Burning Bright

  ‘No, Mum. It’s fine,’ I said, numbly.

  I tried to focus on what she had asked. In some ways the idea of endless weeks on the commune filled me with horror. But the idea of being holed up with Mum all summer was worse. Anyway, what did it really matter what I did?

  Flynn wasn’t who I thought he was. I couldn’t trust him. He had changed and I had to cope with that. The irony was, of course, that the only person I wanted to help me cope was Flynn. I wanted his arms around me more than anything.

  Mum drew up outside Emmi’s house. ‘I have to make a work call,’ she said. ‘I’ll wait here. Don’t be too long.’

  ‘Okay.’ I hauled myself out of the car and trudged up the steps to Emmi’s front door. Emmi’s mum let me in. She looked harassed.

  ‘I had a quick look in Emmi’s room but it was such a mess, as usual . . .’ She sighed. ‘I couldn’t work out which were your things and which were hers, so you’d better have a look yourself.’

  ‘Did Emmi get home okay then?’ I said, feeling awkward as I walked to the stairs. Was Emmi in trouble for sneaking out too?

  ‘Yes, she got back about one,’ Emmi’s mum said. ‘I had no idea she’d even gone out, but after your mum called, Louise said Emmi had told her, so at least . . .’ She sighed. ‘A friend of Emmi’s brought her home in a taxi,’ she went on. ‘I suppose she was safe, but she shouldn’t have gone on a school night, though she was up again all bright and breezy this morning, so . . . Anyway, you girls must tell us where you are. You have no idea how we worry.’ She sighed again.

  I shook my head as I made my way up the stairs to Emmi’s room. Thanks to Emmi’s parents being fairly slack and her older sister Louise being prepared to cover for her, Emmi never seemed to get into as much trouble as I did. Plus she always managed to charm her way out of things. Look at the way she’d got the guy she’d bumped into at the club to bring her home in a cab.

  I stood in the doorway of Emmi’s room.

  ‘I’ll leave you to it,’ her mum said. She drifted away towards the bathroom and I gazed around the bedroom. It was, certainly, in a terrible mess. Clothes were strewn everywhere, mostly on the carpet around the bed. I wandered over and started looking for my school uniform and bag full of textbooks.

  I couldn’t see them anywhere. I was certain I’d just dumped them on the floor, but perhaps Emmi had shoved them somewhere out of the way.

  I had a quick look under the bed, then yanked open Emmi’s walk-in closet. It was, if anything, even messier than the rest of the bedroom. I saw my school bag straight away, but there was still no sign of my uniform. I sat on the floor, my head throbbing again from my exertions, examining a huge pile of jumpers. Nothing. I lay down, flat on the floor, peering into the corners of the closet. There, right at the back, under the racks full of shoes, was a heap of school skirts and shirts. Had my stuff got mixed in with Emmi’s?

  I crawled closer, pulling the bits and pieces of uniform towards me. I examined the various skirts and shirts – none of them were mine. Only one last shirt remained. It was half hidden behind a small wooden box that I vaguely remembered once seeing at the end of Emmi’s bed when we were younger. As I reached around behind the box to free the shirt, I caught a flash of silver on some dark blue cloth. The silver was a crest, a school crest. But not ours. It was the logo for St Cletus’s, the school that Flynn and Alex and James went to. Curious, I tugged at the cloth – it was an old-style PE bag. Our school didn’t use such things but I knew the boys were supposed to keep their football boots in them.

  I pulled the bag properly into view. There was something inside it.

  Forgetting my search for my uniform and Mum waiting outside in the car, I opened the bag then gasped, unable to believe what was inside.

  24

  It was an iPad. I turned it over. The metal on the back was engraved with Alex’s name.

  What was Alex’s missing iPad doing here, shoved out of sight at the back of Emmi’s walk-in closet? Had Emmi taken it? Had she hidden it here?

  My mind reeled with the implications. If Alex’s iPad was here, then it surely proved Flynn hadn’t stolen it. But why would Emmi steal it? Alex was her boyfriend. The answer hit me like a fist. Emmi must have taken the iPad in order to put the blame on Flynn. No. Surely Emmi wouldn’t do that? She’d never liked him but it was unthinkable that she would go this far.

  Wasn’t it?

