Roadkill (LiveWire)

by Daisy White

  “Hey, sorry I didn’t mean to upset you. I’m just saying, people get the wrong idea about you two, that you’re, you know, together.”

  “Is that a bad thing? I don’t see a whole queue of disappointed guys waiting to ask me out!” I force a laugh.

  Matt rolls his eyes, “And I thought I was bad at this. Not a whole queue you idiot, just one.”

  Before I can process this Leo bursts between us, “Caz! I’ve been trying to get your attention for ages.” He blanks Matt, focusing on me. Leo in high energy mode.

  Matt winks at me “Gotta go. See you around Caz.” And he too vanishes into the shadows.

  Damn, I try to make sense of what Leo is trying to tell me but he can tell my attention is elsewhere.

  “Caz you aren’t even listening! Was Matt giving you grief? Did he ask about Rose?” He is concerned and I tell myself I am so lucky to have him as my friend.

  “No, yes…he, well, I think he just asked me out!”

  “He did?” I expect Leo to do his girly laugh and get all excited for me but he frowns and looks awkward. Oh god I hope Matt isn’t right.

  “Thing is Caz, he asked out that Anita bitch earlier too. I heard him.” He touches my arm, his face changing from green to red and back again in the light of a makeshift strobe someone has rigged up next to the pool. “Sorry.”

  I pull myself together, and tell myself it was as I’d thought, someone as cute as Matt would never ask me out for real. He must have been joking. “What…what did you want to tell me Leo?”

  He gives me a doubtful little look but then gathers momentum, “Well I found out the week before she died Rose was at a party on the beach.”

  “I remember. She camped it with a load of friends. I was meant to go but I got that bug.”

  “Yeah, well I was talking to Heidi, you know, from her street dance group, and she said Rose hooked up with this bloke. That night, nobody saw them till morning when she came out of his tent!” He is triumphant, delighted to have scooped some gossip.

  I am shocked, naively I suppose given our age, but I kind of thought Matt was right and Rose and Ashley would be together, well forever. They seemed to fit so well, and….bad timing Leo. Very bad. I wonder if Matt was really going to ask me out…

  “Hi guys. I bought you some more drinks. Are you coming over to Ratz for closing time?”

  “Ashley!” I must look as guilty as I feel because he is immediately confused.

  “Caz? You alright?”

  “She’s fine. Someone just asked her about Rose. Come on Caz, let’s go home.”

  For once I resent Leo speaking for me, it irritates me and I snap at him that I would rather go to Ratz. He looks hurt, and then gives me a look, and says he is tired and wants to head off, but to have fun without him. Ashley looks majorly embarrassed, and I suddenly wonder if he too thinks Leo and me are an item, that he has started a lovers’ tiff.

  “Shall we go then?” I ask Ashley, and he nods looking relieved. Walking back through the huge manicured garden, I catch sight of Anita dancing with a boy from college I vaguely remember. As her wrist waves in the air, a flash of silver and turquoise makes my head spin.

  “Ash, can I catch you up? I just need to see someone,” and I force my way through the sweaty bodies to Anita.

  “Hey Anita!” I shout, catching her hand.

  “What the hell are you doing you……?” Anita is furious. She has changed into another tiny skirt, a silver bikini top and the white floaty shirt, her dark hair straggling wetly down her shoulders. The boy, sensing a row, slouches off.

  I cut her short, “Where did you get that bracelet?” There is no doubt, now I am close. Her sleeve hid it before, but now in the light flooding from one of the downstairs windows, I can see the silver eagle charm, the turquoise stars. And the recently mended link that broke when she had a minor car accident back in January.

  Anita, scowling, snatches my arm and pulls me away from the crowds, guiding me back to the flower bed. The overpowering smell of roses and lavender makes me want to heave.

  “So, I repeat, what the hell’s going on? You just lost me that bloke you stupid bitch!”

  “I’m sure you’ll find plenty more. Where did you get that bracelet?” I all but shout at her.

  Her thin face is twisted in frustration and anger, obviously wondering whether to answer or just tell me where to go, but other people have noticed our row and playing the perfect party hostess she just gives a forced laugh.

