They Did Bad Things

by Lauren A. Forry

  Shit. I’m running out of time. I have to leave soon, and I can only write so fast. You want to know what happened that night. What the police never bothered to uncover. I guess it’s time I told you the rest.

  That afternoon, a delivery van rear-ended a two-door passenger vehicle on Griffin Road, which paralleled Caldwell Street along the back gardens of houses 217 through 209. The accident is documented in public records and consisted of no more than a minor tap. However, the incident escalated because the delivery van left a scrape on a car that happened to belong to the son of a junior MP who had both more money and more impatience than he knew what to do with. What could have been resolved civilly devolved into a battle of fisticuffs won by the van driver, who had a good three stone on the MP’s son and significantly more experience in backroom brawling. The subsequent sound of police sirens as the son of the junior MP lay bleeding on the eastbound lane of Griffin Road was what woke Oliver that afternoon. He could have gone back to sleep, but the sun coming through the window made him sweat in his sheets and sparked the urge to urinate. He tripped over his business ethics textbook and stumbled into the bathroom, where he relieved himself with a low, satisfied groan.

  “Good morning.”

  Oliver turned. Thankfully, he had finished urinating—otherwise he would have coated Maeve’s leg in a stream of warm piss. She stood at the sink with toothpaste foaming around her lips.

  “Door was open.” He slipped himself back into his pajama trousers.

  “Yep.” She pulled the toothbrush from her mouth. “Didn’t think I needed to close the door to brush my teeth.” She laughed too hard and sprayed toothpaste foam on his cheek. “Oh god.”

  She spat into the sink as he wiped his face with the closest towel.

  “I’m so sorry.”

  She spat again and wiped her mouth with her own towel. Oliver grunted and shuffled out of the bathroom.

  “I’m really sorry! There’s half a chicken sandwich left from my lunch, if you want it. I didn’t bite off it or anything.”

  He waved his hand as he descended the stairs.

  Maeve followed him into the hall. “And let me know if there’s anything you want me to get for the party!”

  “Party?”

  Callum stood beside her. His eyes were bloodshot and his hair and skin had a greasy sheen as if he hadn’t showered in several days.

  “Yeah. The party. You know.” She waved the foamy wet toothbrush as she spoke.

  “No, actually I don’t.”

  “We told you. We definitely told you. End of year bash. Final farewell to Caldwell Street. You must not remember.” She poked him in the shoulder. Callum palmed the area as if wounded.

  “No. Nobody told me. I would’ve remembered if Oliver was planning on throwing one of his stupid parties because I would’ve said no.”

  “It’s not one of his parties. It’s one of ours. We established rules and everything.”

  Callum frowned and turned to go back to his room, but Maeve caught his wrist and held it, his pulse thumping beneath her thumb.

  “Callum, what is it? What’s wrong?”

  There were few times in Maeve’s life where it could be said she was genuinely concerned for the welfare of another human being. Here, as she held Callum’s wrist, was the first of these times. And everything might have turned out differently if Callum had been allowed to answer that question. But at the precise moment he spoke, Ellie appeared in the hall, shower caddy in hand.

  “Oh hello! What are we all doing out here then?”

  Maeve dropped Callum’s wrist. “Nothing. Do you need the shower?”

  “I do. Didn’t have a chance to wash my hair this morning. Lorna took ages, and I want to look fresh for tonight. Aren’t you excited for the party, Callum?”

  It was then that Maeve performed the single bravest act she’d commit in her lifetime.

  “Actually, Ellie, I was thinking maybe we should cancel the party.”

  “Cancel? But we set up rules and everything.”

  “I know, but Callum’s feeling a bit under the weather, and it is finals week, after all. He needs rest. It would be rude of us, playing loud music, talking”—she lowered her voice—“smoking, when he’s up here trying to get some rest.”

  “Oh, poppet.” Ellie frowned. “Are you really that poorly?”

  Callum looked stunned. Whether because of Maeve’s actions or because he realized he had not yet escaped to his room, they would never know.

  “Forget it, Maeve. It’s fine,” he said.

  “Are you sure? It’s no trouble.”

