Katie laughs. I don’t think I’ve ever heard a sound like it before. It’s all claws and blades and vinegar.
“Youloved him? Then why did you leave him in that car? You might as well have murdered him. Hey” – she throws out her arms and twirls on the spot – “maybe you did! Who knows? No one was there. Maybe he passed out and you held him under the water.”
“And why the hell would Dylan do that?” Ollie spits. “He was El’s boyfriend.”
“No one knows what goes on behind closed doors,” Suzie says, suddenly soothing. She places a hand on Ollie’s chest and he draws back. “Anything might have happened after the dance. Don’t forget, the video came out that morning. What if Ellis posted it himself? What if he confessed to Dylan in the car and Dylan freaked?”
We have an audience now. Each stab from the girls gets a reaction. Some grumble discontent, others whistle like they’re at a cage fight. I’d say the numbers in each group are pretty even. A smaller set smell blood and start hurling the accusation back at me:
“Yeah, McKee, what really happened?”
“Did you do it?”
Did you did you did you did you did you did you did you?
And through it all I can see Gemma in the doorway, smiling.
Suddenly she breaks in. “Stop it! All of you, just stop! Dylan?” She holds out a hand to me. “Can we talk?”
I don’t need to be asked twice.
Mike and Ollie act as my bodyguards, clearing a route so I can follow Gemma out of the lounge and into a room across the hall. I give the boys a nod and they stay guarding the doorway like a pair of mafia goons.
Gemma closes the door behind us and the music fades to a dull throb. Unlike the rest of the house, this room is rammed with paintings, ornaments, antiques of every kind. A couple of what I assume are Argyle ancestors dressed in country tweeds sneer down at us from the walls. Decent paintings, but nothing compared to yours, El. The party girl goes and sits behind a long mahogany desk, kicking up her Valentino heels. She doesn’t appear drunk or upset any more.
“Gemma, what is all this?” I ask.
She shrugs and examines her nails. “Aren’t I allowed to give my friend a proper goodbye?”
I perch on the arm of a soft leather settee. “He wasn’t your friend. He hadn’t been for months. He knew what you did.”
She blinks, and for the first time ever I see a quiver of self-doubt. “Me? I didn’t do anything. You heard them all out there, Dylan. If anyone’s got questions to answer, it’s you, not me.”
“You scripted that whole scene,” I tell her. “Fed Suze and Katie their lines. Honestly, those two are just not that quick on their feet.”
She shrugs in aprove itsort of way. Then pouts a little and changes the subject. “I’ve got a question for you, Dylan, if you’re man enough to answer it. Who were you before Ellis came along? Really? A nothing, a nobody. Just some little freak who sometimes hung around with Mike Berrington and the footie boys. I was barely even aware of you.”
I nod. “That’s right. I agree. That’s who I was.”
“A nobody who no one even noticed. A whispery little gay boy too scared to say who he really was. I don’t think I even knew your name before El picked you out and made you his pet project. Because that’s what you were to him, Dylan. That’s all youeverwere.”
It’s weird, I should be angry. Screw that, I should be bloody furious. But I’m not, because I know none of this is true and that she’s grasping for something she needs but can never own. She’s grasping for you.
“And now you’re a nobody again,” she goes on. “Oh, I suppose you can carry on hanging around Mike and Ollie if you like, but Ellis is gone and he was the only one who gave you any meaning.”
I nod again. “Gemma, you’re absolutely right. He did give me meaning… And I gave him meaning too.”
She looks at me and laughs. “You?”
I get up and cross to the desk. She draws back as if I might hit her. I wonder if she’s been hit before. Not by Ollie, I’m pretty sure, but Paul Donovan? I wouldn’t put it past him. I take out my wallet, unfold the paper with her picture and lay it in front of her. She starts to laugh, then stops. When she looks up at me, some of the bite has gone out of her.
“What is this?”
“He knew, Gemma. That day after he left you at Hug-A-Book, after he abandoned you for me, he knew what you did. He rejected you because you wanted him to be something he couldn’t be. You wanted this make-believe gay best friend. He was to be your latest accessory, like your handbag or your dog, but El was larger and more complicated and too fantastic to be anyone’s stereotype. And you hated him for it.”
I round the desk and drop to my haunches in front of her. She has turned in her swivel chair and sits with hunched shoulders.
“Were you there at the lake, Gemma? Did you see him die?”
