Follow Me (11 page)

Freddie pointed at herself. ‘I’m the one who found @Apollyon and his photo of Mardling in the first place!’

The guy with the glasses twisted, so he was pushed closer by the crowd, jousting his Dictaphone at Moast. ‘Detective Inspector, is this your case or are you relying on a twenty-four-year-old girl to run it for you?’

‘I’m not a girl, buddy, and I’m only twenty-three!’ Freddie shouted.

Moast bent toward the table. ‘No further comment. Turn the mics off. Off!’

‘Do the police have any clue who @Apollyon is?’ shouted a woman with a ginger bob.

Nasreen forced herself up.

‘What are you trying to hide, Moast?’ a man shouted.

Moast grabbed Freddie by the arm. ‘Out,’ he hissed.

‘Oww!’ Freddie glared up at him. The cameras flashed.

‘Sergeant Cudmore!’

‘Nasreen!’

Nasreen willed her legs to work. Moast and Freddie made it through the door. She forced her way, pushing the journalists back, closing the door behind her, leaning against it as the three of them stood in the small bright purple-painted room.

‘What the hell was that?’ Moast swiped his hand in the air in front of Freddie. Freddie, hair springing round her head.

‘Don’t you ever touch me again!’

‘Touch you! You’re lucky I didn’t arrest you!’ Moast clenched his fists at his sides.

‘Oh yeah, how’d that go for you last time?’ Freddie’s head wobbled.

‘You disobeyed a direct order. I told you not to say a word.’

Only Freddie could make people this angry. Nasreen stepped toward them.

‘You’re endangering people’s lives because you’re too stubborn or too stupid to accept this is about @Apollyon – it’s all there on Twitter!’ Freddie shouted.

Nasreen put a hand onto Freddie’s shoulder. ‘Freddie there’s a set process we have to…’

‘Oh now you stop her, Cudmore!’ Moast turned. A vein on his neck throbbed.

‘I…I…’ she said.

Freddie shook her hand off, shouting: ‘Why am I the only one who gets this? He said, “Who’s next?” He hashtagged “murderer”. You need to wake the hell up. It’s a threat! The tweets, the stuff he’s posted: that’s all you’ve got to go on.’

‘You need to be quiet.’ Moast’s eyes narrowed.

‘Don’t patronise me,’ Freddie said. ‘You’ve got nothing. No one’s safe till you catch this freak, and you’re standing here lecturing me.’

‘Enough!’ Moast screwed his statement up and threw it against the wall. ‘Back to the station. Now!’

‘Jackass!’ Freddie screamed at the door Moast had just walked through.

‘There are procedures to follow, Freddie, you must understand…’ Nasreen tried to order things in her mind.

‘Give it a rest, Nas.’ Freddie grabbed her coat, upsetting one of the glasses of water, and followed Moast out.

Nasreen took a moment to compose herself, then righted the glass, picked up the balled up statement and followed them. A disaster. An unmitigated disaster.

15:37

Sunday 1 November

1 FOLLOWING 54,619 FOLLOWERS

Freddie had read Twitter on the silent drive back to the station. There were screenshots of her being pushed by Moast. Comedy stills of Nasreen with her mouth open like a fish. Looping Vine videos filmed straight from the national news. She slid her headphones in her ears: the voice of a journalist saying ‘there’s a serial killer on Twitter’ played repeatedly. She shuddered. Articles sprang up, to be expanded, dissected and reworked from a different angle as the day progressed. Freddie knew the score:
Hashtag Murder Briefing Descends Into Chaos. Police refuse to confirm there’s a serial killer on Twitter.
Moast had been summoned to the Superintendent’s office, and shortly afterwards Tibbsy had told her she was to go home for the day.

