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‘Billy, really, it’s fine. Don’t worry.’

Jet raised her legs from the coffee table, so he could get past with the vacuum cleaner.

‘I’ve put the sheets in the wash,’ Billy said, over the whir, the crackle, as the machine found a stash of crumbs. ‘You take the bed, I’ll have the sofa.’

‘I’m not kicking you out of your bed, Billy.’ Jet’s eyes returned to her screen, to the Google Street View of River Street, clicking up and down, hunting, a digital stalker. As though she might somehow find her phone there, hiding in the past, in the grass or the dirt.

‘I like the sofa. Sometimes I sleep there anyway.’

Billy Finney was the worst liar. And this sofa was a piece of crap, lumps of springs digging into Jet’s thighs already.

He disappeared with the vacuum into the bedroom, kept it running as he reached for a can of deodorant, spraying it around the room, into every newly tidied corner. Coughing as he inhaled the fumes.

Jet smiled, kept her teeth to herself, started back at the top of River Street again.

More cursing from the bedroom, more rustling.

‘Billy, stop worrying.’ Again. It was hard to concentrate with all the worrying.

He reemerged, a small box in his hands. ‘Got this for Christmas last year. Never opened it.’

He opened it now, a green candle in a glass jar. A scent described as Cedar Delight. Billy placed it on the coffee table, grabbed a lighter from a kitchen drawer, and bent low to light the wick, the baby fire reflected in his glassy blue eyes.

‘Lovely.’ Jet grinned up at him. ‘I can see myself living here, for the rest of my life.’

Billy retracted his thumb, gave her a look.

‘What? That’s funny.’ Jet gave a gruff laugh, if he wouldn’t. Billy normally laughed at all of her jokes.

‘I’ll just grab this,’ he muttered, reaching for the photo frame that lived in the middle of the coffee table.

It had been blocked by Jet’s screen before, but she saw it now as he picked it up.

A woman with dark curly hair and glittering eyes, an ice cream melting over her fingers.

Billy’s mom. Mrs Finney. Beth. Three names for the same person.

There was a boy in the photo too, same hair, same ice cream, same cool blue eyes.

The Billy Jet knew best, about twelve years old.

Billy averted his eyes and Jet averted hers too, pretending she hadn’t noticed, watching out the side of her eye as Billy took the photo and shut it away, on the top shelf in the closet.

‘You don’t have to put everything away just because I’m here.’

‘Oh,’ he said, remembering something else to worry about. ‘I keep a spare key under the mat outside the front door. You should have it. I’ll get it for you.’

He got it for her, almost breathless when he arrived back at her side, putting the key down on the table, between her feet. His eyes caught her screen, mirrored it back.

‘That’s the street where your phone was turned off?’

Jet nodded, craned to look at him, towering above her. ‘You know anyone who lives there?’

Billy chewed his lip. ‘Don’t think so. You think that’s where they live?’

‘Well, they went straight there, after the attack,’ Jet said. ‘Turned my phone off in this spot.’ She pointed to the street view, where River Street passed North Street.

Billy thought about it. ‘Could have been on their way home, then realized it was a bad idea to do that with your phone still on. Doesn’t mean they live exactly there, right? Just that it was on the way.’

‘Maybe.’ Jet nodded. ‘So maybe they live north of town.’

That was a lot of maybe.

‘What else do you have?’

Jet glanced at the scribbles in her open notebook, Billy following her eyes.

‘Not a lot. The police think it’s JJ, I can tell.’

Billy bent lower, leaning on the back of the sofa, his head hovering over her shoulder.

‘Do you think it’s JJ?’

‘No. JJ’s not like that. But I’m trying to keep an open mind.’ She paused. ‘Well … someone bashed it open for me.’

That one almost got a smile out of him, a lopsided twitch in his cheek.

His eyes still didn’t look right, though: haunted, but also busy somehow, ever moving, too much going on behind them.

He was the one who’d seen her dead – well, almost dead.

