They Did Bad Things Read online

  He slipped into the study and sat at the bar with a bottle of Glenlivet that had been left out, pretending, as he often did, to be an adult. He tapped his pen against his notebook, his trusty aid when he’d been a patrolman. The boys had bought him a new one for his first day as detective. That one sat, wrapped in plastic, on the counter at home, awaiting Monday like the suit and shoes in his closet. This old one still had the scuffs from when he and Landry fought. A few unfilled pages remained inside, plenty of space to jot down his thoughts on what had happened at Wolfheather House so far. He’d worry about Linda later. What mattered now was unraveling the web that brought him here.

  So focused was he on writing that he didn’t notice that the door had opened. The hairs on the back of his neck stood up and he turned around sharply.

  “Sorry.” Lorna clutched a book to her chest. “I didn’t think anyone was down here. I can go somewhere else.”

  “It’s fine.” He nodded to the bottle. “Want a drink?”

  She hesitated, then sat down, setting her book on the bar. “No point in lying. It’s what I came for.”

  For several minutes, they drank in silence. Almost as if they were waiting for someone. Maybe they were, Hollis thought.

  “Anything interesting?” She nodded toward his notebook.

  “Just some notes. Trying to pick all of this apart, so I can piece it back together.” He tapped the pen against the paper.

  “Don’t do that. Please.” She pressed her fingers to her temples.

  “Sorry. I know the noise is annoying.”

  “No. It’s not that. It reminds me too much . . . It makes me feel like we’re back there. You and me sitting quietly in the front room. Me with a book. You studying your notes, tapping your pen. It’s too much.” She looked into her drink. “Do you think we have PTSD?”

  “Don’t know.” He thought of the nightmares that came to him at least once a year. “Probably.”

  He set his pen on the bar, picked up her book. “Truffaut’s Hitchcock. Didn’t you read this at Cahill?”

  “It’s even the same copy. Not as interesting as it was, though. I got rid of most of my things from that year, but I still haven’t been able to part with a book. You should see my flat.” She took the book back and ran her thumbnail down the spine.

  “You folded down the corner of the pages,” he said.

  “Yeah, I guess I did.”

  She looked younger in this light, with her hair in that same blunt cut, like she was using it as a helmet to protect herself against the world. But he couldn’t quite picture her as the girl she had been. Like she was a photograph damaged with age. The years had scarred her too much. But then again, he saw the same when he looked in a mirror.

  “Hollis, do you think we deserve this?”

  As a policeman, he was used to being asked such questions. But not by Lorna. Lorna always had answers, right or not. Not questions.

  “I think we were young and stupid. The worst kind of stupid. And given the chance, I’d go back and change everything that happened.”

  “But you can’t.”

  “No. I can’t,” he said. “So maybe all the bad things that have happened to us since are some kind of karmic retribution.”

  “And maybe we’re just very good at doing bad things.” From the back of the book, she pulled out the folded papers. They were missing their envelope now, but he recognized what they were. “You tell me yours, I’ll tell you mine.”

  She held them out, but Hollis didn’t take them.

  “Keeping secrets is what got us into this mess,” she said, “and secrets will only make everything worse. The more light we shed on ourselves, on everything, the less power he has over us. This person. Whoever he is.”

  “It’s a short list of people who knew Callum wrote those Happy Wednesday notes,” he said.

  “And an even shorter one of who knows what really happened that night. I trusted you back then, Hollis. After I felt confident you weren’t going to set the house on fire. That hasn’t changed.” She slid the folded papers across the tin bar. “I slept with a student. A potential student. Allegedly. One I was recruiting for the university.”

  “Was he the age of consent?”

  “Yes. She was.” Lorna sipped her drink. “But that sort of thing is frowned upon. Except I didn’t do it. We may have flirted a bit, but that’s as far as it went. Her dad, though, has been after me for weeks. Thinks I, and I quote, ‘corrupted her sexuality.’ Someone must have paid or pressured her to say it happened. But it’s the excuse they’ll need. The new administration’s been begging for a reason to let me go. I guess I’m still not very good with people.”

