Joanne crumples up her sympathy face and tosses it away. Underneath is a sneer. ‘OhmyGod, are you literally retarded? I’m never going to care about anything any of you feel. Just please tell me she’s not going to start acting like she just lost her true love. Because that would be so pathetic I might have to puke, and bulimia is so over.’

‘Tell you what,’ Holly says. ‘Give me your mobile number. The second you get any say about how Selena acts, I’ll give you a text and let you know.’

Joanne examines her, flat eyes that suck in everything and put nothing back out. She says, ‘Wow. You actually are retarded.’

Holly sighs noisily and waits. Being this close to Joanne is trickling cold oil down her skin. She wonders what Joanne’s face would do if she asked, Did you do it yourself, or did you make someone do it for you?

‘If the cops find out what Selena was doing with Chris, she’ll be a total suspect. And if she goes around acting like some big tragedy queen, then they’re going to find out. One way or another.’

Since Holly is not in fact retarded, she knows exactly what Joanne means. Joanne can’t take the Chief Mourner seat that she’d love, because she can’t afford to have the cops start paying special attention to her, but no one else is getting it either. If Selena acts too upset, then Joanne will upload that phone video online and make sure the cops get a link.

Holly knows Selena didn’t kill Chris. She knows that killing a person does almost-invisible things to you; it leaves you arm-linked with death, your head tilted just a degree that way, so that for the rest of your life your shadows mix together. Holly knows Selena down to her bones, she’s been watching Selena all day, and if that tilt had happened since yesterday she would have seen it. But she doesn’t expect the detectives to know Selena that way, or to believe her if she tells them.

Holly won’t be asking whether Joanne did it herself. She’s never going to be able to give Joanne, or anyone else, one hint that the thought has crossed her mind.

Instead she says, ‘Like you know so much about how detectives work? They’re not going to suspect Selena. They’ve probably arrested someone by now.’

They both hear it in her voice: Joanne’s won. ‘Oh, that’s right,’ Joanne says, flicking one last sneer at her and turning away. ‘I forgot your dad’s a Guard.’ She makes it sound like a sewage sorter. Joanne’s dad is a banker.