My Perfect Family by Melanie Price

Author:Melanie Price [Price, Melanie]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Published: 2024-02-27T00:00:00+00:00

CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE

I say goodbye to my mum’s body and head back down the corridor – Glenn and Zara will be looking for me at any moment. I hear voices, and Zara’s earlier fainting episode springs to my mind. It’s my only card to play. I stumble and crumble onto the floor with a thud.

Footsteps rush towards me, and a shrill cry of ‘Oh God!’ which could only be Deborah, mixed with the quieter cry of ‘Emily!’ I raise myself into a seated position to see them hovering over me.

‘What happened?’ Zara cries, whilst Glenn appears shadow-like behind her. He asks deliberately, ‘Where did you go?’

Deborah flusters about, muttering, ‘Oh dear, oh dear.’

‘I think I got lost,’ I murmur, ‘I need some fresh air.’

Before they can ask me another question, Deborah snaps into action. ‘Of course, of course.’ She bends down. ‘Here,’ she says, offering her outstretched hand. ‘Can I help you?’

I stretch my hand up and struggle to my feet as she helps me back out towards the sunlight. Though I had pretended to faint, the adrenalin that had been pumping my body through this whole encounter rushes out of me as soon as I am through the front doors and back into the unbearable shock of the sunlight reflecting off the bright tarmac.

So this time, as I stagger, it is genuine, and I am thankful to have Deborah to lean on. She leads me towards a little bench underneath the shade of a tree and I sit down gratefully.

‘Oh dear, you two poor girls. I’ll go get you some water.’ She bustles back towards the entrance. This time, I don’t shudder at her use of the word ‘girls’.

I need a few moments to process everything. Really, I should be getting back to it, trying to question Glenn or Deborah immediately about where Mum’s rings might have gone. But I’m so tired. As I close my eyes, I’m tormented by the waxy pallor of her face, the traumatic cuts that were visible underneath the perfectly applied makeup. Nausea sweeps over me once more.

I’m staring at the ground, lost in my tumultuous thoughts, when Zara appears next to me, a bottle of water in hand.

‘You okay?’ she passes it over to me. I nod, unscrewing the cap to take a greedy gulp. ‘It was a lot in there,’ she continues. ‘It got to me too… Did you get all the time you needed, though?’ I glance across at her. There’s no mistaking her expression. I’m sure she knows that I dashed back in there – which means she did faint on purpose.

‘Yeah, I needed a minute,’ I say, a little flustered at this realisation.

‘It was so… awful,’ she begins, ‘seeing her like that. I didn’t get very close – but it didn’t even seem like it was her. But I’m glad you got the closure you needed. That’s all I wanted for you, Ems.’ She fans herself down with her hand.

Ah – she just wanted to give me another opportunity to slip in so I would continue with ‘moving on’ and letting go of my suspicions.

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