Slamming into the station’s ladies’ loo, Freddie tried to stay calm. She pressed play on the Vine video again.
There’s a serial killer on Twitter.
There’s a serial killer on Twitter
. Apollyon’s tweet swam in front of her eyes:
who’s next?
She couldn’t believe this was happening. And Moast and the others were all dicking around with meetings and paperwork. They should be out there.
Looking
. What if there was another way to trace the tweets? Hadn’t those convicted of trolling the woman-on-a-banknote campaigner been traced through other devices? She was sure the trolls had been identified by using the same moniker they had on Twitter on traceable online accounts, like those for games consoles. Nas would know. If she could just speak to her alone, away from that bonehead Moast, she could make her understand. She’d know what to do, where to look.

Freddie scrolled through her recent calls till her finger hovered over Nas’s number, but the sound of footsteps and a familiar voice approaching stopped her. She ducked into a cubicle as the bathroom doors swung open and Nas and someone else in squeaky police shoes entered.

‘The whole canteen’s talking about it, Nasreen,’ said the other woman.

Freddie sat on the toilet and tucked her knees under her chin so they wouldn’t see her feet. They must be talking about Apollyon. This could be useful.

‘It’s a disaster. I don’t like to speak out of turn, but I think Superintendent Gray’s made the wrong call with
that
girl,’ said Nas.

Freddie froze.
That
girl? She heard a squeak of shoes and a cubicle door lock.

‘I thought she was a friend of yours?’ The woman spoke up over the rattling of the loo roll holder.

‘God no,’ said Nas. ‘She’s a liability. We’re bashing our heads against a brick wall with this one: we’ve got no DNA, no witnesses, nothing but those bloody tweets to go on. This is a trying case already, without us having to act as babysitters to some girl.’

Freddie stared hard at a scratch on the melamine of the cubicle door. Nas couldn’t mean her? There was a flush and the other woman stepped out of the cubicle. ‘I heard she worked at Espress-oh’s,’ said the woman as she washed her hands.

‘Yes, and the sooner she’s back there the better,’ said Nas.

‘No wonder the DCI’s pissed,’ said the woman. ‘Try not to worry, she’s not your responsibility.’

Nas sighed. ‘I was talking to Sergeant Tibbsy – weighing up if we went en masse to the Superintendent, if he’d take her off the case?’ Nas said.

Tears pricked Freddie’s eyes.
My Best Frenemy.

‘It’s ludicrous she’s even here in the first place,’ said the woman.

‘Least I can focus without distractions this afternoon. I’m going back through the vic’s phone records – seeing if anything jumps out.’

Freddie listened to the door swing open and their receding footsteps. She held on tight to her knees. What an idiot she’d been. She was, and always would be, just an Espress-oh’s waitress to Nas
.
She wiped her nose on her sleeve. She was just slowing them down. She didn’t belong here. Letting her hair fall down over her face, she left the station. Tomorrow she’d resign.

