SweetFreak

by Sophie McKenzie

  ‘I wouldn’t want to cause Taylor’s mum any more stress,’ I say. ‘Her husband only left her a couple of months ago. The last thing she needs is to have to deal with a break-in.’

  Seti tilts her head to one side. She has a small, pointy little face and looks, right now, like an inquisitive sparrow. ‘But you agree that if Taylor is behind Amelia’s disappearance – or knows anything about it – there might be some sort of proof in his room?’

  ‘Yes, but—’

  ‘Then let me worry about how we get inside. I promise we won’t do any damage. And I can easily deal with the alarm. With a bit of luck Taylor’s mum won’t even know anyone’s been inside.’ Seti pauses. ‘Think of Amelia.’

  I nod. I have to do this, however overwhelming it seems. For my best friend. Because I’m certain that Taylor knows more than he’s letting on about her disappearance and, if the police won’t investigate him, then I have to.

  ‘OK,’ I agree. ‘We’ll search his room, look for clues that will help find Amelia. When should we go?’

  ‘Soon as it’s dark,’ Seti says. ‘We’ll need to buy a couple of bits and pieces first though. Have you got any cash?’

  I let her take me to the DIY superstore on the outskirts of town where, under Seti’s instructions, I use some of the cash Poppy gave me to buy wire cutters and a screwdriver.

  ‘Why do we need these?’ I ask, alarmed, as I put the big roll of notes back into my pocket.

  ‘Just to help us get in without causing any damage,’ Seti explains. ‘The screwdriver is the main thing, the wire cutters are only in an absolute emergency.’

  Reassured, I spend another few quid on some cans of pop and a couple of hamburgers. Seti wolfs hers down, but mine sticks in my throat.

  Are we doing the right thing? Blue’s anxious face keeps appearing in my mind’s eye. Maybe he’s right that I should turn myself over to the police and tell them my suspicions about Taylor. Surely if I really explain everything they’ll have to investigate Taylor themselves.

  ‘You can’t rely on them listening to you, but if you can provide proof from Taylor’s house then they’ll be forced to act,’ Seti insists. ‘Anyway, it’s not like we’re going to steal anything or hurt anyone. And you can hardly get into any more trouble than you’re already in, can you?’

  She’s right.

  An hour later, as the sun begins to set, Seti and I make our way towards Taylor’s house. It’s been a bright, sunny day and my anxieties ease as we stroll across the park a few streets away from where he lives. It’s a smaller park than the one near my house and far better maintained, with smart patches of shrubs and trees dotted artistically at regular intervals. There’s a children’s play area too, with freshly painted swings and a climbing frame in the shape of a bumble bee.

  ‘Posh part of town,’ Seti comments. She sounds like she hasn’t been here before.

  ‘Where are you from?’ I ask.

  ‘Hornchurch,’ she says. ‘Essex.’

  ‘So how come you’re here, in Cornmouth?’ I ask.

  ‘Oh, this and that,’ Seti says airily. ‘Got in a bit of trouble when I was younger, spent some time in care. I was with a lovely foster family for a few years but I had to leave when . . . Anyway, I moved about, came to Cornmouth a few months ago . . .’

  I ask a few more questions but Seti sidesteps them neatly, turning the conversation back to the squat and to Tommo’s hypocrisy. After a while she pauses. ‘So what do you think of Blue?’ Her eyes twinkle as she speaks.

  ‘He seems nice,’ I say, not quite sure what she’s getting at. ‘He helped me when he didn’t need to. Not that I really know him of course.’

  ‘He likes you,’ Seti says with a chuckle. ‘I can tell.’ She taps her nose. ‘I’m good at reading people.’

  I bet you’re good at lots of things, I think, feeling intimidated again. I’ve never met anyone as effortlessly cool as Seti. She studies me with her almond-shaped eyes. ‘So?’ she says. ‘Do you like him?’

  ‘Blue?’ The heat rushes up my neck to my face. ‘No,’ I say. ‘Not like that.’

  ‘Mmm.’ Seti laughs. ‘If you say so.’

  I change the subject to our impending break-in of Taylor’s house. We are at the edge of the park and Seti reassures me, yet again, that we won’t damage anything and that we’ll just look in Taylor’s room and not go anywhere near the rest of the house.

