Pip scanned her eyes down the previews of each message, reading them out in Andie’s voice, bringing her back to life. Hello Harriet, you don’t know me but my name is Andie Bell. I go to Kilton Grammar, but I think we both know Chris Parks… Hi Harriet, thanks for getting back to me and for not thinking I’m a creepy weirdo for reaching out, I’m so sorry about your sister. I have a sister too… All the way down to the last one: Hey HH, would you want to talk on the phone instead of emailing, or even meet up some time…
Something stirred at the back of Pip’s mind, pushing her eyes back to those two letters: HH. She asked her mind what she was supposed to be seeing here; it was just Harriet’s initials.
‘I’m glad you found out the truth of what happened to her,’ Harriet interrupted her thoughts. ‘And that your podcast was kind to her. Andie was a complicated girl, I think. But she saved me.’
Even more complicated now, Pip thought, scribbling down Andie’s email address. Harriet was right; it was a strange email address, almost like it was obscure on purpose. Almost like it had been a secret. Maybe she’d made it for this very reason, just to communicate with Harriet Hunter. But why?
‘Are you going to talk to him?’ Harriet said, bringing Pip’s attention back to the room, this table, the microphones set out in front of them. ‘Are you going to talk to Billy Karras?’
Pip paused, ran her finger across the plastic of her headphones, round and round her neck. ‘I hope I get to speak to the DT Killer, yes,’ she answered. She’d meant it to be tactful, so she didn’t have to lie to Harriet, but there was something else beneath those words. Something creeping and ominous. A dark promise. To herself, or to him?
‘Listen,’ Pip said, clicking the stop button on her recording software. ‘We’re running out of time for today. Do you think we can schedule in another interview soon, where you can talk more about Julia, what she was like? You’ve given me lots to go on today for my research, so thank you for that.’
‘I have?’ Harriet said, the skin between her nose crinkling in confusion.
She had, but she didn’t know it. She’d given Pip a lead, in the most unlikely of places.
‘Yes, it’s been very informative,’ Pip said, unplugging the microphones, those two letters, HH, still playing on her mind, sounding them out in Andie’s voice, a voice she’d never even heard.
She and Harriet shook hands again as they said goodbye, and Pip hoped Harriet hadn’t noticed the tremor in her hands, the shiver that had made itself at home beneath her skin. And as Pip pushed the coffee shop door – holding it open for Harriet – the cold wind hit her, and so did one realization, tangible and heavy. That, even after all this time, Andie Bell still had one mystery left in her yet.
File Name: Andie planner photo March 12 – 18 2012.jpg
Pip found it, the itch at the back of her head, the one that scraped forward and back, sounding like two hissed letters. HH.
She stared at the file open in front of her. Andie planner photo March 12 – 18 2012.jpg. A photo she’d copied and pasted into Production Log – Entry 25 of her project last year. One of the photos she’d taken of Andie’s school planner when she and Ravi broke into the Bell house, just under a year ago, searching for a burner phone they’d never find.
The full photo, the original before Pip had cropped it, showed more of Andie’s cluttered desk. A make-up case with a pale purple hairbrush resting on top, her blonde hairs still wound around the bristles. Beside it was a Kilton Grammar academic planner for the year 2011/12, open to this mid-March week, little more than a month before Andie had died.
And there it was. HH scribbled in on this Saturday, and in the other photos they’d taken – the weeks before and after. Pip thought she’d worked out Andie’s code at the time. That HH referred to Howie’s House, just as CP meant the train station car park, where Andie would meet Howie Bowers to pick up a new stash or drop off money. But she’d been wrong. HH had nothing to do with Howie Bowers. HH meant Harriet Hunter. Whether it was a phone call or a meet-up, it was hard to say. But it had been Harriet all along, and here was proof. Andie reaching out to the sister of the DT Killer’s fourth victim.
The itch in Pip’s head became an ache, sharpening at her temples as she tried to understand what this meant. The idea thrashed against her as she tried to make it make sense. What did Andie Bell have to do with all this, with DT?
There was only one place she might find the answers. Andie’s other email address, one Pip suspected had been a secret. Andie had had lots of those in her short life.