‘Ooh, something touched me! It’s so dark . . . this is the scariest thing—’ Then a gasp. ‘What’s that light?’
‘Probably just an old hurricane lamp some tramp left behind,’ Taylor says. ‘Nothing to worry about.’
‘But suppose the tramp is still here?’
‘Let’s take a look. I’ll protect you. Come on.’
Their footsteps turn slowly in our direction. Poppy folds her arms and Amelia shrinks back into the shadowy corner.
‘I’m scared,’ we can hear Estelle whimpering.
‘There’s nothing to be—’ Taylor walks into the room. His jaw drops.
I brace myself as he looks at me, his face contorted with confusion.
Estelle appears behind him. ‘Aagh!’ she yelps.
Taylor’s eyes widen as he turns from me to my sister, and practically pop out of his head as he spots Amelia. ‘What are you doing h—?’
‘You pig!’ In a single, swift lunge, Amelia is across the room, shoving him backwards. Taken off guard, Taylor staggers backwards.
Estelle shrieks yet again. She looks about the same age as me, petite with short red hair and a snub nose. I glance at her neatly pressed jeans and shiny lipgloss and wonder how much time she spent getting ready to come out with Taylor.
‘How many girls have you brought here?’ Amelia demands.
Estelle watches, wide-eyed.
‘I don’t know what you’re . . .’ Taylor trails off as he catches sight of the sleeping bag on the floor and the various scattered clothes and plastic bags. ‘I thought you were missing. Are you staying here?’
‘This is your fault,’ Amelia says. She’s crying now, shrinking back away from him. ‘You started all of this.’
Taylor stares at her blankly.
He clearly has no idea what he’s done. Before I know what I’m doing I’ve marched over, hands on my hips. But it’s Estelle I’m addressing, not Taylor.
‘You’re worth better than this,’ I say, looking her in the eye. ‘Taylor doesn’t treat girls very well.’ I turn to him at last. ‘Do you, Taylor?’
‘It’s not my fault if you got the wrong end of the stick, Carey,’ he protests.
‘For Pete’s sake,’ Poppy snaps.
‘I haven’t got the wrong end of anything,’ I say. ‘And while I’m not saying this is all your fault, you certainly haven’t helped.’ I take a deep breath. ‘You were nice to me when nobody else was, but I think that was because you knew I was vulnerable. You sucked me in and then you lied to me.’
‘I didn’t lie.’ Now Taylor sounds injured.
‘Yes you did,’ I counter. ‘You were flaky about turning up for things, you pretended you’d never been to this hut before when I knew full well you’d already been here with Amelia.’
‘Is that true?’ Estelle asks.
‘Yes,’ Amelia says sulkily.
‘Plus you’d talked to Amelia’s brother several times when we were going out and you never mentioned it to me, just like you never mentioned Amelia had sent you back the necklace you gave her. I bet you even knew exactly what I’d been accused of when we met up but pretended you didn’t. You seem to like messing with people’s heads, having power over them.’
‘Quite,’ Poppy adds with feeling.
There’s a long pause. Taylor looks at each of us in turn. He opens his mouth as if he’s about to say something.
Then he shuts it, his eyes registering defeat. A moment later he turns and hurries away. His footsteps echo up the stairs as he tramps down to the ground floor. Estelle gives us a final frightened glance, then hurries after him. Amelia sinks down to the floor. She looks upset.
Which is when I realise that I’m not.
I feel free, for the first time in months. Poppy sent the SweetFreak messages and the death threat. Amelia put the dead bird in her own locker, then later, when the attention was dying down, decided to run away.
It wasn’t George or Rose or even Taylor. They – in their different ways – just picked on me when I was at my lowest ebb.
But I’m free of them now. And I’m free of SweetFreak.
All I need is for Poppy and Amelia to admit what they’ve done to the police, and my name will be cleared.
‘I can’t believe Taylor brought other girls here,’ Amelia says with a groan.
‘Yeah, well he did,’ Poppy says tersely. ‘So what’s the plan, Amelia?’ she asks, gazing around at the messy room. ‘Now you’ve worried your family to death and sent the police chasing after Carey?’
