John-Paul lunged at her. Her first fleeting thought was that he was going to kiss her, and this was his odd yet masterful technique, and she was pleased and excited. He wasn’t going to let her break up with him. He wasn’t going to stand for it!

But then his hands grabbed her neck. She tried to say, ‘That’s hurting, John-Paul,’ but she couldn’t speak, and she wanted to clear up this dreadful misunderstanding, to explain that she actually liked him more than Connor, and she’d never meant to hurt his feelings, and she wanted to be his girlfriend, and she tried to convey that with her eyes, which were staring straight into his, his beautiful eyes, and she thought for a second that she saw a shift, a shocked recognition and she felt a loosening of hands, but there was something else happening; something very wrong and unfamiliar was happening to her body, and in that instant a far-off part of her mind remembered that her mother had been going to pick her up from school today to take her to a doctor’s appointment, and she’d forgotten all about it and gone to Connor’s house instead. Her mother would be ropable.

Her last properly articulated thought was: Oh, shit.

After that there were no more thoughts, just helpless, flailing panic.

good friday

Chapter forty-three

‘Juice!’ demanded Jacob.

‘What do you want, sweetie?’ whispered Lauren.

Juice, thought Rachel. He wants a juice. Are you deaf?

It was only just light, and Rachel, Rob and Lauren were standing in a shivery little circle at Wattle Valley Park, rubbing their hands together and stamping their feet, while Jacob slithered in and out between their legs. He was rugged up in a parka that Rachel suspected was too small for him, his arms sticking straight out like a snowman.

As expected, Lauren was wearing her trench coat, although her ponytail didn’t look quite as perfect as normal – there were a few strands escaping from her hairband – and she looked tired. She was carrying a single red rose, which Rachel thought was a silly choice. It was like those roses in long plastic cylinders that young men gave to their girlfriends on Valentine’s Day.

Rachel herself was carrying a small posy of sweet peas she’d picked from her own backyard, tied up with a piece of green velvet ribbon like Janie used to wear when she was very little.

‘Do you leave the flowers where she was found? At the bottom of the slide?’ Marla had once asked.

‘Yes, Marla, I leave them there to be trampled by hundreds of little feet,’ Rachel had said.

‘Oh, yes, good point,’ Marla had said, not at all offended.

It wasn’t even the same slide. All the clunky old metal equipment had been replaced by fancy space-age-looking stuff, just like the park near Rachel’s house where she took Jacob, and the ground had a rubbery surface that gave an astronaut-like bounce to your step.

‘Juice!’ said Jacob again.

‘I don’t understand, sweetie.’ Lauren flipped her ponytail back over one shoulder. ‘You want me to loosen your jacket?’

For heaven’s sake. Rachel sighed. It wasn’t like she ever really felt Janie’s presence when she came here. She couldn’t imagine her here, couldn’t conceive how she had come to be here. None of Janie’s friends had ever known her to come to this particular park. It was a boy, obviously, who had brought her here. A boy called Connor Whitby. He probably wanted sex and Janie said no. She should have had sex with him. That was Rachel’s fault, for going on about it so much, as if losing her virginity was this momentous event. Dying was far more momentous. She should have said to her, ‘Have sex with whoever you want, Janie. Just stay safe.’

Ed had never wanted to come to the park where she was found. ‘What’s the bloody point of that?’ he said. ‘Too bloody late to go there now, isn’t it? She’s not bloody there, is she?’

You’re bloody right, Ed.

But Rachel felt like she owed it to Janie to turn up each year with her posy of flowers, to apologise for not being there, to be there now, to imagine her last few moments, to honour the last place she’d been alive, the last place where she’d breathed. If only Rachel could have been there to see her for those last precious minutes, to drink in the sight of those ridiculously long skinny legs and arms, the awkward, angular beauty of her face. It was a silly thought, because if Rachel had been there, then she would have been busy saving her life, but still, she longed to have been there, even if she wasn’t able to change the outcome.

Maybe Ed had been right. It was pointless to come here each year like this. It felt particularly pointless this year with Rob and Lauren and Jacob standing around like people waiting for something to happen, the entertainment to start.

‘Juice!’ said Jacob.

‘I’m sorry, sweetie, I just don’t understand,’ said Lauren.

‘He wants a juice,’ said Rob so gruffly that Rachel almost felt sorry for Lauren. Rob sounded just like Ed when he got grumpy. The Crowley men were such grumps. ‘We don’t have any, mate. Here. We’ve got your water bottle. Have some water.’

‘We don’t drink juice, Jakey,’ said Lauren. ‘It’s bad for your teeth.’

Jacob held his water bottle with fat little hands, tipped back his head and drank thirstily, giving Rachel a look that said, We won’t tell her about all the juice I drink at your place.

Lauren tightened the belt of her trench coat and turned to Rachel. ‘Do you normally say anything? Or, um –’