Page 82 of Good Girl, Bad Blood

Open leads:

More photos / videos from calamity party being sent in – go through them.

Hillary F. Weiseman –theonlyHillary F. Weiseman I can find is the 84-year-old who died in Little Kilton in 2006. Obit says she left behind one daughter and two grandsons, but I can’t find any other Weisemans. Why was Jamie writing her name down within the last week and a half? What’s the connection?

Who was Jamie on the phone to at 10:32 p.m.? Long conversation – 30 mins+? Same person he’s been texting / talking to in recent weeks? Not Nat da Silva.

The identity of ‘someone’ and why Jamie followed them to calamity?

Stealing money – why? Life or death?

MONDAY

3 DAYS MISSING

Sixteen

She didn’t sit at the front any more. That’s where she used to sit, in this classroom, at this very time, when it was Elliot Ward standing at the front, talking them through the economic effects of World War II.

Now it was Mr Clark, the new history teacher who’d come in after Christmas to take Mr Ward’s place. He was young, maybe not even thirty yet, brown feathered hair and a trimmed beard that was mostly ginger. He was eager, and more than a little enthusiastic about his PowerPoint slide transitions. Sound effects too. It was a bit too early on a Monday morning for exploding hand grenades, though.

Not that Pip was really listening. She was sitting in the back corner. This was her place now, and Connor’s was beside her: that hadn’t changed. Except he’d been late in today, and now he was jiggling his leg as he sat there, also not paying attention.

Pip’s textbook was standing up on her desk, open on page 237, but she wasn’t actually taking notes. The textbook was a shield, hiding her from Mr Clark’s eyes. Her phone was propped up against the page, earphones plugged in and the cable tucked up the front of her jumper, the wire snaking down her sleeve so the earphone buds rested in her hand. Fully disguised. It must have looked to Mr Clark like Pip was resting her chin in her hand as she scribbled down dates and percentages but really, she was scrolling through calamity party files.

A new wave of emails with attachments had come in late last night and this morning. Word must have started to spread about Jamie. But still no photos in the location and time-window she needed. Pip glanced up: five minutes until the bell, enough time to go through another email.

The next one was from Hannah Revens, from Pip’s English class.

Hey Pip, it said.Someone told me this morning you’re looking for Connor’s missing brother and that he was at the calamity on Friday. This video is super embarrassing – apparently I sent it to my boyfriend at 9:49 when I was already super drunk – please don’t show it to anyone. But there’s a guy in the background I don’t recognize. See you at school x

A prickle of nervous energy crawled up the back of Pip’s neck. The time window, and a guy Hannah doesn’t recognize. This could be it: the break. She thumbed on to the attached file and pressed play.

The sound blared into her ear: loud music, a horde of chattering voices, bursts of jeering and cheering that must have come from the beer pong game in the dining room. But this video was taken in the living room. Hannah’s face took up most of the frame, pointing the phone down at herself from an outstretched arm. She was leaning against the back of a sofa, opposite the one Jasveen was sitting on at 9:38 p.m., the end of which was just visible in the background.

Hannah was alone, the dog filter from Instagram applied to her face, pointy brown ears buried in her hair, following her as she swung her head around. The new Ariana Grande song was playing, and Hannah was lip-synching to it.Verydramatically. Air grabs and eyes screwed shut when the song demanded it.

This wasn’t a joke, was it? Pip kept watching, searching the scene behind Hannah’s head. She recognized two of the faces back there: Joseph Powrie and Katya Juckes. And judging by the positions of the sofas, they must have been standing in front of the fireplace, which hadn’t quite made it into the shot. They were talking to another girl with her back to the camera. Long dark straightened hair, jeans. That could be dozens of people Pip knew.

The clip was almost finished, the blue line creeping along the progress bar towards the end. Six seconds to go. And that’s when two things happened at the exact same time. The girl with the long brown hair turned, started to walk away from the fireplace, towards Hannah’s camera. Simultaneously, from the other side of the frame, a person crossed towards her, walking quickly so all you really catch is the blur of their shirt and a head floating above. A burgundy shirt.

As the two figures were about to collide, Jamie reached out to tap the girl on the shoulder.

The video ended.

‘Shit,’ Pip whispered into her sleeve, drawing Connor’s attention. She knew exactly who that girl was.

‘What?’ he hissed.

‘?“Someone”.’

‘Huh?’

The bell rang and the metallic sound sliced right through her, making her wince. Her hearing was always more sensitive on not-enough sleep.

‘In the hall,’ she said, packing her textbook into her bag and disentangling herself from the earphones. She stood up and shouldered her bag, missing whatever homework task Mr Clark was assigning them.

Being at the back meant being last to leave, waiting impatiently for everyone else to spill out of the classroom. Connor followed Pip into the corridor and she guided him over to the far wall.

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