She knew his footsteps; knew them across carpet and hardwood floors, and knew them now across the gravel on the common car park. She turned and smiled at him, and Ravi’s feet picked up in that small-stepped half-run he always did when he spotted her. It made Pip glow every time.
‘Hey, Sarge,’ he said, pressing the words into her forehead with his lips.
His very first nickname for her, now one among dozens.
‘You OK?’ she asked, though she already knew he wasn’t; he’d just over- sprayed deodorant and it was following him around like a fog. That meant he was nervous.
‘Yeah, bit nervous,’ Ravi said. ‘Mum and Dad are already there but I wanted to shower first.’
‘That’s OK, the ceremony doesn’t start until seven thirty,’ Pip said, taking his hand. ‘There are lots of people around the pavilion already, maybe a few hundred.’
‘Already?’
‘Yeah. I walked through on my way home from school and the news vans were already setting up.’
‘Is that why you came in disguise?’ Ravi smiled, tugging at the bottle- green jacket hood pulled over Pip’s head.
‘Just until we get past them.’
It was probably her fault they were here anyway; her podcast had reignited Sal and Andie’s stories on the news cycles. Especially this week, the six-year anniversary of their deaths.
‘How did court go today?’ asked Pip, and then: ‘We can talk about it tomorrow if you don’t want –’
‘No, it’s OK,’ he said. ‘I mean, it wasn’t OK. Today was one of the girls who lived in the same halls as Max at university. They played her 999 call from the morning after.’ Ravi swallowed the lump in his throat. ‘And in cross-examination, Epps went in on her, of course: no DNA profile lifted from the rape kit, no memory, that sort of thing. You know, watching Epps sometimes makes me reconsider if I really want to be a criminal defence solicitor.’
That was The Plan they’d worked out: Ravi would resit his A-Level exams as a private candidate the same time Pip was taking hers. Then he would apply for a six-year law apprenticeship starting in September, when Pip went to university. ‘Quite the power couple,’ Ravi had remarked.
‘Epps is one of the bad ones,’ Pip said. ‘You’ll be a good one.’ She squeezed his hand. ‘Are you ready? We can wait here a bit longer if you –’
‘I’m ready,’ he said. ‘Just . . . I . . . will you stay with me?’ ‘Of course.’ She pressed her shoulder into his. ‘I won’t let go.’
The sky was already darkening as they left the crunchy gravel behind for the soft grass of the common. To their right, little clusters of people were walking out on to the green from the direction of Gravelly Way, all heading towards the pavilion on the south side of the common. Pip heard the crowd before she saw them; that low, living hum that only happens when you put hundreds of people into one small place. Ravi gripped her hand tighter.
They rounded a tight knot of whispering sycamore trees and the pavilion came into view, glowing a faint yellow; people must have started lighting the candles and tealights laid out around the structure. Ravi’s hand started to sweat against hers.
She recognized a few faces at the back as they approached: Adam Clark, her new history teacher, standing beside Jill from the café, and over there Cara’s grandparents waving at her. They pushed forward and, as eyes turned and met theirs, the crowd parted for Ravi, swallowing them, re-forming behind them to block the way back.
‘Pip, Ravi.’ A voice pulled their attention to the left. It was Naomi, hair pulled back tight, like her smile. She was standing with Jamie Reynolds – the older brother of Pip’s friend Connor – and, Pip realized with a stomach lurch, Nat da Silva. Her hair so white in the thickening twilight that it almost set the air around her aglow. They had all been in the same school year as Sal and Andie.
‘Hi,’ Ravi said, pulling Pip out of her thoughts.
‘Hi Naomi, Jamie,’ she said, nodding to them in turn. ‘Nat, hey,’ she faltered as Nat’s pale-blue eyes fell on her and her gaze hardened. The air around her lost its glow and turned cold.
‘Sorry,’ Pip said. ‘I-I . . . just wanted to say I’m sorry you had to go through that, th-the trial yesterday, but you did amazingly.’
Nothing. Nothing but a twitch in Nat’s cheek.