  ‘River, how are you doing?’ Emmi’s mum’s voice echoed towards me from across the landing.

  ‘Fine.’ I scrambled to my feet, wrapping the PE bag around the iPad. I shoved it into my school bag and stood up. I walked out of the closet as Emmi’s mum appeared in the bedroom doorway.

  ‘Find everything?’ she asked.

  As she spoke, I caught sight of my school shoes, tie, shirt and skirt in a neat pile just to the right of the door. I hadn’t noticed before, but Emmi had obviously left them there for me this morning.

  ‘Yes, thanks.’ I held out my school bag to show Emmi’s mum then picked up the pile of clothes and followed her out of the room.

  Emmi’s mum chattered away as we went downstairs, but I didn’t hear a word. I said goodbye, still in a daze, and got back in the car with Mum. She was on the phone, but ended the call as I sat down in the passenger seat, my bag on my lap.

  ‘I’m just going to drop you at home, River,’ she said. ‘Then I have to shoot off to work. I’ll be back at six. We’ll have dinner. Then, perhaps, we can talk . . .’

  ‘Sure,’ I said, blankly.

  I had to speak to Flynn. It was all I could think about: he was innocent of stealing Alex’s iPad. My mind kept going over how he’d rung me earlier and how I’d just let my mobile ring then switched it off because I couldn’t face him. I needed to call him back straight away.

  As soon as Mum dropped me at home I rushed up to my room and switched on my phone. Flynn had left a voice message. I listened to it, my heart in my mouth.

  ‘River, why aren’t you answering?’ He sounded desperate. ‘Listen, they’ve set me up . . . they’ve hacked my Facebook page, I know you’ll have seen it. You have to believe me. I didn’t put that picture there. It’s not even real, it’s Photoshopped. It’s a fake. It’s a lie, just like the stuff about the iPads. Please, River, please believe me, please call back.’

  A sob rose in my chest. Flynn had never gone anywhere near Alex’s iPad. I had the proof now – and yet, if I hadn’t found it, I wasn’t sure whether I would have believed Flynn. Guilt for my mistrust filled me to my fingertips.

  I sat on my bed, emotions tumbling through me. I felt angry with Emmi and shame over not totally believing Flynn and still completely confused about what had actually happened. I took a deep breath. The most important thing was that I talked to Flynn and told him I believed him.

  I called his number. But the phone didn’t connect. Not even to his voicemail. What did that mean?

  I tried again. And again. And again. Not caring whether Mum did a spot check later and got suspicious about the number I was dialling.

  But there was no reply.

  I went online. Flynn’s Facebook page had disappeared too. Well, it would have if it had been hacked and he’d reported it.

  But it left me with no way to contact him.

  Panic swirled in my stomach.

  I had to reach him. But how?

  Maybe James would have another number. After what happened in the taxi last night, he was the last person I wanted to speak to right now but it might be worth a try. Except that it was almost midday so James would be at school, just like Emmi and Grace.

  School. My chest tightened as I thought about how everyone at Flynn’s school believed the worst of him. Well, they weren’t going to any longer. I grabbed my keys and a coat and, with Alex’s iPad tucked under my arm, I headed to St Cletus’s.

  It took over thirty minutes to get there. I tried several times on the way to reach Flynn again but the number was still completely unobtainable. I was half expecting the school
to be awash with boys on their lunch break but, thankfully, the entrance hall was quiet as the receptionist let me in.

  ‘Can I help you?’ she asked politely.

  ‘I have information about a . . . a theft from one of the students here,’ I stammered. ‘I’d like to see the Head, please.’

  The receptionist stared at me. ‘What’s this about?’ she asked.

  ‘I want to talk to the headteacher,’ I repeated stubbornly.

  My head still hurt and the dark, sick, miserable feeling in my gut was now a knot of intense anxiety, but surely Flynn’s phone would ring soon – and when I spoke to him I wanted to be able to tell him that the very first thing I’d done on finding the iPad was to clear his name.

  I waited another ten minutes, rehearsing exactly what I was going to say. I’d met Mr McClure, the St Cletus’s head, on a couple of occasions, most recently when he’d introduced the performances of Romeo and Juliet that I’d acted in with Flynn last term. He was short with sandy hair, round glasses and a warm smile. The boys said he had a really mean streak, but I’d never seen any evidence of that myself. He’d always seemed nice – and approachable.