Freddie easily got a seat on the Ginger Line. She didn’t want to look at her phone. She was sick of rereading @Apollyon’s words. They bounced round her head with every shunt of the train. She should’ve been on the other side of that interview table. She should’ve been the guy with the Dictaphone and the difficult questions. She should’ve known better than to take the bait. She squeaked her foot along the floor, the rubber heel of her trainer was coming away. Her original flatmate, Vic, the one she’d moved in with before she’d disappeared off to her boyfriend’s Wandsworth houseboat, had described Freddie as 95% rage and 5% Converse. It was funny at the time. Now it just felt crushingly true. There were no outlets: that was the problem. There’d been a shift when she graduated. It was subtle at first, the ebb and flow of one social set into another, but now she saw less of her actual mates and more of possible contacts, people like Neil who’d take her to Wagamamas for lunch, or people she’d met on Twitter who she’d buy eye-wateringly expensive cocktails for before emailing them her CV. There wasn’t much time or money for anything else: the odd shared packet of fags and laughs with Milena and Kath, and hook-ups when she could fit them in. Work and the black hole that was her bank balance swallowed everything else.
Help! I Don’t Have Time For Friends.
She used to think her generation had missed out on all the fun of uni, swapping the drunken antics for part-time jobs to pay fees, continuous work experience and caning it on coursework to ensure they got the grades they needed for the big bad world. Now she looked back on the occasional drunken fancy dress party and shared pot noodles in front of the telly with nostalgia. The last time she’d seen Vic was when they’d bumped into each other on the tube: Vic on the way to a job interview, Freddie on her way home from work. The promise of drinks was always there but neither of them really had the time. Thinking back, Freddie realised the only period in her life where she was truly happy, relaxed, chilled, was back at school. Walking home from the small red-brick junior school she and Nas attended, along the common, and either stopping at Nas’s parents’ Victorian terrace for Mrs Cudmore’s freshly cooked
balushahi
doughnuts, or on to her own 1970s cul-de-sac home for Jaffa Cakes and Diet Coke. They played hopscotch and It in the concrete playground, or hid round the back of the wood-covered portakabin that housed the school’s sports equipment and swapped secrets. Her dad hadn’t been so bad then. Mum would still go out with him of an evening, smelling of flowery perfume. Freddie liked to watch her put her make-up on. They would return singing, and joking, and laughing. When had it tipped over? When she was at Pendrick High. There was an incident at Dad’s work. Her parents never spoke of it. It was then that the singing stopped. That dad started going out all the time. That her mum would sneak into her room and hold her in bed while he crashed and swore downstairs. Until he passed out. Freddie remembered pouring the entire contents of the drinks cupboard down the sink one day. And getting a swift hiding after. She shook the sting of the memory off.

She and Nas would stop for sweets at a stall under the yellow and blue striped awning of the town market on Wednesdays. They used to cram as many fizzy sherbet-filled flying saucer sweets as they could into their mouths. She used to laugh hysterically, so sherbet sprayed everywhere. Not the knowing chuckle she gave now. She used to dance round her room. Throw her bag from her shoulders and run into the holidays. Those endless weeks of pleasure. She was free. Before the exams started. Before the constant need to build your CV. Before dad. Before everything became hard and real and insurmountable. With Nas. She weighed the thought in her head: you have only been happy with Nas. Only with Nas. And then obliterated it by tapping her phone screen into life.

16:07. She needed distracting. Occupying. Shame to waste the rest of the day. Opening up WhatsApp, she typed:

Freddie did up her duffel toggles as she left Dalston Junction. The sun was starting its descent, the brittle November light climbing up the front of the mini-cab office and the Co-Op. The sky, a bright blue with Pixar clouds, felt far above the cool shadows that hugged the street and the 277 double-decker, as it swept past, leaving fumes hanging in the crisp air. A girl in a hijab, and her uncovered friend, sidestepped Freddie, laughing. She plodded behind a man clutching a takeaway coffee cup and wondered what Milena and Dan were up to now. Asleep probably, or studying in Milena’s case. She thought about the ridiculous faces Milena pulled behind Dan’s back. Their shared toasties at 3am. Milena had sent a few pics of her and Kathy via WhatsApp since Freddie had left Espress-oh’s that day. Freddie bent her foot round and took a photo of her broken shoe, dropped it into an app, and drew eyes on the image so the split leather became a mouth. She messaged it to Milena. It’d make her smile. She stared at her phone. Waiting. It was too cold to hang about. Perhaps she’d be online later.

People were sat on the stone benches of Dalston Square, huddled against the wind, smoking, also looking at phones. She could hear the tinny base from someone’s headphones, a man talking into his mobile, the girls laughing.
Is London the Loneliest City in the World?
You could be anyone in London, anonymity came with the postcode. Apollyon could be anyone, and anyone could be the next victim. Freddie tried to shake the thought from her mind. Nasreen, Tibbsy and Moast didn’t seem convinced Apollyon was the murderer: she had to trust them.
When to Back Down and When to Stand Up For What You Believe At Work.

Freddie pulled her phone from her pocket, her fingers pinched and stretched by the chill air. A message from Ajay:

‘Sorry, busy today. Another time. A.’

