‘No, you have more to say, so say it.’
‘Perhaps we should leave this meeting here,’ Rita suggests, getting to her feet.
‘Preeya?’ I ask again. ‘Just tell me.’
There’s a moment where Preeya and Rita exchange a glance, as though trying to decide whether to tell me or not. It’s obvious that Rita is against it, but Preeya appears compelled to get something off her chest. Eventually, Rita sits back down and raises her hands, as though giving her permission.
‘It’s pretty rich, you coming in here with these demands, when Grace was found with drugs on school property six months ago. We tried to call you that day but you didn’t answer your phone. Instead we spoke with Charles. Ethan claimed they were his and took the blame, but Grace was no saint, Kat.’ She laughs. ‘Charles even offered us a bribe to keep it all quiet.’
‘I didn’t know anything about this. You should have told me.’
‘Yes, we probably should’ve,’ Rita admits.
‘This school is a fucking joke.’ As I snatch my bag from the floor and storm out of the office, all I can think about is Grace letting me down again.
* * *
I’m not too proud to admit that I’m riled. Grace with drugs. Grace pregnant. Grace a bully. Grace in therapy. Oh, my perfect daughter, you had far to fall and you’re falling a long, long way. Almost instinctively my fingers reach for my phone and dial her number, desperate to hear that sweet, innocent voice once more.
But it’s a lie.
Part of me thinks I should have accepted her death as suicide and never started any of this. Then Grace’s memory would’ve remained untainted. She would still be pure. But now I’ve started, I can’t stop.
On my way out of the school I pause and watch the kids as they mess around on the steps leading to the entrance. They’re a world apart from the kids I went to school with. Happier, glossier, like teenage models in a clothing catalogue. But deep down they all have the same issues. Drugs. Meanness. Boredom. Insecurity.
Over by the school gates I notice a flick of curly hair that I recognise. Sasha is here. I’d hoped to speak to her after my meeting, by asking for her to be taken out of class if necessary, but then Preeya’s revelation left me reeling and I’d forgotten. If anything, finding her here is better because it doesn’t involve a fuss. I hurry over to where she’s standing with her friends.
‘Sasha, hi!’ She’s a quiet girl, easily spooked. I put on my most amenable smile in an attempt to put her at ease. ‘How are you? I meant to say thank you the other night. The orchestra were brilliant – as always. All the guests remarked on how good you were.’
‘Thank you, Mrs Cavanaugh,’ she says shyly.
‘Have you got a moment? I wanted to ask you a question about Grace. It won’t take long. Promise.’
‘Okay,’ she says. I can tell that she’s agreeing out of politeness. I want to tell her not to be polite, because people will take advantage of that politeness for the rest of her life. But right now I’m going to be one of the people taking advantage instead.
We walk away from her group of friends towards the car park to find a quiet spot.
‘I wanted to ask you about Mr Hawthorne.’
‘Okay,’ she says. It might be my eagerness to read cues, but I swear her smile becomes tense.
‘Alicia told me about a disturbing rumour. She said the students at school were gossiping about Grace and Mr Hawthorne having an affair.’
Sasha’s eyes immediately fall to her shoes and she begins to fumble with her shirt sleeve. The girl doesn’t hide her nerves well, which is something else I can take advantage of. When the bell rings she spins on her heel and lifts her big brown eyes towards the school entrance, longing to be anywhere but here answering my awkward questions.
‘I should get to class,’ she says.
‘Please, Sasha.’ I place a gentle hand on her arm. ‘If you know more, tell me. It’s incredibly important for me to understand what was going on with Grace before she died.’
Sasha continues to stare at the school, but she says, ‘Grace once told me that they were together. But no one believed her. She used to make up all kinds of stuff.’
‘Like what, Sasha?’
‘I need to go now.’
I want to push her further, but I know that I can’t. I allow my hand to drop and she hurries away from me. With a sigh, I run my fingers through my hair, trying to make sense of all the things Grace was involved in before she died, when another girl steps out from behind a nearby car. Surprised, I gawp at her, not grasping why she’s there or why her dark eyes are fixed on mine.
