13 Minutes (26 page)

‘She’s in her room,’ Alison Howland said, squeezing Becca’s arm. ‘Go on up. I’m sure she’ll be pleased to see you. Tomorrow will be hard for both of you.’ She wasn’t slurring but her words ran together a little too quickly and Becca saw the wine bottle sitting on the kitchen island. It was open and two-thirds empty. Becca couldn’t blame her. Tasha had very nearly died. Twice. She’d be surprised if the Howlands ever let their daughter out of the house again. ‘Do you want anything to drink? Something to eat?’

Becca shook her head and escaped the warmth of the kitchen, taking the stairs two at a time. She was tired of the claustrophobic care of adults. They wanted to make everything better. They couldn’t.

Tasha’s door wasn’t locked and she opened it quietly, suddenly nervous. It was stupid because there was nothing to be nervous about, but without her phone and having stayed away from all social media it was like coming out of a bubble. She was used to knowing how people were feeling, what they were doing, with the click of a button. Not any more.

‘Hey,’ she said. ‘I just thought I’d . . .’ She shrugged. ‘You know . . . with tomorrow.’

Tasha looked up. She was sitting on her bed, an old shoebox beside her, and had been examining the contents.

‘Come in,’ Tasha said, finally, making space on the bed for Becca to sit down. ‘It’s good to see you. I feel like I haven’t seen anyone but Bennett and my parents for my whole life.’

‘I know what you mean. It’s like we’re the ones in prison.’

‘You okay?’ Tasha asked.

Becca nodded but focused on the contents of the box. She wasn’t ready to talk about how she felt. ‘What
is
this shit?’ she asked. There were old badges, tickets from gigs, loops of hair, a pressed flower, all kinds of crap.

‘Oh, just stuff. I like to keep things from good times.’ She held out the purple dried flower. ‘This is from the first day we found the clearing and made it our secret place. I saw it on the way home. Thought it was beautiful, sitting alone in all the green.’

Picking through the items, Becca saw something familiar. ‘Is that my old Livestrong bracelet?’

Tasha pulled it out of the box. ‘Yep! From when we were in Year Six and we did that challenge. Well, you did it – I never finished. You gave it to me, remember?’

Becca smiled and nodded, her heart almost melting with the resurfacing memory. This box wasn’t just for Barbies. She was in here, too. A treasure chest of memories. She thought of Hayley and Jenny.

‘How could they?’ she asked quietly as Tasha carefully put the lid back on the box and slid it under her bed. Natasha didn’t need to ask who she meant.

‘I don’t think they wanted to kill me,’ she said, picking at the duvet cover. ‘Not that first time anyway. They scared me. Drugged me and left me. But I don’t think they meant for me to die.’ She paused. ‘It all just got out of hand.’

‘What do you remember?’ Becca asked. Tasha looked so fragile, her hair almost lank over her face, not the glorious queen bee of the hive at all, that Becca took her hand and squeezed it for a moment. Her skin was cold.

‘Oh, god, I don’t want to talk about it. Feels like I’ve spent forever repeating it over and over to Bennett for her statement and the CPS and
everyone
.’

‘Sorry, I didn’t think.’

‘It was seeing Hannah like that. The shock. Must have just clicked my brain back into working properly. It was like feeling a tap come on.’ She looked at Becca. ‘But how are you? She was your friend. She was a nice girl.’

How many people were saying that about Hannah now? High-achieving student, lovely girl, all that stuff, when actually even the teachers had barely noticed she was there.

‘I don’t think it’s really sunk in yet.’ Becca felt a tightening of nausea in her stomach. ‘I keep seeing the control panel. When I close my eyes, I see myself snapping at her and moving the slide all at once. I don’t think I’ll ever not see it.’

‘It wasn’t your fault. You know that.
They
did it.’ She pulled back and looked Becca in the eye. ‘It wasn’t
us
. It’s not my fault I wasn’t standing there and it wasn’t your fault the light fell.’ Her shoulders slumped. ‘I wish I still had the diary Doctor Harvey made me write. Maybe I’ll start a new one. It was cathartic, you know? I didn’t think I’d ever do it but it got shit out of my head.’

‘Where is it?’

‘Police. They took it as soon as I mentioned it.’ They both groaned.

‘God, I want a smoke,’ Becca said. ‘You think those photographers can see the window from where they’re parked?’

