Laura

by Amy Cross

  She stops as soon as she sees me, and I can instantly tell that I'm the last person she wants to find in their hallway right now.

  “Sophie,” she says, barely able to meet my gaze. She's clearly seen the photos. She probably took great delight in my humiliation. “I didn't know you were coming over.”

  “It's a last-minute thing,” I tell her, taking deep breaths in an attempt to stay calm. “I'm really sorry to inconvenience you.”

  “It's fine,” she replies, before turning to Elliot. “Can I grab a word with you in the kitchen?”

  As they head through, I find myself standing alone in the hallway. I briefly catch my reflection in the mirror, and I see that my eyes are puffy from all this crying. After a few seconds, however, I realize I can hear heated whispers coming from the kitchen, which I guess means that Martha isn't ecstatic about my sudden arrival. A moment later she comes back through with a smile, although she immediately heads to the coat-rack.

  “Well,” she says, “I'm going to leave you two alone for the evening. Elliot and I can re-schedule our plans for another night. “She hesitates, as if she's waiting for Elliot to interject. “I suppose.”

  “I really didn't mean to -”

  “Don't mention it,” she adds, already wearing her coat and slipping into her shoes. “You know Elliot would do anything for you, Sophie. Anything in the whole world.” She grabs her bag and heads to the door, pulling it open before glancing back at me. “By the way, I saw those dreadful photos that had been put online. It's shocking that someone in the twenty-first century would do that to another human being. I hope the bastard is caught soon.” She briefly eyes me up and down. “There must have been hundreds,” she continues. “By the time I'd finished looking at them all, I was in shock. And I know everyone else feels the same way. Everyone we know. I'm just so glad that I never did anything like that when I was younger.”

  “They're fake,” I tell her.

  “Of course they are,” she replies. “Of course, honey. I'm sure you're right.”

  With that, she heads out and pulls the door shut. Turning, I see that Elliot is coming back through from the kitchen. He looks tired, and it's quite clear that he and Martha just had an argument.

  “Toby really threw you out?” he says after a moment. “But... I mean, the baby...”

  “There's no baby,” I reply, feeling fresh tears welling in my eyes. “Not anymore, not after...”

  I pause as I realize I'll burst into tears if I say another word. After just a couple of seconds, however, the tears come anyway, and I sit at the bottom of the stairs. Elliot comes and sits next to me, placing a hand on my shoulder. For a moment, it feels exactly the same as those days at uni when he always knew exactly how to help. In fact, it's only now that I realize I didn't even contemplate going to anyone else tonight. When Toby threw me out of the house, I came to Elliot immediately, almost as if I was on auto-pilot.

  “Someone's trying to destroy me,” I sob, feeling a flash of anger in my chest. “Someone has set out to destroy my whole life.”

  “You don't know that,” he replies. “It might just be -”

  “I do know it!” I continue, interrupting him. I wipe my eyes on my sleeve, but I can still barely see through the tears. “I just don't know who it could be! I know I'm not perfect, but I never thought I'd made an actual enemy like this! Someone who hates me so much, they'd go to all this trouble! I just don't have a clue who it is!”

  “We'll go to the police,” he replies, leaning closer and kissing the side of my head, just above the ear. Just like old times. “We'll figure it out, and we'll stop whoever's behind this,” he adds. “Don't worry, I'll help you. We'll catch the bastard, and then we'll make him pay. And that's a promise.”

  “I just want it to stop!” I whimper.

  “It will.” He kisses the side of my head again. “I'll make it stop. I'll do whatever it takes. You know that right, Sophie? I've always been willing to do anything for you.”

  Part Three

  ELLIOT

  Chapter Thirteen

  Ten years ago

  Pulling open another drawer in the kitchen, I search for a pack of tissues. I really don't want to take toilet paper in to Sophie, but finally I realize I have no other option. I hurry to the bathroom, grab a roll, and then head back into the front room, where she's still quietly sobbing.

