“What?”He opens his eyes.“You mean...now?”
“Yeah.”It’s my turn to shrug.“If you wish you could get it done right now, then that’s what we’ll do.”
“It’s the middle of the night.”
“There must be someone at the police station round the clock.”
I can feel that this is too much for Colin.But then he seems to consider it seriously.Maybe I’m rushing him, but this way, he doesn’t have to spend two whole days torturing himself and hiding his plan from his family.
Colin looks over to the window.I follow his gaze and see the lights of the skyscrapers against the night sky.
And then he nods.
Colin
We have to be quiet, but this isn’t the first time I’ve crept out at an ungodly hour without waking my parents.I’ve practiced this, even though the reason we’re now taking an Uber across the city is way less fun than when I snuck out in the past.
It’s shortly after five.The streets are pretty quiet, but One Police Plaza is not.
I feel like I might throw up as I go to the desk and ask for the officer whose name I saw in the news reports.He’s not here at this time of day, but the receptionist promises to get someone to call him.Olive lets go of my hand and gives me a kiss, then takes a seat in the waiting area while I explain that I’m here to make a statement about the Ainslee fire, after which I’m led to an interview room, which is every bit as bare and charmless as they look in the movies.
They take my details, don’t bat an eyelid as I say my name, and after a while Detective King walks into the room.And then I tell him everything.Mechanically, like a robot.
About Homecoming night, my lighter, the toilet paper in the gym bathroom, and the moment it caught fire.
“Why were you hanging around in a bathroom with a lighter?”the cop asks.
So I could have a smoke.It’s the answer I’ve given so often, so that nobody finds out what I’m really doing.But I’m through with that now.
“I was self-harming.”My voice sounds alien.“I was stressed out,had a bunch of issues, couldn’t deal with them anymore.I went into the bathroom to distract myself from the emotional pain.”
“Had you often done that?”
“Yes.”
He makes a note.“And then what happened?”
I take a deep breath.“I heard people coming and accidentally dropped the lighter.It landed on a couple squares of toilet paper that were on the floor, and they caught fire.I stomped the burning paper out right away.The floor was kind of damp, and I was certain the fire was out.Then I walked out of the stall and into the washroom where a few guys from my class were hanging around.”
“Can you give me their names?”
I pause, then just blurt them out.“Trent Barlow, Isaac Hawk, and Jeremy Westwood.”
“Are they your friends, Colin?”
“Not exactly.We had kind of a tense relationship.”I take a breath, then tell him about my mom spreading stories about Trent’s influencer sister.That he’d sworn to get revenge and fucked with me any chance he got.I tell him everything I know, and then I carry on with what happened when I was out in the schoolyard and saw the flames.
“You dialed nine-one-one but didn’t give your name?”the detective confirms.I nod, and he asks his next question.“And you left the site before the emergency services arrived?”
I nod again.My throat tightens more with every answer, but I force myself to keep talking.“I panicked and was afraid of getting caught.So I ran away.At that moment, I didn’t see any other way out, but...I regret that.Running away was the wrong thingto do—I should have gone to the police.I was in shock.And I kept asking myself how the fire could have started.I was sure the toilet paper was out, you know?I would never have started a fire intentionally, but I was afraid Trent and the others would figure out what I was doing in the bathroom.That stressed me out, and I worried that maybe I’d been careless, that I hadn’t extinguished the paper after all.I don’t remember exactly anymore.”My voice is shaking, but I try to hold my nerve.“I’d never have believed the fire could spread like that or that a firefighter could die.It’s no excuse, but I’m truly remorseful.I’d do everything differently if I could.I didn’t mean any of it to happen, least of all for someone to die.”
I don’t know when exactly I start crying again.The detective’s face shows no emotion.He just pushes a box of tissues across the table to me.They’re next to the voice recorder that’s taking down my statement.
“Why didn’t you come here right away?”
“I went to my mother.I was afraid and thought she’d help me.She convinced me not to say anything.I thought she meant just until she’d arranged for lawyers to advise me, but then my parents sent me to boarding school in Scotland.It all happened so fast, I was overwhelmed and didn’t know what was happening to me.And then I was on another continent, and I...didn’t do a thing.”
“So how come you’re here now?”