Amelia shrugs. She still looks shell shocked.
Despite all that’s happened, I feel sorry for her. I know how frightened and unhappy I was two days ago when I ran away from home – and I reckon Amelia’s been feeling just as lonely and miserable – for months.
‘How long were you planning to stay here?’ I ask, more gently.
Amelia wrinkles her brow. ‘Not long, just a few days. One of my tutors gave me this book about ancient cultures sending young people into the wilderness as a rite of . . . rite of passage I think it’s called, a way of facing their fears and finding themselves.’
Poppy raises an eyebrow. ‘So you thought you’d hang out in an empty hut on the edge of a Cornmouth industrial estate?’
‘It was the only place I could think of,’ Amelia says simply. ‘I just wanted to be away from home long enough for everyone to notice I’d gone.’
‘That’s sad,’ Poppy says sarcastically.
But it is sad. It’s seriously sad. I can’t imagine a life in which I wasn’t right in the centre of my family, part of everything. Even though Mum thought I was guilty she carried on supporting me, all through the past few months when absolutely everyone else turned their backs. And Mum, Poppy, Jamie and I were always a unit.
‘What a mess, Amelia,’ I say with a sigh.
‘I know,’ she says. Misunderstanding my meaning, she’s looking around at the clothes scattered over the floor. ‘To be honest I haven’t spent much time inside the hut. I’ve been out walking, doing some shopping, trying not to show my face. The nights are a bit creepy but . . .’ She trails off. ‘I just wanted people to miss me. I wanted to matter . . . I even imagined Taylor might come looking for me.’
‘Which was never going to happen,’ Poppy says with feeling.
‘I guess it wasn’t,’ Amelia says softly, her eyes filling with tears.
I lean against the wall behind me, feeling light-headed. Nothing is as I saw it: Amelia was more insecure than I realised and Poppy was more upset with me than I could have imagined. Nothing justifies what they’ve both done – but now I can see that maybe there were things I shouldn’t have done either. I could have listened and sympathised more back in September when they were both so upset about George and Taylor.
I could have been a better friend and a kinder sister.
And I realise something else too: that all three of us gave stupid boys we couldn’t trust far too much control over our feelings.
‘You both need to be honest now,’ I say. ‘You both need to start telling the truth. To everyone, including the police.’
‘Yes,’ says Poppy.
‘I can’t,’ says Amelia.
‘Of course you can,’ Poppy says. ‘I’ll tell everyone I sent you the first SweetFreak messages and that I’m very sorry. But you have to own up to the pigeon and to running away.’
‘But the pigeon is my reason for running away.’ Amelia’s eyes widen with fright. ‘I can’t tell my parents I put it in my own locker, they’ll kill me.’
‘Well you aren’t pinning it on me,’ Poppy says. ‘Or my sister.’
A light flashes outside. The sound of a slamming door echoes up to us.
Amelia rushes to the window.
‘It’s the police,’ she shrieks. She turns to Poppy. ‘Did you call them?’
‘Nope,’ Poppy says, walking to the door. ‘But I’m going straight down to tell them everything.’
‘Did you call them?’ Amelia asks as Poppy disappears. ‘Carey???
?
‘It wasn’t me.’ I peer out of the window. Blue is standing beside the police van, shuffling from side to side. He looks desperately uncomfortable and then he glances up and spots me and smiles.
My insides cartwheel as I smile back. Blue must have brought the police here. Which means he cares about me, was worried about me.
Amelia grips my arm. ‘I can’t tell them I lied about the dead bird. You have to back me up on that. Tell them it was Poppy. She did the SweetFreak stuff, she might as well have done the bird too.’
Her eyes are wide with fear, her mouth trembling with anxiety. For a moment I’m torn. Poppy was a mean cow to send horrible messages to Amelia and a cowardly one to fail to own up to doing so. But what’s done is done. Poppy says she regrets what she did and all the hurt that’s been caused, and that she’s willing to take responsibility now. Amelia, on the other hand, still wants to lie her way out of this situation, not caring about who she upsets.
