‌Pip couldn’t see, sweat stinging at the corners of her eyes. She might have pushed herself a little too hard this time. Too fast. Like she’d been running away, not just running.

At least she hadn’t seen Max out this time. She’d looked for him, ahead and over her shoulder, but he never appeared. The roads were hers.

She lowered her headphones to her neck and walked home, catching her breath as she passed the empty house next door. She turned down her driveway and stopped. Rubbed her eyes.

They were still here, those chalk figures. Five little stick people without their heads. Except, no, that couldn’t be right. It had rained yesterday, hard, and they definitely hadn’t been here when Pip left for her run. They hadn’t, she swore. And there was something else too.

She bent to get a closer look. They had moved. On Sunday morning they’d been at the intersection between pavement and driveway. Now they had shuffled several inches over, down the brickwork, moving closer to the house.

Pip was certain: these figures were new. Drawn in the hour she’d been out on her run. She closed her eyes to focus her ears, listening to the white- noise sound of trees dancing in the wind, the high whistle of a bird overhead, and the growling sound of a lawnmower somewhere close by. But she couldn’t hear the squawking sounds of the neighbourhood kids. Not one peep.

Eyes open, and yes, she hadn’t imagined them. Five small figures. She should ask her mum if she knew what they were. Maybe they weren’t supposed to be headless people, maybe they were something entirely innocent and her wrung-out mind was twisting them into something sinister.

She straightened up, the muscles in her calves aching and a sharper sensation in her left ankle. She stretched out her legs, and continued towards the house.

But she only made it two steps.

Her heart picked up, knocking against her ribs.

There was a grey lump further along the driveway. Near the front door. A feathered grey lump. She knew before she even got close what it was. Another dead pigeon. Pip approached it slowly, steps careful and silent, as though not to wake it, bring it crashing back to life. Her fingers fizzed with adrenaline as she towered over the pigeon, expecting to see herself again reflected in its glassy dead eyes. But she wasn’t there. Because there were no dead eyes.

Because there was no head.

A clean, tufted stump where it should be, hardly any blood.

Pip stared at it. Then up at the house, then again at the headless pigeon. She took herself back to last Monday morning, peeled away the week, sorting through her memories. There she was, rushing out the door in her smart suit, stopping as she caught sight of the dead bird, fixating on its eyes, thinking of Stanley.

It had been here. Right here. Two dead pigeons in exactly the same place. And those strange, shifting chalk figures with arms and legs and no heads. This couldn’t be a coincidence, could it? Pip didn’t believe in those at the best of times.

‘Mum!’ she called, pushing open the front door. ‘Mum!’ Her voice rebounded down the hall, the echo mocking her.

‘Hi sweetie,’ her mum replied, leaning out of the kitchen doorway, a knife in her hands. ‘I’m not crying, I promise, it’s these damn onions.’

‘Mum, there’s a dead pigeon out on the drive,’ Pip said, keeping her voice low and even.

‘Another one?’ Her mum’s face fell. ‘For goodness sake. And, of course, your father’s out again, so I’m the one who has to do it.’ She sighed. ‘Right, just let me get this stew on and then I’ll deal with it.’

‘N-no,’ Pip stammered. ‘Mum, you’re not getting it. There’s a dead pigeon in exactly the same place as the one last week. Like someone put it there on purpose.’ It sounded ridiculous, even as she said it.

‘Oh, don’t be silly.’ Her mum waved her off. ‘It’s just one of the neighbours’ cats.’

‘A cat?’ Pip shook her head. ‘But it’s in exactly the same pl—’

‘Yes, probably this cat’s new favourite killing spot. The Williamses have a big tabby cat; I see it in our garden sometimes. Poos in my borders.’ She mimed stabbing it with her knife.

‘This one doesn’t have a head.’ ‘Huh?’

‘The pigeon.’

Her mum’s mouth turned down at the corners. ‘Well, what can I say? Cats are disgusting. Don’t you remember the cat we had before we got Barney? When you were very small?’

‘You mean Socks?’ Pip said.

‘Yes, Socks was a vicious little killer. Brought dead things in the house almost every day. Mice, birds. Sometimes these great big rabbits. Would chew their heads off and leave them somewhere for me to find. Trails of guts. It was like coming home to a horror show.’

‘What you guys talking about?’ Josh’s voice called down the stairs. ‘Nothing!’ Pip’s mum yelled back. ‘You mind your own business!’ ‘But this…’ Pip sighed. ‘Can you just come look?’

‘I’m in the middle of dinner, Pip.’

‘It will take two seconds.’ She tilted her head. ‘Please?’

‘Uh, fine.’ Her mum backtracked to place the knife on the side. ‘Quietly though, I don’t want Mr Nosy coming down and getting involved.’

‘Who’s Mr Nosy?’ Josh’s small voice followed them out the front door. ‘I’m getting that kid some earplugs, I swear to god,’ Pip’s mum

whispered as they walked out on to the drive. ‘Right, yes, I see it. A

headless pigeon, exactly as I imagined it. Thanks for the preview.’

‘It’s not just that.’ Pip grabbed her arm and walked her down the driveway. She pointed. ‘Look, those little chalk figures. They were here a couple of days ago too, nearer the pavement. The rain washed them away, but they’re back, and they’ve moved. They weren’t here when I left on my run.’

Pip’s mum bent over, leaning on her knees. She screwed her eyes.

