Three things.
Pip headed up the staircase, rounding the corner into the hallway upstairs and across into Max’s bedroom. Pip knew which one it was. She’d been here before, back when she first found out Andie Bell had been selling drugs. It didn’t look any different: the same maroon bedspread, the same piles of discarded clothes.
She also knew that behind that Reservoir Dogs poster, pinned up on the noticeboard, was a photo of Andie Bell. A topless photo Andie had left in Elliot Ward’s classroom, that Max had found and kept all this time.
It made Pip feel sick, knowing it was there, and part of her wanted to rip the hidden photo down, carry Andie safely home with her along with her ghost. Andie had suffered enough at the hands of violent men. But she couldn’t do that. Max couldn’t know anyone had been here.
Pip turned her attention to the white wash basket, overflowing, its lid balanced precariously on top. She pushed off the lid and rummaged through Max’s dirty washing, glad for the gloves covering her hands. About halfway down she found something that would do. A dark grey hoodie with a zip, creased and crinkled. Pip chucked it out, on to Max’s bed, then repacked the too-full wash basket the same way she’d found it.
Next, she headed towards his built-in wardrobe. Shoes. She needed a pair of his shoes. Preferably ones with a unique tread pattern. Pip opened the doors and stared inside, eyes falling to the very bottom and the chaotic jumble of shoes that greeted her there. She bent down and reached in towards the back. If the shoes were at the back, that likely meant Max didn’t wear them as often. Pip discounted one pair of dark running shoes; their soles rubbed flat and smooth with age. She found another nearby, a white trainer, and turned it over, her eyes following the hectic zigzagged lines of its soles. Yes, that would make for some good tracks, and these weren’t the shoes he used on his daily runs. She fished through the pile of mismatched shoes, searching for the trainer’s pair, pulling it out from a tangle of laces.
She straightened up, about to close the wardrobe doors when something else caught her eye. A dark green baseball cap with a white tick, balanced on top of the hangers. Yes, that might come in handy too, thank you, Max, she thought, mentally adding it to the list as she grabbed it.
With the grey hoodie, the white trainers and the cap bundled in her arms, she made her way downstairs, stepping in between Max’s deep-sleep breaths. She laid the pile of clothes down beside her rucksack.
One last thing, and then she was out of here. The thing she was most afraid to do.
She reached in and pulled out another resealable sandwich bag.
Pip held her breath, though she didn’t need to. If Max could hear anything, it would be the sound of her heart, throwing itself around her ribs. How long could it keep going at this rate, before it gave up and gave out? She walked up silently behind him, to the other side of the sofa, where his head lay, listening to the sound of his breaths as they rattled his top lip.
Pip edged closer and then crouched down, cursing her ankle as the bone clicked, echoing in the quiet room. She opened up the sandwich bag and held it up beneath Max’s head. With her other gloved hand, she drew her thumb and forefinger close and then gently, slowly, she pushed them through Max’s hair, towards his scalp. There was only so gentle she could be, pulling hairs out of his head, but that’s what she had to do. She couldn’t cut them out; she needed the root and skin cells attached to the hair, carrying his DNA. Carefully, she pinched her finger and thumb together around a small clump of his dark blonde hair.
She jerked her hand back.
Max sniffed. A heavy breath and a stuttering in his chest. But he didn’t move.
Pip could feel her wild heartbeat, even through the backs of her teeth, as she studied the hairs snagged between her fingers. Long, wavy, a few visible bulbs of skin at the root. There weren’t many, but it would have to do. She didn’t want to risk trying again.
She lowered her fingers into the sandwich bag and rubbed them together, the blonde hairs trickling down into the clear bag, almost invisible. A couple still clung to the latex gloves. She wiped those off against the sofa, sealed the bag up and stepped away.
Back in the hall, she packed Max’s hoodie into the large plastic freezer bag, his shoes and his cap into another before stuffing them all into the main body of her rucksack. It was full now, the zip struggling to fasten, but that was OK, she had everything she needed. She tucked the bag with Max’s hair in the front pocket instead, and then hoisted it all up on her shoulders.
She flicked off the light in the living room before she left, unsure why she did. The yellow lights, harsh as they were, wouldn’t be enough to pull Max out of unconsciousness. But she didn’t want to take the chance; he still had to be like this when she got back in a few hours. Pip trusted the pills, as Max had surely done himself countless times in his life, but she didn’t trust anything that much. Not even herself.