Outside, my sister appears. I watch her talking to two of the police officers, who look up at the window where Amelia and I are standing. Blue waits at the edge of the group. I don’t think Poppy has even noticed him.
Amelia darts back out of sight. ‘Please, Carey, you have to back me up, you owe me.’
I stare at her. ‘Owe you for what? I get what you’re saying about me maybe not being very supportive, but we were still best friends. Which should have meant you trusted me when I said I wasn’t SweetFreak. And you certainly shouldn’t have made up more stuff to blame on me. On top of which I’ve been worried sick about you. Everyone has. I know I ran away too, but you let everyone think something terrible had happened to you.’
‘You’ve always been a rubbish friend,’ Amelia spits. ‘Always putting me down or making snide remarks, thinking you’re so much better than me.’
Silence falls. A few weeks ago I’d have leapt to my own defence at this point, arguing with her, desperate to show that I was a great friend. But now . . .
‘I’m sorry if I wasn’t always there for you,’ I say. ‘I never meant to make you feel bad. But, Amelia, there have been enough lies. It’s time to tell the truth.’
She stares sullenly at me.
There’s nothing more I can say to her. I hurry down the stairs and out into the chill evening air. There are five or six police officers milling around. They’re all focused on Poppy, not noticing as I scurry over to Blue.
‘Thanks for coming,’ I say.
He gestures to the police van. ‘I thought you’d be angry about me calling them but I was worried. In case it was Taylor.’
‘I know,’ I say. ‘And I’m not mad at all.’ I take a deep breath. ‘Taylor was here, but he didn’t have anything to do with it, you were right about that. It was Amelia herself. And my sister. My sister started the whole thing.’
Loud voices rise into the air. Lights flash around us. Somebody calls my name. I think it’s DS Carter, though I can’t see him.
I ignore it all. Blue moves closer. His eyes are dark in the night air, his face just centimetres from mine.
‘So . . .’ He takes a deep breath. ‘So did you see Taylor?’
‘Yeah,’ I said. ‘He’s an idiot.’
Blue smiles. Hesitates. ‘Carey?’ he says, his voice low and husky. ‘I need to ask you some—’
‘Carey.’ DS Carter strides over. ‘We need to talk. Please come with me.’
‘Wait here,’ I say to Blue.
‘It’s OK,’ he says. ‘You have a life to get back to.’
‘But—’
‘Carey!’ DS Carter snaps. ‘Now.’
‘Please wait,’ I urge Blue.
But somehow I know that he won’t, that he won’t want to have to talk to the police officers himself and that as soon as no one is looking he will slip away quietly. Reluctantly I let DS Carter lead me over to the police van. Poppy is standing there, still talking to one of the other officers. Amelia appears from the shack, flanked on either side by two female police officers.
‘You’ve got a lot of questions to answer,’ DS Carter begins.
I’m barely listening. I’m turning around, searching for Blue in the small crowd around the van. But it’s obvious immediately.
Blue has already gone.
34
I stare at the place where Blue stood.
‘Carey?’ It’s Poppy. She turns to DS Carter. ‘Please can I talk to my sister, just for a second?’
DS Carter nods and Poppy turns back to me. We face each other in silence for a few moments. Poppy’s hair blows in front of her face and she forces it angrily back. It’s such a familiar gesture and it brings with it a pang of grief that my sister has been prepared to put me through such a terrible few months.
‘I’ve told the police I sent all the SweetFreak messages, including the death threat.’ Poppy glances at the police officer, then moves closer to me. ‘I’m so sorry I tried to put the blame on you.’ She pauses. ‘And even more sorry that I didn’t own up to it sooner. Will you forgive me? Are we OK?’
I look deep into her eyes and see genuine shame and heartfelt misery. I’m still devastated, but I can see now that Poppy only acted as she did because I’d devastated her. And I’m still furious, But somewhere deep inside I know that I won’t stay that way, that Poppy and I are sisters. Family.
And, like Blue said, you shouldn’t give up on your family.
‘No, I don’t forgive you,’ I say, letting just the faintest shadow of a smile creep around my lips. ‘But one day maybe . . . OK?’