  He pushed the papers back without reading them. She returned them to her book, and he spat out what he needed to say before he changed his mind.

  “I planted evidence on a suspect so that I would have probable cause to search his car.”

  “Allegedly?”

  In response, Hollis downed the rest of his drink.

  “Jesus. Was it worth it?”

  “It saved a life.”

  “Well, at least what you did could be construed as noble. I just come off as a horny lesbian wench.”

  The humor was wrong for the situation, and Lorna knew it.

  “Sorry. I’m shit,” she said. “Here I am thinking this would be the end of the world for me when you . . . God, you’d lose everything, Hollis. Wouldn’t you?”

  “Don’t be sorry. The end of the world looks different for different people. We all have our tipping points.” He finished his drink and slid off the barstool, suddenly desperate to be on his own.

  “No, you stay,” she said. “You were here first.”

  “That’s all right. I’m done anyway. Enjoy your book.”

  Her thumb fiddled with the spine again. “I won’t tell the others. I promise.”

  “I thought you didn’t want any more secrets,” he said.

  “Yours isn’t mine to tell.”

  He looked at her once more, the battered book in her hand, the black jumper and blunt haircut. So much the Lorna he remembered. She was right. It was too much.

  “Goodnight, Lorna.”

  He left her in the study as his brain began to work. Sometimes he couldn’t control it. It attacked a mystery automatically, like an anti-virus. He needed to be alone, to give himself space to parse out these fragments of thought. Something Lorna had said tonight had set his mind off, but he didn’t know what it was or why. He was still trying to sort it out when he realized his feet weren’t carrying him all the way upstairs to his room but down the second-floor hall to Room 2. Callum’s room.

  Lorna and Oliver were also staying on this floor, but Lorna remained downstairs and Hollis heard nothing from Oliver. They’d left Callum’s door open, the key dangling in the lock. Hollis closed it behind him.

  It was after he’d sat in the armchair a few minutes, running through his thoughts, that he spotted it. The edge of a photograph caught in the cushion of the sofa. He slipped it free.

  There they were—all six of them—seated on that very couch in their old house on Caldwell Street. So young then. So stupid. He ran his thumb over the background of the picture. Examined the image in detail. And then he knew. Whether this picture had been left accidentally or on purpose didn’t matter. It filled the gaps of his memory, the missing pieces from his evidence box.

  “Shit.”

  He shoved the photo in his pocket and pulled out his phone, but there was still no signal. Of course. There wouldn’t be.

  Oliver

  Oliver stumbled through the kitchen, desperate for something to soak up the whisky in his stomach. Fucked up. That’s what this whole situation was. People should be allowed to make mistakes, he thought. They should be allowed to move on with their lives. They should be allowed to leave this house. But with his car out of commission on the main road, the only way he was getting out of here was by hitching a ride. Or taking someone else’s. He found the dry goods in a walk-
in pantry and tore open a bag of crisps. Some fell and crunched under his shoes. Ellie’s car keys. He should’ve nicked them when he had the chance. They’d been sitting right there on her desk, on a fuzzy pink keychain. The salt and vinegar burned his lips. God, she looked gorgeous. He might’ve put on a pound or two, but Ellie, he’d seen the shape of her beneath her clothes. He’d barely been able to keep his hands in his pockets. But he had some self-control. And the knowledge that he needed her on his side. It used to be so easy to win them over. A smile for Ellie, a handshake for Hollis, a wink at Maeve. Lorna, just leave her alone. Callum, though, had been a riddle. Oliver must have done something right, because why else would Callum have brought Oliver Lucozade and paracetamol after his birthday rager? Or loaned him a tenner whenever Oliver asked? But Oliver never quite figured out what Callum needed. He had been the lone child watching through the window as the other kids played together outside. With greasy fingers, Oliver pulled out his phone. No signal, but that comforted him. Maybe she’d been texting him after all and the messages weren’t coming through. Good. For once she could be the one at home worrying. After all, he hadn’t told her he was traveling to a possible dead zone. Hadn’t told her he was leaving at all. Only one person knew he was going away this weekend. Only one person knew where to find him.

