Book of Lies

  Waiting in the front of the car is Erin, our dark-haired driver, and a blond guy, cute, with a cheeky smile. He jumps out when we approach and holds the door for me, giving me his front seat. Erin rolls her eyes.

  We head off, and they are all being extra nice. Maybe they are always extra nice to Piper, or maybe they’re not used to being around a friend with a dead mother. They seem a little unsure what to say to me, which suits me fine; hopefully they’ll put any strangeness in how I am down to Isobel’s death. And they seem happy to chatter to each other while I stay quiet, with glances and smiles cast my way now and then—​ones that say they care for Piper and they’re worried about her.

  Piper’s phone beeps in my pocket. I pull it out: think of the devil, and there is her text.

  Hi, it’s me. How’d it go last night? Can you come here now so we can swap back?

  No; actually, I can’t. I smile. I bite my lip for a moment, thinking, then text back: All was fine last night, just heading to school with Erin and friends. So you’d best lie low for the day. I put the phone back in my pocket on silent. It starts vibrating furiously. She’s calling? I ignore it. She had her fun last night; today, I’ll have mine.

  Piper

  I stare at Zak’s landline phone in my hand. She’s not answering? She’s going to my school, with my friends? Pretending to be me? I’m not angry; I’m more . . . stunned. I can’t believe it.

  There’s no way she’ll get through a whole day without everyone thinking she’s completely crazy—​thinking I’m crazy. She doesn’t know where anything is, what anyone’s name is, nothing. How does she think she can pull this off?

  “Good morning.” Zak walks through past the sofa, Ness’s lead in one hand and his jogging gear on. He pauses, turns. “Are you OK?”

  I shrug. “Ish.”

  “Still angry?”

  “Ish.” I sigh and look down through my lashes, lean back on the sofa. Zak crosses the room and stops in front of me.

  “I don’t like it when we fight,” he says.

  I look up. “Then don’t do it. Just agree with me at all times.”

  “That is so never going to happen,” he says, with a ghost of a smile.

  “Not when I get angry,” I reply. “I lose my touch.” Very true.

  He leans down, gives me a quick kiss. “Breakfast together when I get back?”

  I shake my head, the beginnings of a plan starting to form inside. “Nope. I’m going to school today.”

  “Good for you. Come by after?”

  “OK.”

  He clips Ness’s lead onto her collar, and they head out.

  So. Quinn has gone to school. There’s not much I can do about it now, but at least this means I don’t have to. And there are other things I can do today.

  I smile.

  Quinn

  So many eyes. So many nuances of feeling behind them—​sympathy, curiosity, and some other thing that is well hidden and not entirely pleasant. So not everyone loves Piper, but they keep it to themselves: Her return after her mother’s death and funeral—​via her twin-imposter, me—​is acknowledged by everyone, in a blur of words and faces that makes me dizzy.

  The bell finally goes. Blond girl seems to have taken seriously her promise to look after me today. She leads me along, down halls and up stairs, through a claustrophobic onslaught of warm bodies rushing in all directions.

  Erin and the cute guy from Erin’s car all go to the same classroom as we do. I pay close attention when the teacher starts calling out names, trying to remember them all. So blond clothing advisor is Jasmine; cute door-opening guy is Tim. I’m so busy memorizing names that Erin has to elbow me to respond when the tutor calls out Piper Hughes.

  “Sorry. Here,” I say. Not my name, but it’s not Piper’s, either, is it? It should be Piper Blackwood.

  The teacher is in the sympathy camp. She smiles. “It’s good to have you back, Piper.” She carries on with calling out names, and I continue trying to remember them all and the faces they belong to.

  Just as I’m wondering what subject this will be, the bell goes again. Was that just to see who is here? Everyone rushes out and I start to follow Erin, but Jasmine pulls my arm. She shakes her head. “You really aren’t with it today, are you? Come on. We’ve got English now.”

  I follow her down more endless halls into yet another classroom. Other students file in.

