When I walked into the house that evening; Miles and my aunt were laughing about something. That meant that my aunt was in hysterics and Miles was chuckling. They both turned their heads to look at me when I walked into the house. I stopped in the doorway and waited for someone to say something.180Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡL5AJyrWxxh
“Oh! Hi dear.” Aunt Poppy said, “Miles here dropped by to keep me company. It gets awfully quiet around here and Miles always comes over to…” She must have noticed that she had hurt my feelings. She stopped in the middle of her sentence and changed it altogether. “So, how was your day?”180Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡfoLCIj9FWf
“It was okay,” I said. “Hi Miles.”180Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡsKxHTEPpJC
“Angie.” He stood up and grabbed his things to leave. “I need to be heading home now, Poppy. It was nice talking to you.”180Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡLJMFL0f83K
“Oh no! You can stay if you want to. We’ll be putting dinner on the table soon, might as well hang around and talk awhile.”180Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡulLMYu5Ebc
Miles looked at me for approval. “Sure. You can stay. It’ll be fun having you here.”180Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ2arD0pRI5e
We sat down, had food, and then played some board games. My Aunt suggested games because she knew how horrid I was at them. It was fun, and I had a great time; until Miles spoke;180Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡafNHKVAtYn
“What are the detectives saying about the woman?”180Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡBhoj4nTyxQ
They both looked at me. My eyes widened. “I… I don’t know.”180Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡaCIGqvucKa
“But you’ve been talking to Lucas!” Aunt Poppy exclaimed. I cringed inwardly and shook my head;180Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡL0WMkrqdYm
“He hasn’t told me anything, and even if he had; I can’t talk about it.”180Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡjj9h1fUiwz
“Why?” Miles inquired.180Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡlZSUZTiq1h
“Because Police business is private. I can’t give out information that shouldn’t be made public.” I begged them to understand with my eyes. I prayed they wouldn’t pry into it anymore. “I mean… even if he told me things, he’d be telling me because he trusts me enough not to dish it all out.” And Aunt Poppy was a known gossip. She’d tell everyone what I’d said, and I was still trying to reel in Lucas.180Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡLwwjivGoGy
“Oh, okay.” Miles shrugged. I sighed with relief, but my Aunt wasn’t about to drop it.180Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡaqPoVIza17
“Have they identified the woman?”180Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡBj3G2NPlGq
“Aunt Poppy; if that was public information; then it would be in the news. I don’t know and watch for the paper tomorrow, it might please you.” I snapped and stood up; went to my room and lied on my bed to watch YouTube.
The next morning wasn’t as bright as the last morning. I got out of bed, cleaned up and went for a walk. I didn’t run, but I enjoyed exercise… sometimes. And today was one of those times. My thoughts were all over the place. The murder of Celine Ramroth occupied about 80 per cent of my brain, and then food occupied the rest.180Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ2VieF1PZWS
After walking for about twenty minutes, I spotted someone. My heart dropped, not because I hated the person; but because I didn’t want to see anyone this morning, especially not someone I was friends with, and I’d have to talk to. I almost turned around to walk home, but then it would be obvious that I was avoiding her.180Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡJ4ECZyNV9p
“Good morning, Angie.” Alison’s cheery voice said. She was way too cheery considering the time of day, still early.180Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡQ9swOgpwYh
“Hey, Alison. How are you?” I asked, faking glee. “I haven’t seen you in a while.”180Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡjBDvoU5TsP
“One day. It seems to be a long time, doesn’t it?” Alison gave a bitter laugh. “I heard they identified the woman; Celine Ramroth. I’ve heard of her, some high-end jewellery… person.”180Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ2cYJgA7GF8
“Oh?” I said, questioningly. “Where did you hear that?”180Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡv20VKOOM3s
“I guess… I…” She stuttered. “I read the news this morning. They’ve identified the lady.”180Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ8QOssU4lN4
I knew she was lying. If she’d left the house when I did; then she wouldn’t have seen that because the news wasn’t out yet. This town only had two news channels, and both had said nothing; not even on the internet. Another thing was, she didn’t have her phone with her. If she did; then she could have seen the news while running. I kept this to myself.180Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡSecAzNuvhX
“Celine Ramroth.” I faked being deep in thought. “I’ve heard about her before. But I’m not sure.”180Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡsecZx7petS
“She’s everywhere on google. You can look her up; she was rich and supposed to be out on a holiday or something.”180Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡZKbb3a2x1K
“And there was no media that followed her on her holiday?” I asked.180Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡT0vZDEzlAp
“No. She wanted to keep on the down-low. She didn’t tell people who she was. And even her outfits screamed out, ‘I’m middle class.’ Even her outfit, when she died, was middle class.” She giggled. “Maybe that’s why we couldn’t identify her.”180Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡqUpWIJzLS8
But how had she known what the woman was wearing when she died? As far as I knew, that information hadn’t been released into the media. The police were decent at keeping information to themselves; they hadn’t released a lot of the things they knew about the case.180Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡEv9YyAVBjT
I nodded, absentmindedly. “Yeah. Maybe. Where are you headed?” I asked. The thing was, she’d turned around and joined me when she’d seen me. We’d been going opposite directions. Now I hoped she’d remember that and go where she was initially going. Or at least take the hint.180Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡmEvBda7JoW