Poppy flushes, nodding. And then DS Carter signals for one of the other officers to take her away and I’m bundled into the police van and driven away.
The next few hours are a blur. I’m taken to the station, where Mum turns up and bursts into tears as she hugs me and berates me simultaneously. Poppy is given a warning for the original death threat and for failing to own up to it – then the three of us go home.
It’s bizarre to be back here, everything so familiar and yet changed utterly in the two days I’ve been away.
I’m allowed to stay off school the next day. So is Poppy. Mum takes Jamie to school then comes home instead of going to work and we talk and talk for hours, each of us explaining how we have felt about what has happened over the past few months. I’m not wild about doing this, but Mum insists, and once we’ve started I find it a huge relief to be able to tell her and Poppy just how awful my life has been since September and that the death threat exploded my known world into terrifying and unrecoverable fragments.
There is shouting (mostly from me), plenty of self-loathing (mostly from Poppy) and tears and hugs shared between us all.
If that sounds cheesy then it isn’t. It certainly doesn’t end with all of us skipping off into the sunshine without a care or with all our bad feelings soothed away entirely. But after a few hours Mum takes us into the kitchen and makes us help her prepare some soup for lunch. There’s something about the effort of chopping and blending and fetching bowls and slicing bread that binds us together. In some ways it makes me feel better than all the talking. Whatever, by the time Mum leaves to pick up Jamie I know for sure that in time we’ll be a proper family again, maybe even stronger than before.
That night I hug my sister before I go to bed and she cries on my shoulder. I lie awake, wondering what it will be like at school tomorrow. I haven’t heard a word from Amelia, though I know (because DS Carter calls Mum and tells her) that she’s now denying she put the dead pigeon in her own locker. At least the police don’t believe her, not after discovering that she wasted their time by faking her own disappearance.
In spite of my anger, I actually feel sorry for her. She must be really messed up not to be able to admit the truth even now. Once I’d have been desperate to talk to her, to try and make things right between us. But not any more.
I toss and turn, unable to sleep, while the house darkens and settles around me. I wonder where Blue is. Has he crept back to Seti and the squat? Or has he gone off s
omewhere on his own? Why didn’t he stay to say goodbye?
Well, I know the answer to that: he wouldn’t have wanted to be around all those police officers, especially after being framed by Taylor for that fire at his school. Poor Blue. I know how awful that is. Though, now I think about it, Blue’s situation was worse than mine. His mum wasn’t well enough to help him whereas mine stuck by me, even when she thought I was guilty. And for all that Poppy did a terrible thing, I couldn’t have got through the past few months without her support. Blue had no one in his corner.
But why didn’t he ask for my number before he slunk off? Or some other way of staying in touch with me?
Has he had enough of me?
I don’t really believe this, but the thought leaves a hollow feeling in my stomach that stays with me when I wake up the next day. I get dressed and force down the cereal Mum places in front of me. Jamie chatters on, super-excited to have me home and planning our next excursion to Bow Wood to play Warriors at the weekend. But all the time I can only think about Blue.
Mum, who is taking another day off work, drops Poppy and me at school. We walk across the car park in silence as the hubbub of arrival time surrounds us. As we reach the front door Poppy turns to me.
‘Your form teacher’s going to tell the class you’re innocent, that you were set up,’ she says. ‘Mum asked that my name wasn’t mentioned, that the whole thing will die down more quickly if there’s no one to pin the blame on, but I totally understand if you need to tell people it was me.’
I consider this. There is, undeniably, something appealingly vengeful about the prospect of Poppy being pointed and sneered at as I have been for the past few months.
But even as I relish this thought, another rides beside it – that leading a hate campaign against my sister will just keep the whole issue going. Not to mention make her life as big a misery as mine has been. And Poppy doesn’t deserve that, not after sticking by me for so many months.
‘Nah,’ I say. ‘I’m not gonna say anything. Don’t want my friends thinking my sister’s a freaking nut job . . . Even though she is.’ I grin.
Poppy grins back. ‘See you later.’ She squeezes my arm and runs off to her class.