  Maeve

  Goosebumps rose on Maeve’s naked skin as she shivered in the bathroom. Even her bra had been soaked through. That, along with the rest of her useless clothes, was piled on the floor. Lines ran down either side of her nose. The dark circles beneath her eyes were permanent thumbprints. Her hair, frizzy from the rain, at least showed no signs of gray, but only because she dyed it. When did she get so old? She couldn’t be in her forties. She hadn’t done anything yet. No job. No career. No family. Not even a dog. Nothing to drown out the memories of the awkward, gangly boy who used to hover around her like a lost puppy. She’d come up with plenty of excuses as to why they weren’t right for each other. He was too tall. Obsessed with his camera. He couldn’t play guitar and he couldn’t sing, so how would he ever propose to her by playing an original song about their love in front of strangers at the Hyde Park Winter Wonderland while a light snow fell? He’d had a stupid crush on her. That was all. She hadn’t loved him, didn’t even like him that way, no matter how many times he went out of his way to ask her how her day was or leave a note in blue under her door. Back then, it wasn’t about Callum. It was about survival. And for so many years, she never thought she’d survive them again. Yet here she was. Perhaps it was foolishness, or adrenaline, or a vitamin deficiency from living off Doritos and Fanta, but as she towel-dried her hair, she realized she didn’t fear them now.

  Lorna

  Lorna couldn’t make sense of the words on the page. Each sentence got jumbled up in her head, like she was trying to read in a foreign language. In the background, a single question pulsed, growing louder until it was the only thought in her head: What are you really doing here? It was harder than she thought sitting in the room next to Callum’s—the room they’d designated as his—and not think about house 215. Lorna and Callum had shared a wall there, too. She remembered the gray carpet with the brown stain and the Monty Python poster hanging above his desk. Pictures, too. Lots of pictures. Of home, of London, of family, of them. He would stick them up with Blu Tack even though Ellie had warned him it would ruin the walls and he might not get his security deposit back. Closing her eyes, she imagined she heard music from his stereo seeping through the house. Grunge, usually. Nirvana. Bush. Stone Temple Pilots. To her, the music fitted the band names—shabby, dirty—the opposite of Callum. He showered twice a day, never re-wore a piece of clothing without washing it. Kept his auburn hair clean and cut short. The only time his appearance matched his choice in music had been his death. And thinking of his death reminded her of where she was and why. She hated it here. Hated this place and hated Caldwell Street and hated them and hated everything so much. But she needed it all to end. Needed to stop hearing his voice inside her head. Needed stop the feeling that, despite the empty room, Callum was always just on the other side of the wall, waiting for her to save him.

  Ellie

  Ellie thought about flipping on a light, but she liked the room as it was. The outside spotlights cast the study in strange shadows. The remaining darkness softened the corners, hid the cobwebs. Created anonymity. This could be any room in any house. Perched on the edge of the sofa, a drink in hand, she listened to the wind and rain. It was better down here, away from the others. At some point, she had heard someone leave their room—Hollis or Maeve, she wasn’t sure—but paid them no mind. All that mattered was creating a space where she would be able to sleep tonight because every time she closed her eyes, she could see him. Callum. Who never once mocked her for being forgetful or asking a stupid question or needing help with something the others might see as trivial, like putting the sliding drawer back into her desk. He’d done it because she’d asked him, a favor for a friend. But when he’d asked her for a favor, had she been as kind? Ellie jumped from the couch, rubbing her hands. She hadn’t had a flashback in a long time, not since Jilly was a baby and Ellie had panicked that she’d stopped breathing. It had taken David half an hour and two gin and tonics to calm her. He thought she was overprotective about the baby, but that wasn’t it. That wasn’t it at all. In a sudden fit, she downed her entire drink. Callum had been a giver, this was true, and she was not. But that didn’t mean she would let him take from her now. She would see to that. Ellie went to fix herself another drink but spotted something on the floor—a small, square piece of paper. She wandered from the study into the glass-walled conservatory, listened to the rain ping off the glass. The house’s outside light shone through the glass room like the beam of a spotlight, illuminating her find. It was a piece of sparkling gold cardboard, a bit of ribbon stuck through a hole. The words Congrats, Dad! written in proper cursive.