‘I’m past caring. I haven’t even left the house unless it’s to go to the Police Station. I’m hoping after tomorrow they’ll fuck off.’

‘Maybe some other kid will die and distract them,’ Becca muttered, then realised how awful that statement was. It didn’t stop them both laughing, though. Black humour. What was left?

‘Let’s just sit on the floor by the window,’ Tasha said, opening it an inch or two. ‘I’ll turn the lamp off. Best they’ll get is a glowing cigarette end from a distance. Big deal.’

The cold air outside cut through the gap and Becca sat against the wall, knees under her chin, a mirror image of Tasha opposite but with thicker thighs and way less grace. The limited opening wouldn’t be enough to stop the room – and probably the whole of the upstairs – stinking of cigarette smoke, but the Howlands weren’t going to give them any shit tonight, if ever again. Alison would just pour another glass of wine and wonder at all her failings as a mother without realising that none of this awful crap had anything to do with parenting, good, bad or otherwise. It was about them.
Their
world. And there was fuck all their families could have done about any of it.

‘You want to go to the funeral together tomorrow?’ Tasha said, after flicking the light off. ‘Let the gawkers get it out of their systems? There’ll be plenty of them there.’

‘Sure,’ Becca said. It was a relief. She didn’t realise how much of one until her heart thudded heat through her limbs. She didn’t want people staring at her alone. And Tasha was the tragic victim here – not as tragic as Hannah, but Hannah was gone. Natasha was the centre of it all. If she was with Tasha then people might not look at her and see such a monster.
The girl who accidentally killed her best friend.
Maybe some of the hive even thought she was in it with the other two. She knew how the hive worked. Why have a story if you couldn’t embellish it?

‘I’ll get my dad to drive here and then we can follow your dad’s car?’ she said, exhaling a long stream of smoke. It was making her head spin a little and not helping the vaguely sick feeling she was learning to live with. She hadn’t eaten much and barely smoked in days. Her mouth tasted dirty, but she inhaled again.

‘Cool,’ Tasha said. ‘I can’t wait for it to be done. To be over.’

‘Me, too.’ Poor Hannah. Even now, her last ever social engagement, where the girl who could barely scrape together five or six friends for a birthday meal would finally have an audience of most of the sixth form, was being wished away.
I’m sorry, Hannah
, Becca thought, tilting her head back to stop the stinging tears that burst up from her inner well of pity and shame.
I’m sorry I was such a bitch.

‘You going back to school on Monday?’ Becca asked.

‘Yeah. You?’

Becca nodded. ‘I kind of wish it was somewhere different, but then I’d just have strangers staring at me rather than kids and teachers I know.’

‘Snap. You heard from anyone?’

‘No. My phone’s been off. I need a new number. Plus I don’t really want to talk about it.’

‘A couple of teachers have dropped by but I didn’t say much to them,’ Tasha said. ‘Left that to my mum. I looked on Facebook, though. Loads of people writing on our walls if you haven’t checked.’ She gave a half-smile in the gloom. ‘Like we’re mini-celebrities or something.’

Becca bet that there were way more people writing on Tasha’s than on hers, but still it was kind of nice to hear that people were thinking of them.

‘Hayley’s and Jenny’s pages have gone,’ Tasha said quietly. ‘Guess the police or their parents took them down. Probably the police.’ She paused. ‘Hannah’s is still up. I wasn’t her friend on there, though. I’m quite glad, really. It would feel weird seeing her last posts.’ She looked up at Becca. ‘Sorry. That was thoughtless. This is way worse for you than it is for me. She was your friend. And you . . . well, you know. That afternoon.’

I tilted the light.
Yeah, she did. Intentionally or not, she, Rebecca Crisp, had killed her best friend. It was her lighting plan, she’d let Hayley up the ladder to move it, even with all their suspicions, and without any training. It was all her stupid fault. She’d made it so easy for them.

‘There’s loads of shit about Mr Garrick on there, too,’ Tasha said. ‘Even though I remember now, I still find it weird. I mean, of all the teachers,
Mr Garrick
? He’s not exactly Mr Jones, is he? Mr Jones I could almost understand. But Mr Garrick?’ She shook her head. ‘Like, I know Jenny fucked around but I thought she had some standards at least.’

Becca snorted a laugh, if only to clear away the tears of pity and self-pity that kept trying to escape. ‘I just can’t picture them doing it.’ Even as she said it, the image rose up in her mind. Jenny and Mr Garrick on his desk, his trousers down around his thighs, pumping away. ‘Oh, crap, now I
am
picturing it.’