  “Hey,” I say as I sit next to her, handing her the roll. “Sorry. This is all we have.”

  She tears some paper away and wipes her eyes. Mascara has run down her face, leaving smeared black trails on her cheeks, but she forces a smile as she sits back and wipes more tears.

  “I'm sorry,” she says after a moment. “I hate the way I cry so easily. It's completely stupid.”

  “It's not stupid,” I reply, hoping to reassure her. “You're in shock. One of our friends almost died last night, and your ex-boyfriend...”

  My voice trails off as I picture Tommy hanging from a noose in his room. I didn't see him that way, of course, but I can imagine it well enough and the image is burned into my mind.

  “I heard from Nick,” I continue. “He went to the hospital to see Lynn, he said she's awake and feeling pretty sorry for herself. I don't know if you want to go with me later, we could visit her.”

  She nods, but I can tell that she's still thinking about Tommy.

  “I just don't get why he'd do that,” she says after a moment. “I mean, I hadn't really spoken to him much over the past year, but he always seemed like one of those guys who never lets anything get to him. It's so weird to think that this time twelve months ago, he and I were still sort of together, and now he's...”

  I wait for her to finish, but she simply dabs at her eyes again before tearing another piece of paper from the roll.

  “It's almost like...”

  Again, I wait.

  “Almost like what?” I ask cautiously.

  “It's almost like I don't believe he did it,” she continues, staring down at the crumpled, damp ball of paper in her hands. “It's almost like I think there has to be some other explanation.” She pauses, clearly running through the possibilities in her head. “Something else must have happened last night,” she adds finally, turning to me. “There's no way Tommy would have killed himself. Do you think maybe something else might have happened to him?”

  Chapter Fourteen

  Today

  “I'm sorry I don't have tissues,” I mutter, handing Sophie a toilet roll. “You'd think I would, right? I guess I just... I mean, I could go get some! I could go to the store and -”

  “This is fine,” she replies, tearing some paper from the roll and dabbing at her eyes. She forces a smile, but I can see she's on the verge of bursting into tears again. “God, how many times have we been sat here like this, huh? Aren't you sick of me showing up in a mess and crying on your shoulder?”

  “Absolutely not,” I reply, before correcting myself. “I mean, I don't like it, but... You know what I mean.”

  She leans closer and rests her head against my shoulder for a moment. “You're a good friend, Elliot. The best.”

  “I just can't believe that someone would do this to you,” I continue. “Are you sure the account was anonymous? Did you try looking to see if the person left some kind of clue?”

  “There's nothing,” she replies.

  “The police'll be able to track the bastard down,” I tell her. “They have, like, tools and ways to find out who logs on and where they do it from.”

  “I don't know if I want to go to the police.”

  “Are you insane?”

  She sits up straight and wipes her eyes again. “It's humiliating,” she continues. “Maybe if I just don't react at all, the person will get bored and leave me alone. I don't want to escalate things and draw more attention to it all.”

  “No way,” I reply. “We'll go to the cops and explain everything. This bastard belongs behind bars! For all you know, it might be someone really dangerous, someone who isn't ju
st content to torment you from behind a computer screen. Hell, the photos might be just the beginning!”

  “And then more people will look at those photos,” she points out. “Some of them are real, but the worst ones are all fake. I just want to crawl into a hole and pretend like none of this ever happened. Do you think that'd work? I could change my name, start over somewhere else...”

  “That's insane.”

  “But it'd work!” She swallows hard. “I'd keep my best friends, obviously. People like you and...”

  She pauses.

  “This is exactly like what happened to Victoria,” she adds finally.

  “Do you think it's the same person?”

  “It seems like a huge coincidence if it's not.”

  “But why would someone do that? Why would someone go after her, and then come after you? I mean, what would be the point?”

