Free Flesh and Blood by Simon Cheshire

very-easy-to-like self. On the other hand, my doubts and strange misgivings about her family continued to circle in the background, like a shark waiting to strike.
    I spent a lot of time with Emma in the couple of weeks before half term. It was purely by chance that the two of us were assigned to the same coursework project in English: assembling a website containing full details on a local issue or event.
    Thinking about it now, it’s not beyond the realms of possibility that Emma, or her family, pulled theodd string and had us put together deliberately. In order for her to keep an eye on me, I mean, to make sure that I wasn’t doing anything they might not like. I’ve no evidence for it, just the vaguest impression. When we found out what the coursework would entail, before we were split into workgroups, I happened to mention to Emma that I was keen on a career in investigative journalism. I only said it off the top of my head, in passing, but I said it because – again, I’m ashamed to admit – I wanted her to like me. Maybe even admire me.
    “Yeah?” she said, smiling. I took the cheery expression on her face to be approval but, thinking back, it might have been something else. It might have been masking her real reaction.
    I prefer to believe that our team-up for the assignment was simply one of those things. But you never know.
    “You jammy sod,” said Liam with a grin, when the coursework lists were posted up in our classroom. “She’s not even in our tutor group!”
    “Dirty job, but someone’s gotta do it,” I smiled. “At least you’re with Jo, and not lumbered with some useless hanger-on. She’s not in our tutor group either.”
    “Ah, bless our school’s inclusive cross-curricular policies,” grinned Liam. I don’t think he meant to show how pleased he was. I never did get to the bottom of his reluctance to tell Jo how he felt about her.
    Emma suggested, sensibly, that our project cover the reopening of the Hadlington public library, partly because it was a ready-made story that perfectly fitted the bill, but mostly because her family’s involvement in the whole thing gave us quick access to useful stuff. Detailed plans of the library building, past and present, for example, and an interview with the guy in charge of the refurbishments.
    The Greenhills had personally donated a large sum to the town authorities, in order to prevent the library from closing. Its interior was being completely redesigned and refitted by firms whose bosses were personal friends of the family. Five years earlier, they’d funded a nearby centre for drug-addiction treatment, under similar circumstances.
    Our project went well. Emma and I assembled our material with efficiency, and we collaborated on constructing the website, me on overall construction (with some input from Liam), she on design andnavigation.
    I need to record the details of one particular conversation we had. It didn’t really strike me as anything odd or unexpected at the time, but it has a direct bearing on what I discovered later. It’s not that she let anything slip exactly, it’s that she revealed things that became relevant to my later understanding of the Greenhills, and their true nature. It marked a small change in how I felt about her.
    We were close to finishing the project. It was a Thursday, and the completed thing had to be in on Monday morning. We were in what the school pretentiously calls the learning resources room, sitting on armless foam lounging chairs, with school laptops on our knees. Kids padded around the bookshelves that stood in long rows before us, and a teacher marked homework behind the curved information desk nearby.
    “Have you got the photo from last week’s
Courier
?” I asked.
    “Oh, yes, sorry, I’ll drop it into the shared folder now,” said Emma. I found it and slotted it into place on the relevant page. There was her mum at the reopening ceremony, shaking hands with the mayorand the leaders of the town