  ‘River Armstrong?’ Mr McClure was standing in front of me. He smiled. ‘I thought I remembered the name. You were in our play last term, weren’t you?’

  I nodded, clutching the bag with the iPad.

  ‘Now, what’s this about? Shouldn’t you be at school?’

  I stood up slowly, then drew the iPad out of the PE bag.

  ‘I found this. It belongs to a boy who comes here. Alex Barker. He thought . . . people thought that Flynn, Patrick Flynn, took it.’ I handed the iPad to Mr McClure.

  I wanted to say Flynn was my boyfriend, but that was far too embarrassing. Mr McClure turned the iPad over. As he read the engraving on the back his eyebrows shot up.

  ‘This was reported missing several weeks ago,’ Mr McClure mused. ‘Where did you find it?’

  ‘At a friend’s house,’ I said. ‘A friend of mine and Alex’s.’ My throat felt tight. I’d come here only thinking about proving Flynn’s innocence, but now I was standing in front of Mr McClure I realised that if I said any more, I’d get Emmi into massive trouble.

  No matter what she’d done, I couldn’t do that.

  Mr McClure’s eyebrows rose further. He strode over to the receptionist and asked her to have Alex removed from his class and brought straight to his office. Then he asked me to go into the office and wait with him.

  The room was small and rather stuffy. A large bookshelf groaned with files and the desk in the centre was also heavily cluttered with papers. Mr McClure pointed to one of the chairs. ‘Sit there, please.’ He had totally lost his warm smile.

  I sat down, my hands shaking. Now what was going to happen?

  25

  A minute later, Alex knocked on the door and was ordered inside. He did a double take when he saw me, then another when Mr McClure produced his iPad.

  ‘River says she found this at a mutual friend’s house.’ Mr McClure fixed Alex with a stern stare.

  ‘Should we call your parents and the police to report its discovery?’

  I could feel my cheeks burning. I hadn’t anticipated this. Alex’s face went bright red too.

  ‘Oh,’ he said. ‘I see.’

  I stared at him. There was something wrong. He didn’t look in the slightest bit shocked or surprised.

  Mr McClure turned to me. ‘Exactly where did you find it, River?’ he asked.

  ‘Er . . .’ I couldn’t dump Emmi in it. ‘Er . . .’

  ‘You said a mutual friend?’ Mr McClure prompted with a frown.

  I looked at the floor.

  ‘Oh my goodness, was it Emmi’s house?’ Alex said.

  I glanced up, my mouth falling open. How did he know?

  ‘Er, yes.’

  ‘Right.’ Alex turned back to Mr McClure, his face still bright red. ‘Emmi’s my girlfriend, sir. She’s a friend of River’s. I must have left the iPad there by . . . by mistake. Er, thanks for finding it, River.’

  Was Alex seriously expecting us to believe this was all an accident? There was no outrage in his voice – nor any confusion. Just massive embarrassent. And it hit me . . . There was only one way he could have known the iPad was in Emmi’s bedroom:

  He’d hidden it there.

  Mr McClure looked sceptically at the pair of us then asked me to wait outside while he talked privately with Alex.

  I did as I was told. Five minutes later, Mr McClure reappeared. He thanked me for coming to the school to return the lost property. ‘You did the right thing, River,’ he said with a smile as he walked me to the door.

  ‘This means Flynn didn’t take the iPad,’ I blurted out. ‘You do see that, don’t you?’

  ‘Yes, I see.’ Mr McClure smiled again, but I got the distinct impression it didn’t make any difference to his overall feelings about Flynn.

  I had no choice but to leave. I wandered to St Cletus’s school gates. I remembered the first time I’d ever been here, for the audition for Romeo and Juliet . . . The day I’d met Flynn. As I reached the gates, I took out my phone and tried him again. Still no response. I scrolled to Emmi’s number. Had she known about the iPad? I wasn’t sure anymore. I hesitated, lost in thought. Her phone would almost certainly be on silent right now, while she was at school, which meant I’d have to leave a message. And I wanted to see her face when I asked her about it.

  ‘River?’ Alex’s voice brought me back to the present moment. I turned as he ran across the tarmac towards me.

  The wind blew a strand of hair in my eyes.