Disappointing. Freddie flicked through her Tinder messages. No one of particular interest at the moment, or rather no one who wouldn’t already be busy on a Sunday afternoon. Quick shower, change and head to The Bearded Mole then? Her flatmates would be out: Anton cycling, Pete with his mates at the pub. She didn’t want to be in the flat alone. Thinking.

The pub was busy. Freddie dropped her bag from her shoulder and squeezed past an animated group of blunt-fringed men and women, resting their ciders and gin and tonics on the dark wood bar. Freddie scanned the room for a free table. Two girls with rockabilly flowers in their hair had snagged her favourite spot by the fire. Four men with hair pushed behind their ears nursed pints at the adjacent table. A group of what looked like students sat along the wall that was overwhelmed with taxidermy animal heads. Freddie watched their laboured ‘I’m having fun!’ smiles, as their eyes and fingers nervously fluttered toward and over their phones. She recognised the anxious looks of those who thought they should be somewhere else: working? Blogging? Applying for jobs?
How Generation Y Squandered Their Student Days Worrying
. She headed to one of the red velvet stools at the bar.

‘Shoreditch Blonde, please mate, don’t worry ’bout the glass,’ Freddie said to the cute lad with the geeky glasses behind the bar. He gave her a gap-toothed smile.
Potential
.

She hung her bag off the hook under the bar and updated her Facebook and Twitter status: I’m in The Bearded Mole, if anyone fancies a drink? Then clicked onto Happn, just in case. She was halfway through her second bottle and fiddling with her Kindle app when he came to the bar.

‘Hey.’

Freddie looked up at the lanky guy in the battered Ghostbusters T-shirt and skinny black jeans next to her. ‘Hey yourself.’

He leant his elbow on the bar and turned toward her. His hair had been buzz cut, leaving a curly brown quiff on the top, like a 99 ice cream with no flake. With concave cheeks and blinking eyes, he had a nervous energy she liked immediately. ‘Drink?’

‘Sure, same again, ta,’ Freddie winked at the barman.

He pulled coins out of his pocket to pay. ‘What’s your name?’

‘Freddie.’

‘What’s that short for?’ His T-shirt rucked as he reached for his bottle, revealing olive hipbones.

‘Freddie,’ she said. His hazel eyes didn’t react. He took a sip of his beer.
Don’t blow it, Freddie, keep talking
: ‘My dad was a big Queen fan.’

‘Like royal. I get ya,’ he nodded.

‘No, like Mercury. Freddie Mercury.’ She stared at him. He stared back. ‘Freddie Mercury. Lead singer of Queen. Gay. Died of Aids?’

‘Whoa. Tragic,’ he said.

Freddie took a gulp of her beer. Surely no one’s this void of pop culture references? Was he one of those mythical people who tweeted ‘Who’s this Neil Armstrong dude everyone’s talkin bout?’ when prominent figures passed away? He had the air of an obsessive about him, maybe his mind was consumed by whatever his specialist subject was: parkour, Berlin graffiti artists of the late 80s – she’d met his type before.
The Twelve Fanboys You’ll Meet In East London.
She smiled. He smiled back. Or perhaps he was just dim?
Are We Too Smart For Our Own Good?: Why Being Stupid Makes You Happy.

He took another sip from his beer. Ah what the hell, she deserved a treat. ‘Want to go some place else, like yours? My flatmates tend to walk through my bedroom,’ Freddie said.

‘Sure.’ He put the bottle down. ‘I’ll grab my jacket.’ She watched him walk to an empty table and collect his bag. Perhaps his friends had left, or was he, too, out alone looking for a little company? She pulled her coat on and made her way through the pub, the roar of alcohol growing more audible with each shriek and laugh. She was already feeling better.

‘We’ll have to take the 149. It’s only five minutes from here.’ He took her hand as he led her outside. The streets were busier as people walked through the dusk, clutching bags of ready meals, and gathering outside restaurants and bars, their cigarette smoke mingling with the condensation from their chattering mouths. His skin was smooth and warm, like it could heat her from inside. Excitement and desire tingled in Freddie.