Page 46 of Good Girl, Bad Blood

‘Here, have a look through.’ Joanna passed her phone across the table. ‘There’s several if you scroll left.’

Connor moved his chair closer, to look over Pip’s shoulder at the screen. The first photo showed Jamie on his own, on the other side of this kitchen table. His dark blonde hair was pushed to the side and he was grinning, an overly wide grin that stretched into his rosy cheeks, as his chin glowed orange from the lit candles on the caterpillar birthday cake below. In the next photo he was bent low over the cake, cheeks puffed out to blow and the flames stretching away to escape from him. Pip swiped. Now Jamie was looking down at the cake, a long grey knife in his hand with a red plastic band between handle and blade. He was sticking the point of the knife in the caterpillar’s neck, cracking the chocolate outer shell. Next photo and the caterpillar’s head was detached, Jamie looking up, smiling directly at the camera. Then the cake was gone, replaced by a present in Jamie’s hands, the silver-spotted wrapping paper half ripped away.

‘Oh yeah,’ Connor snorted, ‘Jamie’s face when he realized Dad bought him a Fitbit for his birthday.’

It was true; Jamie’s smile did seem tighter, more strained here. Pip swiped again but it was a video next that started to play as her thumb brushed against it. Connor was in the frame now, the two brothers together, Jamie’s arm draped across Connor’s shoulder. The frame was swaying slightly, rustling sounds of breath behind it.

‘Smile boys,’ Joanna was saying, through the phone.

‘We are,’ Jamie mumbled, trying not to disturb his smile for the photo.

‘What’s it doing?’ Joanna’s voice asked.

‘For goodness sake,’ Connor said, ‘she’s accidentally taking a bloody video again. Aren’t you?’

‘Oh Mum.’ Jamie laughed. ‘Again?’

‘I’m not,’ Joanna’s voice insisted, ‘I didn’t press that, it’s this stupid phone.’

‘Always the phone’s fault, isn’t it?’

Jamie and Connor looked at each other, their laughs spiking into high-pitched giggles as Joanna grew more insistent that she hadn’t pressed that. Arthur’s voice saying, ‘Let me see, Jo.’ Then Jamie tightened his arm around Connor’s neck, bringing his little brother’s head down to his chest where he messed up his hair with his other hand, Connor protesting through giggles. The frame dropped and the video ended.

‘Sorry,’ Pip said, noticing how Connor had tensed in his chair, and Joanna’s eyes were so full she’d dropped them to the floor. ‘Can you please email me all of these, Connor? And any other recent photos?’

He coughed. ‘Yep, will do.’

‘Alright.’ Pip stood up, packing her laptop and microphones into her bag.

‘Are you going?’ asked Connor.

‘One last thing to do before I go,’ she said. ‘I need to search Jamie’s room. Is that OK?’

‘Yes. Yes, of course,’ Joanna said, standing up. ‘Can we come too?’

‘Sure,’ Pip said, waiting for Connor to open the door and lead them upstairs. ‘Have you already looked through it?’

‘Not really,’ Joanna said, following them up the stairs, tensing as they all heard Arthur cough in the living room. ‘I went in there earlier when we first realized he was gone. I did a quick look to see if he’d slept here last night and left early in the morning. But no, curtains were still open. Jamie’s not the sort of person who opens his curtains in the morning or makes his bed.’ They paused outside the door of Jamie’s darkened bedroom, which was slightly ajar. ‘Jamie’s a little untidy,’ she said tentatively. ‘It’s a bit messy in there.’

‘That’s fine,’ Pip said, nodding for Connor to go ahead. He pushed open the door, the room full of dark shapes until Connor flicked on the light, and the shapes became an unmade bed, a cluttered desk under the window, and an open wardrobe disgorging clothes on to the floor, piles like islands against the sea-blue carpet.

Untidy was one word for it.

‘Can I, um . . . ?’

‘Yeah, do whatever you have to. Right, Mum?’ said Connor.

‘Right,’ Joanna said quietly, staring around the place from which her son was most missing.

Pip made a beeline for the desk, stepping over and between the small mountains of T-shirts and boxers. She ran her finger over the lid of the closed laptop in the middle of the desk, over the Iron Man sticker, peeling at the edges. Gently, she pulled open the lid and clicked the on button.

‘Do either of you know Jamie’s password?’ she asked as the machine purred into life, the blue Windows login screen jumping up.

Connor shrugged and Joanna shook her head.

Pip bent down to typepassword1into the input box.

Incorrect Password.