‘You see them, right?’ Pip asked her, doubt stirring in her stomach, cold and heavy.

‘Er, yeah, I guess,’ she said, squinting even harder. ‘There are some faded white lines.’

‘Yeah, exactly,’ Pip said, relieved. ‘And what do they look like to you?’

Her mum stepped closer, tipped her head to look at them from another angle.

‘I don’t know, maybe it’s a tyre-tread from my car or something. I did drive to a building site today so there could have been dust or chalk around.’

‘No, look harder,’ Pip said, her voice spiking with irritation. She narrowed her own eyes; they couldn’t just be tyre-treads, could they?

‘I don’t know, Pip, maybe it’s dust from the mortar joints.’ ‘The… what?’

‘The lines between the bricks.’ Her mum blew out a funnelled breath, and one of the little figures all but disappeared. She straightened up, running her hands over her skirt to smooth out the creases.

Pip pointed again. ‘You don’t see stick people? Five of them. Well, four now, thanks. Like someone has drawn them?’

Pip’s mum shook her head. ‘Don’t look like stick people to me,’ she said. ‘They don’t have he—’

‘Heads?’ Pip cut her off. ‘Exactly.’

‘Oh, Pip.’ Her mum eyed her with concern, that eyebrow slipping up her forehead again. ‘They aren’t connected. I’m sure it’s just something from my tyres, or maybe the postman’s car.’ She studied them again. ‘And if someone did draw those, it’s probably just the Yardleys’ kids. That middle one seems a bit, well, you know.’ She pulled a face.

It made sense, what her mum was saying. It was just a cat, of course. Just tyre-treads or a kid’s innocent doodle. Why had her mind jumped so far ahead, thinking they must be connected? She felt the creep of shame under her skin, that she’d even considered the idea someone had left them both here. Even more shameful, that they’d left them just for her. Why would she think that? Because she was scared of everything now, the other side of her brain answered. She had a fight-or-flight heart, felt danger pressing in on her when there was none, could hear gunshots in any sound if she wanted

to, scared of the night but not of the dark, even scared to look down at her own hands. Broken.

‘Are you OK, sweetie?’ Her mum had abandoned the chalk figures, studying her face instead. ‘Did you get enough sleep last night?’

Almost none. ‘Yes. Plenty,’ Pip said.

‘You look pale, is all.’ The eyebrow stretched even higher. ‘I’m always pale.’

‘Lost a bit of weight too.’ ‘Mum –’

‘I’m just saying, sweetie. Here,’ she slotted her arm through Pip’s, leading her back towards the house, ‘I’ll get back to dinner and I’ll even make tiramisu for dessert, your favourite.’

‘But it’s a Tuesday?’

‘So?’ Her mum smiled. ‘My little girl’s going off to uni in a few weeks, let me spoil her while I still have her.’

Pip gave her mum’s arm a squeeze. ‘Thanks.’

‘I’ll deal with that pigeon in a minute, you don’t need to worry about it,’ she said, shutting the front door behind them.

‘I’m not worried about the pigeon,’ Pip said, though her mum had already moved away, back to the kitchen. Pip listened to her clattering around in there, tutting about these industrial-strength onions. ‘I’m not worried about the pigeon,’ Pip said again quietly, just to herself. She was worried about who might have left it there. And then worried that she’d thought that at all.

She turned to the stairs, walking up to see Josh perched on the top step, chin between his hands.

‘What pigeon?’ he asked as Pip rested her hand on his head, navigating around him.

‘Seriously,’ she muttered, ‘maybe I should let you borrow these more often.’ She tapped the headphones cradled around her neck. ‘Glue them to your head.’

Pip went into her room, leaning against the door to close it behind her. She freed her arm from the Velcro phone holder and let it drop to the floor. She peeled her top off, the material clinging to her sweat-sticky skin,

getting tangled around the headphones. They came off together, now in a heap on her carpet. Yeah, she should definitely shower before dinner. And

… she glanced at the second drawer down in her desk. Maybe just take one, to calm her and settle her spiking heart, keep the blood off her hands and her mind off headless things. Her mum was starting to suspect something was wrong; Pip needed to be good at dinner. Just like her old self.

A cat and tyre marks. Those made sense, perfect sense. What was wrong with her? Why did she need it to be something bad, like she was looking for trouble? She held a breath. Just one more case. Save Jane Doe and save yourself. That’s all it would take, and she wouldn’t be like this any more: misplaced inside her own head. She had a plan. Just stick to the plan.

Pip quickly checked her phone. A text from Ravi: Would it be weird to have chicken nuggets ON TOP of pizza?

And an email from Roger Turner: Hi Pip, Should we have a chat sometime this week, now you’ve had a chance to think about the offer from the mediation? Best wishes, Roger Turner.

Pip exhaled. She felt sorry for Roger, but her answer was the same.

Over her dead body. What was the most professional way of saying that?

She was about to open the email when a new notification slotted in beneath. Another message had come through the form on her website, to [email protected]. The preview read: Who will look for you… and Pip knew exactly what the full text would say. Yet again.

She opened up the message from anon to delete it. Maybe she could set up some kind of blocker that would send them straight to spam? The message opened and Pip’s thumb hovered over the bin icon.

Her eyes stopped her just in time, catching on one word. She blinked.

Read the message in full.

Who will look for you when you’re the one who disappears? PS. Remember to always kill two birds with one stone.

The phone slipped from her hands.