  There are student presentations today, so it is easy to sit back and just listen. They’re doing Sylvia Plath: who is she? Sounds like she had some serious issues, and I’m drawn into wanting to know more about them, to read her work and find the hidden threads inside her poems. Around the room some faces are interested, some are puzzled, some are masks as minds wander.

  There are so many things they all seem to know that I don’t; things I itch and burn to read, study, and figure out. Even though many of the students seem to find being here a torture, they don’t know what they have—​what is being given to them in this place.

  So this is school. I often wondered what it was like.

  When the bell goes again, I start to follow Jasmine out of the room.

  The teacher stands by the door. “Piper? Stay a moment.” She waits until the others file out. “I don’t want to put any pressure on you now, but you need to do your presentation as well. You are on the schedule for tomorrow. I can leave yours to the end and juggle things around if you’re not ready?”

  I wonder if Piper has done her assignment. Somehow, I doubt it. She’s been far too busy with Zak.

  I smile. “No problem. I’ll do it tomorrow.”

  Piper

  From the bottom of our road, I check our drive; Dad’s car is gone. I walk fast to the door and enter the code, hoping no nosy neighbors watched me leave in a car and return on foot dressed differently moments later.

  Upstairs, the door to my room is ajar, and I step in, close it behind me. When I turn, my eyes open wide. There are clothes flung all over the bed, spilling onto the floor, too—​even that silly onesie my aunts got me for Christmas last year.

  Has she been through everything? All of my stuff? I look through my desk and drawers, and nothing seems to be missing. But it all somehow feels different, disturbed. Her eyes and hands have been over all my belongings, and I’m as creeped out as if a burglar had rifled my room.

  But she’s my sister. I try to make myself calm down, but can’t stop the anger simmering inside. A sister that just now I’d like to slap, but I can’t because she’s with my friends, at my school, pretending to be me.

  Focus, Piper.

  What do I know so far? The other day, I couldn’t find any trace in this house of where Mum came from. Dad said Mum’s family name—​and mine—​is Blackwood. Quinn confirmed this is also her name. Dad said there is a Blackwood inheritance, but that he doesn’t know what or where it is. Quinn told Zak she was raised by her grandmother, and she told both of us that Mum visited her.

  So the only family I know for sure we have is this grandmother. Somehow I have to trace her, and the only way I can do that is by finding out where Quinn lived, or where Mum visited. Then I hope this will lead me to our family and our inheritance.

  Next step? The internet.

  I open my laptop. Has Quinn been on here, too?

  No. She wouldn’t know the password—​unless she guessed it was NESS.

  To start with, I type Isobel Hughes into the search engine. The first hits are reports of her death. Her eyes look at mine from the screen, and my fingers reach out to her, to touch her image. An image that is somehow both her and not her.

  Like that dream I had last night. First she was the way I remembered her, from when I was small; and then she was someone else, someone horrible.

  This photo was taken at some law firm party and was one she hated. She was looking down a little, distracted and sad—​she’d have smiled if she’d seen the camera, projected what she wanted to be seen. It had caught her in an unguarded moment. What was she thinking? Did
I ever really know?

  I make myself scroll down until the photo is gone, but once I’m past recent events, a random collection of people and places with no connection to her or each other comes up.

  Next, I search for Isobel Blackwood, then Quinn Blackwood. With both searches, endless pages scroll past; none of them seem to relate to Mum or Quinn. No Facebook, no Twitter, nothing. I know Mum wasn’t into social networking, and I’d be surprised if Quinn was online much—​she’s not very tech-y. I even had to show her how to use my smartphone. But it is somehow more surprising that nothing Quinn has done has ended up on anyone else’s radar, either. Wherever she’s been, she’s not turned up on the internet—​at least, not as Quinn Blackwood.

  How about Blackwood and Dartmoor together? I don’t know that my relatives are definitely from Dartmoor; or if they are, that they are still there. All I know is that Mum was working there when she met Dad. But if they are from Dartmoor, that could bring up something. I type the words in, not really expecting anything much, and hit ENTER for search.

