The Guilty Innocence by Freya Atwood

Author:Freya Atwood [Atwood, Freya]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Published: 2024-02-02T00:00:00+00:00

Chapter 16

“You’re not seriously suggesting I was friends with them, are you?”

“Friendly?” I suggested.

A roll of the eyes. “You don’t become Head Girl by hanging out with that. I mean…” A callous laugh. “That’s social suicide.”

“So, just to confirm, you weren’t friends with Benjamin, Ethan, or any of the boys they were close with.”

She looked down her nose at me, the expression on her face suggesting that I asked if she still played with Barbie dolls. “What do you think?”

It was the next day, and I was back at Gravat Public School of Grammar, determined to build on what I’d learned the previous day, gathering as much information as I could about Benjamin and his group of friends so I might determine the real circumstances surrounding his murder.

But while yesterday I’d met with various teachers, keen to get an adult’s perspective on the matter at hand, today it was the students to whom I was speaking. And again, I’d asked the principal to collect who he thought was best for me to interrogate—those who were “friends” or known “associates” of the boys. Anyone who he assumed might have something to tell me.

As I soon learned, the only friends that my son’s group had were one another. Which left a rather interesting group of students to talk with, leading to a rather interesting assortment of opinions, none of which were good.

“They were weird,” Sally Clearwater explained matter-of-factly. She was well groomed, undoubtedly attractive, and a little prissy. The kind of girl who likely did very well in class but was pretty enough that it didn’t affect her social standing. “And I don’t do weird.”

“Weird how?”

“You’ve seen them.” She sneered. “The way they dress.” A shudder. “I mean, who wears that much black? And Chris and William even dye their hair that color. And the piercings!”

“I was told that you used to be close to Ben?” I pointed out.

Her lip curled in disgust. “In middle school. But don’t tell anyone, okay? Please. I can’t have that getting out.”

“You’re aware that he was murdered a few days ago, aren’t you?”

She looked a little taken aback by that. “Well… yes. And I don’t mean to be mean about it. I am sorry about what happened, but…” A sigh. “You hang out with weirdos, and these things happen.”

Sally Clearwater didn’t have much to give me. Too focused on her own standing at school, too worried that if she revealed too much, it might get out and people might accuse her of being closer to the boys than she was, she refused to go further than stating unequivocally that she had nothing to do with them and that was that.

The Head Boy, Hayden Dent, was far more helpful.

“I didn’t mind Ethan,” he said simply. He was effortlessly cool in that way that popular boys so often were. A natural athlete, apparently an A student, and unlike Sally, he didn’t have to work for it—he simply was popular. “Until the start of the year, I used to get along with him well enough.

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