Forbidden Friends

  I sunk down onto my bed. “What am I going to do, Bailey? How could they say something so awful about my dad? And how am I going to find out what really happened to Luke – what really went on between our two families? If only I knew what was in those two letters...”

  “Well, that’s easy enough, isn’t it? Find the letters and read them.”

  “Easy? What do you mean, easy? I don’t know where they are. My dad might have taken the first one with him, for all I know – and I can’t get anywhere near my mum to find the second one, not with Nan guarding her!”

  “Well then, you’ll just have to call your dad.”

  “But what if he won’t tell me?”

  Bailey pulled me up off the bed. “Blimey, Bee, I never realized you were such a defeatist! He might not tell you. He might pretend he never read it, or that it was an electricity bill or something, but surely it won’t hurt to try.”

  “I am not a defeatist,” I said, getting cross. “I was going to call him as soon as I got home, but that was before I read the diary. How would you like it if someone accused your dad of being a murderer? And anyway, how am I supposed to get Uncle Ron’s phone number without my nan or Mum finding out?”

  “Well, what about his mobile?”

  “I’ve been calling his mobile for the past two weeks. I’ve left loads of messages but he doesn’t call back. It’s hopeless.”

  “There you go again,” he said, shaking his head. “Defeatist! Don’t you ever watch any crime shows on TV? I’ll distract your nan while you look in her phone for your Uncle Ron’s number. Simples!”

  “Oh yes, simples,” I said sarcastically, but I followed him out of my room and downstairs.

  Nan was in the kitchen, stirring a pan of baked beans on the stove.

  “Would you like to stop for tea, Bailey?” she said as we came in. “It’s only beans on toast, I’m afraid. That’s all I could find in the cupboard.”

  “Is Mum eating with us?” I asked, trying to sound as natural as possible.

  “She’s still upstairs, resting,” said Nan. “And I’m not going to disturb her. Set the table would you, Bee?”

  “Don’t worry, I’ll do it,” said Bailey, “and I’d love to stay for tea. How was your holiday, Mrs. Brooks? I heard there was a waiter who had his eye on you. I bet you were fighting them off.”

  “Oh, get away with you,” giggled Nan, blushing bright red. “What’s Bee been saying now?”

  I grabbed a scrap of paper and a pen and left them talking about Carlos. I’d forgotten how good Bailey was at sweet-talking Nan. He’s just got this cheeky way of speaking to her that she loves. When I go round to his house I can never think of a thing to say to his parents – it’s so embarrassing.

  Nan’s phone was in her handbag by the front door. She only got it about six months ago but I knew all the family phone numbers were in it because I’d helped her add them to her contacts list myself. I felt bad about tricking her in a way, but in another way, I did have the right to speak to my own dad. I unlocked the phone and clicked on contacts. Raymond, Renie, Rita, Ron. I copied the number, locked the phone and dropped it back in her bag.

  Bailey kept Nan chatting all through tea. I watched him across the table as he entertained her with stories of his camping trip. I’d been so caught up with everything, I hadn’t even asked him how it went.

  “There was more mud than tent, to be honest,” he was saying. “My dad kept insisting it was character-building, but even my mum was begging for a hot bath and some clean clothes by the end of the third day, and we only lasted till the fourth.”

  “That’s a shame,” said Nan. “We had gorgeous weather, didn’t we, Bee? And the pool was lovely. I managed a swim nearly every day.”

  “Lucky you,” said Bailey. “Mind you, it rained so much in Norfolk, we practically had our own private pool right in front of our tent.”

  Bailey grinned at me as Nan roared with laughter. I blushed, looking down at my plate, my face burning up. I shook my head. What was wrong with me? I got up to clear the dishes, my stomach in the tightest knot, but only because I was about to call Dad.

  We helped Nan to wash up as quickly as we could and raced back upstairs. By the time we got up to my room, the knot in my stomach had turned into a massive great boulder. I hadn’t spoken to Dad since the Friday he went missing. That was only three weeks ago, but I was used to seeing him every day and it felt like a lifetime. So much had happened since then; it was almost like calling a stranger.