‘And I know this week and next must be awful for you, but we are going to get him. I know it. And if there’s anything I can do . . .’
Nat’s eyes slid off Pip like she wasn’t really there at all. ‘OK,’ Nat said, a sharp edge to her voice as she faced the other way.
‘OK,’ Pip said quietly, turning back to Naomi and Jamie. ‘We’d better keep moving. See you later.’
They moved on through the crowd, and when they were far enough away, Ravi said in her ear, ‘Yeah, she definitely still hates you.’
‘I know.’ And she deserved it, really; she had considered Nat a murder suspect. Why wouldn’t Nat hate her? Pip felt cold, but she packed away Nat’s eyes into the pit in her stomach, alongside the rest of those feelings.
She spotted Cara’s messy dark blonde top-knot, bobbing above the heads in the crowd, and she manoeuvred herself and Ravi towards it. Cara was standing with Connor, who was nodding his head in quick doubles as she spoke. Beside them, heads almost pressed together, were Ant and Lauren, who were now always Ant-and-Lauren said in one quick breath, because one was never seen without the other. Not now that they were together together, unlike before when they must have been pretend together. Cara said apparently it had started at the calamity party they all went to last October, when Pip had been undercover. No wonder she hadn’t noticed. Zach was standing the other side of them, ignored, fiddling awkwardly with his liquid black hair.
‘Hi,’ Pip said as she and Ravi breached the outer circle of the group. ‘Hey,’ came a quiet chorus of replies.
Cara turned to look up at Ravi, nervously picking at her collar. ‘I, um . . .
I’m . . . how are you? Sorry.’ Cara was never lost for words.
‘It’s OK,’ Ravi said, breaking free from Pip’s hand to hug Cara. ‘It really is, I promise.’
‘Thank you,’ Cara said quietly, blinking at Pip over Ravi’s shoulder.
‘Oh, look,’ Lauren hissed, nudging Pip and indicating with a flash of her eyes. ‘It’s Jason and Dawn Bell.’
Andie and Becca’s parents. Pip followed Lauren’s eyes. Jason was wearing a smart wool coat, surely too hot for the evening, leading Dawn towards the pavilion. Dawn’s eyes were down on the ground, on all those bodiless feet, her eyelashes mascara-clumped like she’d already been crying. She looked so small behind Jason as he pulled her along by the hand.
‘Have you heard?’ Lauren said, beckoning for the group to draw in tighter. ‘Apparently Jason and Dawn are back together. My mum says his second wife is divorcing him and apparently Jason has moved back into that house with Dawn.’
That house. The house where Andie Bell died on the kitchen tiles and Becca stood by and watched. If those apparentlys were true, Pip wondered how much choice Dawn had had in that decision. From what she’d heard about Jason during her investigation, she wasn’t sure how much choice anyone around him ever had. He’d certainly not come out of her podcast smelling of roses. In fact, in a twitter poll a listener made of the Most Hateable Person in AGGGTM, Jason Bell had received almost as many votes as Max Hastings and Elliot Ward. Pip herself had come in close fourth place.
‘It’s so weird they still live there,’ Ant said, widening his eyes like Lauren’s. They fed off each other like that. ‘Eating dinner in the same room she died.’
‘People deal with what they have to deal with,’ said Cara. ‘Don’t think you can judge them by normal standards.’
That shut Ant-and-Lauren up.
There was an awkward silence that Connor tried to fill. Pip looked away, immediately recognizing the couple standing next to them. She smiled.
‘Oh hi, Charlie, Flora.’ Her new neighbours from four doors down: Charlie with his rusty coloured hair and well-trimmed beard, and Flora who Pip had only ever seen wearing florals. She was the new teaching assistant at her brother’s school, and Josh was more than a little bit obsessed with her. ‘Didn’t see you there.’
‘Hello,’ Charlie smiled, dipping his head. ‘You must be Ravi,’ he said, shaking Ravi’s hand which hadn’t yet found its way back to Pip. ‘We are both very sorry for your loss.’
