more suspicious if we didn’t hang out (as she keeps reminding me whenever I show any sign of wanting to be alone for two minutes). But we should steer clear of Polly and Rae, just to be on the safe side.

  ‘Cass, you drive me insane. You do realize that, don’t you?’

  ‘Ah, but you love me really.’ She tries her best grin on for size. That grin used to make me laugh. It used to charm me. Things have changed.