by Tanya Byrne
What about him? I almost said, but I stopped myself this time.
I think that’s why I can’t sleep, because I keep thinking about that girl, the one with the neat nails and the brightly coloured purse who never missed a class and dated a guy who would bring her mother flowers and chat to her father about Boko Haram when he came to pick her up. Then I walked over to my closet, opened my tuck box and took out our cellphone.
Him and his paranoia, but he was right.
‘You’d better be worth it,’ I told him with a smile when he answered.
And he laughed.
12 DAYS AFTER
MAY
I’m a fool. A fool. They were seeing each other, weren’t they? The sneaking around, the disposable phone, the hours in the back seat of his car instead of the back row of the cinema like other couples. Normal couples. I thought it was because of me, because of my parents. I thought I was protecting him. And I actually thought it was exciting. I got a thrill from it, from lying, from having him to myself. But I didn’t and if he could lie about that, what else did he lie about?
I can’t stop thinking about it. Every time I do, I shake. It’s like a scab that I keep picking at. I think about every call he didn’t answer, every lunch break he didn’t have time to see me. Was he with her? Would he open his eyes while we were kissing to check his watch? Did he have to think before he said my name? Did they have a song? A place? Did he meet her in Savernake Forest, too, always late, his hair wet?
I used to like it, the way my fingers smelt of shampoo after I ran them though his hair, how his skin tasted of soap. That’s the real betrayal: not the lying, not even thinking that he might love her more than me, but the tiny betrayals, the secret ways she knew him that I didn’t. I imagined a photograph hidden somewhere in her room, tucked into a drawer, under her mismatched socks, or between the pages of a book he’d given her. A photo of the two of them. The thought of it was like taking off a cheap ring to find a green mark on my finger. And with that it was over.
Broken.
Ruined.
‘I know!’ I roared at his voicemail after I saw what she’d written in her notebook. I shouldn’t have, I was in my room and someone might have heard, but I couldn’t stop myself, somewhere between our fight in the graveyard and reading that note, doubt had become fact and when I got his voicemail again, it spilled out of me. I listened to the generic message and cried, not knowing how it had come to this. How it went from him sending frantic texts, desperate to see me, to not answering his phone.
All of this for a boy.
But then I went to bed and I thought of him – him giggling and counting my eyelashes with the tip of his finger, him kissing my wrist and telling me that he could feel my pulse, catching him looking online for apartments in Cambridge – each memory like an ice cube in a glass of whiskey, diluting my resolve.
How did I get it so wrong? I’ve never thought of myself as gullible, but I guess I am. Did he enjoy it, going between us? He must have. He must have enjoyed those little lies, the tang of them on his tongue, sweet as sherbet. That’s who he was going to meet that Sunday afternoon. I see it all differently now – the chug of The Old Dear then the ring of his cellphone, his brow tightening as he answered it. Why hadn’t I put it together? I guess I believed him. He hadn’t given me a reason not to until now. That’s doubt, it will make you think anything.
I turned on my lamp and reached for my cellphone, but as I was about to call Bones, I stopped myself. What was I going to say? That I thought he had murdered Scarlett? It wasn’t the sort of accusation you threw around. It would ruin his life. And did I even think that? It’s him – sweet, charming, funny him. I thought of him at the airport the day my father was shot, at Edith’s wedding, lying next to me in Savernake Forest watching the clouds bob by, in class, the corners of his mouth twitching a moment before he dropped a note into my bag, and I kicked back the duvet and walked over to my bookshelf. I pulled off the battered, second-hand copy of Love in the Time of Cholera he’d given me and opened it.
No one’s ever picked me.
I held it to my chest, my heart singing in that way it does every time I read it and I didn’t know what to do. I don’t know what happened. I don’t know how this happened. I wanted to call my father, but I knew what he’d say, he’d tell me to be honest, but how can I? I am in the middle of this, ingrained in it, deep, deep down.
