‘Oh, uh, hi,’ said April distractedly as she hurried on.
‘Have a good time at the party?’ called Sara to sounds of laughter.
April stopped and turned to face them. ‘Yes, it was fun,’ she said.
‘That’s what we heard,’ said Sara, a touch of spite in her voice. ‘A
lot
of fun.’
‘I’m sorry? What are you saying?’ said April with a creeping sense of dread.
‘Oh, nothing. We just heard how you like to spread the love around.’
Sara cracked up laughing at this and April was disturbed to see that a crowd was gathering around them.
‘I could say the same about you, Sara,’ said April. ‘I heard you spent a lot of time in the bathroom.’
The smile faded from Sara’s face. ‘Who told you that?’
The double doors to the refectory sprang open and Caro came bowling through. She grabbed April’s arm and dragged her back the way she had come. ‘We need to talk,’ she said from the side of her mouth.
‘What? What’s going on?’
‘No big deal,’ said Caro. She hurried April down the corridor and out into the grounds. When they were a decent distance from the building, Caro stopped. ‘Someone is spreading a rumour about you and a whole bunch of boys at the party.’
‘WHAT?’ cried April, horrified. ‘You’re joking! Tell me you’re joking?’
Caro shook her head. ‘No, I’m not. I wouldn’t make something like that up.’
April could feel her heart hammering.
God, I’ve only been at this horrible school a week and already everyone thinks I’m a slut,
she thought in despair.
I only wanted to fit in.
‘But why? Why would someone do that?’
‘Well, you obviously pissed someone off last night and now they’re trying to drag you through the mud.’
‘But who?’
Caro led April over to a bench and sat her down. ‘Okay, talk me through the whole thing. And leave nothing out - the tiniest detail could give us the clue.’
‘For God’s sake, Caro,’ snapped April, ‘this isn’t one of your stupid conspiracies, this is serious. This is about me! What if people believe it? What if I become known as some kind of sleep-around slut?’
Caro looked as if she was about to object, but instead she nodded. ‘Yes, you’re right, but let’s go through it all anyway. We need to find out who is behind the rumour, then torture them until they retract it. So what happened?’
Taking a deep breath, April slowly told Caro the story of her night, from meeting Milo at the door, flirting with Ben, through the incident with Marcus, then making out with Milo, the fight and the romantic walk home with Gabriel.
When she had finished, Caro whistled. ‘Wow. You did have a busy night.’
‘So what do you think? Maybe someone saw me talking to all those boys and decided I was doing more than talking?’
Caro pulled a face. ‘That’s not the rumour. The rumour is that you were throwing yourself at anything in trousers. In fact, none of those names were mentioned.’
‘Oh God,’ said April. ‘But why? Who would do that?’
Caro thought for a moment. ‘Did anyone see you kissing Milo?’
‘Only Gabriel.’
‘Definitely?’
‘Definitely.’
‘Hmm. Well then, the prime suspect has to be Marcus Brent, doesn’t it? You obviously caught him out and he’s trying to cover himself with this story about how you threw yourself at him and his chums.’
‘Eww, don’t ...’ said April, screwing her face up. ‘But why? I mean, I know Marcus hates me for some reason, but I assumed that was because he didn’t like Benjamin talking to me.’
‘It’s obvious - you were about to blow his cover.’
‘What cover? Cover for what?’
‘Think about it: what were you doing just before Marcus grabbed you?’
‘I was taking photos of the party.’
‘Exactly! And then he deleted all the photos, right? So now we can’t see what they were trying to hide.’ Caro was looking at April as if the answer was blindingly obvious.
‘What? What’s all that supposed to mean?’ she asked impatiently.
‘I knew it all along!’
‘Knew what? What have you known all along?’
‘That they’re vampires!’
April gaped at Caro. She began to speak but then found she didn’t have the words. She shook her head and stood up.
‘Okay, fine,’ said April. ‘You have your little joke too. Actually I came to you to ask your advice about Gabriel because I thought you were my friend and that you might be able to help, but it seems that you can’t stop your silly little games for one minute. Thanks, Caro. I’ll deal with it myself.’ She picked up her bag and started to stalk back towards the school buildings.
‘Hey, hey!’ said Caro, running ahead of her and putting her hands up. ‘I know it sounds mad, but hear me out, okay?’
‘Caro, please,’ said April, trying to get past her. ‘This is ridiculous.’
‘Okay, so explain it to me - why did Marcus go so crazy when he saw the camera?’
April threw her arms up in frustration. ‘I don’t know! Maybe they were doing drugs? They were all standing around a table, maybe they had some coke or they were rolling a joint or something. Maybe they were arm-wrestling for all I know. Whatever it was, it was definitely dodgy and they didn’t want me having evidence of it.’
‘Or maybe there’s a simpler explanation.’
‘What? Them all being vampires is a simpler explanation? Jesus!’
She pushed past Caro, shaking with anger and disappointment. True, she hardly knew Caro, but she had thought they had really connected, that Caro was the one person she could count on. Didn’t she understand how serious this was? Getting a reputation for something like that - more to the point, for something she hadn’t done - it was unthinkable. She’d never live it down. Never.
‘Dammit, dammit, dammit.’ April sat in the kitchen staring down at her phone and its unblinking display. No bars at all, no reception in this stupid house. Why did they have to move here? April had tried to call Fiona, but her best friend’s phone had gone straight to voicemail three times before she got home.
