Soul Fire

one suspect. How in my last phone conversation with him, Tim promised me he
didn’t kill her. Told me his own life meant nothing with her gone.
    But I daren’t say any of it. As a Visitor I must watch every word. Nothing can upset a Guest, or remind them of how they came to be on the Beach. Breakthat rule, and I’ll be banned
forever from the site.
    I made that mistake once, when I’d just found this place: I dared to ask my sister who she thought might have murdered her. The Beach disappeared before she could answer, and with it, all
my hopes. I was only allowed back because I was new, and unfamiliar with the rules. Second time round, there’d be no mercy.
    I’d lose the Beach, lose everything .
    ‘Later, Danny,’ I say. My voice sounds like a stranger’s, hoarse with dread.
    The Guests are moving forward, packed together so tightly that we’re being pulled along with them.
    Tim is dead. But how did he die? Was he murdered too?
    I watch him scrambling ashore, as though he’s climbing the summit of a mountain, rather than simply stepping out of the water onto the sand. He’s come a long way, so he must be
exhausted. My instinct is to run to him, hold him, help him ashore. Tell him everything will be all right.
    But that would be a lie.
    He’s blinking constantly, as though if he does it often enough, he’ll see something different.
    Already the Beach has changed him. In real life, he barely noticed what he wore, sticking to jeans and t-shirt whatever the weather or the occasion. I remember him at Meggie’s first
outdoor gig, his face turning ice blue because he’d not realised everyone else was wrapped up for a winter’s night. He hadn’t even remembered his coat. His mind was always on
higher things.
    Now he’s in ‘Beach uniform’ – surfer shorts, linen shirt in flame red – and even though it’s dripping wet, it makes him look like every other Guest here. He
never had those muscles in his arms before, and I don’t think I ever saw him clean-shaven, as he is now.
    He’s a Guest. No doubt. A too beautiful version of his living self: transformed by death into a phoenix Tim, bearing no sign of how he died.
    Danny takes my hand. ‘You’re frozen.’
    ‘It’s the shock of seeing Tim.’ Then I realise what I’ve said. Perhaps even speaking his name is a breach of the rules.
    But Danny doesn’t disappear. He stares at me. ‘Tim? Meggie’s boyfriend ?’
    I nod. It must be safer than speaking.
    ‘Jeez, Alice.’ Danny shakes his head. ‘Does that mean . . . the person who killed Meggie might have killed Tim? Why is he here, else?’ Danny doesn’t have to be
careful what he says, because he won’t be banished from the Beach, even if he wanted to be. Paradise is forever.
    Even as I nod, I realise there’s another, darker possible reason for Tim being here. Maybe he did smother my sister. And he’s here now because he couldn’t live with the
guilt . . .
    ‘Danny, we need to find Meggie before—’
    But then I see her myself, three rows of Guests away from me. I shout out, but my voice is lost in the chatter as Tim finally makes it onto the shore.
    Too late.
    ‘Tim?’ Her voice trembles as she pushes towards him. I try to reach her but too many Guests are in the way. They’re not moving. They’re too gripped by the drama.
    ‘ Tim, ’ Meggie whispers. It’s not a question anymore. He’s gawping backat her.
    Meggie stops a couple of steps away from him. She’s shaking her head, but there’s something in the way she’s gazing at him that tells me nothing has changed for her, that she
still loves him.
    The Beach holds its breath.
    And then I hear knocking. It’s coming from such a long way away.
    ‘Alice?’ My father’s voice, his breaking-bad-news voice, the one I’ve heard too many times in the last few months.
    Shit . Not now.
    Meggie takes another step towards Tim.
    ‘Alice, if you’re online again, I promise I won’t tell your mother. But I do need you to open the door now .’
    I shut the laptop lid as gently as possible. ‘Dad? I’m not online. I’m asleep. It’s one in the morning.’
    ‘I’m sorry, sweetheart. I wouldn’t wake you if it wasn’t urgent. It’s just . . . we have a visitor. And he wants to talk to all of us together.’

4
    The policeman is sitting at our dining-room table, his backside too big for the chair. Usually they send the family liaison woman. She knows us so well now that she always puts
the right number of sugars