Finding Abby

23

"I know about the night in my van," Ben says in a quiet voice from behind his hands.

I can't help wondering how the hell he'd know about that.

"Matty told me." It's as if he can read my mind.

"My dad told you about ...?"

Ben lifts his head and gives me a small smile. "I'm sure you talk about things like that with your mates, don't you?"

I think about my brief conversation with Minda about what happened with Finn and feel my cheeks go pink. I wave him onwards.

"Let's rewind a little." Ben scratches his chin, and sits back in his chair, resting his palms on the table. He drums his fingers as if he's counting back the years. "Matty was ... he was larger than life, Jenna. Your dad - he filled spaces with his personality. So much so, there often wasn't much room for anyone else—"

"He must have been incredible ..."

"We're all incredible when we're eighteen," Ben says, giving me that raised eyebrow look he does.

I crease my own eyebrows, think about Finn and Minda and Alex and Zee.

Okay. We are incredible.

"But ..." Ben continued, "there's a difference between being incredible and knowing it. Matty was fully aware of his magnetism. He ... he loved the attention; loved being on stage. He told me once that he craved fame. Matty was the one driving the band too. I was just in it because I loved the music and hanging out with people who liked the same stuff as me. But he was in it because he wanted that ... thing. He was shooting for the top."

"He was passionate, then? Had clear goals and objectives."

"You could put it like that." Ben laughs a little from deep in his chest. I can see he's remembering things and wish I could see into his memory bank and witness my dad's passion for myself. "So" —Ben taps his fingers on the table again— "when Abby turned up looking like ... someone who could stand beside him ... help him stand out—"

"Why would he need her to do that?"

"Remember, this is what I saw — from knowing both of them. I may be wrong. I may be remembering things wrong. But what I knew of Matty was that he moved between people, searching out the ones who could help him get to where he wanted to be—"

"Don't we all do that, though?"

"For sure we do, you're right." Ben scratches his head. "But maybe we're not aware of it. I think he was very aware of it. And I watched Abby change from this ... reserved, country girl to this dramatic goth—the hair, the makeup—and she really did stand out ... and there is the possibility Matty took advantage of her ... naivety."

"My parents ... so complex," I lean my chin in my hands and look up at him. "Were you ... upset when she kind of ... drifted off with him even though you were friends?"

"Honestly, I'd been watching her drift off with Mara. She was a little infatuated with her too. At that point I just thought, well, this is you working out where you fit in and who you are. I figured if she needed me, I'd be there for her, but I could see in her a desire for something I couldn't give her." I pick up on a tiny glimpse of hurt brushing across his face before he shakes it off with a big breath in and out. "I was ... probably worried for her more than anything. But we were young, Jenna. I was probably more pissed off that he ..."

I sit up and fold my arms in preparation for what I think he's going to say because I can tell he's about to get to the tough bit.

The night my parents spent in his van.