  “Look I know it sounds crazy but it was posted through my door this morning. With a note saying……” she trails off shifty and embarrassed.

  “Go on!”

  “It said this person was thinking of me, and to wear it at my party tonight.”

  “What person?” I snap.

  “I don’t know. Look Caz, I’m not like you. I have a life, boyfriends….it could have been from any of them. I get stuff all the time,” she is triumphant, point scoring against a little nobody.

  “Come on Anita. Who did you think it was from? This is really important. If you don’t tell me I’ll call the police right now and tell them I’ve seen a bloke selling pills at your party. Have you ever heard of LiveWire?”

  She looks like a hell witch, grabbing a drink off the nearest bloke and downing it in one, glaring at me.

  “Hey, that was mine…”

  “Piss off!” she snaps in his direction, shoving her face close to mine. Her breath is rank and alcohol soaked, and her fists clenched, but I know I’ve got her. There is no way the great Anita could have anything other than a wildly successful party.

  I smile, “LiveWire, Anita?”

  “Live what? Are you pissed or something?”

  Ignoring her I make as if to pull out my phone, “And who was the bracelet from?”

  “No! I thought….okay I hoped it might be from Ollie, this bloke I met on Tuesday night. He’s kind of different,” for a split second, even though it’s dark I can see her eyes soften, “He sent me some roses at the weekend. How cute is that? I thought maybe he was just being shy…..I thought it was kind of romantic. What’s it to you anyway?”

  I look at her long and hard. She seems genuinely pissed off at my unexpected interrogation (see I did learn something from The Vultures after all!), but what a lame story.

  “It was Rose’s bracelet.”

  Silence. The music blares a different beat, and a grappling couple collapse into the rose bush behind us.

  Anita gives me a shove, hard in the chest, and vanishes into the dark garden, no doubt to tell everyone what a loser I am, yet again. Or maybe she won’t, maybe she won’t mention our little conversation for reasons of her own. I stand still and rub my chest. My ribs are sore.

  There is no sign of Leo and I feel bad for hurting him, but he made me feel like a kid whose mum has just grounded her. Or a loony. Still, I tap out a grovelling text. He is only looking out for me.

  Wearily, heading for the house, mind spinning, I can’t decide whether I believe her or not, but who else would have Rose’s favourite bracelet, and then post it to another girl? She wasn’t wearing it the night she… the night on The Road, well it never turned up in the bag of stuff the police gave us. Quickly I flick my train of thought away from that one. That’s classic Vulture territory. I rack my brains trying to remember if I saw it in her room when Leo and I were up there.

  Ashley is waiting patiently next to a crushed looking white flowered ornamental tree. He looks up sharply at my expression, but merely nods and starts walking up the Hollywood style steps to the flung open doors. The pale carpet has red wine stains and cigarette stains already, but I have heard a rumour Anita’s parents are rich enough to employ a cleaner so I guess they won’t care too much.

  Funny to think that we almost ended up with a place like this ourselves. After Dad died, Mum found he’d done all the right things with life insurance, and it sounds sick but we got money from the army too. But this woman Mum was friends with persuaded her to invest it in her
new textile company. Which went bust in six months. There’s enough for college, uni, travelling, and another flat up north that was dad’s when he was a student, but mum insists anything we have now comes from her salary. It’s like she’s punishing herself for losing the money.

  We make it to the rather impressive white pillared front door, when Anita reappears, arm in arm with one of her bitch friends, a skinny blonde with huge chandelier earrings.

  “Hooking up with your sister’s bloke is just soooo wrong Caz. Gonna sleep with him are you? Does it bring back memories Ash? The great Rose, who couldn’t put a foot wrong. Well she must have done, mustn’t she or she wouldn’t be dead?”

  Chapter Eight

  She has obviously wasted no time in grabbing more booze, and surprise, surprise she’s a spiteful drunk. For a moment it feels like I’ve been punched in the ribs again, but Ashley is expressionless, and just pushes us both past her and out onto the deserted street. There is no sign of Leo. We swing left, heading for the park, and Ratz. Out of Anita’s cosseted cul de sac (known locally as ‘millionaires’ row’) the houses are smaller, dirtier, more real.

