Good Girl, Bad Blood

She stayed there, clicking through for hours, jumping from article to article, comment to comment. And it was with her too, of course. It always was.

The gun.

It was here now, beating within her chest, knocking against her ribs. Aiming with her eyes. It was in nightmares, and crashing pans, and heavy breaths, and dropped pencils, and thunderstorms, and closing doors, and too loud, and too quiet, and alone and not, and the ruffle of pages, and the tapping of keys and every click and every creak.

The gun was always there.

It lived inside her now.

Welcome to season two of A Good Girl’s Guide to Murder – The Disappearance of Jamie Reynolds

‘This was always going to happen. I deserve it.’

‘No, you don’t,’ she said, pressing her hands against the hole in his chest and the hole in his neck. She could feel the pulses of blood pushing against her.

‘Jack Brunswick,’ he said quietly, eyes circling hers.

‘Charlie . . . what are you doing?’ she said, her voice shaking like his hand.

‘Come on, Pip,’ he said with a sniff, eyes following the line of the gun. ‘You’ve worked it out by now.’

‘You’re Layla Mead.’

‘I’m Layla Mead,’

r me. You aren’t on your own here, so stop pushing people away. Stop pushing me away.’

‘No, I can’t make that decision for you. Only you know, only you can know,’ he said. ‘But what I do know is that whatever you decide will be the right thing. That’s just how you are. And whatever you choose, you know I’ll be here, right behind you. Always. OK?’

The sky had given her no answers. But there was someone who might; someone who knew her better than she knew herself. She pulled out her phone and dialled.

‘Ravi?’

She knew his footsteps; knew them across carpet and hardwood floors, and knew them now across the gravel on the common car park. She turned and smiled at him, and Ravi’s feet picked up in that small-stepped half-run he always did when he spotted her. It made Pip glow every time.

Words spliced, growing across the gaps like vines as her eyes unfocused, until her handwriting was just one writhing blur. Pip was looking at the page, but she wasn’t really there. It was like that now; giant holes in her attention that she slipped right into.

There was a time, not too long ago, she would have found a practice essay about Cold War escalation enthralling. She would have cared, really cared. That was who she was before, but something must have changed. Hopefully it was just a matter of time until those holes filled back in and things went back to normal.

Words spliced, growing across the gaps like vines as her eyes unfocused, until her handwriting was just one writhing blur. Pip was looking at the page, but she wasn’t really there. It was like that now; giant holes in her attention that she slipped right into.