Free First One Missing by Tammy Cohen

key so many times they were always having to make copies from copies. She’d tried to make him wear his key around his neck once. Like that was going to happen. As the door opened there was a chorus of frenzied snapping from the photographers behind trying to get a shot into the hallway. Of what, he wondered? The grief-stricken coat-stand? The sorrow-struck shoe-rack? Stepping inside, he heard Mum’s worried voice calling from the kitchen.
    ‘Rory? Is that you?’
    Rory had read books where people said ‘my heart sank’ and he recognized the symptoms all too well. One minute his heart was sitting happily in its proper place behind his ribcage, and the next it was squelching around somewhere in his stomach along with the remains of the chicken tikka sandwich he had for lunch. His mum always did that.
    He did his ‘walking but not really moving’ motion down the black-and-white-tiled hall. By the time he reached the five stairs at the back that led down to the kitchen-diner, he was practically going backwards.
    ‘Oh darling, has it been awful for you?’
    She flung her arms around his waist and pressed her head into his shoulder. Looking down, he was pleased to note her head stopped lower down his body than the last time they’d stood in this awkward position. He was still growing then.
    Holding him at arm’s length, she peered up into his eyes. He noticed she looked paler than usual but she had those red spots on her cheeks and on her neck that she got whenever she was agitated or excited (or drunk).
    ‘I’m fine,’ he said, crossing to the back of the room to toss his bag down on the kitchen table.
    ‘It is all right, you know, to say how you’re really feeling.’
    Rory turned his back to her and pretended to be looking through the French windows into the garden, but really he was wondering how to get up to his room without having to go through another hug.
    It wasn’t that he didn’t feel sorry for his mum. Obviously it was crap, having your daughter murdered and then having to relive it every time the freak did it again. But the thing was, life went on.
    ‘That poor, poor woman,’ Mum was saying.
    Rory didn’t need to ask who she was talking about. She said that about them all. All the mothers. All of them poor, poor women.
    ‘I saw her on the news earlier,’ she said. ‘Just a glimpse. Just to think of what that poor woman is going through. No doubt the police will ask me to talk to her soon enough.’
    ‘You can always say no,’ he pointed out.
    Mum looked over at him, frowning.
    ‘It’s not something you choose, Rory,’ she said, and he noticed with panic that her eyes were starting to well up. ‘No one chooses to be a bereaved parent. Choice doesn’t come into it. You can’t just say, “No, not today, thank you.” Like it was a pint of milk.’
    He stared down at the floor so as not to see her cry. The laces of her brown brogue-type shoes were undone and he almost pointed it out, but stopped himself at the last minute.
    ‘People will start bringing it all up again, Rory. I want you to promise me not to let it get to you. Your exams are coming up soon and you must focus on those. What happened to Megan wasn’t your fault. You mustn’t let anyone upset you.’
    Rather than having to meet her eyes, Rory followed the course of the tear snaking down her left cheek. Now he was feeling really awkward because he wanted to go to his room, but knew he shouldn’t leave his mother crying on her own in the kitchen. He knew she wanted him to say something. It was what she was waiting for.
    ‘It’s all right, Mum,’ he said finally, his voice coming out all croaky, like it did when he was really embarrassed. ‘I know it wasn’t my fault.’
    For a moment her hand stayed resting on his arm, just where it emerged from the sleeve of his white school shirt. Her blue eyes, blurred by the tears, continued looking right at him and a strange expression passed over her face. Then her hand dropped and