She stopped, laughed and then said; “Oh dear! Thank you. I was headed to… a friend. I thought I’d squeeze in a little workout.”180Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡuUu3LadIMT
“Oh. It was great talking to you, Alison. I’ll see you soon, yes?” But I hadn’t the pause between ‘to’ and ‘a friend’.180Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡj3Fj7NNtTt
I was deep in thought for the rest of my walk. I came to once I was at home; I took a shower, made breakfast and hung out with my aunt. She said she was sorry for the night before and then started talking about my day and how she wanted to spend her time today. It shocked me that people planned out their day; they didn’t… go with the flow. Which is exactly what I did?180Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡYoaSt8AeAL
“Aunty…” I began tentatively. “Do you know Alison?”180Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡeaOHWShGxH
“Alison who?”180Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡxYFrtdDuYi
“I don’t know. Alison, the girl that came here because of Asthma and cancer or something?” I tried to jog my Aunt’s memory. No spark of recognition came.180Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡRP58ZNQ2oC
“No. I don’t know anyone called Alison.”180Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡF4qbJUouVy
“Aunty!” I said. “She says she’s been here for a long time already, like five years. How don’t you know her? You know everyone here.”180Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡSqsPry7TTU
“Everyone except this Alison creature.”180Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡTaI7wCtzpZ
At mid-morning, I made tea and checked the news. And the news about the woman’s identity still wasn’t out; which meant Alison knew a bit too much; but how? And my Aunt’s staunch belief that she knew no one by the name ‘Alison’ in town made me uncomfortable.180Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ4dadCRmOvD
I went for a walk like I seemed to do way too much these days. I hoped I could run into Lucas and convince him to tell me something, then let me tag along. I knew I could never walk up to the station and into his office. That would be creepy.180Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡIhnZuT5pcH
No ideas entered my head for the first fifteen minutes of my walk, then I saw Tanya rushing in my direction. How could I avoid her? I wondered. I needed to get away; I needed a cover story. She was by my side in less than a minute, which wasn’t enough time to come up with a story that didn’t include my Aunt.180Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡzPJlMml7yk
“How are you today?” Tanya asked me. She had a soft voice today. Or I hadn’t noticed before.180Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡgW0n230DgC
“I’m great,” I say and smile. “How are you?”180Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡFfvctRTJKs
“Okay. Anything come up about the woman?”180Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡxYCbkNOpMR
I remembered how she’d lied about not knowing Celine. I was positive she’d known something about her, even if it wasn’t her full name; but she’d seen her before.180Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡhSybN1Pk08
“I don’t know. I’ll talk to the detective about it and try to get him to talk to me.”180Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡJXeYAVVivv
She nodded. “Oh. Please tell me what he says when you talk to him okay?”180Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡODPrsHDVdd
“Sure. How’s your husband? Is he back yet?” I asked.180Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡYGGarKsB7L
Tanya hesitated before slowly saying; “No. He’s not back, but he will be soon enough. I told him the Police wanted to talk to him, and because he’s- he was in the force; he wanted to help them as much as he could.”180Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡTuMIGGPCc6
“I understand. It must be hard on you though, hearing everything that people are saying about your husband, and not being able to disprove the rumours?”180Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡTnN8mawHkZ
“Yes. But I know that I could cause more harm than good if I try to say anything.”180Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡh5iP9NAgua
My phone rang then, and I silently thanked the caller because now I could get rid of Tanya. “Oh, I’m sorry I have to take this. I’ll see you after?”180Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡGxtAVljodY
She nodded and walked away; I waved and then looked at the caller; mom.180Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ6f0kD09Ppj
“Hello?” I said questioningly.180Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡqbiLVTMX2o
“Yes, dear.” She sounded concerned. “I heard.” That was all she said. She didn’t offer any more information and my heart clenched in my throat.180Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡrgoQgGmZEB
“Heard about what?” I asked, my voice came out choked. I hoped it wasn’t the murder. That would mean I have to explain everything to her, which I wasn’t keen on doing.180Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡZcBHso8Rpi
“The woman you found on the beach.” She said. “Why didn’t you tell me?”180Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ4XL25rDYf3
“I didn’t find her, mother. Someone else did.” I was suddenly exhausted, and I ignored her question about not telling her.180Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡkMD7DuWiZE
“That doesn’t matter!” My mother shrieked, and again; only fragments of my hearing remained. “I hope you’re staying out of it. I saw that she was murdered.” She gave an exaggerated gasp.180Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡkOccxqr8yR
“Yes, I haven’t involved myself in any of it, mother,” I drawled. “I wouldn’t dare, especially with such things. I don’t want to get murdered too.”180Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡHQw9FXNz3u
“Exactly!” She exclaimed. I figured she was relaxing more now that she thought I was on her side and agreed. “Imagine how I’d deal with that kind of loss.” I silently begged her not to mention my sister, I wasn’t in the mood to comfort myself and her.180Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ8mPksFmuKm
“Yes,” I said.180Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ8tQGHJe0Ad
“If I hear anything about you from anyone, Angela, I promise you I will…”180Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡqZRYvlpImb
“Yes, mother. You won’t hear anything of the sort.” I didn’t know what she’d do if she found out, she enjoyed saying she’d disown me, but so far… she hadn’t. That should have counted as an accomplishment.
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