  “I said I’m fine! It’s fine. It’s all fine. You didn’t ask me when you planned it. Why should you ask me to cancel it?” He vanished behind a slammed door.

  Ellie folded her arms, her shower caddy dangling from her fingers. “Well, honestly, there was no reason to be so rude about it.”

  Maeve watched the closed door as if by staring hard enough she could get it to reveal the secrets within.

  “Are you done yet? In there?” Ellie jerked her thumb toward the bathroom.

  “Sorry. Yeah. Almost.” She shuffled to the sink to rinse her toothbrush while Ellie waited in the doorway.

  “You know, if you wanted to cancel, we could,” Ellie said.

  “Really?”

  “Of course. I know how nervous you get at these parties. If it makes you uncomfortable . . .”

  Maeve snapped the toothbrush back into its yellow travel case. “I don’t get nervous. I’m just concerned for Callum.”

  “Of course you are.”

  “Not like that!”

  “I wasn’t implying anything.”

  “Yeah, sure you weren’t.” Maeve shoved her toothbrush, paste, and tweezers into her toiletry bag, shaking it hard when it wouldn’t all fit. Ellie’s shower slippers flapped against the tiled bathroom floor.

  “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to upset you.”

  “I’m not upset!” Maeve cleared her throat. “I’m not upset.”

  “Good, because the party really is going to be fun. I even bought some of those strawberry alcopops you like.”

  “You did?”

  Ellie rested her caddy on the toilet and brushed out her hair. “I got something for everyone. And you know I heard Oliver saying he liked that little yellow dress you bought from Top Shop.”

  “The one with the buttons?”

  “He saw it hanging on the closet door before you took it upstairs. He thought it was mine.”

  Maeve looked down at her waistline. “I have lost some weight.”

  “But it’s up to you, of course. And if you want to cancel, I’ll be behind you one hundred percent.”

  Maeve stared at herself in the mirror, smoothed the eyebrows she hadn’t had a chance to pluck, teased her hair with her fingers. “No, you know, it’s fine.”

  “Are you sure?”

  “You already bought all that food. It would be a shame to waste it.”

  “Brilliant! So are you . . . I mean, I need to shower.”

  “Right, yeah. Sorry.” Maeve gathered her towel and toiletry bag, then paused at the door. “Ellie, later, would you mind helping me with my hair? I can never do anything with it.”

  “Absolutely! It’ll be fab. We can have a whole makeover session.”

  “Makeover?”

  “Oh, the water’s warm. Better get my shower before it runs out. Mind closing the door?”

  Maeve remained alone in the hall for several minutes, staring at Callum’s door. I don’t know exactly what she was thinking, whether it was something to do with Ellie’s makeover comment or learning Oliver liked her dress or Callum’s attitude or how she hadn’t even thanked him for helping her with that tricky maths exam. When I asked, she couldn’t remember, like how she couldn’t remember seeing me and saying “hi” before she went upstairs to hide in her room. That disappointed me, but I wasn’t surprised. If there was anything consistent about their memories from that period, it was that they barely re
membered me. Even if I didn’t live there, I was around often enough. I knew all of their names, where they were from, what courses they were taking. I knew all their bad things and their secrets, and they couldn’t even bother to remember my face.

  10

  Maeve

  Maeve screamed and punched, desperate to get free from the hands trying to restrain her. Oliver had the keys. Oliver had found the keys. She needed to go after him. She needed to get them back. It was her job to keep the keys safe. She’d promised.

  “Maeve. Maeve!”

  She heard her name like a distant echo. A ghost calling to her.

  “Maeve, stop. It’s me! Look at me.”

  She hadn’t realized she’d closed her eyes, and when she opened them, the ghost was there.

  “It’s okay. It’s me. It’s really me.” Lorna held up her hands. “It’s me.”

  Maeve saw the blood—or at least, in the fading light, what looked like blood—but the air didn’t smell of it, not like when Hollis died.

  “Paint? Is . . . is that paint?”

  “I knocked over a can in that office. But I’m okay.”

  Maeve stepped forward, saw she was real, and the two women embraced. Maeve was crying before she could even think about stopping herself.