So I did what I did when Orla told me that she had been raped and I treated it like I was writing a piece for the Disraeli. I rolled up a towel and put it against the crack under my door, then went to my desk and pulled out a stack of index cards and a Sharpie and wrote down everything I knew. Everything. Times, dates, facts. I wrote them all on index cards, then sat cross-legged on the floor and spread them out in front of me and I don’t know whether it was seeing it all, but I couldn’t look at it.
It was him.
I stood up and began pacing. He wouldn’t. He couldn’t. But what is it that Sherlock Holmes says? When you have eliminated all which is impossible, then whatever remains, however improbable, must be the truth and there it was, in black and white on my floor.
The pendulum swung the other way again and something in me kicked back. Was it black and white? I only had proof that he was seeing her, that he could have, that he had the opportunity, but did he have the will? Why would he hurt her? Why? I thought of Orla outside the police station yesterday, defending Sam, and I wondered if I was letting my heart win again as I looked down at the index cards at my feet, but it wasn’t enough. I loved him. It wasn’t a silly crush. He might have deceived me about her, but not about that. I knew him. I knew what he dreamed about, good and bad. I’d counted each of his moles, his birthmarks, his scars. Real things, not words scribbled on index cards. Why would he hurt her? He couldn’t.
But what if he did?
I tried to ignore the question, but I couldn’t and when I got up this morning, I went back to the pile of stuff I’d taken out of her locker, going through it again. I stopped when I got to the receipt. I don’t know why. I didn’t even know what it was for – it was just a small square of paper from one of those old tills that didn’t even have the name of the store at the top, just the date and time in greying ink – but I slipped it into the pocket of my blazer before I headed down to the dining hall. I’ve been thinking about it all day. I keep taking it out of my pocket to stare at it – wondering what she’d bought – before I tell myself that it could be from anywhere, given her inability to stay still, and put it back in my pocket again.
My father called as I was heading into my room to dump my bag. He never calls at 3 o’clock because I’m usually harassed and trying to get something filed for the Disraeli or cramming for Debating Society. So he calls after 6 o’clock, when he knows I’ll be in my room and can talk properly. It was probably a coincidence, but it’s moments like that that make me feel like he still knows me, even after all the lies, after everything I’ve done.
‘Ada, kedu ka i mere?’
‘How am I?’ I dropped my bag at my feet and took the receipt out of my pocket again, biting down on my bottom lip as I stared at it. ‘I don’t know, Papa.’
I shouldn’t have said that. I don’t even know where it came from, but my head was a mess and I think I just wanted him to say something to make me feel better.
‘What’s wrong?’ When I didn’t respond, his voice softened. ‘Are you OK?’
‘No.’ I pressed a hand to my forehead. ‘Can I say that?’
‘Of course you can say that, Ada.’
‘I don’t know sometimes.’
‘I think you should come home with us, Ada,’ he said and I pictured him in one of the big chairs at the Castle and Ball, a pot of tea on the small table in front of him.
‘Where’s home, Papa?’
I shouldn’t have said that, either, it must
have felt like a splash of hot water on his heart, but when I looked at my bed, I thought of Scarlett’s room, of her creased white sheets and the half-eaten chocolate bars she leaves everywhere. There is something missing from her house now. A hole. Then I thought of my bedroom in Lagos with its half-full drawers, and my bedroom in London that I’ve hardly slept in; then I looked around at my room, at my narrow bed and the closet and desk and chair that were exactly the same as Orla’s closet and desk and chair, and Molly’s closet and desk and chair, and I realised that I was everywhere and nowhere, all at once. I didn’t have bedrooms, I had hotel rooms, places to sleep. When I wasn’t in them, no one noticed. No one missed me.
‘What’s wrong, Adamma?’
I didn’t think I’d be able to say it until I heard the words. ‘I think I know who murdered Scarlett, Papa.’
He didn’t hesitate. ‘Tell the police.’