  We wait another thirty minutes or so until it’s properly dark, then we pull up our hoods and leave the park. Seti falls silent as we reach Taylor’s house. Her sharp eyes take in the long sweep of the gravel drive.

  The house is dark, just a little light over the front door. I can’t believe that I stood here with Jamie only a day and a half ago. My little brother will be missing me. I miss him badly. And as for Mum, I can’t bear to imagine how worried she must be. When we’re done here I’m going to ask Seti if she has a phone I can borrow so I can call home and let them know I’m all right.

  Seti creeps across the drive. I follow her as she crouches down, frowning, and examines the wires that surround the door frame and flow along the base of the brick wall on either side. Without speaking, she takes the cutters and snips the wires close to the ground.

  ‘What are you doing?’ I hiss. ‘I thought we weren’t going to cause any damage?’

  ‘It’s just a little cut,’ she protests, sweeping her plaits over her shoulder with a flourish. ‘We don’t have a choice. We’ll set off the alarm otherwise.’

  ‘OK,’ I say, ‘but that’s it, we’re not damaging anything else.’

  ‘Course not,’ Seti says with a grin, then steps smartly across to the hall window and smashes the glass at the bottom with the end of the wire cutters. As I gasp, she sweeps the glass away, then leans inside, flicks a catch and levers up the window. In less than ten seconds the window is open enough for us to crawl through.

  My mouth hangs open. ‘You said we wouldn’t break anything.’

  ‘Well it’s done now,’ Seti says with a giggle. ‘We might as well go in.’

  I stare at her, an uneasy feeling creeping over me.

  ‘There’s no point not going in, is there?’ she goes on.

  My heart is beating fast. I’m wishing we hadn’t come, but Seti is right, the damage is done. We might as well look at Taylor’s stuff now we’re here.

  Seti scrambles deftly inside. She’s disappeared by the time I’ve clambered over the sill and am standing, terrified, in the hall.

  ‘Seti!’ I whisper. ‘Seti, where are you?’

  ‘Here!’ She’s already halfway up the stairs. ‘Come on.’

  I follow her up to the first floor.

  ‘Which is his room?’ Seti asks.

  ‘Second on the left,’ I say.

  Seti peers into the other doors as we pass: there’s just enough light from the uncurtained windows to make out the other bedrooms: the row of bottles and boxes ranged across the dressing table in Taylor’s mum’s room and the toys on the floor of Blake’s.

  ‘Don’t turn on any lights,’ Seti warns as we reach Taylor’s bedroom. Her sharp eyes dart all over, taking it in. I follow her gaze, clocking the big heap of clothes, the football posters on the walls, the big-screen TV with both an Xbox and a PS4 attached. It’s such a rich boy’s room: twice the size of mine, with a king-size bed and a massive walk-in wardrobe at the far end.

  ‘Try under the bed,’ Seti suggests. ‘I’ll look in the wardrobe.’

  I crawl under Taylor’s bed. There’s nothing here apart from a collection of muddy football boots, some empty deodorant cans and a stray sock. I shuffle back out again. There’s no sign of Seti, who must still be looking through the walk-in closet. I turn my attention to the desk under the window. A stack of text books and folders are piled, higgledy-piggledy, on the top; the drawers beneath are so crammed they won’t close. I pull them fully open one by one, scrabbling through their contents. The top drawer is still full of old phones, just as it was when I came here before. The drawe
r beneath is all USB sticks and cables and wads of tissue and bags of half-open sweets. I push a handful of cables to one side of the drawer, revealing a pair of phone chargers. I’m about to turn away when I catch a glint of silver peeking out from underneath one of the chargers. It’s a chain . . . a necklace with a heart on the end. I hold it up to the moonlight that streams in through the window. My throat tightens as I turn the little heart over. There on the back someone has scratched the initials ‘A’ and ‘T’, entwined. I gasp. This is the necklace Taylor gave Amelia, the one she never took off. It’s proof at last that he must have had something to do with her disappearance.

  ‘Seti?’ I hiss, hurrying over to the closet. I peer inside. There’s no sign of her, just a load of messy shelves and clothes half off their hangers. My heart skips a beat. Where is she? I hurry out on to the landing. ‘Seti?’ I call as loudly as I dare. ‘I’ve found something. Where are you?’