  Vast numbers of hits fill the screen.

  Blackwood is an ancient name for Dartmoor’s black peat, which was cut for fuel. Garth Blackwood was the brutal master of Dartmoor prison, until he was murdered by an inmate in 1895. He apparently came back from the dead to take revenge. Nice move.

  Then there are all sorts of random, apparently unconnected links between Dartmoor and an old-fashioned version of our name: of-the-Black-Wood. There are hauntings, myths, and all sorts of supernatural things.

  Now, the internet can be weird. Can’t it? Sometimes searches throw up all kinds of odd things that have nothing to do with what I’m looking for. But a lot of this is weird with extra weird stirred in, and there is something about it all that just feels like it means something.

  But nothing is specific enough to be definite. Nothing says it must be about my family and Dartmoor or gives me a clue where to look or what to look for if I go there.

  I sigh and frown at the computer. What next?

  If Quinn lived on Dartmoor, she must have gone to school there or near there. I search for every secondary school in the area, and make a list with addresses, phone numbers. I start at the top.

  “Hello? I have an urgent personal message for one of your students. Yes, I’m a family member—​her sister. Sadly, there has been a death in the family. Her name is Quinn Blackwood . . . Oh? You don’t have a student there by that name?”

  I cross off the first school and carry on through the list. Each time some variation of the first call takes place that amounts to no Quinn, right through until I cross the last one off the list.

  How does someone live in the world and leave no tracks, no traces? Quinn must be a ghost.

  Quinn

  The bell goes at the end of an incomprehensible math class, but at least I wasn’t alone in not understanding any of it: a scan of the room earlier suggested most of the others were in a similar fog of confusion. Everyone runs as if the very Hounds of Hell are on their heels before the bell has even stopped ringing. But when I go to follow Jasmine, the teacher bars my way at the door.

  “Piper, have you got your coursework that was due last week?” His words have none of the softness of the English teacher’s.

  “Sorry. I don’t.”

  “I can’t grant you any more extensions.”

  “How about I bring it tomorrow?” I say, anxious to get away from him and follow Jasmine. If she disappears, I’ve no idea where to go.

  “See that you do.”

  Luckily Jasmine is waiting outside the door. “Have you got it done?” she asks, evidently having overheard.

  “Ah . . .”

  She raises an eyebrow. “Tim will want something if you keep getting him to do your homework for you, you know. And I don’t think even he is lovesick enough to do your actual coursework.”

  I’m shocked. Piper has Tim do her work?

  I follow Jasmine to the cafeteria—​time for some lunch?—​and the reason everyone bolted is apparent. It’s packed. But Jasmine walks confidently through the masses, and they part before us. A large table has two empty seats with bags across them that are moved as we approach.

  I sink into the one next to Tim, Jasmine on my other side.

  “Poor Piper, you look all in,” Tim says, and slips an arm over my shoulders. He gives me a squeeze, and I see Erin at the other side of the table giving me an odd look. Does Piper normally not allow this? I smile and lean on his shoulder, and her eyes widen.

  “Let me get your lunch,” he says. “What’ll it be?”

  “You decide. Thank you.” I smile at him as he gets up and heads for the endless queue.

  “Darling,” Jasmine says in a low voice by my ear, “when I suggested he’ll want something for helping in math, I didn’t mean to start right now.” I wink, and Jasmine titters. “Not entirely sure what the divine Zak would make of that.”

  “I can handle him.” I shrug, and wonder as I say the words. Can Piper really handle Zak? Surely not even Piper could get away with flirting with other boys when she has a boyfriend. Someone is bound to tell Zak.

  Jasmine smiles approvingly and winks back, and there is a feeling of warmth and belonging. This could be my life. It would have been, if Isobel had picked me instead of Piper when she left Gran and came to Winchester.

  It should have been my life.

  If only Isobel hadn’t left me behind. How could she do that to me? It is too late to ask her, and none of the conclusions I can reach on my own are comforting.