‘But I’m not sure. What if I’m wrong?’
That didn’t make him hesitate, either. ‘Then be sure, Adamma.’
I didn’t know where to start, but figured I’d start in Ostley because all the stores had those old tills that dispensed the sort of receipt I’d found in Scarlett’s locker. The village only has four stores: a butcher – which I ruled out immediately because they get their meat and eggs from her parents’ farm, so there would be no reason for her to go in there; a greengrocer – but she’d spent £10.99 and, after a swift circuit sniffing nectarines and inspecting carrots, I discovered that they didn’t sell anything that cost more than £5. I was sure that it was the newsagent – which sold everything from vodka to birthday cards – but when I bought a pack of gum and a Dairy Milk for Orla, I realised that it didn’t give receipts, which left the chemist.
The chemist is the smallest – and oldest – store in Ostley. Like the rest of the village, it’s postcard perfect. Its name is at the top in gold letters over the dark green-painted door and there’s a display of antique scales and medicine bottles in the window that people stop to take a photograph of when they drive through. Inside isn’t as impressive. The first time I went in there with her, I thought it had a weird smell, but, like her, I’m a total make-up junkie, so it didn’t take me long to succumb to the lure of the make-up stand.
We’d spend ages in there after school, testing sparkly eyeshadows on the backs of our hands and trying out nail polishes, so I knew my way around the store pretty well. I checked my cellphone and realised that I only had twenty minutes before I had to get to swimming practice, so before I wasted time looking for things that cost £10.99, I bought a pack of cough drops. I held my breath as the man behind the counter smiled and handed me my change and there it was: a small receipt just like the one I’d found in her locker.
I had to take a breath before I thanked him, then went over to the make-up stand, checking the yellow price tags on everything – the nail polishes, the blushers, the foundation – to discover with a defeated sigh that nothing on it cost more than £6.99. I checked my cell again with a flutter of panic as I tried to think what she would have bought, going over to check the bubble baths (and resisting the urge to take the lids off and sniff each one) then the lotions and finally the perfumes. But as I examined each dusty box, I realised that as much as my grandmother loved that stuff – she’s had a bar of Yardley lavender soap, still wrapped in the wax paper, in her bathroom for as long as I can remember – Scarlett would never wear it and even if she bought something for someone else, none of it cost more than £10.
I had to get back to Crofton so I started frantically checking everything: cotton buds, aftershave, tubs of Slim-Fast, razors, vitamins. Everything. The guy behind the counter must have thought I was shoplifting, because while I was checking the last thing I could think of – a bottle of lavender water, of all things – he asked if he could help and it made me jump. I told him I was fine and hurried to the door, but on my way out, I passed the one section it didn’t occur to me check, the section I would never look at, not in my Crofton uniform.
I glanced at the window, then over at the counter and reached for a pack of condoms. The most expensive pack was £10 and my shoulders fell, but as I was about to leave, I glanced at the counter again and the panic in my fingers stilled as I realised why she had bought something from the chemist, and not her poor father whom she tasks with buying everything from hair-removal cream and tampons when he does the weekly shop. Why the receipt was in her locker at school and not on her bedroom floor: because she didn’t want anyone to see it.
I marched over to the counter and took a breath. ‘I need a pregnancy test, Sir,’ I blurted out and he looked a little relieved. I guess it explained my erratic behaviour.
‘How late are you?’
‘I don’t know.’ I squirmed, my cheeks burning. ‘I’ll just take the best one.’
I saw his expression as he turned and picked up a white and blue box from the shelf behind him. He put it on the counter. ‘This one. It’s digital.’
‘How much is it?’
‘Ten ninety-nine.’
My heart slammed into my ribs. ‘I’m sorry, Sir. I have to go.’
I turned and ran out of the chemist and straight into Bones. It knocked the air right out of me and when I stepped back with a gasp, he raised an eyebrow at me. ‘Either congratulations are in order, Buffy, or you and I need to compare notes.’