‘It sounds like your brother was an amazing guy,’ Flora added. ‘Thank you. Yeah, he was,’ said Ravi.
‘Oh,’ Pip patted Zach’s shoulder to bring him into the conversation. ‘This is Zach Chen. He used to live in your house.’
‘Lovely to meet you, Zach,’ Flora said. ‘We love the house so much. Was yours the back bedroom?’
A hissing sound behind Pip distracted her for a moment. Connor’s brother Jamie had appeared beside him, talking to each other in hushed tones.
‘No, it’s not haunted,’ Charlie was saying as Pip tuned back into the conversation.
‘Flora?’ Zach turned to her. ‘Have you never heard the pipes groaning in the downstairs toilet? It sounds like a ghost saying ruuuuun, ruuuunn.’
Flora’s eyes widened suddenly, her face draining as she looked at her husband. She opened her mouth to reply but started to cough, excusing herself, stepping back from the circle.
‘Look what you’ve started.’ Charlie smiled. ‘She’ll be best friends with the toilet ghost by tomorrow.’
Ravi’s fingers walked down Pip’s forearm, sliding back into her hand as he gave her a look. Yes, they should probably move on and find his parents; it would start soon.
They said goodbye and carried on towards the front of the gathering. Looking back, Pip could have sworn the crowd had doubled since they’d arrived; there might be nearly a thousand people here now. Almost at the pavilion, Pip saw for the first time the blown-up photographs of Sal and Andie, resting against easels on opposite sides of the small building. Matching smiles etched into their forever-young faces. People had laid bouquets of flowers in orbiting circles underneath each portrait, and the candles flickered as the crowd shuffled on their feet.
‘There they are,’ Ravi said, pointing. His parents were at the front on the right, the side Sal looked out on. There was a group of people around them, and Pip’s family were close by.
They passed right behind Stanley Forbes taking photos of the scene, the flash of his camera lighting up his pale face and dancing across his dark brown hair.
‘Of course he’s here,’ Pip said out of earshot.
‘Oh, leave him alone, Sarge.’ Ravi smiled back at her.
Months ago, Stanley had sent the Singhs a four-page handwritten apology letter, telling them he was ashamed of the way he’d spoken about their son. He’d printed another public apology in the small-town newspaper he volunteered at, the Kilton Mail. And he’d also led the charge on fundraising to get a bench dedicated to Sal on the common, just up the path from Andie’s one. Ravi and his parents had accepted his apology, but Pip was sceptical.
‘At least he said sorry,’ Ravi continued. ‘Look at all of them.’ He indicated the group around his parents. ‘Their friends, neighbours. People who made their life hell. They’ve never apologized, just pretended like the last six years never even happened.’
Ravi cut off as Pip’s dad folded them both into a hug.
‘Doing OK?’ he asked Ravi, patting him on the back before he let go. ‘Doing OK,’ Ravi replied, tousling Josh’s hair in greeting and smiling at
Pip’s mum.
Ravi’s dad, Mohan, came over. ‘I’m going in now to get a few things ready. I’ll see you after.’ He tapped Ravi affectionately under the chin with one finger. ‘Look after Mum.’ Mohan walked up the stairs of the pavilion and disappeared inside.
It started at seven thirty-one exactly, Ravi standing between Pip and his mum, holding both of their hands. Pip circled her thumb in his palm as the district councillor who’d helped organize the memorial stepped up to the microphone at the top of the stairs to say ‘a few words’. Well, he said far more than a few, going on about family values in the town and the inevitability of truth, praising the Thames Valley Police for all their ‘tireless work on this case’. He wasn’t even trying to be sarcastic.
Next up to speak was Mrs Morgan, now headteacher at Little Kilton Grammar School. Her predecessor had been forced by the board to resign early, in the fallout from everything Mr Ward had done while working at the school. Mrs Morgan spoke about Andie and Sal in turn, about the lasting impact their stories would have on the whole town.