  Lunch arrives with Tim—​salad and a yogurt for me, fries and ketchup for him. Is that the sort of thing Piper eats for lunch? Lettuce?

  “Is that all right?” Tim is concerned.

  “It’s fine. If I can steal a few fries?”

  “Have these. I’ll get some more.” He’s so eager to please, he reminds me of Ness. I shake my head, and when he starts to stand, I take his hand to pull him back to his seat.

  “Really, it’s fine—​don’t,” I say, and his smile is absolutely delighted—​that I touched his hand?

  “No, I insist.” And he’s gone back to stand in the queue.

  What is it about Piper that makes her friends behave like this? I study the others at our table.

  They are all in the sympathy-for-Piper camp and defer to what I—​she—​says, some in a faintly odd way.

  Some of Piper’s friends seem to genuinely care for her, like Jasmine. And Jasmine reminds me of the fancy car types who come to the hotel and never notice anyone who works there. She’s beautiful; everything about her hair and clothes screams money, and the way she interacts with many of the other students and even teachers is much like they’re the help, beneath notice. Yet she seems to be Piper’s sidekick and happy to do what she wants.

  Piper seems to inspire love and obedience in equal measure in her friends, but why? How does she do it? It’s not by her goodness or sweet nature. She lied so easily to her dad and aunts; she probably does to everyone in her life. Gran would be horrified.

  And as if I’m really Piper, the lies seem to fall easily from my lips when I’m her.

  Gran would be horrified at me, too, a voice whispers inside. At me pretending to be Piper, deliberately making promises for her that can only land her in trouble, flirting with Tim just to create mischief. Why am I doing these things?

  My belly squirms, uncomfortable. One large Zak-size reason. I wanted to get back at Piper for how she made me feel when she spent the night with Zak. Some twist inside says she knew the whole time that I’d be upset.

  Gran was always right about me, wasn’t she? Isobel, too. The longer I keep up this charade, the more I prove them right.

  Jasmine leans in close, voice low. “Are you all right, Piper? Is there anything I can do?” Her eyes are soft and concerned. Her arm links in mine, and suddenly, unexpectedly, something chokes inside me. I look down and shake my head, unable to speak. Her arm goes around my shoulders.

  She
’s Piper’s friend, not mine. None of these people know me. None of them would want to.

  I look up, and the sense of claustrophobia I felt earlier rushes back. So many people, so many eyes, and they are all focused on me—​wanting me to be who they think I should be.

  “I’m sorry. I have to get out of here.”

  When I get up and start heading for the door, Jasmine follows. She shakes her head at the others, and they stay where they are.

  “Let’s cut. Go out for a Coke or something?”

  “No. No, sorry. I just need to get out of here and be alone.”

  “Are you sure?”

  “Yes.”

  She looks inclined to argue, then finally nods. “All right. But call if you want me, and I’ll come. OK?”

  “Yes. Thanks. Apologize to Tim for me. Do I need to tell anyone I’m going?”

  She shakes her head. “I’ll cover for you. Just go.” She leans in and gives me a quick hug. And I bolt out the door.

  Piper

  There’s a knot in my neck. I roll my shoulders forward, then backwards. How do you find a ghost?

  I think for a while. Maybe there is a flaw in my approach. Quinn never confirmed she was from Dartmoor, did she? All I know is that Dad met Mum in a hotel on Dartmoor. Despite all the interesting weirdness a combined search of Blackwood and Dartmoor generated, they could have nothing to do with anything. Mum really could have been from anywhere. This is a complete waste of time. I can’t phone every school in the country.

  But what else can I do? I sigh, head in hands. Think, Piper.

  Take a step back. What do I know to be true about Quinn?

  She’s my twin; we have the same mother, Isobel Blackwood. Quinn told Zak she was raised by her grandmother. Mum used to visit Quinn occasionally.

  I already tried all of Mum’s bills and records that I could find, and there were no stray trails to a place she visited regularly. She must have deliberately hidden her tracks—​whether from me or Dad or both of us.