29 DAYS BEFORE
APRIL
It took a month of grovelling and a phone call from Mrs Delaney – to confirm that I’d been on my best behaviour – but my father grudgingly agreed to reschedule my birthday party. I was determined not to let Scarlett ruin it, though. Today is Adamma Day. Not Scarlett Day. Adamma Day. She can have the other 364 days of the year, but I want this one.
As always, I was the first up. ‘Going for a run on your birthday,’ Mrs Delaney said when I told her, stopping to raise her mug of tea at me. ‘Now that’s dedication!’
If she noticed that my hair was pulled back into a neat ponytail and I was wearing lip-gloss, she didn’t think to mention it. And it’s funny, because after being too scared to go to Savernake Forest alone after what had happened to Orla, I’ve never felt more safe there. That’s where we meet now. We even have a tree, a crooked beech barnacled with moss that we’ve carved our initials into.
On the way there, I was torn between getting there as quickly as I could and not arriving in a sweaty mess. In the end, my legs made the decision for me and I ran there so quickly that I was almost sorry my old track coach wasn’t there to see me do it. I barely had time to notice the wetness in the air: not a damp winter chill, but a wetness, like running across the hockey field in bare feet after it’s been watered. This morning it was fresher, the light yellower as the trees began to shift and stir, bright green buds turning towards the sun, ready to burst. It felt like the end of something, like the start of something, and it made me run faster.
For the first time in weeks, he wasn’t late, and I checked over my shoulder before I veered off the road and ran towards where his car was parked.
He jumped when I opened the door, then grinned. ‘Hey, birthday girl!’
I didn’t wait to be invited, just crawled across the passenger seat and into his lap. He giggled as I put my hands on his shoulders and pressed my mouth to his.
‘As fun as this is, Miss Okomma,’ he said, pulling back after a moment or two. ‘We only have fifteen minutes and I want to give you your present.’
Ordinarily, I would have been pissed – much can be done in fifteen minutes – but I was desperate to see what he had got me. I clapped like a giddy kid as he reached over and opened the glove compartment. My gaze went straight to the small, carefully wrapped box with the pink ribbon, but when he took it out, I caught a glimpse of the letter underneath. It took me a moment to work out how I knew the blue logo, but when I did, I frowned. ‘Yale?’
He closed the glove
compartment before I could reach for it.
My shoulders sagged. ‘But what about Cambridge?’
‘It’s nothing,’ he said with a quick smile. ‘Just an offer. We can talk about it later.’
‘But I haven’t applied to any colleges in the US.’
‘Please, Adamma,’ he said, pinching my chin. ‘Not now. It’s Adamma Day.’
He waved the present at me and I pretended to be excited, ignoring the kick of panic I felt at the thought of an ocean between us as I unwrapped it.
‘Saint Francis de Sales,’ he told me when I opened the black velvet box to find a silver necklace with a small oval medal. ‘The Patron Saint of Journalists.’
‘Really?’ I gasped, bringing my ponytail over one shoulder and turning as much as I could in the cramped front seat so that he could put it on.
‘Yeah,’ he said, stopping to press a kiss to the back of my neck. ‘Although, anyone you’re interviewing will need the medal. You’re kind of scary, you know?’
I turned to face him again with a scowl, poking him in the stomach. ‘Hey!’
‘So do you like it?’
I pressed the medal between my finger and thumb. ‘I love it. Thank you.’
‘Vivian Darkbloom has sent you some flowers, too.’
I pretended to swoon. ‘Vivian is the bestest friend ever!’
‘I’m sorry I can’t come to your party tonight, though.’
I felt my smile wilt. ‘I know. But we’re still going to Paris for our next exeat weekend, right?’
‘Oh yeah.’ He wiggled his eyebrows and I poked him with my finger until he laughed. ‘I just hope that your parents don’t find out.’