  “What happened to you? I thought she killed you!”

  “Nothing. Nothing happened. No one attacked me. I faked it.” Lorna rubbed her back.

  “Why would you do that? I thought you were gone. I thought I was on my own. I thought—”

  “I know. And I’m sorry. But I needed to get away from you. I mean, not you, specifically, but the group. And there was no way to do that without drawing suspicion.”

  “But Lorna, why?” Maeve pulled back and wiped the tears from her eyes. “It’s not safe to be on your own. Not with this crazy woman running around. She could’ve killed you for real.”

  Lorna rolled her eyes. “Right. And who is she? This crazy woman?”

  “Callum’s ex-girlfriend.”

  “The so-called ex-girlfriend none of us remember? The one Ellie conveniently recalled after she killed James Caskie?”

  “But the ballroom. She’s been sleeping in . . .”

  Lorna went to sit down, but the nearest chair was the bloody one in which Caskie had died. She turned away from it and leaned back against the bar instead. The paint on her clothes had mostly dried, but the occasional patch glistened like a fresh wound.

  “Callum never had a girlfriend,” she said. “He cared about you. He wanted you. Ellie’s story is bogus. A cover. Someone was camped out in the ballroom, but it’s not any mythical ex. There isn’t anyone else here. I think . . . I think it was just Ellie.”

  “That doesn’t make any sense,” Maeve said. “Why would Ellie be living here? Hiding here? How would she have even known . . .” She thought back on everything Ellie had done this weekend, every comment, every reaction. Had she known all along? How good an actress was she? It didn’t seem possible. And yet, Maeve had been so hurt when Ellie mentioned a girlfriend. It would be just like Ellie to make up a story that would hurt Maeve the most.

  “She looked right at me, Maeve. Ellie looked me right in the eye when she bent down to check that I was dead. She knew I was alive. She knew I was faking. She played along anyway, and the only reason she would do that would be to maintain her story that someone else is here.”

  “Is that why you did it? To see her reaction?”

  “I did it so I could sneak around and see what proof I could find. I didn’t know it would be her that checked on me. But turns out that’s all I needed to see.” Lorna pushed off the bar and paced the floor, carefully avoiding the blood soaked into the carpet. “When Caskie died, I couldn’t stop asking myself, why would Ellie do that? She had no reason unless she knew he was working with us and she killed him to get back at us.”

  “But what was Caskie even doing here? He wasn’t supposed to come back till tomorrow morning.”

  “I don’t know. I never got the chance to ask him. But Ellie must’ve found out about our plan.”

  “Princess. God, I shouldn’t have called her princess in the text.” Maeve said. “She figured out it was us and then must’ve found out what we’d planned. But then why did she come at all? If she knew what we were going to do, why not stay home? Why risk hiding out in that other room if Caskie or even Mr. MacLeod could’ve found her? Why would she be camping out here at all? What was she doing all that time? And did she kill Mr. MacLeod?”

  “Maybe. I don’t know.”

  “She must’ve. And she could’ve slipped that twine into my pocket when we were searching the rooms together. But I still don’t understand why Caskie returned early in the first place. He wasn’t supposed to come back until Monday morning.”

  “I don’t know. He said it’s because MacLeod found out we were staying here, but Caskie had problems of his own. It’s why we were able to convince him to let the house to us in the first place. He wouldn’t have tried to defraud his employer if he was such an honest, upstanding young man, now would he?”

  “So maybe Ellie turned him? Like a double agent?”

  “I don’t know.”

  “But then she killed him anyway? And what are we supposed to do on Monday?”

  “I don’t know.”

  “He was supposed to find the two of us hysterical, covered in blood, weeping over the nightmare weekend we only barely survived. The last ones standing. The final girls.”

