Page 5

Claire

Now

The air feels the same. That’s the first thing I notice as I exit the Sydney airport. Dry, with just the faintest smell of the distant ocean. I inhale deeply, nostalgia washing over me as my ride share pulls up.

“How ya going?” The driver, a twentysomething guy with windswept hair and board shorts, greets me with a smile and a heavy Australian accent, the sound of which floods me with memories. I respond with a “Good, thanks.”

“American?” he asks, and I offer a nod. “Traveling quite lightly,” he says, letting his eyes rest on my carry-on suitcase and backpack.

“I don’t plan to be here for long,” I say truthfully. I have a return flight booked for five days from now. Barely enough time to sleep off the jet lag. But if I handle things correctly, it should be all the time I need.

Ten or so minutes later, we exit the highway into an area I never traveled to during my first time here.

The roads are windy, increasing in elevation.

Eventually, we turn off a main road, onto a narrow street.

As I watch out the window, the houses become few and further between, replaced with gates and lush greenery, clearly designed to block the world from the fancy residences that lie beyond them.

Through it all, the driver keeps up a steady thrum of questions, undeterred by my monosyllabic answers.

Suddenly, the car takes a sharp right, pulling to the side of the road, and I feel my stomach shift. As the driver eases off the gas, the nerves I’ve been battling throughout thirty hours of travel return, the wings of my butterflies flapping loudly in my ears.

I’m not ready to see these people again, I realize.

They were strangers turned family in little more than hours, the product of those whirlwind relationships that occur only when you’re all thrown into the same foreign circumstances.

Like lifelong friends from summer camp, only our version was a month-long trip that culminated in death.

We’d kept in touch over the years, but primarily through our group text message chain.

Early on in our trip, Phoebe discovered mob was the proper term for a group of kangaroos.

One of the others had adopted the nickname for our crew, and it stuck.

It was fitting, in a way. We were just as close as the Mob—for that one month at least—and equally riddled with secrets and lies.

“Whoa,” the driver says, prolonging the vowels with a surfer-like drawl. It takes me a moment to realize what’s prompted it.

The building in front of us is an amalgamation of glass and concrete that seems to rise to infinity. It sits back from the road, a winding concrete pathway leading past a black sliding gate that immediately starts to open as we pull up next to it.

Kyan was never shy about flashing his money, and that was back when he “only” had his massive trust fund to rely upon.

Since then, he’s managed to invest in numerous tech companies throughout Australia, Singapore, and Silicon Valley, and his wealth has multiplied, as he likes to display on social media any chance he gets.

His feed is littered with photos from his private jet or with his arm around some model on an unidentifiable island he seems to have rented out for just the two of them.

I exit the car, mouth open, transfixed by the colossal building in front of me, so the quick rush of force against my abdomen comes as a complete surprise.

The wind rushes from my lungs as limbs wrap themselves around my shoulders, squeezing tightly. Seconds later, the person draws back so that I can see their face, a mix of familiar and alien.

“El-Ellery?” I finally manage. The throngs of metal that once lined both earlobes have been replaced by two modest gold hoops.

Her face has been cleansed of the heavy dark makeup and piercings from ten years ago, and now sports only mascara-laden lashes and the faintest spread of foundation across her cheeks.

Her once blue-streaked hair has returned to its natural dark color, spreading across her shoulders in a blanket of curls.

“The one and only,” she says, a huge smile plastered on her face.

I’d seen the updated photos of her on Facebook and Instagram, of course, but they never seemed real.

All I could see was teenage punk rock Ellery playing dress-up as an adult, masquerading as a businesswoman for an NGO focused on child welfare in conflict zones.

But here, standing in front of me, eyes wide and the faintest of lines dancing their way across her forehead, I can see how much she’s changed.

“God, I’m so happy to see you,” she says, pummeling me with another full-force hug before grabbing my suitcase from the—for once speechless—driver and pulling me up the path to the compound. “Come on, you need to see everyone else.”

