As Good as Dead

by Holly Jackson

  Pip stood off to the side, leaning against the backlit menu, still in sight of the cameras. She arranged her face for Hawkins, slack and unthinking, but really she was thinking about him studying the position of her feet, the arch of her shoulders, and the look in her eyes. She tried not to fiddle too much as she waited, in case he thought she looked nervous. She wasn’t nervous; she was just here to eat some junk food with her friends. She glanced over to Cara and Naomi and gave them a small wave. See, Hawkins? Just getting food with her friends, nothing to see here.

  Someone handed Pip her order and she thanked them, smiling for the cameras, for Hawkins. She gripped the three paper bags in one hand and balanced the cardboard tray of drinks on the other, walking carefully back to their table.

  “Here we go.” Pip passed the drink tray to Cara and slid the food bags across the table. “That’s you, Naomi,” she said, handing her the one at the front.

  “Thanks,” Naomi said, hesitating to open it. “So”—she broke off, studying Pip’s eyes for answers—“we just eat and talk?”

  “Exactly.” Pip grinned back, with a small laugh, as though Naomi had said something funny. “We just eat and talk.” She unrolled her paper bag and reached inside, pulling out her box of nuggets and her fries, a few lying abandoned and soggy at the bottom of the bag. “Oh, I’ve got the ketchups,” she said, passing one each to Naomi and Cara.

  Cara took the small packet from her, staring down at Pip’s outstretched arm, her sleeve sliding back toward her elbow.

  “What happened to your wrists?” she asked quietly, uncertainly, her eyes on the raw, ragged skin the duct tape had left behind. “And your face?”

  Pip cleared her throat, pulling the sleeve back down over her hand. “We don’t talk about that,” she said, avoiding Cara’s eyes. “We talk about everything except that.”

  “But if someone hurt you, we can—” Cara began, but it was Naomi who cut her off this time.

  “Cara, could you go grab us some straws?” she asked, an older-sister edge to her voice.

  Cara’s gaze flicked between the two of them. Pip nodded.

  “OK,” she said, pushing up from the booth and over to a counter a few tables away with a straw dispenser and napkins. She returned with a few of each.

  “Thanks,” Pip said, piercing the straw through the lid of her Coke, taking a sip. It burned in her throat, in the gouges left by her screams.

  She picked up one nugget. She didn’t want to eat it, she couldn’t eat, but she put it in her mouth and chewed all the same. The texture felt rubbery, her tongue coating itself with saliva. She forced it down, noticing that Cara hadn’t started her own food, was staring too hard at Pip.

  “It’s just,” Cara said, voice dipping into whispers, “if someone hurt you, I would kill th—”

  Pip choked, swallowing the regurgitated food back down. “So, Cara,” she said when she recovered. “Have you and Steph decided where you’re going on your travels? I know you said you really wanted to do Thailand?”

  Cara checked with Naomi before answering. “Um, yeah,” she said, finally opening her box of nuggets, dipping one into the ketchup. “Yeah. We want to do Thailand, do our scuba diving there, I think. Steph really wants to go to Australia too, maybe do some kind of tour.”

  “That sounds amazing,” Pip said, turning to her fries instead, forcing a few down. “You’ll remember to pack sunscreen, won’t you?”

  Cara sniffed. “Such a Pip thing to say.”

  “Well”—Pip smiled—“I’m still me.” She hoped that was true.

  “You’re not going to do skydiving or bungee jumping, are you?” Naomi said, stuffing in a few more fries, chewing uncomfortably. “Dad would freak out if he knew you were throwing yourself off a bridge or out of a plane.”

  “Yeah, I don’t know.” Cara shook her head, staring down at her own hands. “I’m sorry, this is just really strange, I don’t—”

  “You’re doing really well,” Pip said, taking a sip of Coke to force down another bite. “Really well.”

  “I want to help, though.”

  “This is helping.” Pip locked her eyes on Cara’s, trying to tell her with her mind. They were saving her life right now. They were sitting in a rest stop McDonald’s forcing down fries, having a stilted, awkward conversation, but really they were saving her life.