  “I don’t know!” Lorna pressed her palms against her eyes. “I don’t know. I don’t know! God, Maeve. I don’t have all the answers! All I know is our plan’s been fucked ever since MacLeod turned up. But Hollis is dead, and Oliver’s too stupid to pull something like this off. Put tampons and a bra in with that camping stuff to throw us off his scent? Please. He couldn’t even touch an empty box of tampons on our bathroom counter. It has to be Ellie. She killed Callum, and we’re the only witnesses to what happened that night. You, me, Oliver, Hollis. For years, that’s never been a problem. None of us was going to talk. But once we texted her about Caldwell Street, that looked like it was going to change. So she plays along and decides to take her chances. See if she can off us one by one. So we need to sort her out. Now. Like we always planned. And the rest we can figure out later.”

  Maeve looked up at the ceiling as if she could see through the floors and walls to the room where Ellie was trapped.

  “Oliver!” Maeve remembered. “He took the keys, the diary . . .”

  “And he can’t get far. He won’t know how to navigate Caskie’s boat back to Skye, and the next ferry is over twenty-four hours away. Let him go for now, and we’ll take care of Ellie first. Finish what we started.” Lorna held out her hand.

  Maeve took it.

  Lorna

  13 months prior

  It had been the kind of Edinburgh day that taunted with the promise of blue skies and sun in the morning but drew clouds and temperature drops in the afternoon. She sat in a back booth against the large picture window in Black Medicine Coffee, nursing her second flat white while ignoring the pain au chocolat in front of her. Though the café was warm, she huddled in her oversized peacoat, a knit cap pulled down over her ears. Each time she checked her watch, she had to draw back the sleeve of her coat and the jumper underneath. The train had arrived twenty minutes ago, and Waverly was only an eight-minute walk away. She supposed she could’ve chosen a seat by the door. It would’ve made it easier to watch the people passing by, maybe pick her out from the crowd. But the table by the door felt too exposed. A back booth felt more suitable for their discussion. If she came, that was.

  And come she did, bursting through the doorway in that clumsy manner of hers that hadn’t changed in two decades, late as always, more frazzled than she was trying to appear. She looked for Lorna and, once spotting her, gave a big childish wave before ordering her coffee. She waited at the counter until it was done, even though they’d bring it to the table, and spilled some of the
large, frothy cappuccino as she carried it over.

  “Lorna, oh my god. It’s so good to see you!”

  Despite Lorna’s reluctance, Maeve drew her into a hug before taking a seat.

  “Did you get a pastry? Maybe I should get a pastry, too.” She looked over at the counter. “I got food on the train, but dropped half my sandwich on the floor, spilled coffee on my lap, and the toddler next to me swiped my crisps. Although I suppose he wasn’t a toddler. Maybe five or six? I’m terrible at judging ages. Do they have any danishes or scones?”

  Lorna pushed the pain au chocolat across the table. “You can have this.”

  “Are you sure?” Maeve asked, already picking it up.

  “I’m not as hungry as I thought.”

  “God, Lorna. Cheers. Thanks.” She bit into it and spoke with her mouth full. “And thank you for all this. I can’t remember the last time I had a holiday where I wasn’t playing nanny to Max’s kids. You remember my brother, Max, don’t you?”

  “I do.” She looked at Maeve’s frizzy hair, the bags under her eyes, the uneven lipstick. “You’re exactly as I remember.”

  “You don’t look too bad yourself. I love what you’ve done with your hair!”

  “I’m trying something new.”

  The pain au chocolat was already gone—all that remained was a few flakes on the plate and a crumb stuck to Maeve’s lower lip.

  “I dropped my bag at the hotel before I came over. I hope you don’t mind. That place is so cute! I would’ve never found it on my own. I usually end up at a Travelodge or, if I’m really lucky, a Jurys Inn.” She rolled her eyes.

  “Maeve, I don’t want to be rude, but I’d like to get straight to the point.”

  Maeve paused with the oversized mug at her lips.

  “About why I invited you up here.”

  “Oh! Yes! I’ll be honest, I never really pictured myself working for a university, but to tell the truth, I could so do with a change of scenery. I’ve always liked the idea of Edinburgh, even if I struggle with the Scots accent. The poor conductor had to repeat himself four times before I figured out he only wanted to see my ticket. What? I’m rambling again, aren’t I? Sorry. It’s . . . I’m so excited to see you. To see anyone, really.”