Maybe that took a while to go away. Jet hadn’t had to see it, hadn’t had to live it after those first few seconds, but she wondered if her eyes looked haunted too.

Felt like it, that deep pain behind her right eye, the dull ache and itch beneath the bandages.

Not dull enough; she should take more codeine.

At least Dr Lee gave her the good stuff.

She winced.

‘What’s wrong?’ He bent even lower, to meet her eyes. ‘You need your painkillers? Food? I can make you something, anything you want.’

‘Billy, it’s OK. Stop doing stuff for me.’

‘I like doing stuff for you.’

He always had.

Billy was nine months older than her. Jet didn’t know a world he didn’t exist in. Always right there, next door.

Hey Billy, wanna ride bikes? I’ll race ya. Hey, did you let me win because I’m younger and smaller? Don’t let me win, Billy.

Hi Mrs Mason, is Jet in? I found a frog and I need to show her. Jet loves frogs.

Only stopped when Jet turned fourteen, when Sophia became her best friend instead, took all Jet’s time and attention, because Billy couldn’t come over if Sophia was already there – that would have been weird, two worlds that didn’t mix.

Jet and Billy had outgrown each other; no more bike races, no more frogs.

Billy was right, though; Jet did love frogs. It was a fucking awesome frog.

A notification pinged up on her screen: low battery.

‘Shit,’ Jet said. ‘I need my – fuck sake, what’s that word? The white wire thingy?’

‘Charger?’

‘Yes!’ Jet clapped him on the shoulder. ‘Charger, that’s it.’

‘I’ll get it.’ Billy straightened up, because he couldn’t not do stuff for her. For anyone, really. He was just like that, made like that. Jet was made a different way.

She pointed him toward the red backpack. ‘In there.’

‘You got some mail here,’ Billy said, digging through, pulling the envelopes out to reach the charger.

‘Oh yeah. I was proving a point. Let me see.’

Jet lowered her feet to the floor, MacBook on the table, and took the letters out of Billy’s hands.

The first was a red envelope, handwritten address.

Jet flipped it over and ripped open the tab, while Billy moved his guitar case so he could reach the wall socket, plugging her ch-ch – white wire thingy in.

‘It’s a card,’ Jet said, pulling it out.

A white card, with a vase of flowers drawn on the front, in garish colors. Below the vase and its little shadow were the words: Get Well Soon.

‘You’ve got to be kidding me.’

She held it up so Billy could see. He winced.

‘Who’s it from?’ he asked.

Jet opened it, scanned the handwriting inside.

‘From Gerry Clay.’

‘The village trustee guy?’

Jet nodded, clearing her throat to read aloud. ‘ So sorry to hear about your accident. Accident, Gerry? It’s called premeditated murder. Sending all of our thoughts and prayers. Well, Gerry, you can shove your thoughts and prayers up your –’

‘– What’s this one?’ Billy asked, picking up the other envelope from her lap. ‘Looks official.’

Jet swapped the card for the letter. It did look official, her name and address in a type so neat it looked almost aggressive, through a thin plastic window. PRIVATE her phone was with her killer.

She slipped her thick socks into her Birkenstock clogs.

‘See you later,’ Jet said, reaching for the door.

‘Oh,’ Billy replied, one arm already inside his fur-lined denim jacket. ‘I thought … no, yeah, that’s fine.’

Jet faltered in the open doorway. ‘Oh,’ she said too. ‘I just thought you’d be busy, you know. I’m probably imposing enough, right? Don’t need to take up any more of your time.’

Billy’s jacket fell, his face too, catching it with the hook of his little finger. The jacket, that is, not his face. He’d already picked that up, a one-sided smile. ‘Yeah, no, you’re right. I’ve actually g-got a shift at the bar later anyway, so that’s … yeah, that’s fine. S-see you later.’

Later. The meaning different now, shortened to a few hours. Because that’s the only kind of later Jet had left.

‘Yeah, see you later, Billy.’