  “I’ll keep watch by the door,” said Bailey. “Just in case your mum gets up, or your nan wants you for something.”

  I sat on the edge of the bed, clutching my phone. “But what am I going to say? I can’t just ask him about the letter straight off. I really don’t think I can do this, you know.”

  “Come on, Bee, just chat to him. Tell him about your holiday. Lull him into a false sense of security and then go in for the kill.”

  “Bailey!”

  “Just talk to him, Bee. It’s not rocket science.”

  I turned to face the wall and dialled the number. It might not be rocket science to Bailey, but what are you supposed to say to your dad when you’ve just found out that your best friend’s parents think he murdered their son? I pressed the numbers really slowly and then held the phone up to my ear. Someone answered straight away. It was Uncle Ron.

  “Hello,” I said in a small voice. “Erm...it’s Bee.”

  “Oh hello, Bee, my love,” he boomed. “How are you?”

  “I’m fine, thank you, Uncle Ron.” I took a breath. It was difficult to speak. I wanted to hang up. Bailey nodded at me from the door, urging me to keep going.

  “Erm, I was just wondering if I could talk to my dad.”

  There was a beat. “Your dad?” said Uncle Ron. “Your dad’s not here.”

  “Oh, I’m sorry,” I said. “Do you think you could ask him to ring me when he gets back?”

  “What do you mean, love? What do you mean, when he gets back?”

  I clutched the phone even tighter. I could feel my tea churning about in my stomach.

  “I haven’t spoken to your dad, or seen him, in months.”

  CHAPTER TWENTY-EIGHT

  I still couldn’t take it in. Did this mean Luke and Aidan were friends? My brother and Bee’s brother. It was crazy. Aidan must’ve taken the photo of me and Luke at the picnic. Bee and I were really young back then, just under three, but our brothers were teenagers. They must have been mates. Maybe Aidan was even there on the night Luke died – but why was he saying sorry?

  I took the photo into my room and slipped it under my pillow. I really needed to talk to Bee, but I felt funny about it at the same time. If only things could go back to the way they were before Dad told me about Bee’s dad. It felt as if a hundred years had passed since we were last sitting up on our rock, giggling about the lifeguards and moaning about how hot it was. Now I had questions about her dad and her brother and I had a horrible feeling our friendship might never be the same again.

  The next morning at breakfast it was business as usual. Or as usual as it could be in our house. Dad was out for a run, but as soon as he got back it would be double maths followed by literacy. No six-week summer holiday for me. It was the same every year, two weeks in Spain and then straight back to lessons.

  Mum was at the sink, washing up. “I still haven’t managed to talk to anyone at the airport about your suitcase,” she said as I came in. “I’ve left a message but it’ll be a miracle if anyone rings back.”

  “Hey, Mum, you know that picnic you were telling me about? The one we had just before Luke died?” She turned round, frowning. The toast popped up in the toaster suddenly, making me jump. I took a breath to steady myself. “You were telling me at the memorial, remember? About how Luke stuck a piece of orange in his mouth to make me laugh.”

  “What about it, Lizzie? Why are you bringing it up now?”

  I shrugged. “No reason. I was just thinking about writing
a poem.”

  “Really?” Mum’s face brightened. “A poem about Luke?”

  I nodded. I hadn’t planned on saying that at all, it just came out, but it suddenly seemed like the perfect way to pump her for more information. “I was just wondering if there were any photos of me and Luke together?”

  Mum shook her head. “Not from the picnic. I didn’t have my camera with me that day – I left it at the hotel – but I can still remember the whole afternoon as if it happened yesterday.”

  “And were we on our own? Or was anyone else there, with us?” I took a bite of toast, trying to breathe normally.

  “Were we on our own where?” It was Dad, back from his run.

  “Nowhere,” I said quickly, hopping up from the table. Why did he always have to creep up on us like that? “Do you need any help with the dishes, Mum?”

  Mum handed me a tea towel but she didn’t say anything. I could feel Dad’s eyes burning into the back of my head.

