Page 37 of This for That (The Edge of Retaliation 1)
I hate that I’m lying. That I’m tricking people. But I want to know what happened to Celia Yates, even if I have to lie my way to the answer.
Amber smiles, and says, “What’s your name, sorry? I missed it.”
“My name is April.” I smile. “Nice to meet you, Amber.”
She looks like she’s trying to remember if Celia ever mentioned an April, but it doesn’t seem to concern her for long, because she says, “I don’t think she mentioned a cousin, but I’m glad to meet you. It has been so long since I’ve talked about Celia.”
“Me too,” I admit, which is partially the truth. Ethan was the last person I sat down with and truly expressed how I felt about Celia to. After that, I rarely mentioned her name. “Would you mind meeting up with me, so we can chat about her, and I can get a few things for her memorial?”
“Sure. I finish my shift in half an hour if you want to wait?”
“Sounds great.”
I sit at a table and order a coffee. Amber finishes up her shift and joins me when she’s done. I’ve got my phone on record so I don’t miss anything. I have to be really careful about what I say here, because if I look like I’m digging for answers, Amber is going to get suspicious.
“How long have you been in the area, April?” Amber asks me.
“A few months. I moved back. I’ve caught up with some of Celia’s family, but mostly I’m just trying to see how many of her friends are still here. So far, it looks like you could be the only one.”
Amber nods. “Yeah, as far as I know, Kirsty and Vi left town a few years ago. I still follow them on Facebook. I’m sure they’d love to help even if they’re not here.”
Kirsty and Vi. I make a note in my head to look up Amber’s Facebook friends list and see if I can find them. The more answers I can get, the better.
“Were you and Celia best friends?” I ask Amber, sipping my coffee.
Amber nods. “We were, for around five years before she died. We met by accident; it’s a funny story, actually. Someone ran over my cat, which isn’t funny of course, and Celia found him, and she was so upset. She went knocking on all the doors until she found his owner, she was so sad and wanted to make sure he got the right burial. She was good like that, really sweet.”
“Yeah,” I say softly. “I remember.”
“When she came to my door, I felt so bad for her that we became friends. We buried my cat together, and that was that. We were inseparable.”
“I’m really sorry, Amber,” I say, and I mean it, I really mean it. “It must have been so sad for you to lose her.”
Amber nods, her eyes sad. “It was the worst day of my life when we got that call. I couldn’t believe it. No matter how many times I heard what my parents were telling me, I couldn’t believe it. She couldn’t be gone. The worst part was we had been fighting a little beforehand, so I never got to tell her that she was the best friend I’d ever had.”
God.
This is tugging at my heartstrings in ways I wish would stop.
It only reminds me of what I took away from this world. Sometimes I wonder if it would have been easier to know that Celia was a horrible person. I don’t think it would, because death is still death, but when I think about how kind and loving she obviously was, it makes me feel that much worse.
“I’m sorry you were fighting. I’m sure she knew how much you cared about her,” I tell Amber. “Friends fight; it’s completely normal.”
“This was a bad fight, though. I knew something was wrong with her. She was putting on this brave face for everyone else to see, but something had gone from her eyes. I wanted to know what it was. I suspected it had something to do with her boyfriend, but she got angry at me and told me to get out, that I was just trying to cause problems. I wasn’t, though. I was worried.”
Funny, this wasn’t mentioned when I was trying to tell everyone Celia stepped in front of that car. Everyone who knew her said she was happy; obviously Amber didn’t step up and tell them her suspicions.
“Oh, that’s right, I forgot about him. What was his name again?” I ask, acting like I’m trying hard to remember.
“Chase.”
I click my fingers, “That’s right! Chase! You know, I never met him. What was he like?”
Amber shrugs. “He was the best-looking guy in school; you know the one every girl wanted to be with. Celia got him, and she was so happy. She thought he was amazing. But, I don’t know, he was cocky. He seemed to think nothing could ever go wrong in his world, like he could do no wrong. I don’t know what happened between them. I just know something went down because behind closed doors, Celia was struggling.”