  ‘I only have a second,’ Alex said, his own blond fringe ruffling in the breeze. ‘Mr McClure told me to go straight back to class but I had to speak to you first. Please don’t tell Emmi about this.’

  I frowned, brushing my hair out of my eyes. ‘Don’t tell Emmi about me finding your iPad in her bedroom closet?’ I could hear the bitterness in my voice. ‘Doesn’t Emmi know already?’

  ‘No.’ Alex shook his head vehemently. ‘Emmi doesn’t know. Honestly. Look, if I explain what happened, will you promise not to say anything?’

  I nodded slowly. ‘Go on . . .’

  Alex held up the iPad. ‘I got this for Christmas but then the new version came out and I wanted an upgrade for my birthday but Mum and Dad said no, it was too soon, so I waited a few weeks then I pretended it had been stolen so my dad would buy a new one with the insurance.’

  I stared at him, horrifed. I’d told some lies to Mum and Dad in my time, but nothing on that kind of scale. ‘You pretended it had been stolen?’ I said.

  ‘Yes, I was worried my parents would find it if I hid it in my house, so I stashed it in Emmi’s closet. I was going to get it out and sell it later but . . .’

  ‘You accused Flynn of stealing it.’ My mouth fell open. I couldn’t believe what I was hearing. ‘You let him take the blame.’

  Alex looked away, his face covered with shame. ‘I know, but Flynn’s an . . .’ He paused. ‘I know he’s your boyfriend but nobody likes him. He’s rude and violent and . . .’ He paused again. ‘I shouldn’t have blamed him, but it’s not like I was the only one. Flynn was always getting in trouble.’

  ‘Was it you who hacked his Facebook page?’ I demanded.

  ‘No, that wasn’t me.’ Alex met my gaze. ‘I have no idea who did that but it was probably someone else Flynn annoyed. I get that you see him differently, but—’

  ‘Don’t say any more,’ I interrupted. I didn’t want to hear another word about how the rest of the world saw Flynn. I lived with the consequences of that every day.

  Alex nodded. ‘Okay.’ He still looked desperate. ‘Okay . . . so you won’t say anything to Emmi . . . you promise? I’m going to be in enough trouble when my parents realise I just “lost” this, that it wasn’t really stolen.’

  I bit my lip. I felt angry enough to broadcast what Alex had done to everyone I knew, but what good would it do?

  ‘Fine,
’ I said. ‘I won’t say where I found it, so long as you make sure you tell Emmi you have found it, so she and everyone else will know Flynn had nothing to do with it.’

  ‘Deal.’ Alex thanked me, looking relieved, then walked back into school.

  I went home. I tried to study, but it was impossible. Emmi phoned later to see if I was okay. I kept my word to Alex and told her nothing about the iPad. She mentioned it herself, explaining it had turned up after all ‘in Alex’s locker at school’.

  I pointed out this clearly let Flynn off the hook – as did the fact that his Facebook account had obviously been hacked – but it made no difference. Emmi was just as disposed to think badly of him today as she had been yesterday.

  The same was true of Mum who, as promised, sat me down for a Big Talk when she got home from work. I submitted to a long lecture which covered personal responsibility, problem drinking and the importance of Moving On. The fact that Flynn was innocent of the theft didn’t matter to Mum, any more than it had to Emmi or Mr McClure.

  In their eyes he was difficult and unlikeable and I was better off without him.

  And I was without him. I tried over and over again to call – but his number stayed unobtainable. By the time I went to school the next day I was beside myself with worry. What on earth had happened to him? Was he okay? I’d called James – who didn’t have another number for him – and even left a message at the hairdressing salon where Siobhan used to work. I was hoping that the owner, Mr Goode, would give me Gary’s mobile number, and that I might be able to get hold of Flynn through him.

  I had to switch off my phone for the whole afternoon in order to take the history and English tests we’d been set. I knew I’d done badly – it was just so hard to focus, not knowing what had happened to Flynn.

  After the exams I chatted to the girls for a while. Emmi was offhand about the tests, making out she’d done no work at all and didn’t care about the results. Grace was typically anxious – worried that in spite of all her revision, she’d answered the questions poorly. Emmi suggested we walked to the Broadway and bought ice creams. It was a sunny day – the warmest of the year so far.