Jackdaw44: You kissed me.

ICE9: I was drunk.

Jackdaw44: Not that drunk.

ICE9: I fucked up. I’m sorry.

Jackdaw44: I can’t believe you kissed me.

ICE9: Please don’t tell anyone.

ICE9: Are you still there?

ICE9: Say something! I’m sorry.

Jackdaw44: You already said that.

ICE9: Please don’t tell anyone what happened. I was drunk and lonely and I felt a connection with you. I made a mistake. It won’t happen again.

Jackdaw44: Chill out. I won’t tell anyone.

Jackdaw44: P.S. Now we both have a secret.

Chapter 27

‘I found the album in Billy’s room,’ Mark says, sitting forward on the sofa, his fingers interlocked between his knees. ‘Before he went missing.’

I am sitting on the opposite end of the sofa, a cushion clutched to my chest. ‘When?’

‘A few months before he disappeared. It was a couple of days after Mr Edwards called us in to talk about the graffiti. The second time he called us in. I wanted to check Billy didn’t have any graffiti pens or cans stashed in his room.’

‘Where was Billy?’

‘In town with you. It was a Saturday and you were getting him some new shoes for school.’

I remember the trip. I dragged Billy around shop after shop while he rejected every single pair of shoes I pointed out, telling me they were sad or gay, arguing that he should be allowed to buy the ‘sick’ pair of black trainers he liked because ‘everyone else wears them’ and anyway, ‘clothes should express who you are’. Wearing the same uniform was enforced conformity, he told me. ‘If I wanted that I’d join the fucking army.’

By the end of the trip we were both fed up and irritable. He refused to wear the shoes I bought him, preferring to slump around in his old knackered pair with the worn-down heels.

‘I found the photo album under his bed, face down,’ Mark says. ‘I saw what he’d done to the photos.’

‘And you didn’t mention it when we got home? Not to me or Billy? It’s not like you to avoid pulling him up on something like that.’

Mark exhales heavily. ‘You’re not the only one to get sick of the arguments, Claire.’

‘I don’t buy that. Not for one second.’

‘My dad was still recuperating from his heart attack, work was a nightmare and we were arguing. I didn’t need the stress. Neither did you. I thought the best thing to do was to hide the album until I had the time to go through the photos and take out the ones Billy had defaced and then put it back on the bookcase.’

‘Why hide it in the boxes in the garage?’

‘Because they were there. I just shoved it in the bottom where no one would see it. I didn’t want it to upset you.’