  A splotch of red marred the final letter.

  Hollis

  The cold wind woke Hollis like a shock. He zipped his jacket all the way to the top, ducking his chin into the collar. He’d hurried from the house as soon as he’d found the photograph. It had all clicked then, what Lorna had said, what had bothered him about the whole evening. She hadn’t been in the study when he returned, but he didn’t want to waste time looking for her. He needed to get them help. Fast. The outdoor lights of Wolfheather House guided him up the rocky drive as he kept one eye on his footing, the other on his phone. Drops of rain beaded on the screen, and he tried to remember if his phone was water resistant while his boots crunched on the wet gravel.

  “Come on. Can’t I have one bar at least?”

  A metal ping echoed in the air behind him.

  Hollis scanned the area, using his phone as a torch. Seeing nothing, he continued up the drive. When the lights of the house were mere specks in the darkness, not one but two bars emerged. Hollis fist-pumped the air.

  “Yes! There we are.” He rubbed the screen dry on his jeans. As he tried to open the phone app, a long series of email alerts popped up faster than he could dismiss them.

  “Come on. Quit it! I don’t care about my bloody Men’s Health subscription.”

  Then he saw the texts from Linda.

  19:32 Hey Dad u there?

  19:40 Dad ring me when u c this

  19:43 Srsly Dad need u to answer

  19:47 One new voice mail.

  Hollis pressed play. He had to listen to the voice mail twice before understanding it.

  “Shit.”

  He dialed 999. The bright screen blinded him to all else, including the tire iron swinging at his head.

  Pp. 23–30

  promise there’s a reason behind everything. I swear on Callum’s grave. And you might think I’m skipping a whole bunch of time, but honestly there’s really nothing else you need to know about the rest of September 1994, or even October. In fact, if everything could have kept going like it did in those months, then none of us would be in
the situation we’re in now. But things did change, and that change started early in November, when the weather still felt like October and most people thought it too soon for Christmas decorations.

  That November morning, Lorna made a resolution. She was going to be more sociable. For two months she had avoided long conversations in the front room and flat-out refused to participate in the near weekly house parties. She wanted to focus on her schoolwork, get her degree, and move on from this temporary phase in her life. But excluding herself hadn’t given her more focus. It had turned her into a ghost, benign but unwanted. Whenever she entered a room, she sucked the life out of the conversation. People avoided eye contact so as not to set her off. She didn’t want to be that person anymore.

  That morning, she pulled her short hair into a ponytail and nodded to herself in the mirror. She could do it. She could be a normal university student.

  When she opened the door, she met Callum as he exited his room. Years later, Lorna would recall him ducking his head to fit through the doorway as he examined the Minolta Maxxum 9000 that hung around his neck by a black and red woven strap. She remembered that the strap resembled a seat belt. When he walked, he would keep one hand braced against the camera to prevent it from bouncing against his chest. When he held it to his eye, it blocked most of his face. When not in use, the camera remained in a padded black nylon case with a Scottish Rugby keychain attached to the zipper pull. The case would sit on the back left corner of the desk in his bedroom, which was pressed against the wall that formed the border between his and Lorna’s rooms.

  “Morning, Lorna!” He winced. “Sorry. Too loud?”