Sarah J. Harris - The Colour of Bee Larkham’s Murder

He leans towards me and I almost fall off the cushions to escape from him.

‘Don’t worry, Jasper. We can certainly discuss your concerns about the death of the parakeets. But first, I’d like to talk about your friends: Bee Larkham and Lucas Drury.’

Where did the Metropolitan Police find this man? Is he the last human survivor of a zombie apocalypse? Honestly, I thought this was what we were talking about before he changed the subject abruptly and brought up the massacre of my parakeets.

I should give him another chance, I suppose, even though he’s stupid enough to think Lucas and me are friends. We’ve never been friends. We were Bee Larkham’s friends . Her willing accomplices.

I try again to make him understand. ‘Ice blue crystals with glittery edges and jagged, silver icicles .’ I emphasize the icicles because that’s important. It’s the one thing about Friday night that sticks in my mind. The rest is too blurry; too many blanks and curly question marks, but the icicles’ jagged points remind me of the knife.

‘You’ve told me that twice already, but I’m afraid artists’ colours don’t mean a lot to me,’ Rusty Chrome Orange says. ‘Look, I’m sorry if I’ve confused you. Let’s be clear, none of the boys we’re speaking to are in any trouble or danger. We’re trying to establish a few background facts before we track down Miss Larkham and speak to her ourselves.’

I’m attempting to tell him he’ll never be able to speak to Bee Larkham, but he’s not interested. His voice grates like nails down a blackboard.

‘I want to go home.’

‘Please, Jasper. Concentrate. It’s not for much longer.’ Dad’s muddy ochre has a yellowish pleading tone.

‘I can’t do this. I’m too young. I can’t do this. I’m too young.’

I speak loudly, but Dad doesn’t hear.

‘Jasper’s hardly an ideal witness in your investigation,’ he says. ‘There must be other boys at his school who can assist you? Boys who don’t have as many special needs?’

I need to go home. That’s my special need. My tummy’s hurting. No one’s listening. They never do. It’s like I don’t exist. Maybe I’ve melted away beneath my fingertips into nothing.

‘I understand your concerns, Mr Wishart. I’ll raise them at our case meeting this week, but we need to look closer at Jasper’s relationship with Miss Larkham and Lucas Drury. We believe he may have information that could assist our inquiries. He may have made notes of important times and dates in their alleged relationship.’

‘I doubt it.’

A fluttering of pale lemon.

One of my notebooks protests against Dad’s probing fingers.

‘Look at this entry. The people going in and out of Bee’s house have only basic details: Black Blazer enters, Pale Blue Coat leaves, etc. Jasper has no sense of what they look like, even if they’re teenagers or adults. I doubt he’d be able to identify Lucas or any other boy.’

Dad flicks through my notepad .

‘Most of Jasper’s entries don’t even record people. They’re his sightings of the parakeets nesting in Bee’s tree and other birds. He’s a keen ornithologist.’

Rusty Chrome Orange’s hand dips into a box and pulls out a steel blue notebook with a white rabbit on the front.

‘That’s not right,’ I say, surprised. ‘The rabbit doesn’t belong there.’

‘OK, sorry,’ Rusty Chrome Orange says.

The white rabbit notebook returns to its hiding place in the box.

‘Look at this notebook,’ Dad says, holding up another. ‘It’s all about his colours. How’s that interesting to you? To anyone?’

I want to scream and kick and flap.

Dad doesn’t see my difference in a good, winning-the- X- Factor -kind-of-way. He doesn’t look for the colours we might have in common, only those that set us apart.

I need to hold on. I have to focus on the colour I love most in the world: cobalt blue.

That’s all I’ve got left of Mum – the colour of her voice – but after Bee Larkham moved into our street the shade became diluted. It happened gradually and I never noticed until it was too late.

‘Take me home!’ I say. ‘Now! Now! Now!’

The colour and ragged shape of my voice shocks me. It’s usually cool blue, a lighter shade than Mum’s cobalt blue. Today it looks strange. Is it actually a darker shade than Mum’s? More greyish? I can’t remember. I need to remember her. I want to paint her voice.

‘I have to leave!’

It’s too late. Her colour’s slipping from my grasp, sand through my fingertips. I plaster my hands to my eyes. I want to keep the cobalt blue, vivid, reassuring, behind my eyelids.

Rub, rub, rub.

I want her cardigan. I forgot to bring one of the buttons to rub because I was concentrating on making sure my boxes were correctly ordered.

I glance across the room and the back of my neck prickles. Rusty Chrome Orange told me the mirror was ornamental, like the ship picture on the far wall. He insisted there’s no one behind it, but I can’t trust his colour.

Someone is standing behind the mirror, scrutinizing my face, my mannerisms and laughing at my mix-ups. There are three strangers sitting on crimson sofas on this side of the mirror.

I don’t recognize any of them.

The smallest, the one with dark blond hair who is rocking backwards and forwards, opens his mouth and screams.

Pale blue with violet-tinged vertical lines.

He vomits on the sofa.

Dad’s silent. He doesn’t flick on Radio 2 or tap his fingers on the steering wheel. I guess it’s not surprising, considering the whole embarrassing vomit thing. He’s still angry with me even though Rusty Chrome Orange said not to worry. Lots of kids throw up in that room; the police service employs someone to scrape up their sick. Dad says that’s the deadbeat career I’ll end up with if I don’t work harder to control myself.

The sofa had definitely seen a lot of sick action. What does Rusty Chrome Orange expect when he hangs a trippy mirror on the wall? One minute you think you’re alone and the next you’re surrounded by strangers.

He showed me behind the mirror after I’d calmed down; it was a normal wall.

No hidden window into another room.

No hidden recording devices.

I attempt to block out the dark colours and harsh shapes of the lorries and cars rumbling past. Dad hasn’t said a word since he turned on the engine, marmalade orange with pithy yellow spikes . Maybe he’s not angry with me. Maybe he’s thinking about Bee Larkham.

He knows we both need time to think about what’s happened – me without distractions of unnecessary colours and shapes, him without me banging on about my colours and shapes.

I should try to make him feel better, considering everything he’s done for me. He hasn’t forced me to come out of my den over the last three days except to visit the police station. He rang my school yesterday and said I had a bad tummy ache. At least that wasn’t a lie.

‘Don’t worry, Dad,’ I say finally. ‘I think we did it.’

‘We did what?’ he asks, without glancing back.

‘We got away with murder. Richard Chamberlain – like the actor – knows nothing.’

Dad spits out a yellowish cat-puke word.

I hate swearing. He knows I hate swearing.

He’s getting back at me for throwing up over Rusty Chrome Orange’s sofa.

‘I’m sorry, Jasper. I shouldn’t have used that word. Have you understood anything I’ve told you? Is that what you think’s happened?’

I screw my eyes tightly shut and curl into a ball beneath the seat belt.

Yes, I do. Think. That’s What Happened Back There.