I crawl out of the lake, gasping. I don’t know what to feel: relief? Shock? I’m glad I’m on my own this time, so I can sit on the ground, head in hands, and think.
So Lena and Nellie don’t run away.
I’m completely thrown. Part of me is thinking of Joel’s big secret, the relief that he didn’t run away that night I caught him on the balcony, yet for Lena and Nellie this doesn’t feel right. After all their plans and promises, I’d assumed they’d be the one part of the story that did work out. And to think they were coming to Brighton – my home town! But it didn’t happen. It went wrong. Which goes to show that even the strongest friendships can break.
Back at the house I can’t sleep. The air feels tight, prickly. I turn the pillow over, push back the sheet, pull it 200up again. It’s hopeless trying to rest when my brain keeps churning, stirring, whirling like a machine.
Mary Foster.
I sit up. Now my heart’s racing too. Mary Foster, the name on Nellie’s mother’s gravestone. Okay, so in those days, Mary was probably a common enough name, but I can’t help thinking these two Marys are linked. The Mary up the lane can’t be Nellie’s mum, because she’s already dead. But I’ve a feeling she’s someone in all of this. I just need to find out who.
*
The next morning the sky is heavy and grey. At breakfast, just the effort of lifting our cereal spoons is enough to make us sweat. Jessie’s complaining of a headache.
‘Too much to do, way too much to do,’ she mutters, as her device keeps dinging with notifications. One message makes her particularly frustrated. ‘Oh great, just what I need.’
‘What is?’ I ask.
She turns her screen to show me the news report. A big storm is coming up from France, crossing the English Channel, and due to hit us later this evening or early tomorrow. 201
‘Rain, huh?’ Joel raises his eyebrows. ‘Sounds exciting.’
‘Not a joke, matey,’ she replies. ‘It’s a nasty-looking storm.’
Her screen shows weather warnings, flood warnings, a whole list of red triangles. There’s a chance of power cuts, floods, fallen trees, blocked train lines and afterwards, food shortages that could go on for days. It’s not uncommon for the weather to wreak havoc, though this storm does sound a particularly bad one. We’re told to expect record rainfall, and to avoid all travel after six o’clock tonight.
Even time travel? I wonder. Not that it would stop me: I’m going to the lake tonight, no matter what the weather’s doing.
‘There’s real concern that even major roads will become impassable,’ says the weather forecaster in an online clip.
‘Fingers crossed we can’t get back in time to start school,’ Joel says.
‘Huh! I wish.’ I’m feeling particularly sore about Sasha this morning, so the thought is very appealing.
Yet before we get our hopes up, Dad calls. Jessie puts him on loudspeaker as she starts to gather her things for work.
‘Kids? You’ve seen the weather, right?’ he says.
‘Yeah, Dad,’ Joel replies. ‘It’s going to rain. A lot.’ 202
‘A heck of a lot, so I’m coming to pick you up early, while I can still get through. I should be there about one o’clock, okay?’ Dad sounds as if he’s in the van, already on the road.
‘Today?’ I’m horrified.
Joel puts his earphones back in and gets up from the table. But I’m panicking – and not just because if we go back to Brighton my brother might do something stupid and take off to London. Going home early means I’ll never find out what happens to Nellie or Lena, or if the Channel swim-swap actually takes place.
‘Not today, Dad!’ I cry.
‘Sorry, Pol. I don’t want your mum worrying.’
‘We’re fine here. We’ll be safe with Jessie.’
Dad sighs. ‘Sorry, pet. I know you’re having a fab time.’
It’s far more than that. It’s the threads of Nellie’s story still hanging in the air: it feels so tied to us, tied to Joel and me and that stupid night on the beach. If we go home now, he’ll run away: I’m really scared he will. Nate said that to properly run away you needed money and a place to go, and Joel doesn’t have either of those. If I can go back to Nellie’s life one more time, I might at least understand how things end, and what I can do to help my brother.