Then Andie’s best friends, Chloe Burch and Emma Hutton, walked out of the pavilion and up to the microphone. Clearly Jason and Dawn Bell had declined to speak at the vigil. Chloe and Emma did a joint reading, from Christina Rossetti’s poem, Goblin Market. When they were done, they re- joined the quietly murmuring crowd, Emma sniffing and dabbing at her
eyes with her sleeve. Pip was watching her when someone behind bumped her elbow.
She turned. It was Jamie Reynolds, shuffling slowly through the crowd, a determined look in his eyes, the candles lighting up a sheen of sweat breaking across his face.
‘Sorry,’ he muttered distractedly, like he didn’t even recognize her.
‘It’s OK,’ Pip replied, following Jamie with her eyes until Mohan Singh walked out of the pavilion and cleared his throat at the microphone, silencing the common. Not a sound, except the wind in the trees. Ravi gripped tighter, his fingernails pressing half-moons into Pip’s skin.
Mohan looked down at the sheet of paper in his hand. He was shaking, the page fluttering in his grip.
‘What can I tell you about my son, Sal?’ he started, a crack halfway through his voice. ‘I could tell you he was a straight-A student with a bright future ahead of him, but you probably already know that. I could tell you he was a loyal and caring friend who never wanted anyone to feel alone or unwanted, but you probably already know that too. I could tell you he was an incredible big brother and an amazing son who made us proud every day. I could share memories of him, as a grinning toddler who wanted to climb everything, to a teenager who loved early mornings and late nights. But instead, I will tell you just one thing about Sal.’
Mohan paused, looked up to smile at Ravi and Nisha.
‘If Sal were here today, he’d never admit to this and would probably be thoroughly embarrassed, but his favourite movie of all time, from age three to eighteen, was Babe.’
There was a light and tense laugh from the crowd. Ravi too, eyes starting to glaze.
‘He loved that little pig. Another reason he loved the film was because it contained his favourite song. The one that could make him smile and cry, the one that made him want to dance. So I’m going to share a little of Sal and play that song for you now to celebrate his life, as we light and release the lanterns. But first, those words from Sal’s favourite song, I say them to you now, my boy.’ The page quivered against the microphone like paper wings as Mohan wiped his eyes. ‘If I had words to make a day for you, I’d sing you a morning golden and new. I would make this day last for all time. Give you a night deep in moonshine.’ He paused, nodded at someone off to the right. ‘Take it away.’
And from the speakers set up on both sides, the super high-pitched voice of a mouse exclaimed: ‘And-a-one-and-a-two-and-a-three, hit it!’
The song started, a steady drum and the climbing melody sung by a squeaky mouse, until a whole chorus of other mice joined in.
Ravi was laughing now, and crying, and something in between the two. And somewhere, behind them, someone started clapping in time to the song.
Now a few more.
Pip watched over her shoulder as the clapping caught, passing up and down as it swelled through the swaying crowd. The sound was thunderous and happy.
People started singing along with the shrill mice, and – as they realized it was just the same few lyrics repeated – others joined in, struggling to hit those impossibly high notes.
Ravi turned to her, mouthing the words, and she mouthed them back. Mohan walked down the steps, the page in his hand replaced with a
Chinese lantern. The district councillor carried another down, passing it to Jason and Dawn Bell. Pip let Ravi go as he joined his mum and dad. Ravi was handed the small box of matches. The first one he struck was blown into a thin line of smoke by the wind. He tried again, sheltering the flame with his cupped hands, holding it under the lantern’s wick until it caught.
The Singhs waited a few seconds for the fire to grow, filling the lantern with hot air. They each had two hands on the wire rim at the bottom, and when they were ready, when they were finally ready, they straightened up, arms above their heads, and let go.
The lantern sailed up above the pavilion, juddering in the breeze. Pip craned her neck to watch it go, its yellow-orange flicker setting the darkness around it on fire. A moment later, Andie’s lantern crossed into view too, mounting the night as it chased Sal across the endless sky.
Pip didn’t look away. Her neck strained, sending stabs of pain down her spine but she refused to look away. Not until those golden lanterns were little more than specks, nestling among the stars. And even beyond that.