  “I’m going up to have a shower,” he said. “I’ll be down to start maths in ten minutes.”

  Mum waited until she heard the bathroom door close. “Why did you ask me that, Lizzie? Did Bee say something to you? Did she talk about Luke?”

  I looked down at the pan I was drying. “Of course not. I don’t think she even knows that our families knew each other. I wish I could call her, Mum. Please. Just to let her know that I’m still her friend. Can’t you give me her home phone number? I’m begging you.”

  “I can’t,” said Mum, automatically looking towards the door. “Your dad’s forbidden you to ever have contact with her again. I’m not saying I agree with him, but I have to respect his wishes.”

  “But what about my wishes? When are you going to respect my wishes?” I bashed the pan down on the side. “Bee’s my best friend. I can’t help it if her family were involved in Luke’s death, especially as no one will tell me what really happened.”

  Mum took a step towards me. “Stop shouting!” she hissed nervously, her eyes darting to the door again. If only she wasn’t so scared. “Luke died in an accident. Your father insists that Bee’s dad was to blame, but it was an accident, Lizzie. Just a terrible, tragic accident.”

  “I know, Mum, you keep telling me. But what about Bee’s brother, Aidan? Was he in Spain? Was he at the picnic?”

  Mum’s hands flew up to her face. “No he wasn’t. No one was at the picnic. Why do you keep asking me that?”

  A door slammed and we heard Dad coming down the stairs.

  “It’s for my poem,” I lied. “I just want to know about Luke – about his friends and his last days in Spain. That’s all.”

  I left her in the kitchen and ran upstairs to get my maths book. How did Aidan get that photo if he wasn’t at the picnic? Or was Mum lying? She’d definitely looked shocked when I mentioned Aidan’s name.

  The next two hours were like torture. I thought I was going to die of boredom. Fractions and decimals and negative numbers. I just didn’t get how Dad could act as if nothing had happened after dropping such a huge bombshell on me. I didn’t want to know about converting fractions to decimals, I wanted to know about Aidan and Luke and Bee’s dad and what really happened ten years ago in Spain.

  “Mum says you’re writing a poem about Luke,” Dad said suddenly, almost as if he could read my mind. “We can use your literacy lesson to work on it if you want. We haven’t done a poetry unit for ages.”

  I was about to say no, that anything I wrote about Luke would be private and I wasn’t planning on writing a stupid poem anyway – Bee was the one who was good at poetry – but I clamped my mouth shut. If Dad thought I was writing about Luke, if I could get him talking about the past, he might let his guard slip and reveal something about the night Luke died.

  “Okay,” I said, as casually as I could. “We’ll do it in literacy.”

  I lowered my head, pretending to finish my maths, but it was impossible to concentrate. I owed it to Bee to find out what really happened – for the sake of our friendship. But even more than that, more than anything in the world, I owed it to my big brother Luke.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-NINE

  I don’t know what I said to Uncle Ron after that, I think I just hung up. He hadn’t seen my dad or spoken to him in months. Mum was lying. She took that call when the policeman was round. She said he was staying at Uncle Ron’s and that he was fine, but it wasn’t true. He must have called her from somewhere else, but why would she lie about something like that?

  “What did he say?” asked Bailey. “What’s the matter?”

  “He’s not there.” I was still gripping the phone in my hand, a million thoughts piling up in my head. “My dad’s not there. Uncle Ron hasn’t seen him in months.”

  “Where is he then?”

  My eyes met Bailey’s. I wished I knew the answer to that. But there was no way of knowing where he was. He could be anywhere.

  “What if the first letter was from Lizzie’s dad, threatening him or something? He might be on the run, like a real criminal. I mean, think about it. The letter arrives, it causes the most almighty row and then, a few days later, Dad disappears. He’s in trouble, Bailey, he must be. That’s why my mum lied to the police. She didn’t want them to start searching for him.”

  “Calm down, Bee. Didn’t you say the letter was addressed to your mum?”

