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Still in her wet swimsuit and towel, ignoring my questions, Mum paced to a crowded corner of the garage.

Whatever she was looking for, she knew exactly where she’d left it.

Clearly, it had been stored for a long time.

Kicking aside some gear, she yanked down the stepladder and scrambled up to the attic.

She stomped back and forth on the landing, hoisting boxes.

“Up here,” she finally called from the top of the ladder, tipping a cardboard box over the edge. “Careful. It’s heavy.”

I reached up and lowered it to the ground. It thudded as if books were inside. The box was dusty, sticky with spiderwebs, and stinking of mouse droppings.

Mum scrambled down, and together we hauled it toward the table on the back deck.

“Mum, tell me what’s inside,” I said as we heaved it onto the table.

“I don’t know.” Her voice rang hollow. “I never looked.”

After opening the box, she lifted out a textbook from my first year at high school, but carefully, as if it might reveal something important. She showed me the name inside: “Janey Saunders,” written in the same handwriting we’d seen on the suicide note.

Shock electrified my brain. “This is Janey’s stuff?” I fingered through the pages, which were marked with her annotations. “Oh my God. Where did you find it?”

“The week after Janey died, I was at the dump.” She pulled out another textbook.

Smoothed it with a shaky hand. “I saw her mother drop off this box. She seemed upset, angry almost, and I thought I’d keep it in case she regretted throwing it away.

The time never felt right, because Janey’s mum got sick soon after.

When she died two years later, I forgot about it, I suppose. ”

Hope sparked in my chest. This could be something. An insight into Janey’s mind before she died, some clue to why she disappeared.

We took out six textbooks. Before us, the air pixelated into a strange and uncertain dusk. The cold clouds darkened. The only thing left in the box was a composition notebook.

I took it out and opened it.

It looked like a diary. The first handful of pages had been ripped out. Four of the remaining pages were written on. The rest were blank.

I started to scan the first page, with Mum reading over my shoulder.

Oh hell.

I checked in with Mum for her response. Mum was a slower reader, but her hand flew to her mouth. Her face drained, her body locked.

“God,” she whispered.

We read through the second, third, and fourth pages. My vision went dark, white spots pulsing around the edges. I wanted to sink to my knees, the grief was so heavy.

Instead, I picked up my phone and called Bevan and Kui to come quick. I didn’t call Janey’s dad. He couldn’t be part of this.

It was Janey’s diary. Her life was not what I’d thought.