“Am I?”
He had to be.
“She’d never…” This time she might know the words, but there was no getting them out. “Not with you.”
Ryan finally looked up, smile snatched away in a storm of anger. “Listen to yourself. You’re such a fucking snob.”
“She hated you—”
“No – you hate me, Carbs,” Ryan spat back. “Maybe think about that while you’re so busy asking yourself why she never told you.”
Her hands rose reflexively to her face to stop it melting off in horror because … he was telling the truth, wasn’t he? The two of them. Together. And Freya never said. Never once let on…
“I think I’m going to be sick.”
“Fucksake,” from Ryan, as Sunny shifted a little away from her on the bench with a “Please be exaggerating…”
But this wasn’t just about Ryan. It was a swell of misery that threatened to purge all the secrets from her system. She swallowed it back, she could do this. Front it out for that little bit longer. If there was one part of her that had grown stronger recently, it was her will.
“Just give us the letters,” she said. She knew she was crying now, but consigned that fact to the same part of her brain that was dealing with the pains in her hands and the aches that stiffened the muscles in her leg and shoulder: just because it was happening didn’t mean she had to admit to it.
Ryan pushed himself off the wall and yanked a sheaf of crumpled envelopes from his back pocket.
“Lucas… Win…” Ryan handed the others theirs. Because of course he did. Sophie refused to stand and Ryan refused to step closer until Sunny lunged forward and snatched the letter from him and handed it to Sophie without sitting back down.
“You guys. I swear…”
But Sophie wasn’t listening. Didn’t care. Today was twice too long as it was and she was done. This was done. Here was the treasure at the end of the trail. The promise of a piece of Freya that Sophie got to keep to herself.
Without waiting, Sophie tucked a nail under the flap of her envelope and tore along the top.
WIN
“Thought the plan was to open them on the count of three?” Ryan was saying as Win looked down at her name on the envelope. Freya had written the one name this time: Win.
Win wondered about that – about all of this. How Freya had chosen to write everyone’s name in full on each layer because she’d wanted them to be able to find each other without needing Freya’s help…
So much work for everyone except Freya.
“Is this a wind up?” Sophie rose from the bench and took a step towards Ryan, glaring at the paper she was holding, then at him, face mottled from the tears the rest of them were pretending not to notice. “Where’s my letter?”
“In your hand,” Ryan snapped back.
“This” – the paper made a snap as she whipped it in the air, making herself wince – “can’t be all she sent me. There must have been something else in there.”
Ryan edged back a touch, bringing him closer to Sunny, like he might welcome her protection once more.
“Er … there wasn’t,” he said.
“Like I believe you.” Sophie held her hand out, palm up as if expecting him to spit out whatever he was withholding the way a toddler might relinquish a half-chewed Lego brick. “Hand it over!”
“I gave you it already.” But there was amusement in the way he said it. “Just because you don’t like what she—”
An angry hiss slipped through Sophie’s teeth before she went for him, shouting that it wasn’t funny, that she knew he had it…
And Ryan was laughing, trying to push her away – and Sophie looked so angry, so pained, that Win couldn’t stand by any longer.
“Stop!” She stood, pushed Ryan beyond Sophie’s reach and got between them. “The pair of you … just … stop yelling at him and you” – Win turned to channel as much disapproval as she could at Ryan – “could you maybe take one minute off being a complete and utter tool and perhaps not wind her up?”
“She started it.”
Whatever expression accompanied the warning finger Win aimed at his chest, it was enough to shut him up. But when she turned back to Sophie, she was holding herself like a puppet who’d lost her strings yet still felt compelled to perform.
“You want to know what’s in my letter?” Her voice wobbled with every word and Win wanted to tell her no. She didn’t want to hear whatever it was that Freya had said to do this to her best friend. She hadn’t wanted to be a part of any of this – her connection to Freya had become weaponised against someone to whom she meant so much more.
“It says, Hey Soph.” Her segue into Freya’s voice was uncanny. “Thanks for trusting me. Miss you tons. Speak soon. Love F.”
The others waited as a she wavered on a breath. Only nothing further followed.
“Huh?” From Sunny. Blunt and to the point. “Trusting you with what?”
“How about absolutely nothing?” Sophie choked back at her.
“Hey, don’t yell at Sunny for asking—” Lucas stood up and reached out to touch a hand to Sunny’s arm.
“Why not?”
“I’m sure Freya didn’t want—”
“You’re sure, are you? How? Because I’m not sure what she wanted,” Sophie shouted back at him with more rage than she had for Ryan; her whole body was trembling, voice shaking with it. “Why the fuck would I presume to know anything about my so-called best friend’s life?”
Sunny and Lucas backed away, drawing closer to Win and Ryan, like that could protect them from whatever bomb was about to detonate. Swear words didn’t sound right in Sophie’s perfect Queen’s English. Her cut-glass accent smashed into shards and flung in their faces.
A side of her that Win hadn’t known was there.
“Until today I hardly knew any of you existed! You know what I thought when I opened that thing this morning? Who the hell is Winnie Su? I had to ask at the school office! And you” – she scowled at Lucas like he was the one who’d lied – “all this time you’ve been two different people. Some guy from work that she stopped talking about once the novelty wore off and Kellan Spencer’s pal that she never even talked to.”
Her gaze slid to Ryan and the disgust on her face said it all.
“Whatever,” Ryan muttered. “So she didn’t tell you about a couple of mates? Big fucking deal. At least you still get to talk to her.”
“Do I?”
“All the…” Ryan thumbed the screen of an invisible phone. “You know where she is, how she’s doing. She didn’t ghost you like she did everyone else.”
“Didn’t she?” Sophie trembled with the force of whatever she was holding back, her voice hoarse.
There was a moment in which the answer to that question changed from what Win believed – to what she knew. The way Sophie had dialled Freya in the car knowing she’d not answer, the look on her face whenever she talked about her leaving … how had Win not even guessed?
“But…” Ryan started. Win wished she could reach over and slam his mute button. “You said. Every time someone asked – I heard the answers. About how she’s doing with her dad, why she’s not posting anything online…” His frustration snowballed into rage, so that he was practically shouting. “You said!”