‘Vivian,’ she whispered, sitting beside her on the bed, not able to bring herself to touch her. ‘Vivian, what did you do?’
Her daughter’s blank face turned up to hers.
‘It wasn’t my fault, Mummy,’ she said calmly, blood on her cheek, on her clothes, everywhere. ‘It wasn’t my fault. She deserved it.’
Vivian
I can’t process what I am seeing. His face, as he looks back at her. At her. And my mother, she’s looking at me, somehow flushed and sick-yellow at the same time. All that time, when he was ignoring me, when I was wanting him, needing him, he was with her! My mother! I picture them writhing together, talking about me, laughing at me, and something snaps in my head.
‘You are supposed to love me! Me, not her!’ The words scream out of my throat, hurting, and before I realise it I am in front of him, hammering my useless fists against his chest. ‘You liar! How could you do all those things with me and her too?’
He shoves me backwards easily, overpowering me with one hand. I nearly knock Mum over, feel her clutch at me, keep me upright.
‘I just wanted to get the truth about what you are! You’re a monster! Lexie knew you were evil, but no one believed her. Everyone said it was an accident, everyone. You don’t care about anything, you’re incapable.’
I cannot cope with the disgust in his voice. It’s not true, what he’s saying to me – I do care! Then my mother pushes in front of me again, trying to pull him away from the cliff edge, to talk him down, and every fibre of me screams, How dare she touch what belongs to me! Her focus is on him, and I see again the way he is looking at her as her hair whips around her face: he has never looked at me like that, never.
She isn’t taking any notice of me at all, and I realise that if she believes him then I have nothing left to lose. I don’t have to pretend any more. ‘You whore! You disgusting, old whore. How could you? He was mine!’
She turns to me, looking so tragic that I almost smile, and then I throw out my arms, as hard as I can. The air whistles from her lungs as she staggers backwards toward the brink, and falls.
Rachel
I stumbled and landed painfully on the rough, stony ground, winded by the shove, pain blooming in my chest. Vivian’s eyes were wild, her teeth small and white and sharp in her screaming mouth. Her fingers clawed, and she went for my face, her nails scraping burning furrows in my cheeks.
Liam lunged. He grabbed her by her hair, making her shriek with anger and pain, and pulled her away from where I was curled, defenceless, on the ground. But they were too close to the edge; fear and vertigo spun my head and I couldn’t catch my breath.
‘You’re blind, Rachel! Look at her! You’re not safe, why can’t you see that?’ Liam had her by the neck, choking her.
I got to my knees and I tried to reach out and hold her and pull her away from him, but she kicked me, smashed at me with her feet, knocking me down yet again in her struggle, in her blind wrath.
‘Tell her the truth, Vivian! Tell her the truth about why you hurt my sister! Tell her what you did to your own grandmother! Rachel, Lexie told me that Vivian was walking alone, the morning your mother died. She must have pushed her, then gone to school as if nothing had happened! No one listened, but it was true, I know it was.’
Trapped in Liam’s brutal embrace, looking down at me, her familiar mask slipped back into place, but it was too late. I had seen her true face now and I could not unsee it.
Molly in the woods, my mother falling.
‘I didn’t do anything! I didn’t hurt Nana! He’s lying! He’s trying to turn you against me! Mum, you have to believe me!’ I could see her nails digging into his arm, scratching him like she had scratched me, and her eyes, her colourless eyes, caught mine as they so rarely did, and something broke apart inside me. I didn’t believe her, not this time. Not again.
The world was black, roaring. A flash of lightening scored the sky and the rain beat down.
Vivian
Everything is white hot: the pain of his fist in my hair, the hate. How could this have happened to me? How did I let myself be tricked, by that bitch’s brother of all people! Liam Coleman, a background boy, a nothing boy! Fury in my mouth, searing and bitter as blood. I remember now what his sister’s blood felt like rushing over my hand, that perfect colour. I fight the arm that is pinned across my neck. I want to hurt him.
‘Stop lying!’ He uses his arms to shake me like a dog. My mother is just collapsed on the grass, holding her hands to her cheeks, then looking at her bloody fingers. ‘You’re insane!’ he shouts, making my ears ring.
‘It’s not true, it’s not! I’m so sorry, please don’t hurt me, I love you, please! I loved my Nana, I didn’t hurt her. It wasn’t me!’ I spit out the lies like bullets, anything to get him off me.
‘You don’t love me, you want to control me and own me like you do with everyone you decide you want! I found Molly, Vivian! I wanted to go back, back to the woods to think, to the place you took me: it was special, and she was there. You left her there! I was actually beginning