‘I can tell you everything you need to know about Grace,’ the girl says.
She has a familiar face that I can’t place. I know that I recognise her, but I don’t know how I recognise her.
‘Are you one of Grace’s friends?’ I ask.
‘Yeah,’ she replies. ‘I guess it wasn’t for long though. She… she died too soon.’ She shakes out her glossy black hair and smiles sadly.
The new friend. The one she talked about in her video diary.
‘What’s your name?’
‘Lily.’ She glances up at the school building, squinting in the afternoon sun. ‘I have psychology now, but I can meet you in Ash Dale later.’
‘At the café?’
‘Sure.’ She hovers awkwardly before saying, ‘Bye then.’
I frown as she walks away, her black hair bouncing along with her steps. Then I remember exactly who she is. She’s the girl from the video. She’s the girl Grace was bullying.
Twenty-Seven
A few minutes before 3 p.m., I ask for the Wi-Fi password in Ash Dale café, take my macchiato and sit by the window. After a sip of my coffee, I upload a few photos I believe might be in the public interest to the front page of Lady Margaret’s website. While Preeya and Rita were busy with their outrage, I’d slipped a slim address book into the palm of my hand. It contains not only all of Rita’s contacts, but the passwords to her various accounts, including the website administration password.
If I hadn’t found the password like that, I would’ve found it another way. But Rita struck me as the kind of woman who would need to write down the passwords she doesn’t use often enough to memorise. Most people my age and over do. It hadn’t been my intention to steal the book during our meeting, but I could see that my pleas were getting nowhere, and the book caught my eye.
I have to do something to ensure that Alicia and Ethan understand the repercussions of their actions. Perhaps with the photo caption – ‘Look what Lady Margaret’s condones’ – both the kids and the school will find themselves facing consequences. And why shouldn’t they? My daughter was failed by that school. They dismissed the way Alicia bullied her and they failed to tell me about the drugs. Everybody let her down, including me.
The door to the café opens and a small group of kids arrive, staring at their phones and giggling. As I’d been uploading the photos, I must admit that I’d worried no one would check the school website before the pictures were removed by staff. It’s obvious, however, that news has already spread, and no doubt all these kids are screenshotting the evidence already. My macchiato tastes good today.
‘Hey, um, Mrs Cavanaugh?’ The girl from the car park shuffles over to my table, thumbing the strap of her rucksack as it rests on her shoulder. I can tell by the frayed edge of the material that this is a common tic of hers.
‘Lily, isn’t it?’ I gesture at the empty chair for her to sit. ‘Would you like me to buy you a hot chocolate or a coffee?’
She places the rucksack down on the ground and sits in the chair. ‘That’s okay; I have money.’
‘Oh, I don’t mind treating.’ My voice is honey, my expression warm. I know how to come across as sweet, especially to a nervous teenage girl like Lily.
‘Okay, well a hot chocolate would be good,’ she agrees.
‘This weather is rather gloomy, isn’t it? We need comforting hot drinks in this weather.’
She nods.
The waitress comes by and takes our order, then disappears back to the counter. All the while, Lily twirls her hair and shuffles her feet underneath the table. Now that she’s closer, I notice she’s lost much of the ‘alternative’ style I saw in the video of Grace bullying her. No thick black eyeliner and no bead bracelets. But she is wearing Doc Martens and her rucksack is decorated with band badges and song lyrics, which I see clearly when she lifts it onto the table to take out her phone. At the same time, she removes a few notebooks to get to the bottom of the bag.
‘Grace had a book almost exactly like that,’ I point out. ‘Is it a school book?’
‘Oh, no,’ she says. ‘We bought matching books one day.’ She hurries to jam everything back into her bag and then unlocks her phone. ‘Sorry, I need to text Mum and tell her I’ll be home late. She doesn’t like it when I don’t tell her where I am.’
‘Good girl,’ I say, perhaps too patronisingly. ‘Don’t stop telling your mum things.’
Lily appears uncomfortable as she puts down her phone and frowns. As the waitress comes back with her hot chocolate, I can’t help but deliberate whether the sudden paleness in her expression is guilt or fear, or something completely different.
