‘Man,’ I said. ‘What I wouldn’t give for a Slush Puppie right now. Cherry flavour, with two fingers of strawberry at the top.’
‘Raspberry,’ said Mason. ‘All the way. But right now I’d settle for lemon and lime.’
‘Or just a Sprite,’ Cora suggested. ‘Squash, Ribena, anything. As long as it’s cold.’
There was a noise like someone being strangled, and we turned to see Abi making fists at her sides. ‘Will all of you please just stop?’ she said. ‘It’s like you’re deliberately trying to make things worse!’ She folded her arms and turned her back.
I caught something in Mason’s smile then. I mean, I guess I was smiling a bit, too, but something about Mason’s expression seemed … I don’t know. Different somehow. Cruel.
Cora got to her feet. ‘So?’ she said. ‘What’s it to be?’
‘Well,’ I said, when nobody else spoke. ‘We obviously have to find something to drink. Except …’ I glanced at the stream. ‘There isn’t anything to drink out here. So I don’t see that we really have any choice.’ I looked at Luke, who dropped his head. He was thinking about Sadie, obviously. About leaving her out there. Not that we knew where she was, but there was no getting away from it: going home meant giving up.
‘You’re kidding,’ said Mason. ‘Right?’
The rest of us were already standing. Even Luke, after I’d offered him my hand.
‘You’re turning tail already?’ Mason went on, rising now, too. ‘Even though we’ve only just started?’ He glared – at me in particular.
‘It was always the plan to head back today anyway,’ I said, giving him a lopsided shrug.
‘I told you before, that wasn’t my plan,’ said Mason. ‘That’s just what you and Cora cooked up between yourselves.’
‘Cooked up?’ said Cora. ‘What’s that supposed to mean?’
‘We can’t stay out here forever, Mase,’ I said, trying to be appeasing. ‘Apart from anything, our parents will have realised we’re missing. My mum will have, anyway.’
‘I thought you told her you were staying over at mine?’ said Mason.
‘No, I did, but –’
‘So there you go then. She won’t start worrying at least until this evening. And none of the rest of our parents are going to panic exactly, are they?’
‘How do you know?’ said Cora.
Mason rolled his eyes as he turned towards her. ‘Because my dad doesn’t give a shit where I am. Yours and Abi’s probably won’t even notice you’re out of the house, and Luke’s –’
‘No,’ said Cora. ‘I meant, how did you know Fash told his mum he was staying at your place? He told me he said that. But at the time we didn’t even know you were coming with us.’
‘He … told me yesterday. In the woods.’
‘When? I didn’t hear.’
‘You were probably arguing with Abi,’ said Mason, waving a hand. ‘Jesus, Cora, what’s the big deal?’
He turned back to me and raised his eyebrows. Like, well?
‘I suppose we could keep searching for a bit longer,’ I said.
‘What the hell, Fash?’ said Cora. ‘You don’t have to do everything Mason says, you know.’
‘So what’s your hurry, Cora?’ Mason said to her. ‘Don’t you want to find your friend?’ He emphasised the final word so that it sounded like it was wrapped in quotation marks.
‘What? Of course I do! Why do you think I came out here in the first place?’
Mason smiled, snidely. ‘And that’s the question, isn’t it? Why are any of us here? And why is everyone so desperate to hurry home the second there’s the slightest excuse?’
I saw Abi shift uncomfortably.
‘In case you hadn’t noticed, Mason,’ said Cora, ‘we’re miles from home on the hottest day of the year with nothing to drink but pond water, and with no way of calling anyone for help. That’s not an excuse. That’s a frigging reason.’
‘And whose fault is that?’ Mason answered. ‘The water, I mean. The phones.’
Cora turned red. ‘I told you already! It wasn’t me!’
Mason stared at her. ‘Maybe it was,’ he said, ‘maybe it wasn’t. But it was clearly someone.’ He turned his stare on me.
Cora spoke again before I could. ‘What’s your problem, Mason? If you’ve got something to say, just fucking say it.’
‘It’s just curious, that’s all. Don’t you think? That we set out to try to find Sadie, and yet the second we close our eyes, something happens to force us back?’
He was looking at me again, and I swallowed. Because I hadn’t thought about it like that. The phones, the water … I’d assumed that it was all a prank or something. I didn’t imagine it was anything more serious than that.
‘As for my problem,’ Mason went on, ‘my girlfriend is missing and nobody but me seems to want to find her. Plus, the second we get back home, the police are going to do what they’re probably wishing they did last week: they’re going to lock me in a prison cell and throw away the key.’
Cora sniffed. ‘So that’s what this is about for you. The Mason Payne Self-Preservation Society.’
Mason whipped around to face her. ‘I don’t give a fuck what happens to me! But if the police lock me up, they’ll say they’ve solved it, and that’ll be the end of it. They’ll stop looking and they’ll stop asking questions and then we’ll never find out what happened to Sadie. Never.’
He was breathing heavily, and there was a bubble of spit at the corner of his mouth. It was hard to believe that just a few minutes ago I’d been getting annoyed at him for not taking things seriously.
‘Easy, mate,’ I said. I reached out a hand and touched him on the shoulder. Tentatively, the way I would have tested something hot.
He flinched when I made contact, but after a second his shoulders dipped lower. His eyes met mine, then moved on.
‘Luke,’ he said, turning. ‘You agree with me. Don’t you? You agree we should keep looking?’
I looked at Luke – we all did – and suddenly I felt this rush of sympathy for him. It was everything, you know? Sadie,
