The Last of Us

Twenty-Three

I hear the news in the early hours of Sunday morning.

It's my day off from work. I'd been up all last night trying to keep my mind off everything that's been going on, trying to create a proper plan for next week's meeting with the final girls.

My eyes had been raw from staring at the screen. I'd blink, and they'd water, missing the moisture that technology seems to evaporate. Eventually, I gave up and went to sleep.

Only five hours later, my mother opens my bedroom door without knocking. She looks utterly stricken, clutching a hand to her throat.

I don't bother with morning small talk as I shoot up straight in bed, resting my weight on my arms.

"What is it?"

I can feel the beating of my heart begin to intensify as I stare at her, concerned. When dad died, she appeared this way when she told me the news. She'd stood in the entryway, clasping at her chest as though she'd forgotten how to breathe. It had taken me several minutes before she'd been able to give me the news, hyperventilating as she sunk to the ground in pain.

"What is it?" I repeat, shoving the duvet off my body.

Any former need for sleep has left me as I stare at her, waiting for whatever she says to give me the reality check I'm sure I don't want.

"Oh, Harlow," she croaks. "I don't know how to tell you this."

"Mum," I say urgently. "Just tell me."

"It's Sophie Murray. The girl from your support group," she whispers.

I have to strain to hear her at first because I can't quite believe the words that spill past her lips, despite the warning I'd been given in that note.

Sophie's dead. She was killed in cold blood, no doubt.

We officially had a serial killer on our hands.

I feel the bile rising in my throat just in time. I rush from my room, barging past mum's shoulder aggressively as I empty the contents of my stomach into the toilet bowl.

This was seriously happening again, and I hadn't stopped it in time. I hadn't taken the note seriously enough.

I hadn't done enough.

Tears prick the corners of my eyes, but I refuse to cry over my weakness and failures. Sophie had lost her life because I'd been too slow in learning who had killed Talia and Ed.

Self-pity was beginning to wane as I stood from the cold tiles of the bathroom floor. My mother is watching me sadly at the end of the hallway.

Another girl has lost her life. Another girl who deserved to live for all that she'd been through. There isn't much either of us can say to make this situation alright.

"Where was she found?" I ask, not closing the distance between us.

We stand facing each other from either side of the hallway. Sadness consumes the space between us, but we'd been here before. We'd learnt to accept it too many times.

"In the park near her house," mum concludes. "Constable Chaplin came by earlier, but I'd told him I wanted to be the one to tell you the news."

I nod, nervously playing with my hands. "Do they have any idea who did it? I'm guessing the suspect is the same person as Talia's killer."

Mum shakes her head. "They still don't know, but Chaplin said he's looking at a few leads."

"In other words, they know nothing at all," I rub a frustrated hand across my face.

"Just give them time," she reassures me.

"Time," I snort. "Time is exactly what they don't have, what I don't have. Hasn't time just proven that the longer we go on without answers, the worse off we are?"

Mum squints at me like she's assessing everything I've just said. I realise too late what she's picked up on most.

"What do you mean by time isn't what you have?"

"Nothing," I say quickly, walking towards the safety of my room so I can suffocate the awkward tension that's beginning to appear.

"Harlow," she says, her warning tone building.

"I just want to sleep for a while," I say.

"Not until you explain to me what you meant. Have you involved yourself in the case again?"

I go to shake my head, but I'm so tired that I can feel a deep-rooted pressure begin to build, throbbing against my skull.

She doesn't know about the body. She doesn't know that I've been stalking people's profiles on Facebook, trying to understand who 'Ed' was. She doesn't know that I've asked people outrightly about their involvement in the case.

"Don't lie to me," she says sternly.

"I need to rest."

"Harlow! Did I not tell you to stay out of this? It's the last thing you need. I'm really beginning to think this support group was a terrible idea."

"Why? Because innocent girls are losing their lives?"

"Yes."

I stand from my bed, feeling the headache grow. "What about the fact that someone is out there killing them? Can't you see that that is the issue and not the girls themselves? You, of all people, shouldn't be victim blaming."

She takes a step back, baffled. "I wasn't," she says, offended.

"All I've been trying to do is protect them, and I'm failing."

She shakes her head, crouching down in front of me. "You know that isn't your role as their support leader. You aren't there to stop a serial killer."

"So I should just let it happen?" I snap. "What if I'm the only one who can prevent this? What if I need to keep looking into this case—"

"Can't you see what's happening to you?" she shouts. "You're spiralling! Just like how you did when your father died and then again after you were... taken."

"And you're being too protective. I know how to look after myself. For fuck sake, a man raped and tortured me for weeks, and I still survived that. I know what I'm doing."

As soon as the words leave my mouth, I know I've been way too harsh. She hates being reminded of what I went through, and I know that. I purposely pushed her buttons to torment her.

"All I'm doing is looking out for you," she whispers, close to tears. "When are you going to start looking after yourself, Harlow? You haven't in years."

"Finding who is doing this will help me."

"Even if it permanently scars you? Is that helping?"

I don't answer her as I stare at my palms. The lines that shape them as they lead in all different directions become the only thing I can focus on until she leaves me alone with my consuming thoughts.