‘Thank you for talking to me, Lily. I’m sorry we never met while Grace was alive. Did you hang out with her a lot?’
She drops her marshmallows into the drink and nods. ‘I think Grace was sick of Alicia’s drama. She wanted to talk to someone outside that group. Outside of the orchestra, I guess.’
‘I never saw you on Grace’s vlogs.’
‘Nah, I guess not. I don’t like my photograph being taken.’
‘Why not? You’re a beautiful girl.’
Lily’s pale cheeks flush and her shoulders lift like a much younger girl pretending to be shy. ‘Really not.’
‘You don’t have to be a Barbie clone to be beautiful.’ I quickly change the subject, seeing her discomfort. ‘You mentioned that Grace told you things? Like what happened with Mr Hawthorne.’
Lily nods. ‘Sasha said Grace was lying, but that’s not true. I saw the text messages.’
‘Between Grace and Mr Hawthorne?’
Another nod. She tugs at her sleeve, pulling it back to scratch her inner arm, at the same time revealing a red scar along her forearm that concerns me. But as soon as I frown, she pulls her sleeve back down to cover it up.
‘Yeah, she showed them to me. He was going to leave his wife for her.’
‘Lily, do you have Grace’s phone?’
She shakes her head. ‘Don’t you have it?’
‘No, it’s missing.’
‘Oh, okay,’ she says. ‘That’s a shame, because then you’d see all the messages. He used to tell her that he loved her and all that kind of thing.’
I close my eyes for a second, trying to control the tidal wave of emotion threatening to knock me off my feet. How did this happen?
‘Are you all right?’ Lily asks.
‘I’m just shocked that this was going on and I didn’t know.’
Lily sips her hot chocolate and then says, in a quiet voice, ‘I feel horrible for not saying anything. At the time it didn’t seem that bad. She was happy with him and she was always talking about how amazing he was. I mean, he’s not that much older than us, so I guess I didn’t think it was that bad. Though I knew he was a teacher and that was wrong.’ Her gaze wanders to the café window. ‘But then…’
‘What?’
‘Then she was frightened. There was…’ She grips the end of the table and blinks away tears. ‘Oh God, I don’t want to say.’
‘Please do, Lily. I need to know.’
But she shakes her head. ‘You’ll hate me. You’ll think I’m awful.’
‘No I won’t. You’re not in any trouble, but I need to know what happened to Grace.’
Lily whispers, ‘She was pregnant.’
I let out the breath I didn’t realise I was holding. ‘I know. It came up during the post-mortem.’ So Grace did know she was pregnant, and she chose not to tell me.
Her face pales again. ‘That poor little baby.’ Her hand flies to her mouth and she blinks a few more tears away.
‘Are you okay?’ I reach across the table and gently stroke her arm. ‘I know it’s a lot to take in. You’ve been carrying this alone for a long time, haven’t you?’
She nods. ‘I guess so. No one knew we were friends. It took me by surprise because Grace was popular and I’m… not. But I really miss her.’
‘I know.’
She wipes her eyes and sniffs.
‘I know Grace bullied you once. Someone sent me the video of her doing it.’
Her jaw drops.
‘How did the two of you become friends?’ I ask.
‘She came to apologise. She said… she said that she’d been going to therapy and it’d made her evaluate some stuff, you know? She had regrets about what she’d done. She stayed and talked to me for a bit, and we got on, and then we started hanging out.’
If Grace felt guilty for what she’d done to Lily, it means she wasn’t a sociopath after all. She wasn’t like me.
‘And… she seemed genuine?’
Lily nods.
Oh, I want to believe it. I want to know that my Grace had a conscience, and that she loved, and she felt remorse, and that she cared about the world. But what if she was faking it, like I’m faking concern for Lily right now?
‘Did Grace tell Mr Hawthorne she was pregnant?’ I ask.
‘Yeah, she did. That didn’t go well.’ Lily glares at her spoon as she stirs the hot chocolate, and I can see that she’s unimpressed with the way the teacher behaved.