I try to maintain my breathing as she drags me through the front door and into an enormous foyer. I glance around at the stark white walls, the absurdly high ceilings, and my gaze lands on Adrien.

The long blond hair that used to reach halfway down her back has been chopped into a sleek bob and parted in the middle, but her skin looks just as blemish-free as it did when she was twenty.

She’s as stylish as ever, wearing a silk tank top tucked into pair of tailored linen trousers, and as she raises her arms to pull me in, I can’t help but notice an enormous oval diamond twinkling on her left hand.

“Oh honey, it’s so good to see you,” Adrien says, her accent tinkling in my ear as she envelops me in a floral-scented hug.

I’m taken aback at first. The Adrien I remember wasn’t one for affection of any sort, and she certainly wasn’t a hugger.

She’s so thin that I could wrap my arms around her twice, but her muscles are firm as she leans against me.

Before I can stop it, Phoebe’s voice pops into my head.

Lots of time for Pilates when you’re a stay-at-home trophy wife.

“Bring it in, Whit,” Kyan says, appearing by Adrien’s side and using the nickname that only he ever used, his accent as clipped and posh as I remember.

As I lean into his hard body, I feel small, like I used to around him.

He’s always been nearly a foot taller than me and twice as broad, his chest a thick sheet of muscle. “We missed you.”

I try to return the sentiment, but it sticks in my throat as soon as I see him, leaning against a pearl-white couch in the living room off the foyer, hands shoved into jeans pockets, shoulders slightly rounded, peering sheepishly from those dark brown eyes.

I inhale sharply, imagining the woodsy scent of his auburn curls from the same shampoo he used all those years ago, feeling his body curled against mine.

But that was in the before. Before everything went wrong.

“Hi, Claire,” Declan says, raising his hand awkwardly in the air. I can feel the others’ gaze on us, wondering how we’ll react, whether we’ll drop the decade of silence and be friendly. Or whether we’ll be cold, refuse physical contact.

“Hi,” I say softly, opting for the latter.

“Well, come in, come in,” Kyan says, depositing my bags by the door and leading me inside.

“This place is unreal,” I mumble. It’s an understatement.

The huge open-plan first floor must span well over a thousand square feet, and the furniture and walls are all gleaming white, reflecting the afternoon sunlight filtering in from the wall of floor-to-ceiling windows.

Plants, as lush and green as those that lined the walkway up to the house, decorate every corner, giving a splash of color to the modern Scandinavian design.

“Wait until you see the bedrooms,” Adrien adds.

Kyan leads me into the kitchen, a giant slab of marble surrounded by a half circle of empty countertops and littered only occasionally by a near unidentifiable—but no doubt expensive—appliance.

“Well, I think we know the first order of business,” Kyan says, pulling a bottle of whiskey from a bar cart in the corner. “What can I get you all?”

We give him our orders, and I watch as he deftly pours and swirls and shakes, a comfortable volley of conversation running among the others. But I can barely pay attention to it.

My eyes dart from one to the other, everyone laughing and smiling. It’s like they all forgot the reason we’re here. As if they can’t sense the presence of the other people who should be in the room with us.

“Let’s head out to the patio,” he urges after everyone’s received their drinks, and I follow them outside, white wine in hand, sucking in my breath at the view.

Beyond the patio, which is lined with a full bar and matching white furniture, lies one of the most pristine beaches I’ve ever laid eyes on.

Green grass, as immaculately cut as a golf course, eventually gives way to fresh white sand, spotted at this hour with families and a few beachgoers who have managed to outlast the heat of the afternoon sun.

Cobalt blue waves crash against the sand, the water frothing as if trying to hide what’s beneath it.

Buildings dart up behind the curve of the beach, a reminder that this paradise exists in the middle of the city.

“To being reunited at last.” Ellery’s voice draws my attention from the view. I turn to see her raising her glass, and we all join her. My eyes catch Declan’s and quickly dart away.

