Sweet Little Lies by Karin Nordin

Author:Karin Nordin [Nordin, Karin]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: HarperCollins Publishers
Published: 2023-06-27T17:00:00+00:00

Chapter 32

My apartment is cold and empty when I get home from the restaurant. I turn up the heat and check on the thermostat in Spaghetti’s tank to ensure it hasn’t dropped too low for her. I thought I’d feel better after talking to Cameron. I thought I’d feel relieved or find myself one step closer to understanding what happened all those years ago. But, in all honesty, I’m just more confused. Even worse, I feel like someone isn’t telling the truth. Like someone is putting on a performance. I just don’t know who.

So, I do what anyone raised on weekly episodes of Catfish would do in order to solve a mystery. I go to the internet, starting with Amber’s Facebook. And then I regret it almost immediately.

We miss you!!

Forever in our hearts!

RIP Beautiful Girl

I’ll always remember the good times we had together

luv u babe!

Before I realize it, I’ve been scrolling the old comments on Amber’s Facebook memorial page for over an hour. I don’t know what I expect to find, but it’s not there. There are a few recent comments. Most are from some of the women who were on the cheer squad with her in high school, talking about how they’ll be at the memorial service. Others link to some articles about Riley. But the majority of the posts are from the year after she died. Hundreds of them. I don’t recognize a lot of the people because even though we were born in the same year, Amber was a year behind me at school.

No one has written anything mean or malicious like those earlier forums I found. Everything is positive and sentimental, full of overbearing sympathy. Exactly what you would expect from the wall of a dead teenager. But I can’t help but feel like it’s all an act. Did any of these people really care about Amber? Did they really know her? Or were they just sucked into the shared mentality of a grieving town? How many of these comments are authentic and how many are merely people playing a role in order to fit in?

Maybe I’m just envious because I know that if I died there wouldn’t be anywhere near this many comments on my social media accounts. If I were lucky I might get half a dozen. But in all likelihood no one would even notice I was gone. Because I’m not Amber. I’m not a—how did that person put it? I scroll back to one of the old comments.

A shining light taken from the world too soon.

Fuck these strangers. If they actually cared about Amber they would have done more to find out what really happened to her. Because after the last few days I’m certain that there’s more to the story than I’ve been told.

The initials in the tree, Riley’s missing pocketknife, the ring, Danny’s veiled threat, Newman’s unwavering conviction despite the contradictory evidence, Dad’s suspicion that there was also something else going on. I don’t know how it all fits together, but I’m going to figure it out.

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