  There was a crash behind Pip. She whipped her head around, saw one of the drunk men had tripped over a chair, knocked it to the ground. But that’s not what the sound was by the time it reached Pip’s ears. And she was surprised, in a way, that the sound wasn’t the crack of Jason Bell’s skull breaking open. It was still a gunshot, blowing an unfixable hole through Stanley Forbes’s chest. Staining the sweat on her hands a deep, deep, violent red.

  “Pip?” Cara called her back. “Are you OK?”

  “Yes.” She sniffed, wiping her hands on a spare napkin. “Fine. Fine. You know what?” She leaned forward, pointed at Cara’s phone lying facedown on the table. “We should take some pictures. Videos too.”

  “Of what?”

  “Of us,” Pip said. “Hanging out, looking normal. The metadata will have a record of the time and be geo-tagged. Come on.”

  Pip got up from her chair and moved over to the booth, sidling in beside Cara. She picked up Cara’s phone and flicked it onto the camera. “Smile,” she said, holding the camera out to take a selfie of the three of them, Naomi holding up her McDonald’s cup in a mock-cheers.

  “Yeah, that was good, Naomi,” Pip said, studying the photo. She could tell the smiles weren’t real, none of them. But Hawkins wouldn’t.

  Pip had another idea, the hairs rising up her arms as she realized where it had come from. She might just be putting one foot in front of the other, getting through the plan, but her steps weren’t in a line. They were curving back on themselves, right to the start of everything.

  “Naomi,” she said, holding up the camera again, “in the next one, can you be looking down at your phone, angling the screen this way, so we can see it in the photo. On the lock screen, so it displays the time.”

  Both of them stared at her for a second, eyes flickering with recognition. And maybe they could feel it too, that all-seeing circle reeling them back along. They knew where the idea came from too. It was exactly how Pip had worked out that Sal Singh’s friends had taken his alibi away from him. A photo taken by Sal, and in the background had been an eighteen-year-old Naomi, looking down at her phone’s lock screen, the time on it giving everything away. Proving that Sal had been there, long after his friends originally said he left. Proving that he had never had enough time to kill Andie Bell.

  “Y-yeah,” Naomi said shakily. “Good idea.”

  Pip watched the three of them in the front-facing camera of Cara’s phone, waiting for Naomi to get her positioning right, lining up the shot. She took the photo. Shifted her smile and her eyes and took another, Cara fidgeting beside her.

  “Good,” she said, studying it, her eyes drawn to the little white numbers on Naomi’s home screen, telling them the photo had been taken at 10:51 p.m. exactly. The numbers that had helped her crack a case once before, and now they were helping her make one. Concrete evidence. Try not believing that, Hawkins.

  They took more photos. Videos too. Naomi filming Cara as she attempted to see how many fries she could fit in her mouth at once, spitting them into the trash while the table of drunk men cheered her on. Cara zooming in on Pip’s face while she sipped her Coke, zooming and zooming, until the shot was only of Pip’s nostril, while she innocently asked: “Are you filming me?” A line they had prepared.

  It was a performance. Hollow, orchestrated. A show for Detective Hawkins days from now. Weeks, even.

  Pip forced down another chicken nugget, her gut protesting, foaming and simmering. And then she felt it, that metallic coating at the back of her tongue.
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  “Excuse me,” she said, standing up abruptly, the others looking up at her. “Gotta pee.”

  Pip hurried across the concourse, her sneakers shrieking against the just-mopped tiles as she headed toward the restrooms.

  She pushed through the door, almost crashing into someone drying their hands.

  “Sorry,” Pip just about managed to say, but it was coming, it was coming. Rising up her throat.

  She darted into a stall, slamming the door behind her but no time to lock it.

  She dropped to her knees and leaned over the toilet just in time.

  She vomited. A shudder down to the very deepest parts of her as she vomited again. Her body convulsing, trying to rid itself of all that darkness. But didn’t it know, that was all inside her head? She threw up again, undigested bits of food, and again, until it was just discolored water. Until she was empty, retching with nothing more to come, but the darkness remained.