  No reply. I dart from room to room. I can’t see her anywhere, but the elegant wooden dressing table in Taylor’s mum’s room is scattered with upturned bottles and what looks like a jewellery box tipped on its side. A shell necklace and a handful of chunky bangles trail onto the table. I stare at the mess. I’m certain the bottles and the box were neatly placed to the back of the table when we passed this room earlier. I hurry over to the box. It’s almost empty . . . I stagger back as the truth hits me.

  Seti has stolen Taylor’s mum’s jewellery and run away.

  A light filters up from the ground floor. I rush to the top of the stairs. People are outside, crunching on the gravel. Torchlight flickers over the broken window.

  ‘See that?’ It’s a woman’s voice. ‘I knew I heard breaking glass.’

  ‘And those wires have been cut.’ It’s a man. ‘D’you think they’re still inside?’

  I freeze.

  ‘Let’s go back to the road and call the police from there,’ the woman says. Their voices fade away along with their footsteps.

  I grip the bannister. The quiet of the house presses down on me. Seti is long gone. I need to go, too, before the police get here. The thought propels me down the stairs and across the hall. I fling open the door and race across the drive. The couple with the torch are just ahead of me on the pavement. Their light swings around, into my eyes. I shield my gaze and race on, head down.

  ‘Aagh!’ the woman shrieks.

  I tear past them and swerve on to the pavement beyond. I run hard, pounding past the park Seti and I waited in earlier and on in the vague direction of the squat. As I stop at last to catch my breath, a freezing-cold rain starts to fall. In seconds I’m wet through, the droplets driving against my face like tiny knives. I keep moving, jogging now, without much sense of purpose. It’s not quite eleven o’clock, but it feels like the middle of the night. Tears stream down my face, and my heart, already in my stomach, plummets to my shoes. I can’t believe Seti tricked me like that. She did exactly the opposite of what she promised. And now Taylor’s mum has had her house broken into and jewellery stolen and it’s all my fault.

  I can’t go back to the squat. And I can’t go home.

  The police already think I’m a criminal. Now I’ve turned myself into one.

  27

  I shove my hands in my pockets. My fingers curl around Amelia’s necklace. Even though this is proof against Taylor, it doesn’t really bring me any closer to finding my best friend. What’s to say the police will even believe I found the necklace in Taylor’s house?

  I trudge along the empty backstreets, rain and tears mingling on my cheeks. I feel so despairing that I don’t even bother to wipe them away. After about half an hour, I realise I’m just a few streets away from the church porch where I tried to shelter last night. Tugging my hood low over my face I make my lonely way there. It’s as good a place as any to get out of the rain and to think about what I should do next.

  I slump against the wall of the porch on the cold stone seat. Seti will be long gone now, with the jewellery in her bag. I’m in bigger trouble than ever, with the police coming after me at home and at the squat. Blue was right. I should have turned myself in while there was still a chance that I might persuade them I was innocent. Now I don’t have a leg to stand on, because I’m guilty of breaking in and, though I didn’t take the jewellery myself, I’m the one who brought Seti to the house. I’m responsible for the crime that’s been committed.

  I won’t be able to talk my way out of that.

  Which means I can’t go back.

  I look out into the dark, damp streets. Despair washes over me again: bleak and black and brutal.

  A familiar figure turns the corner and comes loping along the road. I gasp as he hurries up to the porch.

  It’s Blue.

  ‘Carey?’ he calls. He steps inside the porch, blinking, his eyes adjusting to the gloom. ‘Are you here?’

  ‘Yes.’ My heart swells with gratitude and relief and I rush into his arms. He hugs me tightly. ‘How did you know where I was?’

  ‘I’ve been looking for you since you left, I had a feeling what Seti might be planning.’ He draws back, his face clouding with anger. ‘When she turned up at the squat I knew I’d been right.’

  ‘She went back to the squat?’ I flush with shame, sitting down on the church porch bench. ‘Oh, Blue, I’ve been such an idiot, I helped her break into Taylor’s house and—’

  ‘I know what she did.’ Blue grits his teeth, sitting beside me.

  ‘And now the police will think I’m a thief on top of everything else.’ I look up. ‘What happened when they came to the squat looking for me?’