I look pleadingly at Jessie, hoping she’ll back me up, but she pulls a sad face. 203
‘If this storm’s as bad as they say it’s going to be, then it’s sensible, petal,’ she reasons.
Dad hangs up. All I can do is go and pack my stuff, and try not to cry, though the tears are welling up. To have come so far with Nellie only for it to end like this is crushing. It makes me think of that day at the station, when she was all geared up for an adventure, and instead had to lose her best friend.
I’m sitting on my bed when Jessie knocks and sticks her head in.
‘Could you do me a quick favour?’ She holds out a white paper bag, the sort you get from a pharmacy. ‘These are for Mary. More blood pressure tablets. Would you mind dropping them in? I’m run off my feet this morning what with the storm coming.’
Jessie sees my surprise. ‘I know I told you to keep away. But she does need these, and I’d be really grateful.’
‘Sure.’ I take the bag.
It’s then I see Mary’s full name: it’s on the printed label stuck to the bag. ‘Mary Elizabeth Foster – DOB 07/01/1941.’
‘You okay, petal?’ Jessie wants to know.
I look up, dizzily. ‘Yeah, fine. I’ll take these up to her now.’
I grab my sandals, tugging them on without undoing 204the buckles. It’s not the homework task I’m thinking of. It’s so much more – too much, almost. My heart’s roaring in my chest.
Foster is Nellie’s surname. The date of birth – 1941– would make Mary the exact same age as Nellie in 1952. It’s all falling into place: Shakespeare Cottage, Mary’s knowledge of Channel swimming. Even the middle name is right: there’s a girl in my class called Nell and she told me it’s short for Elizabeth.
I make sure I take the old door handle with me: I’ve a feeling it’s going to help. I’m in full flight out of the door when Joel calls me back.
‘You got a sec, Pol?’
He’s in his room, looking at his screen. My stomach sinks when I see it’s open on the site where that swimming clip got posted. He’s scrolling through the comments: there’s more of them than ever. I wish he’d stop going back to it, going over it, torturing himself – and me. Yet there’s something about the way Joel looks that’s almost defiant.
‘You asked me to check out Sasha’s accounts, yeah?’
I nod uneasily.
‘Well, she didn’t block you.’
‘Oh.’ Somehow, this is a relief. ‘Okay.’
‘But I’ve found out who filmed us,’ he says. ‘I think 205they’re the same person who put the clip online.’
I perch next to him on the bed, suddenly nervous. There’s something in the way he says it that makes me want to know – and not know – who it is. He doesn’t say the name out loud. He does what Jessie did with the news, and turns his screen towards me so I can see it for myself. The page is so full of messages and images, I’m not sure where to look until Joel, finger hovering, directs my eyes to the right place.
SASHA_TORTE20
My blood runs cold. I know the username. Sasha explained the pun to me one Saturday afternoon, taking me past a cake shop in town and pointing out a glossy chocolate cake in the window.
‘That.’ She tapped the glass with a stubby fingernail. ‘Is my favourite thing in the world. A Sachertorte.’
It’s typical of Sasha to name herself after a cake. All her accounts have the same name, more or less. Yet it’s not like her to be deliberately nasty – thoughtless, yes, but not cruel. And would she really be on the old pier in the middle of the night?
Some of the comments posted under the clip are so vile I feel sick reading them. Would Sasha – my often silly, bit-of-a-joker friend – think it was okay to film someone and post it online without asking? And since 206when did she hate my brother so much to do this to him? To me?
‘Sasha wouldn’t post that clip,’ I say.
Wouldn’t she? says another voice. Why else has she not been in touch? Why’ve all her media accounts closed down apart from this one?
I don’t know. It feels as if the storm is already here, inside my head. Yet Joel looks brighter than he has done for days, maybe weeks. He’s on a trail that should lead him to who’s been making his life hell at school.
‘We’re getting somewhere,’ he says.
Maybe. I stand up, push my hair off my hot face. But one mystery at a time.