‘How so?’
‘He was a total arsehole to her. Everything he told her about leaving his wife turned out to be bullshit. He wanted her to get an abortion.’
My heart hurts for Grace. She went through all that rejection alone.
‘Oh, wait – I just remembered. Grace sent me a screenshot of that conversation. Let me see if it’s still in my phone.’
While I wait for Lily to find the right message, I shake my head, thinking about the scumbag who impregnated my daughter and then rejected her. Of all the lowest creatures in the world, a man who takes advantage of a young, innocent girl and then abandons her in her time of need must be the worst. I’m convinced that hatred is seeping out of my pores as I sit here in the café. Mr Hawthorne is going to pay. He had no idea who he messed with when he hurt the one person I’ve ever loved.
‘Here it is.’
The sound of Lily’s voice makes me start. I pull myself back from the violence in my mind and concentrate on the image on the screen. It’s a picture message sent via WhatsApp from my daughter’s account.
Grace: I want you, Dan. Why are you making it so hard? You said you’d leave your wife and be with me. Now we have a baby to look after. I know it’s scary but we can get through it together.
Dan: I’m sorry, Grace. I can’t. I have to stay with my wife because she’s sick. You can’t message me anymore.
Grace: It isn’t fair! You’re punishing me!
Dan: I’m not. This is just the way it has to be. I’m sorry.
Grace: I can’t believe you’re doing this to me.
Grace: Will you at least come to the clinic?
Dan: Yeah, I guess. Make an appointment.
The most disturbing part of the exchange to me is Grace’s use of emojis throughout. A crying face; a sad face; two hands pressed together as though begging him. It hammers home how young she was, and I can hardly bear it. When I pass Lily the phone, my hands are shaking.
‘He’s an awful human being,’ Lily says. ‘I wish I’d gone to you back then. If I’d known you were nice, I might have.’
The atmosphere in the café is stifling. A prickle of sweat breaks out along my hairline, but I manage to pull myself together enough to think straight.
‘I’m going to write down my email address,’ I say, grabbing
a napkin and retrieving a biro from my bag. ‘Send me any message that you think is important. In fact, send me that screenshot right now.’
‘Okay,’ she says.
‘Here’s the money for the hot chocolate. I’m sorry to rush off, Lily, but I have to go. Thank you for telling me all of this.’
‘It’s okay,’ she says. ‘I hope he loses his job. Creep.’
‘Don’t worry; he’ll get what’s coming to him.’
On the way out of the café, I turn back to see Lily drumming her fingers against the table, a long sheet of black hair obscuring half of her face.
I’m close now, Grace. I can feel it. I’m close to finding out what happened to you that night.
Twenty-Eight
My phone starts ringing before I even make it to my car. The school’s number flashes up on the screen. Rita isn’t an idiot. I showed her the pictures of Alicia and Ethan before I put them up on the website. This was never supposed to be the crime of the century.
‘Rita, I know why you’re calling me, but I want to let you know I’m on my way back to the school.’
‘What the hell were you thinking? How did you even get those photos onto the website?’
‘There’s something more important to talk about. I’ll explain when I get there.’
I have too much going on to care about the high pitch of Rita’s angry voice. What Alicia and Ethan did is nothing compared to the sick relationship Daniel Hawthorne had with my daughter, and since Lily has already sent me the screenshot, I have proof.
My windscreen wipers swish back and forth against the April showers as I head back to the school, passing groups of chattering students queuing outside the newsagent. They know who Alicia is now. They know who Ethan is, too. But what they don’t know is that there is someone more dangerous walking the school halls. They don’t know about a man who might take advantage of them.
I swing into the car park, quickly find a bay and hurry through the entrance to Rita’s office. For the first time, it hits me that my relationship with Lady Margaret’s school is over. Grace is gone; we have no connection here; we won’t be sending them donations anymore. We won’t come to the board meetings. We won’t be in their list of contacts. Especially after what I’ve done today. This is over.
Only Daughter: An gripping and emotional psychological thriller with a jaw-dropping twist Page 18