I can’t help but remember that first day at the Notting Hill Hotel, the local bar near the Hamilton campus. All of us cheers-ing to the month ahead, nearly overflowing with excitement. Could we have stopped things at that point? Or had we already started down a path that was bound to end in death?

We all take a seat on the pristine patio furniture, Ellery complimenting Kyan on the extraordinary life he built.

“Yeah, work’s been going well,” he says, taking a deep swig from his glass. “The company’s really taken off in the last few years. We’re poised to break into the Forbes Top 100 Digital Companies list.”

The conversation circles, everyone sharing their life updates.

Ellery admits that she recently became engaged, which causes us to erupt into a round of cheers and soft yells.

Adrien talks halfheartedly about her job as a lawyer in her father’s firm, and I think briefly of how ticked off Phoebe would be to find that Adrien is not, in fact, a stay-at-home wife.

And Declan gives a bare-bones account of his work as a journalist, although I notice he avoids any mention of his life in New York, the new home he’d traded for Dublin a few years back.

He hadn’t told me he’d be living in the same country, only a few hours away by plane.

I was left to find that out through social media.

The thought still burns, a wound that won’t heal.

And then the conversation turns to me. I keep it as short as possible.

“Not too much has changed really. I stayed in Illinois, moved to Chicago shortly after I got back from Australia. I work as a receptionist…for a medical insurance company,” I add after a second, hoping to lend more gravitas to the temp job that somehow morphed its way into my career.

I feel my cheeks grow red at how pathetic it sounds in comparison to everyone’s accomplishments.

Ellery’s forehead wrinkles almost imperceptibly, probably as she remembers how passionate I was about earning my nursing degree back then.

I don’t mention that it never happened. That I dropped out of college with a year left to go. But they don’t know how my world collapsed when I came back from Australia, as I tried to cope with what I’d done. As the ground gave out beneath me.

Thankfully they’re all too kind to point out the obvious. There are no follow-up questions like with the others, for which I’m grateful. Any answers I’d have would be just as depressing.

The conversation lulls then, and Ellery jumps in, never one to outlast an awkward silence.

“Wow, I really can’t believe it,” she muses. “The Mob back together at last…”

She trails off, and it’s clear we’re all thinking the same things. Of the others who should be here. Who can’t be.

“Could Josh not make it?” Adrien asks.

Ellery latches onto her question, grateful. “He really wanted to, but he said he had a work commitment. We should FaceTime him at some point.”

“What about Hari?” I ask.

Kyan looks down at the watch on his wrist, a blue-faced Omega coated with diamonds. “I talked to her earlier. She said she’d come by. She should have arrived by now. I’ll text her.”

The group falls into an awkward silence. There are two additional people missing: Phoebe and Tomas. Two people who can’t share what they’ve been up to in the past ten years.

Eventually, after a few throat clearings and the silent passing of seconds, the group moves on to another conversation topic.

Rather than joining in, I take a moment and look at these people who were once my best friends, my family.

People I used to know intimately, who are now strangers in so many ways. Maybe they always were.

I start with Declan. Even with all the hurt, something beckons me to run my fingers through his curls like I used to.

To cuddle up beside him. But then I notice the dark circles around his eyes, the slivers of gray hair in his hair.

My eyes skirt to his hands, which are grasped tightly—too tightly—around his whiskey glass.

I shift to Adrien, her perfectly botoxed forehead masking any years that have passed. Sensing me looking at her, she flicks her eyes towards mine, her gaze cold and steely. She catches herself almost instantly, the warmth from earlier seeping back into her face.

Kyan’s next to her, his face lit up animatedly as he tells some outrageous story. But there’s something off about him, something that wasn’t there all those years ago. A hardness that seems to lie just beyond the gregarious mask.

And then there’s Ellery, whose lips are pursed in something resembling a smile, but which looks more like a grimace.

For the first time, I consider that I may not be the only one uncomfortable here. But why? The others wanted to return even before they heard the news about Phoebe, and none of them seem particularly broken up about her body being found.

Unless they’re hiding something too.