Dead Time by Anne Cassidy Page A

black jeans and a white shirt. She pulled out her DMs and looked for some socks. When she was dressed she looked at herself in the mirror. She saw a pale girl with chin-length hair. Her eyes were big and dark and made her look younger than her years. She pulled her hair back and held it behind her ears. She still looked young, not a girl of seventeen.
    Her shirt was loose and her jeans were skinny, her boots making her feet look huge. She glanced at her wardrobe. She had a line of hangers with black jeans or trousers and various black or white tops. Anna didn’t like the way shedressed but she didn’t care. At Mary Linton the talk was always about what you wore, what you looked like, who looked the best, whose clothes were the most expensive. Rose had felt completely at sea among the girls there, never knowing the right way to look. As soon as she got home she got rid of all the colours: the stupid skirts, tunics, leggings, T-shirts, dresses. She took them all to the local charity shop and bought herself some monochrome. She, whose very name suggested a variety of soft pinks, preferred herself in black and white.
    In the evening Joshua came. She got a text from him to say that he was in the lane at the back of the gardens. Anna was out visiting a friend so she went down and opened the gate. He gave her a hug.
    â€˜Poor Rosie!’ he said.
    She took him into the studio. Anna wasn’t due back until after eleven so she was relaxed. Josh sat on the sofa and she pulled over the big cushion and sat on the floor. The electric heater had been plugged in for a couple of hours so the studio was warm. She’d already told Josh about the events of the previous night in an email.
    â€˜If I’d got there earlier …’ she said. ‘If I’d been
with
Emma.’
    â€˜Might not have made any difference,’ he said. ‘
You
might have been hurt.’
    â€˜The police think I had something to do with it!’ she said.
    â€˜You’re kidding!’
    She described the interview she had had and how the detective kept pressing her to answer in a certain way.
    â€˜Do they want to see you again?’
    She shrugged.
    â€˜The one thing I didn’t tell them about was this feeling I had when I was in the rose garden. It was as though someone was there. I looked round but couldn’t see anyone but I had this certainty that there was someone.’
    â€˜A
feeling?
What kind of feeling was it?’ Joshua said, looking at her with interest.
    â€˜I don’t know. I can’t say.’ Rose was cross with herself for not being able to be more specific.
    â€˜Could someone have been hiding?’
    â€˜I don’t know the place well enough. I was in there for two, three minutes, five at the very most. I was focused on Emma.’
    She stopped speaking because the memory was making her feel tearful. Joshua must have noticed because he put his hand out and grabbed hers.
    â€˜I’m sorry about our trip across the Millennium Bridge,’ she said, pulling herself together, and trying to change the subject.
    â€˜No problem. We can go another day. Are you going to school tomorrow?’
    â€˜Not for a few days. I can’t really face people. First Ricky Harris, now this. It’s as if I’ve got some kind of curse …’
    Joshua looked thoughtful. After a moment he spoke.
    â€˜Do you believe in any of that stuff? Supernatural phenomena?’
    â€˜No,’ she shook her head. ‘Do you?’
    â€˜Not sure.’
    She felt odd for a moment, as if there was more that Joshua wanted to say. Instead he was fiddling with the beads round his neck. She changed the subject.
    â€˜Let’s go and see the bridge on Wednesday.’
    â€˜OK. Come round to the flat and have lunch and then we’ll go. I’ll tell you all about different grades of suspension bridges. It’ll be massively interesting.’
    â€˜As long as I can tell you about T. S.