  Pip sat back beside the toilet, wiping her mouth with the back of her hand. She pulled the flush and sat there for a moment, breathing hard, her neck resting against the cool tile of the bathroom wall. Sweat trickled down her temples and the insides of her arms. Someone tried to push into her stall, but Pip kicked it shut with one foot.

  She shouldn’t stay in here too long. She had to hold it together. If she broke down then the plan did too, and she wouldn’t survive it. Just a few more hours, a few more boxes to check off in her head, and then she would be clear. Safe. Get up, she told herself, and the Ravi inside her head said it too, so she had to listen.

  Pip pushed up to her feet, shakily, and pulled open the stall. Two women around her mom’s age stared at her as she walked over to the sink to wash her hands. Wash her face too, but not too hard that it cleared away the foundation covering the tape marks beneath. She swilled cold water around in her mouth and spat it out. Took one tentative sip.

  Their stares hardened, disgust in the way they held their upper lips.

  “Too many Jägerbombs,” Pip said, shrugging at them. “You’ve got lipstick on your teeth,” she told one of the women before leaving the bathroom.

  “All right?” Naomi asked her as she sat back down.

  “Yeah.” Pip nodded, but her eyes were still watering. “No more for me.” She pushed the food away and reached for Cara’s phone to check the time. It was 11:21 p.m. They should probably leave in the next ten minutes. “How about a McFlurry before we go?” she said, thinking of that final charge on her card, another bread crumb in the trail she was leaving for Hawkins.

  “I really couldn’t eat anything else.” Cara shook her head. “I’ll be sick.”

  “Two McFlurries coming up.” Pip stood, grabbing her wallet. She added, under her breath: “To go. Or to go in the trash when I drop you home.”

  She waited in line again, shuffling forward a few steps at a time. She ordered the ice creams, told the cashier she didn’t care which flavor. She tapped her card to pay for them, that beep reassuring her. The machine was on her side, telling the world that she’d been right here, until past eleven-thirty. Machines didn’t lie, only people did.

  “Here we are,” Pip said, passing the too-cold McFlurries into their hands, glad to be away from the sickly-sweet smell. “Let’s go.”

  * * *

  —

  They didn’t talk much on the way back either, driving the same route in reverse. Pip wasn’t there with them anymore, she’d moved forward in time, back to Green Scene Ltd. and the river of blood on the concrete. Working through everything she and Ravi still had to do. Memorizing the steps, so nothing was forgotten. Nothing could be forgotten.

  “Bye,” she said, almost laughing at how ridiculous and small the word sounded, as Cara and Naomi stepped out of her car, untouched ice creams still clutched in their hands. “Thank you. I…I can never thank you enough for…but we can never talk about it again. Never mention it. And remember, you don’t need to lie. I came here, made one phone call, then we drove to McDonald’s, and I dropped you home after, at”—Pip checked the time on the dashboard—“eleven fifty-one p.m. That’s all you know. That’s all you say, if anyone ever asks you.”

  They nodded. They got it now.

  “Will you be OK?” Cara asked, her hand hesitating on the passenger door.

  “I think so. I hope so.” The truth was, there were still so many things that could go wrong, then all of this would have been for nothing, and Pip would never be OK again. But she couldn’t tell them that.

  Cara was still hesitating, waiting for a firmer answer, but Pip couldn’t give her one. She must have realized, reaching back inside to give Pip’s hand a squeeze before closing the door and walking away.

  The sisters watched as Pip reversed out of their drive, one final wave.

  OK. Pip nodded, turning down the hill. Alibi: done.

  She followed the moon and the plan, and in that moment, they were one and the same, taking her back home and to Ravi.

  Her parents were already in bed by the time Pip got home, waiting up for her. Well, one half of them was.

  “I said don’t be too late,” her mom hissed, squinting through the weak light given off by her bedside lamp. “We’re up at eight for Adventureland.”

  “It’s only just past midnight,” Pip said, shrugging from their doorway. “Apparently late nights are a lot later than that at college. I’m in training.”