  ‘I said I’d only met you yesterday – which was almost true.’ He gives me a shy smile. ‘Tommo talked to them most, told them how you spent the night.’

  ‘I can’t go back there,’ I say.

  ‘I know.’ Blue sighs. ‘I can’t go back either. I had a big row with Tommo over grassing you up to the police and then when Seti turned up I had an even bigger row with her.’

  ‘Is she still there?’ I stand up. Perhaps I can talk her into returning the jewellery.

  ‘Nah, she only came to get her stuff. She’s gone again now. She wanted me to go with her but I refused. I can’t tell you how mad I am at her. I mean I knew Seti’d stolen food before, shoplifted and stuff, but I didn’t think she’d take advantage like that. I’m so sorry.’

  I sit back down. ‘I can’t tell you how much it means that you stood up for me.’

  ‘I did more than that,’ Blue grins. ‘I took this out of her rucksack while she wasn’t looking.’ He holds up a plastic bag and hands it to me. ‘Then I ran like hell.’

  I peer inside and see two diamond necklaces, a string of pearls and assorted earrings and rings. It must be the jewellery Seti stole.

  Tears prick at my eyes as I take the bag. ‘Thank you.’

  Blue beams at me and I hug him again. How is it, I wonder, that I feel so comfortable when he’s around? I never felt like that with Taylor. Blue just seems to understand me and accept me as I am.

  ‘What are you going to do with the jewellery?’ Blue asks.

  ‘I don’t know,’ I say. ‘I mean I know I should take it all to the police, but I’m worried they’ll think I stole it.’

  Blue opens his mouth but before he can speak I hurry on.

  ‘I know you’re going to say that I should tell them everything and it’s true that I’ve got proof against Taylor now. I found Amelia’s necklace in his bedroom.’ I pull the silver chain out of my pocket and show Blue the scratched initials on the back of the heart. ‘Amelia never took this off. If Taylor’s got it, he must have seen her recently. But I don’t know if the police will even believe I found it at Taylor’s.’

  I’m expecting Blue to argue back, to insist as he did before that I should definitely go to the police with everything. Instead he wrinkles his nose.

  ‘Yeah, you’re probably right,’ he says.

  I sink back against the cold, damp stone wall, suddenly deflated. Part
of me, I realise, had been hoping Blue would insist I went to the police whatever the risks. After all, what other alternative do I have?

  ‘Well that’s just great,’ I say bitterly. ‘Looks like I’m totally out of options.’

  ‘No you aren’t.’ Blue leans forward, suddenly earnest. ‘You’re free right now. We can go wherever we like.’

  ‘We?’ I raise my eyebrows. ‘You mean you want to come with me?’

  ‘Sure.’ Blue shrugs, suddenly self-conscious. ‘I mean, after what I said to Tommo I’m not going back to the squat, so . . .’ He clears his throat. ‘Do you have any friends or family that might help? Lend us money? A place to stay?’

  I dig my hands into my back pocket and draw out what remains of the money Poppy gave me. To my horror there’s only a couple of ten pound notes and a handful of coins. The main roll of cash is gone.

  ‘Seti must have seen where I put my money and pickpocketed it,’ I wail. ‘I’ve got less than twenty-five pounds left.’

  Blue and I stare at each other.

  ‘OK, well, that’s enough for bus tickets, so long as we don’t go too far,’ Blue says. ‘I can probably find us a squat or a shelter if we need it, but do you know anyone who would take us in for a bit? Anyone who lives nearby?’

  ‘Only my dad,’ I say with a hollow laugh. ‘He lives in Broadcombe, at least he did last summer. Camber Avenue.’

  Blue gives me a quizzical look. ‘So when did you last go there?’

  ‘I’ve never been there.’

  ‘But you’re in touch with him?’ Blue persists.

  ‘Not really,’ I admit, my cheeks burning. I wish I hadn’t mentioned Dad now. It’s stupid, I know, because lots of people’s dads aren’t around, but talking about him always makes me feel rubbish: a mix of embarrassment and anger and a weird kind of emptiness. ‘Don’t you have any relatives?’ I ask, trying to shift the emphasis of the conversation.

  ‘Not that I have anything to do with,’ Blue says. He’s still frowning. ‘I don’t understand about your dad. You know where he lives and you obviously saw him six months ago, so what’s happened sin—?’