  “God she is such a bitch. Why is she always like that?” Ashley sighs, his droopy face dropping another notch, making him look like one of those cute stray puppies that get picked first at the dogs’ home.

  “Believe it or not you are not the first person to say that to me tonight. I don’t know, she seems to get a kick out of having everyone hate her. And Rose always said she was jealous of her. Especially the modelling competition. You know Anita entered? She didn’t even get through the first round. Rose said she must have had a really crap childhood or something to be such a cow, but she can’t of can she? I mean her parents are rich, and….” Shut up Caz, you’re babbling like a loon. I am trying to get round to telling him about the bracelet, oblivious to the fact he is trying equally hard to tell me something.

  “Hmm. Look Caz you know how much we both loved Rose right? I’ve got to say this and I hope you don’t mind. Your sister was the most amazing, cool, outrageous person. You know that. But just remember she wasn’t an angel. Everyone gets some stuff wrong and Rose did to. Don’t put her up on a pedestal, ok?”

  I actually stop walking, “What do you mean?”

  He shrugs, hands thrust deep into surf boy shorts, his loose check shirt flapping in the breeze.

  “Ashley?”

  “Okay. She wasn’t just with me okay? I know everyone thought we were this perfect couple, but I heard what Leo said. That beach thing wasn’t the first time.” He squints at the moon, “I didn’t care though. Isn’t that crazy? I still loved her.”

  I am shaken. Is he saying what I think he’s saying? My sister was basically a slapper. I am shocked all over again, and suddenly have no appetite for a late night session/early morning by now at Ratz. “I’m actually really tired Ashley. I think I’ll head home.”

  “Want me to walk you?”

  “No I’ll be fine.” I say firmly. Then I stop, “Ash did Rose ever mention LiveWire?”

  He shakes his head, confused, “Unless it was that syncro swim team?”

  “Look, I know the police went over everything but I still can’t work out why she was down on The Road.” I look hard at him.

  Ashley scuffs a tatty Converse trainer, drawing slow patterns in the dust. When he looks up, the pain is back in his eyes, “I don’t know Caz. She liked to keep secrets, you know that.”

  A huge haulage truck grinds its way down The Road, lights flashing, and I watch the bridge illuminate orange in the glare. I consider for a moment, then, hoping I’m doing the right thing, tell him about LiveWire.

  He is shocked, but not so much, after all he hasn’t seen the dares on the website. “I can see she would have loved it. Just another crazy thing to do. She loved to push herself didn’t she?”

  “Yeah, it’s mad.” I take a breath, and ask,” So she could have gone on and done anything that night? A dare from LiveWire?”

  He is amused, “You’re worse than the police.” Then the amusement flickers and dies, “We had this row, well you already know that, and she stormed off home. That was at about eleven.”

  “She didn’t come home.”

  “No.”

  So what was she doing for three hours before she was killed? Of course I already heard all this at the inquest, and the police interviewed us all. About ten times.

  “Sorry Ash. I didn’t mean to bring it all up again.”

  He looks at me, as though deliberating, “The row. Rose met this other bloke online. Maybe on this LiveWire thing you asked about, I don’t know. She told me she really liked him.”

  I almost forget to breathe, unsure how many more shocks I can take tonight. The bracelet incident recedes into the background. Then I clock his sadness, maybe the real reason he is hurting so much. He thinks she tried to commit suicide, just like the police. Against my will, I remember the police report. Rose had high levels of some sort of drug in her bloodstream. I struggle….Barbiturates, that was it. Painkillers or sleeping tablets. Shoving these unhelpful thoughts away I scowl at Ash.

  “But she wasn’t going to leave you…”

  Ashley is closer suddenly, intensity glassing his eyes, “I dunno. I thought maybe she was, but then she kept saying it was tearing her up. Then I’d heard from someone about the beach camp. It was just like the last thing.”

  “You don’t know it’s true though do you? The beach thing I mean, people were always jealous of Rose. Perhaps someone was just trying to split you up!” I can’t believe I’m having this conversation. Why didn’t she tell me about this online bloke?