  Her dad grunted from his half sleep, book open and cradled on his chest.

  “Oh, and just so you know, I lost my phone earlier,” Pip whispered.

  “What? When?” her mom said, trying and failing to keep her voice down.

  Another grunt of agreement from her dad, no idea what it was he was agreeing with.

  “On my run, I think,” Pip said. “Must have bounced out of my pocket and I didn’t realize. I’ll replace it next week, don’t worry.”

  “You need to be more careful with your things,” her mom sighed.

  Well, Pip was going to lose or break a lot more than just her phone tonight.

  “Yeah, I know. Adulting,” she said. “Training for that too. Anyway, I’m going to bed now. Night.”

  “Good night, sweetie,” her mom said, an accompanying grunt from her dad.

  Pip closed their door gently, and as she walked across the landing, she could hear her mom telling her dad to put the book down if he was already asleep, for God’s sake.

  Pip stepped inside her bedroom, shutting the door behind her. Loudly—not loud enough to wake up an already grumpy Josh, but loud enough that her mom could hear her settling in for the night.

  It smelled like bleach in here, and Pip checked inside her closet, bending down to look into the bucket. Floating lumps of clothing and duct tape. She prodded her sneakers back down, farther into the liquid. The blue markings on their sides had begun to bleach to white, disappearing against the material. As had the bloodstains on the toes.

  Good. Everything was going to plan. Except, not quite. She was already late for meeting Ravi. She hoped he wasn’t sitting there, panicking, although she knew him better than hope. Pip just had to wait a few minutes more. For her mom to fall asleep.

  She double-checked everything in her backpack again, repacking the items in the order she thought she’d need them. She looped another hair tie around her ponytail, tying it into a loose bun, and then pulled one of the beanies over her head to secure it all, tucking in any stray strands of hair. Then she pulled on her backpack and waited by her bedroom door. Cracking it open, moving it a half inch at a time so it made no noise, Pip peeked her head out and stared down the landing. Watching the weak yellow light in the gap beneath her parents’ door, cast from her mom’s bedside lamp. She could already hear the soft rumbling of her dad’s snores, using the in-and-out to measure the time slipping away from her.

  The light cut out, leaving only darkness behind, and P
ip gave it a few minutes more. Then she closed her bedroom door and walked across the hall, steps careful and quiet. Down the stairs, remembering this time to step over the one that creaked, third up from the bottom.

  Out the front door into the cold again, leaning into the door slowly, so the only sound it made was the click of the lock sliding into the mechanism. Her mom was a heavy sleeper anyway, had to be, considering the grunting, snoring man she slept next to.

  Pip walked down her drive, past her parked car, and onto Thatcher Road, turning right. Even though it was late, and dark, and she was walking alone, she didn’t feel afraid. Or if she did, it was a dull kind of afraid, an ordinary kind of fear, near-unremarkable when placed beside that terror she’d felt just hours ago, its mark still all over her.

  Pip spotted the car first: a black Audi, waiting on the corner, the intersection where Pip’s road met Max’s road.

  Ravi must have seen her, the headlights in Max’s car blinking on, carving two white funnels through the black of midnight. Past midnight. Quite-a-lot-past-midnight. Ravi would have been panicking about the time, she was sure, but she was here now.

  Pip used her sleeve to open the door and dropped into the passenger seat.

  “It’s eighteen minutes past.” Ravi turned to her, eyes wide with dread, just as she thought they’d be. “I’ve been waiting. I thought something bad had happened to you.”

  “Sorry,” she said, using her sleeve to close the door again. “Nothing bad. Just running a bit late.”

  “ ‘A bit late’ is like six minutes,” he said, eyes refusing to back down. “That’s how late I was; took longer to walk through the woods to Max’s house than I thought. Eighteen minutes is a lot late.”

  “How did everything go with you?” Pip asked, leaning forward to press her forehead against his, in the way he always did to her. To take on half her headaches, or half her nerves, he said. And here, Pip took on half his fear, because it was the ordinary kind, and she could handle it.