Soul Beach

beach again on my screen. I can’t get rid of that picture, whatever I do. It’s not even a normal photo. It’s too vivid, the colour of the sea too turquoise, and the breakers against the shore so bright white they fizz like sherbet in front of my eyes. It’s almost like a 3D image, even though I know you don’t see 3D images without those stupid glasses. But whenever I see the picture, it makes me think of the email, and it’s driving me mad.
    I search for my old photo collage in My Pictures, but when I find it, it won’t let me load it as wallpaper. The blood rushes so loudly in my head that it sounds like waves.
    ‘Enough!’
    I slam the laptop lid shut. Is this just a phase? Mum told me that when you grieve, you go through these different phases, and anger is one of them. But now I’ve shut the computer, the rage has gone, like that.
    And yet . . . I can hear Mum’s hairdryer humming next door, and the telly blaring downstairs.
    But underneath the routine noises of our house, is the distant but unmistakeable sound of waves crashing against the sand.

7
    Robbie, Cara and her new man, Mickey, are in the pub garden already.
    ‘Hello, lovely Alice!’ Robbie gets up, kisses me on the lips, and heads for the bar.
    Mickey mutters some kind of Neanderthal greeting. He’s twenty-two. Cara met him when he served her a Big Mac and Fries. He’s cute, in that bit of rough way Cara likes these days.
    ‘So have you replied to that email?’ she says to me, over Mickey’s head.
    I nod.
    ‘I knew you would. And?’
    ‘No reply yet.’
    ‘I’ve been thinking,’ she says. ‘It’s not random, is it? Someone wants to get at you, Ali. Or get your attention.’
    ‘Yeah. But who wants my attention that badly?’
    Robbie arrives back with my beer. ‘Someone trying to get your attention, Al? Should I know about this?’
    I shoot Cara a warning look but she chooses not to see it.
    ‘We’re trying to work out who is sending these freaky emails to Alice.’
    I see hurt in his eyes. I used to be able to spend hours debating what exact shade of brown they were, chestnut or dark chocolate. ‘It’s nothing. Just another one of those nutters with a thing about Meggie,’ I tell him.
    ‘But they’ve got your email address?’
    ‘Really, it’s nothing,’ I repeat.
    ‘It was your sister, wasn’t it? says Mickey, waking up. ‘That got murdered.’
    ‘Yes.’
    ‘Pretty, wasn’t she? And she was famous. I remember her on that talent show. Wouldn’t have thought she was your sister.’
    Robbie’s hand tightens into a fist, ready to defend my honour. Mickey hasn’t noticed. ‘I had a mate that got murdered,’ he continues. ‘Well, it was my brother’s best mate’s cousin. Punch-up, outside a pub. Someone draws a blade, next thing . . .’ and to make the point, he pulls a finger across his throat.
    ‘Mickey?’ says Cara. Her voice is soft but her eyes are almost as black as her hair.
    He turns to look at her.
    ‘Please sod off and leave me alone. Forever.’
    Mickey’s face twists, like a glove puppet’s. Then he picks up his pint. ‘Never fancied you anyway. Stuck-up cow,’ then he nods at me and Robbie as he stands up, ‘stuck up mates. Oh, and your dead sister was way nicer looking.’
    Robbie tries to go after him, but I put my hand out to stop him. ‘He’s not worth it.’ I don’t add that I reckon that thug could floor Robbie with one punch. Or that Mickey only said what most people think when they realise who I am.
    ‘So, this email thing?’ Robbie says.
    ‘Really, it’s not an issue, OK? Someone hacked into Meggie’s account, and I’ve had a couple of stupid emails.’
    ‘That’s horrible,’ he says, taking my hand and stroking it. Six months ago that sensation would have left me unable to speak. ‘Lewis could track them down, throw a cyber shit storm at them, if you want.’
    Lewis is Robbie’s geeky older brother’s even geekier best friend. He’s one of those geniuses who started their own web design outfit before uni and ended up not bothering to go to college. Apparently he’s going to be as rich as Bill Gates, but he’s never had a girlfriend.
    ‘No, please.’ I let go of his hand to pick up my beer. ‘The truth is, I almost like getting the emails. They . . . well, they kind of remind me that she existed.’
    ‘Oh, mate,’ says Cara, ‘of course she existed. She still exists, because we remember her. The whole of Britain does. Even that thicko Mickey knows