  She leans back against the sofa cushion and stares straight ahead for a moment. “What if some sick asshole just hates us so much, he wants to destroy our lives?”

  “But this person isn't following you around, is he?” I point out. “I mean, what Victoria described is more of a real-life stalking case, where someone's actually following her in the street and sending her items in the mail. With you, it's more like a kind of online harassment. It's two totally different situations.” I take a deep breath, while trying to make myself feel better by focusing on the fact that no-one seems to be actively following Sophie in the real world. “You should still be careful, though,” I add finally. “You shouldn't go out alone, even if this has nothing to do with what's been happening to Victoria.”

  “They still might be linked.”

  “But who would hate both of you so much?” I ask.

  She pauses, still staring into space, before slowly turning to me. “Maybe it's someone from the old days. The stuff that happened when we were at uni was -”

  “No!” I say firmly, getting to my feet. For a moment, I feel a flash of panic, but I force myself to stay calm. “It's nothing like that. It can't be.”

  “But -”

  “Why would someone bring all of that up now?”

  “Because Laura was -”

  “Don't say that name!” I snap, unable to stop myself. I immediately realize that my reaction was a little over-the-top, but the mere mention of that name reminds me of what happened.

  “Elliot, we have to face facts.”

  “That doesn't mean digging up things that are supposed to stay buried.”

  “Buried?”

  “You know what I mean.”

  “Maybe someone thinks we were wrong,” she continues. “Maybe someone found out the worst of it, and they think we made bad choices. Maybe someone thinks we should own up to our mistakes.”

  I shake my head.

  “Why else would Victoria and I be subjected to this campaign of hatred?” she asks. “I've lost my husband, my unborn child, my dignity, I'm on the verge of losing my job, and all because someone decided to bring me down. I'm not anyone special, Elliot. I'm just a normal woman.” She pauses, eyeing me with concern. “It has to be someone who knows me pretty well. Someone who knows what buttons to push, someone who was able to get access to photos that Tommy had ten years ago. There aren't many people who would have the knowledge to launch a campaign like this. It has to be someone close to me.”

  “Now you're starting to sound like Victoria,” I point out. “Remember at dinner last week, how she basically accused one of us of stalking her?”

  She nods. “I thought she was nuts at the time.”

  “She's still nuts!”

  “Maybe someone's coming after all of us,” she continues. “Maybe someone wants us all to suffer.”

  “But why would -”

  “You know why!” she adds, her voice trembling with fear. “Don't act dumb, Elliot. It doesn't suit you. If someone is after Victoria and me, and if they come after you or Lynn or Nick or Jonathan next, then it's really pretty obvious why it's happening. It's happening because of...”

  Her voice trails off.

  “You know why,” she says again. “I think maybe this is happening because of Laura.”

  I want to tell her she's wrong, that there's no way the past is being dredged up like this, but at the same time I can't deny the logic in her argument.

  “We should have known this would come back to us eventually,” she continues. “As soon as Victoria started being targeted, we should all have realized that someone was onto us.” She dabs again at her tear-filled eyes. “It was inevitable, Elliot. We were wrong to think we could get away with it. Obviously someone wants us to pay for what we did. And do you know the worst part? The worst part is... I kind of think that we deserve it.”

  Chapter Fifteen

  Ten years ago

  “So the police want to talk to anyone who was at the party,” Laura explains as she pours milk over her cereal, “but they don't know who was at the party, so I guess it's kind of a voluntary thing at this stage. I'm not sure many people are gonna come forward. I mean, why the hell would you?”

  “Is that about what happened to Lynn, or what happened to Tommy?” I ask, glancing at Sophie for a moment before turning back to Laura.

  “Well, it's...” She frowns. “Actually, I'm not sure. Maybe a little of both. I mean, Tommy was selling drugs to a lot of people in town, so they've probably figured that out by now. I hope he didn't keep a record of his clients and transactions, because if he did, things might get pretty awkward.” She eats a spoonful of cereal, taking a moment to ponder while she chews. “If you ask me,” she continues finally, “the town is better off with Tommy gone. Drugs are disgusting, and the people who peddle them are scum.”