‘You’re not the one who actually
saw
it!’ Tasha said.

They laughed again, small sounds which faded quickly. They’d both been through too much and were too tired and contemplative for belly laughs. They were too hollow for them, Becca thought. Everything had been sucked out.

‘I liked him,’ Becca said, eventually, flicking the glowing butt of her cigarette out through the window. ‘He was kind, if you know what I mean.’

‘Yeah,’ Tasha said. ‘I guess I do.’

‘And now he’s totally fucked his life up. I mean, it’s not like he just fucked a sixth former. He’s part of all the rest of this shit. What they did to you to protect the secret.’ She looked at Tasha. ‘How do you think he’s feeling?’ She paused. ‘How do you think
they’re
feeling?’

She didn’t need to use their names.
They
was always going to mean the other two Barbies from now on.

Tasha turned her face to the window and stared out. She didn’t say anything for a long time. ‘Trapped and scared,’ she said eventually. ‘And sorry.’ She paused. ‘Very, very sorry.’

‘Yeah,’ Becca said. ‘I guess you’re right.’

‘Hey.’ Tasha got to her feet and put the light on. ‘Did you see that girl? Emma? On Facebook? Friend of Aiden’s?’

‘Who?’ Becca’s stomach pinched hard but she wasn’t sure why. ‘I haven’t been on.’

‘I just saw she’d posted something on his wall about being glad it was all sorted.’ Tasha reached out a hand and pulled Becca to her feet. ‘So I clicked through to her page and she doesn’t have it set private or anything and she’d posted something on Tuesday about having saved a guy from prison. What was all that about? Do you know her?’

Becca felt sick. No, she didn’t know her. How could she have saved Aiden?
Becca
had saved Aiden by getting Bennett to search the girls’ lockers. Or did Bennett search them because this girl somehow gave Aiden an alibi? He hadn’t exactly been forthcoming about the interview, just that they needed to talk over a couple of things. And on top of that, how was Tasha seeing Aiden’s Facebook page? Were they friends now? Had he added her?

‘Not sure,’ she said. ‘I might know her. I get confused. He’s got lots of music friends.’ She hoped she sounded casual but her mind was on fire. He’d been weird with her but she’d presumed it was because of Hannah, not because of something he might have done.

‘But he didn’t say anything to you about it?’ Tasha’s eyes were sharp. Becca shook her head. Somehow it made her feel like a failure.

‘Maybe I got the wrong end of the stick, then,’ Tasha said. ‘Who knows what she was talking about? Probably someone else. Or just making a joke.’

‘Yeah, it’ll be something like that.’ Becca suddenly wanted to be on her own where the ants in her brain could run wild without her having to pretend to be listening to anyone. ‘Anyway, I should get home. My mum’s mental at the moment. She didn’t want me to come out at all.’

‘I know what you mean. Mine’s the same. But you’ll come over here first tomorrow? Maybe ten?’

‘Defo. I don’t want to go on my own. It’ll be better with you.’

Tasha enveloped her in hug so tight Becca was sure she could feel the fast beat of her heart pressed against her chest. ‘Thanks for everything, Becca. You’ve been amazing. I don’t know how I would have managed without you. I really don’t.’

Becca squeezed her back, her head filled with thoughts of Hannah. ‘See you tomorrow,’ she said. ‘Let’s get it over with.’

She waved goodbye to Alison Howland, still drinking in the kitchen, and then left. She kept her coat hood up and her head down. The journalists still skulking outside her and Natasha’s houses might get a picture, but it wouldn’t be a very good one. And so what if they reported that the
two tragic teenagers
met up before the funeral? What did it matter? Becca was finding she cared less and less about the outside world. She just wished they would leave it alone and let them get on with getting over it all.

Her phone buzzed halfway home. It was Aiden, checking on her and saying he’d come to the funeral the next day if she wanted him there. Jamie was going, too, so he’d catch a lift with him. Three kisses on the end. Her fingers itched. Everything itched, apart from her heart, which was aching. Jamie wanted him to go to the funeral and suddenly he’d decided to be there? Where did she fit into that picture? Why didn’t he want to be there for her? He was supposed to
love
her! Her rage surged from her brain to her fingertips and they whizzed across the screen.

Who the fuck is Emma??

How did she save you from

prison?? And when did you