‘Think, April,’ she muttered to herself. ‘What would Dad do?’ Scotland’s top investigative reporter wouldn’t give up after a few failed phone calls. She only had half an hour left if she was going to get back to school before the lunch break ended - if she could even bear to go - but ... Then it clicked. Of course! Fiona would be on her lunch break too. She sprinted up the stairs, taking them two at a time. April flew across her bed and rattled at the keyboard, bringing the computer out of sleep mode. At lunchtime, April and Fiona had usually gone to their form room in St Geoffrey’s to use the computers under the guise of ‘extra study’. They generally messed about on Facebook and looked up celebrity gossip, but she knew that Fiona would check her email accounts as a matter of course, especially as she had been trying to get in touch to gossip about the party. She quickly signed in to her account.
Fee, need to speak urgently, can you call?
she wrote, stabbing at the ‘send’ button.
Almost immediately, a box popped up on the screen.
Been trying, you daft cow. Your mobile doesn’t work and the landline’s constantly engaged! Fx
April cursed and ran across to the phone extension she’s had installed in her room. Fee was right - the handset was out of its cradle. It began to ring the moment she clicked it into place.
‘Thank God, Fee ...’ she began, but her friend was already talking.
‘What’s the matter with you, April?’ said Fiona with irritation. ‘I’ve been trying and trying to get in touch since about ten o’clock last night! Where have you been? I’ve been up all night worrying myself to death.’
‘I’m sorry,’ said April, a little taken aback, ‘but the big story all happened this morning.’
Fiona paused, hearing the distress in her friend’s voice. ‘Okay, sorry, but I was imagining all sorts of things after those photos. So what happened?’
April quickly told her all about the party, then the rumours at school. She left out the fact that she’d fought with Caro, too - they had enough to discuss as it was.
‘Listen, Fee, I’m sorry I didn’t call you this morning, but I thought I’d see Gabriel at school and then all this stuff about the ... well, the lies they’re spreading about me, it distracted me. So what did you want to talk about?’
There was a pause at the other end of the line. ‘Nothing bad, but ... well, it’s just a bit weird. Look, get back on the Internet, I’m going to send you something, okay?’
April frowned. What was Fee on about? Was she worried April had fallen in with a bad lot or something? Surely Fiona knew her better than that?
When she opened her inbox, there was already a message from Fiona waiting for her, with the subject ‘Open!’ There was no other text, just four jpegs attached.
April clicked on each in turn and waited as her computer downloaded them.
‘Are you looking at them?’ asked Fiona impatiently.
‘They’re opening now. Hang on, the first one’s ... oh. Oh God.’
The picture was grainy, as mobile phone snaps always were, but it was clear enough. It was the picture April had taken in the bar area at the party, with all the decadent teens lounging on the sofas. It was exactly as she remembered it, apart from one detail. Right in the middle of the shot, there was an armchair. On either side, perched on the arms and leaning inwards, were two girls, both laughing.
Only at the party they weren’t sitting on the chair.
‘Where’s he gone?’
‘Who?’ asked Fiona.
‘Those girls in the first picture, they weren’t sitting on the chair. They were sitting on this gorgeous guy’s lap. He had a red shirt on, and it was sickening how they were throwing themselves at him.’
‘And ...?’ prompted Fiona.
‘And he’s not in the photo! It can’t be, it can’t ...’ said April, almost to herself. The other pictures had downloaded now and she clicked on them quickly, looking for the one that was making her stomach turn over. Not that one: a shot of the crowded corridor; not the next one either: a shot of the entrance hall. And then, there it was.
‘Oh no, no, no ...’ moaned April.
‘What’s up? Are you looking at the one you sent me of Milo?’
‘But this is stupid!’ snapped April. ‘Have you been messing about with them? You Photoshopped them or something?’
‘No, April, I didn’t.’ Fiona sounded annoyed. ‘I thought you had.’
April looked back at the screen. Her heart was beating too fast, too hard, it felt like it was wedged in her throat. The picture in front of her was of the ballroom. April had sneaked off to the side with her camera because she had wanted to send Fiona a picture of Milo. She had snapped it off, and sent it with the message: ‘This is Milo dancing - sexy huh?’ But Milo didn’t look sexy in this picture. He didn’t look like anything, because he wasn’t there. Just like the guy in the armchair wasn’t there. April tried to swallow, but she couldn’t. Maybe she had made a mistake with that first shot - maybe the girls were sitting on the arms of the chair.
But they weren’t, they weren’t
, her mind insisted. But she hadn’t made any mistake with the picture of Milo. He had been in the centre of the photo, dancing, a huge cute grin on his face because he was twirling a girl around in the air. And now, here, that girl was in the photograph alone. Whirling through space, no partner, no Milo. Just a weird black smudge where he should have been.
‘Where has he gone?’
‘That’s what I wanted to ask you,’ said Fiona. ‘At first, I thought it was a joke, but I couldn’t figure out why you’d bother airbrushing someone out of a photo right in the middle of a party. And then I started to worry. I don’t know what’s going on down there, but I do know it’s pretty strange. And now you’re telling me about this Marcus guy spreading rumours - it does sound a bit wrong.’