  He shrugs again, brushing his eyes roughly, fiddling with his phone, and I get it as clearly as if he’d spoken.

  “She didn’t try to kill herself Ashley. She just wouldn’t, because she had everything sorted. Everything. The rest is just stupid lies.” I tell him finally, much too loud, and as much to convince myself as the skinny boy standing lonely in the moonlight.

  As I stride away he has stopped and is staring after me with the saddest expression, then as I glance back, he shrugs again, and I hear soft footfalls getting further away. I am alone, which is good because I need to think. The street is dark and I scamper up it, past the newsagents, Tesco Express, and taking a deep breath, over the bridge. There are no street lights for about a hundred yards and I breathe the darkness, exhilarating in being alone, scaring myself.

  Trying not to jump to conclusions, because if I do my head might explode. Actually I don’t need to try to scare myself. The police said Rose was killed at around 2am, and as I check my watch I realise it’s five to. I wonder if she haunts this place, and more, I wonder for the millionth time what the hell she was doing walking on The Road at this time. Because she wasn’t trying to kill herself. She was too sussed to freak out over some imagined love triangle. The Rose I knew would deal with it and move on.

  My phone flashes with a message:

  ‘its ok – know u r still upset ova rose. Still love u!’

  Lovely Leo, my rock. He still refuses to decide what to do with his life, but he took loads of A Levels just after Christmas and already got top marks for pure maths, computer science, and psychology. That’s what happens when you’re clever, you take your exams early and get the whole summer off. He’s even been talking about applying to whatever uni I go to. But, bless him, he’s worse than I am when it comes to making a decision. He still can’t decide whether to go down the finance route or do a science degree. Guess when you’re that smart you can have too many choices.

  The Road is silent far below and I almost don’t see the shadowy figure, detach itself from the blackness, to thump up behind me. I spin and scream.

  “Matt! Can you stop sneaking up on me? That’s like twice in a week, I’m gonna think you’re a stalker or something!” I gasp in relief, and a tiny bit thrilled to see him again so soon. A tiny bit wary as well, after what Leo said. Plus half my mind is still chewing over my weird conversat
ion with Ashley.

  He smiles, “I didn’t realise you guys had left. Are you heading home?”

  “Yeah, Ashley went on to Ratz.” I feel suddenly shy again. Ask him about Anita, I tell myself firmly, but….he looks so gorgeous, silhouetted against the summer night, dark hair and eyes highlighting his slightly square face, pale blue shirt hanging loose over baggy jeans. I can’t bring myself to spoil the moment. And she’s not here is she? He followed me!

  I am sweating, “Aren’t you hot in jeans?” Way to go Caz, how to make a sophisticated comment. I sound like my mum; again! I must be the oldest eighteen year old I know. Dredging in the murky depths of my brain for some witty, sophisticated conversation I come up with…nothing.

  He doesn’t seem to care though, “Not really. Come on, I’ll walk you back.”

  “You don’t need to…” We are meandering along, drifting off the path onto the top of the embankment, surrounded by a froth of white and yellow flowers. It is very quiet, just a hum from The Road, but even that fails to unsettle me. My heart is thundering, and I am praying the hand he just took is not sweaty. His palms are cool and dry.

  “It’s 2:30am, I need to get back!” I push myself reluctantly from his embrace, heart thundering, as he combs my hair back with gentle fingertips. My skin buzzes from his touch, and we link hands like two kids walking back from a picnic. But not as innocent.

  It’s only when he heads back into the night that I remember he was coming up from the embankment again, and did I imagine it, or was there the rumble and crash of an artic. pulling away from the lay-by. I file it away for future reference. Along with all the other stuff cluttering the back of my mind.

  When I finally slide into my bed I spend maybe a half hour remembering, and Rose, from her lofty position on my wall gives me the thumbs up. I can’t even work up the energy to be indignant, to ask her about what Ashley told me. For the first time since her death, I sleep long and dreamlessly, and wake with a smile, reaching for my pastels and sketchbook.