The priest’s collar was too tight, the flesh of his neck bunching over it as he read out the sermon. Pip looked beyond him, at the small grey headstone she’d picked out. A man with four different names, but Stanley Forbes was the one he chose, the life he’d wanted, the one who was trying. So that was the name engraved over him, forever.
Stanley Forbes
June 7th 1988 – May 4th 2018
You Were Better
‘And before we say our final prayer, Pip, you wanted to say a few words?’
The sound of her name caught her off-guard and she winced, her heart spiking, and suddenly her hands were wet but it didn’t feel like sweat, it was blood, it was blood, it was blood . . .
‘Pip?’ Ravi whispered to her, giving her fingers a gentle squeeze. And no, there was no blood, she’d only imagined it.
‘Yes,’ she said, coughing to clear her voice. ‘Yes. Um, I wanted to say thank you, everyone for coming. And to you, Father Renton, for the service.’ If Ravi wasn’t holding her hand still, it would be shaking, fluttering on the wind. ‘I didn’t know Stanley all that well. But I think, in the last hour of his life, I got to know who he truly was. He –’
Pip stopped. There was a sound, carrying on the breeze. A shout. It came again, louder this time. Closer.
‘Murderer!’
Her eyes shot up and her chest tightened. There was a group of about fifteen people, marching past the church towards them. Painted signs held up in their hands.
‘You’re mourning a killer!’ a man yelled.
‘I-I-I . . .’ Pip stuttered, and she felt the scream again, growing in her stomach, burning her inside out.
‘Keep going, pickle.’ Her dad was behind her, his warm hand on her shoulder. ‘You’re doing so well. I’ll go talk to them.’
The group was nearing, and Pip could recognize a few faces among them now: Leslie from the shop, and Mary Scythe from the Kilton Mail, and was that . . . was that Ant’s dad, Mr Lowe in the middle?
‘Um,’ she said, shakily, watching her dad hurrying away up the path towards them. Cara gave her an encouraging smile, and Jamie nodded. ‘Um. Stanley, he . . . when he knew his own life was in danger, his first thought was to protect me and –’
‘Burn in hell!’
She tightened her hands into fists. ‘And he faced his own death with bravery and –’
‘Scum!’
She dropped Ravi’s hand and she was gone.
‘No, Pip!’ Ravi tried to hold on to her but she slipped out of his grasp and away, pounding up the grass. Her mum was calling her name, but that wasn’t her right now. Her teeth bared as she flew down the pathway, her black dress flailing behind her knees as she took on the wind. Her eyes flickered across their signs painted in red, dripping letters:
Killer Spawn
Monster of Little Kilton
Charlie Green = HERO
Child Brunswick Rot in Hell
Not in OUR town!
Her dad looked back and tried to catch her as she passed but she was too fast, and that burning inside her too strong.
She collided into the group, shoving Leslie hard, her cardboard sign clattering to the floor.
‘He’s dead!’ she screamed at them all, pushing them back. ‘Leave him alone, he’s dead!’
‘He shouldn’t be buried here. This is our town,’ Mary said, pushing her sign towards Pip, blocking her sight.
‘He was your friend!’ Pip snatched the sign out of Mary’s hands. ‘He was your friend!’ she roared, bringing the poster board down with all her strength against her knee. It broke cleanly in two and she threw the pieces at Mary. ‘LEAVE HIM ALONE!’
She started towards Mr Lowe, who flinched away from her. But she didn’t make it. Her dad had grabbed her from behind, pulled her arms back. Pip reeled up against him, her feet kicking out towards them, but they were all backing away from her. Something new on their faces. Fear maybe, as she was dragged away.
Her eyes blurred with angry tears as she looked up, arms locked behind her, her dad’s calming voice in her ear. The sky was a pale and creamy blue, pockets of soft clouds floating across. A pretty sky for today. Stanley would have liked that, she thought, as she screamed up into it.
SATURDAY
6 DAYS LATER
Forty-Three
The sun climbed up her legs in leaf-like patches, reaching through the tall willow tree in the Reynoldses’ garden.
The day was warm, but the stone step she sat on was cool through the back of her new jeans. Pip blinked against the shifting beams of light, watching them all.
A get-together, Joanna Reynolds’ message had read, but Jamie joked it was a Surprise, I’m not dead barbecue. Pip had found that funny. She hadn’t found much funny the last few weeks, but that had done it.
The dads were hovering around the barbecue, and Pip could see her dad was eyeing the unflipped burgers, itching to take over from Arthur Reynolds. Mohan Singh was laughing, tilting his head back to drink his beer, the sunlight making the bottle glow.
Joanna was leaning over the picnic table nearby, removing cling film from the tops of bowls: pasta salad and potato salad and actual salad. Dropping serving spoons into each one. On the other side of the garden, Cara stood talking with Ravi, Connor and Zach. Ravi was intermittently kicking a tennis ball, for Josh to chase.
Pip watched her brother, whooping as he cartwheeled after the ball. A smile on his face that was pure and unknowing. Ten years old, the same age Child Brunswick was when . . . Stanley’s dying face flashed into her mind. Pip screwed her eyes shut, but that never took him away. She breathed, three deep breaths, like her mum told her to do, and re-opened them. She shifted her gaze and took a shaky sip of water, her hand sweating against the glass.
Nisha Singh and Pip’s mum were standing with Naomi Ward, Nat da Silva and Zoe Reynolds, words unheard passing from one to another, smiles following along behind them. It was nice to see Nat smiling, Pip thought. It changed her, somehow.
And Jamie Reynolds, he was walking towards her, wrinkling his freckled nose. He sat down on the step beside her, his knee grazing hers as he settled.
‘How are you doing?’ he asked, running his finger over the rim of his beer bottle.
Pip didn’t answer the question. ‘How are you?’ she said, instead.
‘I’m good.’ Jamie looked at her, a smile stretching into his pink-tinged cheeks. ‘Good but . . . I can’t stop thinking about him.’ The smile flickered out.
‘I know,’ said Pip.
‘He wasn’t what people expected,’ Jamie said quietly. ‘You know, he tried to fit a whole mattress through the gap in the toilet door, so I would be comfortable. And he asked me every day what I’d like to eat for dinner, despite still being scared of me. Of what I almost did.’
‘You wouldn’t have killed him,’ Pip said. ‘I know.’
‘No,’ Jamie sniffed, looking down at the smashed Fitbit still on his wrist. He’d said he would never take it off; he wanted it there, as a reminder. ‘I knew I couldn’t do it, even when the knife was in my hand. And I was so scared. But that doesn’t make it any better. I told the police everything. But, without Stanley, they don’t have enough to charge me. Doesn’t feel right, somehow.’
‘Doesn’t feel right that we’re both here and he’s not,’ Pip said, her chest tightening, filling her head with the sound of cracking ribs. ‘We both led Charlie to him, in a way. And we’re alive and he’s not.’