  “Excuse me?” Sophie replies, clearly shocked.

  “I know you and he were close,” Laura adds, “and I'm sorry for your loss, but you've gotta recognize that the guy was kind of an undesirable type. Maybe his guilty conscience finally got the better of him and he realized he had to atone for all his sins.”

  “You need to shut the hell up,” Sophie mutters, getting to her feet and heading out of the kitchen. “He's dead, for God's sake.”

  As Sophie hurries upstairs, I turn to Laura and see a faint smile on her lips.

  “Did you really need to say those things?” I ask.

  “You mean the truth?”

  “Laura -”

  “Come on, Elliot, you never liked the guy either.” She stirs her cereal while watching me intently. “You're just acting all upset because you want Sophie to think you're on her side.”

  “That's not true, I actually -”

  “Don't try to kiss her today.”

  I open my mouth to tell her she's insane, but something about the look in her eyes makes me hold back.

  “I know Sophie's vulnerable and upset right now,” she continues, still stirring, “and I know that might seem like a good time to slip in there, but trust me, you'd be making a mistake. If you want to get things started with her, you need to leave her alone for the next few days. Not for too long, but just a respectable gap.”

  “She's my friend and she's -”

  “Exactly! She's your friend, and that's a major problem. If you keep consoling her like this and following her around like a little puppy, she's going to start seeing you as only a friend. I mean, you're pretty much in that stage already, but I think there's still time for you to make a change.” She eats another spoonful of cereal, swallowing quickly. “And don't tell me you don't like her that way, because I know you do.”

  “You don't know what you're talking about!” I snap.

  “You want her.”

  “Laura!”

  “Have you and her ever even kissed?”

  I glance out into the hallway, to make sure there's no chance of us being overheard.

  “Tragic,” Laura adds.

  I turn back to her.

  “It's time to stop pussy-footing around,” she continues. “We finish uni in just a few months, Elliot.
Either you make a move soon, or you and Sophie are destined to be nothing more than friends for the rest of your lives. Would you be happy with that?”

  “Totally,” I reply, although I can tell I don't sound very convincing.

  “Everyone has always assumed that you two would get together,” she adds, “but time's running out. You're a smart guy, Elliot, and you're hot. You'll find someone else eventually, that won't be the problem. The problem will be the questions that keep popping into your mind, the thoughts about whether life might have been better if you'd just made a move on Sophie at the right time.” She pauses. “I can help you, if you want. I guarantee that I can get you and Sophie together and you'll be a happy couple forever and ever. Is that something you'd like?”

  “I don't need your help for anything,” I reply, heading over to the door. “I'm going to -”

  “Check on Sophie? Big mistake.”

  Stopping, I turn back to her. “She's my friend and she's hurting!”

  “If you go up there right now,” she replies, “she'll never be anything more than a friend. I'm trying to do you a favor, Elliot. Come sit with me and let me explain how you're going to win her heart.”

  I hesitate for a moment, before turning and making my way through to the hallway. I hear Laura letting out a melodramatic sigh, but I simply hurry up the stairs and head to Sophie's room, where I find that she's left her door ajar.

  For the next couple of hours, we sit on her bed, talking about Tommy and Lynn. She leans her head on my shoulder, and eventually I can tell that I'm starting to make her feel a little better. She keeps talking about Tommy, and about how it's impossible that he'd have killed himself, but I think she's coming to terms with the shock. And I keep my arm around her, so that she doesn't feel alone, even as she finally nods off and falls asleep.

  Eventually I hear footsteps on the landing, and I look over at the door. Laura is standing out there, and she watches me for a moment with a faint, knowing smile, before heading to her room. I swear to God, if she sticks her nose into my life much more, I'll kill her.