Deep Wate - Sarah Epstein Page 0,7

the motel, our little circle of friends invented a game. Impostor, we called it: perfecting the art of lying. We’d all write silly made-up words on scraps of paper and toss them into a hat, then we’d each pick one out and have less than a minute to come up with a joke or short story with the word slipped in there somewhere. The trick was trying to disguise it while everyone else had to guess which word was the sneaky infiltrator.

I suppose we were impostors too, creating our fake stories, casually deceiving each other in order to win. The victor was whoever could tell a bare-faced lie to their friends most successfully and get away with it. I was actually pretty good at that game. I picked up on the subtlest betrayals: a tiny vocal inflection here, the flicker of an eyebrow there. I knew my friends’ mannerisms so well it was easy to spot the exact moment a lie made them stumble.

The one person I couldn’t crack was Mason. He was inscrutable, as though he was as well practised at lying as he was at telling the truth.

There were no eyes darting left and right like Sabeen, no subtle nostril flare like Raf. No rapid blinking like Tom, or touching his face and hair constantly like Rina. The closest I’ve ever come to catching Mason in a lie was three months ago on the morning we found out Henry was missing. It wasn’t obvious at the time, not with everything else going on, but I definitely sensed something was off.

We were all gathered on the Weavers’ verandah, craving news and awaiting instructions while Sergeant Doherty questioned Mason and his mother inside. Doherty then questioned each of us, one by one, before returning to the police station to coordinate a proper search. When Mason and Ivy joined us on the verandah, we peppered them with the same questions Doherty probably had: When was the last time they saw Henry? What time did they go to bed? Did they hear Henry moving around the house after turning in for the night?

According to his mother and brother, Henry had been in his room when Mason headed to bed at ten o’clock, leaving Ivy dozing on the couch in front of the TV. Their recollection of the evening’s timeline was identical and airtight, but I sensed a weird shift in the energy between them, the weight of things unsaid.

Maybe it was my confusion about why Henry left, or perhaps guilt over things I’d said, that distracted me from something so obvious I’m surprised it’s taken me until now to connect the dots.

For all his quick talking and easy answers, there’s one thing not even Mason Weaver can control.

Biology.

As he stood in the doorway of Room Fifteen just now and lied about his injured knuckles, his ears flushed as red as the bloodstains on his T-shirt.

* * *

I turn this over in my mind as I unpack in my bedroom, avoiding the front office where Luisa is walking Dad through some kind of complicated online booking system. Apparently she’s the new office manager and was the one who convinced Dad to change the motel’s name and install the water fountain. For some reason it’s all making me uncomfortable, and that’s before we address why Luisa was here at one in the morning when Mason broke the window.

My phone chimes with a new message from Sabeen.

Are you here yet?

I let her know I am, glancing out my bedroom window at the Nolans’ house next door. Next door is actually a little way up the hill, a grassy field and a tangle of acacia trees separating the Nolans’ property from our motel. It’s close enough that Sabeen and I spent our entire childhood in each other’s pockets. It’s also close enough that occasionally, late at night, I catch glimpses of her older brother Raf ’s silhouette moving across the glow of his bedroom window.

I’m working tonight, Sabeen adds. Come down for pizza.

My first instinct is to say no. As much as I’d love to see my best friend and her parents, I’m not sure how I’m going to approach Raf. In the last three months our texts and messages have been patchy, and the only subject we’ve touched on is finding Henry. We haven’t talked about that night in January, or what we told Sergeant Doherty the next morning. It’s as though what happened at the bush hut has been packed away and forgotten. Simply