Undone(23)

Three days after it happened the police came to interview me. I refused to get out of bed (Mum was furious) so the two officers had to come up to my room. The female officer stood, while the male officer sat on my desk chair. I couldn’t stop looking at their shoes; they were so shiny and sturdy. Mum hovered in the doorway, looking awkward.

The woman did most of the talking. She was very brisk and businesslike, as if talking to me was just a formality. Which it was. They clearly hadn’t checked his emails, because they had no idea about the video. I was relieved; the thought of Kai’s private life being raked over by the police (and leaked to the papers, no doubt) was unbearable. And if the papers did manage to get hold of the story, it’d surely only be a matter of time before the video found its way onto the Internet. That’s all anyone would think about when they remembered Kai, and God knows what it would do to his parents. Louise must have kept her mouth shut, and I followed her lead. It helped that the police seemed to be going through the motions, as if they’d done this a thousand times before and it wasn’t getting any more interesting. They mentioned that Kai had left a suicide note, saying he was sorry and not a lot else. I guessed the McBrides must have given them permission to tell me that. Maybe they thought it would be comforting.

I answered most of the questions with one-word answers, and they didn’t exactly try to grill me. The McBrides must have told them he was gay, because they asked me about his sexuality. I just shrugged and told them we never talked about stuff like that. The female officer raised an eyebrow at that but she didn’t accuse me of lying or anything. Mum didn’t bat an eyelid, which made me wonder if Mrs McBride had told her too. The whole ordeal lasted no more than twenty minutes, but it was exhausting. Part of me wanted to tell them, because then they’d be forced to do a proper investigation and find out who was responsible. But I knew that Kai would have wanted me to keep quiet, and what Kai wanted was the most important thing of all.

The police left, saying that they’d be in touch if they had any more questions. Mum showed them out, then came back up to my room and perched on the edge of my bed, in the exact same place she’d sat three days ago. I relived it over and over again – the moment when she shattered my whole world.

She wasn’t crying when she came into my room, but I could tell that tears were lurking just below the surface. She was wringing her hands together and fiddling with the cuffs of her jumper – a gesture I recognized as one of my own. I don’t remember ever seeing her do that before. I wonder if I picked it up from her or she picked it up from me.

She perched on the edge of my bed and I pulled out my headphones, only realizing how loud the music was when I could still decipher every word. ‘What’s up? Mum . . . are you OK?’

She tucked a few strands of hair behind her ear and nodded. She didn’t say anything though, which is when I really started to worry. ‘Mum? You look . . . is it . . . is there something wrong with Grandad?’ He’d been battling colon cancer for the past few years and no one had expected him to survive this long.

Mum shook her head and put her hand on my knee. The gesture did nothing to comfort me; it only ramped up the panic. ‘No, darling, your grandad’s doing fine. The latest round of chemo was pretty rough, but he sounded cheerful enough when I spoke to him yesterday. Well, as cheerful as you can expect, anyway.’

Then she started talking about how we’d go up to visit him in a few weeks and how much he enjoyed seeing me and Noah. ‘He says you two are better than anything the doctors could ever give him.’

‘Mum?’ I was wondering why the hell she was going on about Grandad when she’d just said he was fine.

She looked at me and her eyes were filled with something that scared me. She’d never looked at me like that before. I’d seen it before though – albeit in a smaller, more measured way. When she watched some tragedy unfolding on the news. When my aunt came to stay after her husband left her. When Noah’s guinea pig died.

It was pity.

‘Oh sweetie, I’m so sorry. It’s Kai.’

And I knew. She didn’t even have to tell me. I knew.

But she told me anyway.

I screamed. A raw, animal sound that I would never have imagined could come out of my body.

Then I blacked out.

When I woke up he was still dead.





chapter fifteen


I nearly chickened out of going back to school the day after Fernando worked his magic on me. Mum was extra nice to me at breakfast; she made me a cup of tea and poured cornflakes into my favourite bowl. I sipped the tea and watched the cornflakes turn into a soggy milky mush.

By some unspoken agreement Mum gave me a lift to school. She chattered the whole way, trying to keep my mind off the ordeal ahead. I couldn’t stop staring at my reflection in the wing mirror. I was looking at a complete stranger – a blonde stranger who went to school with her mum. What had happened to the blackhaired girl with her satchel slung over her shoulder, meandering down the street arm in arm with her favourite boy?

We arrived just as the bell was going for register, so there was hardly anyone milling around outside. I think Mum must have planned it that way.

She hugged me and told me everything was going to be OK. I didn’t believe her.

It was brutal. If I thought it was bad showing my face the day after people saw the video, it was a hundred times worse now. Everyone looked at me when I walked into my classroom. Mr Donovan’s sad eyes looked extra sad and his droopy moustache looked extra droopy. He squeezed my shoulder so hard it actually hurt.