  “I know, but maybe he sent it to my mum to tell her he was coming after my dad. Seriously, Bailey, what other explanation is there?” I could feel myself getting hysterical. Where was my dad? What if he was scared or hurt? What if Lizzie’s dad was hunting him down?

  “What about your brother?”

  “My brother? What’s he got to do with any of this?”

  “Well, think about it, Bee. You were all on holiday in Spain ten years ago, weren’t you? So if you can’t talk to your dad about the night of the accident, and your mum and nan are hiding stuff from you, why don’t you ask Aidan?”

  I opened my mouth and closed it again. I wanted to fling my arms round Bailey and kiss him.

  “Oh my God, you’re a genius! Why didn’t I think of that?” I jumped up and then froze as my hopes came crashing back down. “But I don’t know where he is. He moved just after Christmas and I don’t know his new address. He hasn’t been round for ages and you know how private Aidan is. He never tells me anything.”

  “Well, you could ask your mum or your nan, couldn’t you? They must know where he’s living.”

  “I’m not sure they know where he is either. My dad and Aidan had this massive fight last Christmas. Aidan was winding Dad up all through lunch. It was like someone picking at a scab over and over until it bleeds. He’s only been round once since then to pick up some of his stuff when he moved, but it’s not as if they made up or anything...” I trailed off, remembering how awful it was.

  Bailey stood there for a moment, thinking, and then grabbed my arm. “Come on, I’ve got an idea. We need to go back to mine.”

  “Why, what are we going to do?”

  He pulled me out of my room and down the stairs. “We’re going to find him online.”

  There were only four Aidan Brooks on Facebook and none of them had a photo of themselves as their profile picture. Bailey sent them all a friend request with a simple message explaining who he was. Just, Hi, it’s your old neighbour Bailey from Westbourne Drive. Bee needs to get in touch with you. You can contact her through my Facebook page. Bailey.

  “What do we do now?”

  “Wait, I suppose. It might be days before we hear anything.”

  I lay back on Bailey’s bed. “I can’t believe that two weeks ago my biggest concern was Melissa Knight and her stupid mates, and now my dad’s missing, he’s been accused of murdering Lizzie’s brother, and I have no way of seeing Lizzie, or talking to her or even finding out if she’s okay.”

  “Who’s Melissa Knight?” said Bailey, turning round from his desk.

  My face grew hot. I sat up, realizing I’d never told him. “Oh, just s
ome girl who’s been on my case at school. It’s no big deal.”

  He rolled his eyes. “Now who’s lying? Why didn’t you tell me before?”

  “I don’t tell you everything, you know. I didn’t want to go on about it. Can we just drop it, Bailey, please?”

  “Okay, okay, consider it dropped,” he said, holding his hands up. “So what school does Lizzie go to?”

  “She doesn’t go to school. Her dad teaches her at home.”

  “You’re kidding me!”

  “I’m not, it’s true. She says it’s grim. She’s never been to school. When she was really young, her mum used to teach her with these two boys who live at the end of her street, Danesh and Dilan, but then when she was...”

  I stopped mid-sentence.

  “What is it? What’s the matter?”

  “I’ve just remembered something,” I said. “It’s about Dilan. When I told Lizzie about Melissa Knight and Glendale High—”

  “Oh, so you told Lizzie about Melissa Knight,” said Bailey, interrupting me, pretending to look hurt.

  “Bailey! Stop being such a baby! This is important... When I told Lizzie, she said she knew Glendale High because it was right near to where she lived, and then this other time she was telling me about how much she likes Dilan and how he lives at the end of her street and that he’s always in the garden, messing about with his bike.”

  “So what are you suggesting?” said Bailey sarcastically. “That we go and look at all the roads near your school until we find a house with a boy fixing his bike in the garden. Talk about looking for a needle in a haystack!”

  “No, that’s not all,” I said, excited now for the first time. “She said she calls him C.C. which stands for Cromwell Corner because he lives in the corner house of her street. It was like a code or something, just in case her dad ever read her diary. I didn’t think anything of it at the time but her street must be called Cromwell Road or Cromwell Avenue, and we know it’s near my school...”