Found time for one more update before the move :) loved the comments guys! See you on the other side.

Review maybe?

Chapter seven

...

'I should probably go ... shouldn't I?' Naomi asked the question in a hopeful way, as if she was willing Emily to prove her wrong.

Emily sighed. Whether she wanted to be or not, Naomi was right. 'Yeah,' she answered, trying not to register the fall in Naomi's face. She instead walked past her, out of the kitchen, into the hall and along to the front door. She heard Naomi follow her reluctantly, dragging her feet along the carpet.

'I am really sorry,' Naomi said as she stepped out of the door. Her foot made a soft tapping sound as it made contact with the cold flagstone outside. 'I didn't mean you to ever get mixed up in any of this.'

She meant those words. She meant them with every drop of blood in her body. Emily could tell. Looking into her eyes she could almost see someone she recognised.

'I know,' she said finally. 'It was a totally random fuck-up.' She paused, 'I mean ... you shouldn't have been doing it in the first place,' she observed, 'But, me being there was nothing to do with it.'

Naomi nodded; a melancholy little head bob that terminated in her looking at the ground. The winter sun glinted off the wisps of blonde hair that fluttered towards Emily in the cold breeze.

'Naomi?'

Naomi looked up.

'Be careful, okay?' Emily said. It was her turn to mean the words with everything she was.

It made Naomi smile.

They stood there like that for a moment, until the cold from outside began trickling through Emily's skin and coiling around her bones.

'Right, I'd better go ... er ... make the event planner's morning even more surreal then,' Emily joked.

Naomi laughed briefly, 'It'll be tough without me.'

That was true.

'Congratulations by the way,' Naomi said, almost as an afterthought.

Emily raised an eyebrow.

'On the wedding,' Naomi explained.

'Oh right ... yeah.' It was awkward. Emily didn't know whether to say thank you or not.

'I'm glad that you have someone,' Naomi said quietly, in a small voice that contradicted the bright blue of her eyes. 'I sure she's ... er ...' the words seemed to stick in her throat, 'lovely.'

Emily nodded with a smile, 'You'd hate her.'

'Already do.'

Naomi seemed deep in thought for a second, and Emily wondered briefly if there was ever an appropriate way to say goodbye to her. She barely had time to muse upon it before Naomi had leant up, pressing the swiftest, softest kiss to her cheek. Her nose and lips were cold, but her warm breath swathed the skin of Emily's cheek.

'Bye,' she said, moving back and turning from the door.

Emily said nothing.

She momentarily wondered how the hell Naomi found out where she lived, but she quickly dismissed it as inconsequential. It didn't matter. She wouldn't have been surprised if Naomi had just closed her eyes and let the current of the earth tow her to Emily's door. The invisible pull between them felt strained and taut as Naomi walked away.

Emily watched her go: retreating back into the sunlight, a beautiful haunted woman; a scared little child; a feral, traceless animal; a shadow drifting abstractedly along the ground.

...

Sam was quiet that night.

They ate practically in silence.

The sound of Sam's fork scraping along the china plate raked painfully through Emily's brain. She dragged her gaze along the offending piece of cutlery, up to the knotted bones of Sam's knuckles, and then across her slender arms, elbows, shoulders, skin and muscle and bone that she knew so well, then onwards, up her pale neck and eventually to her face. She caught Sam staring at her.

Emily quickly looked away. The sun had vanished behind thick dark cloud and rain began, speckling the windows teasingly at first, and then hammering them so hard Emily was scared they would shatter. She gazed outside, wondering where the horizon was, wondering what colour the sea was this evening, wondering what Sam would do if she just ran out into the rain, face upturned to the sky and stayed out there until she felt truly clean.

'Have you decided you want to tell me what's wrong yet?' Sam asked. The question was as cold as the weather.

Emily tore her gaze away from the window. Sam's loud fork was now settled amongst the half-eaten food on her plate. Her arms were folded.

'There's nothing wrong,' she sighed. 'I just ... it's ... my writing's not going very well at the moment.'

She felt briefly grateful that she wasn't taking stun pills at that moment. Emily never considered herself a liar. Not anymore. There were times when she had lied to her parents, to Katie, to everyone she knew at school, but she had never believed the lies herself.

Sam's hardened face softened minutely. 'Yeah?' she asked. 'What are you working on?'

Emily was always working on nothing. And everything. The most she had ever managed to actually get published was a few stories in local journals. They were always short. Emily kept them short. It was like she had so many ideas that she was afraid they would merge and become one incoherent consciousness. So she would separate them, giving them individual characters and worlds that would never meet. Parallel universes that couldn't exist together. She had become so terrified of confusing her separate worlds that the thought of writing anything as long a novel made her never want to pick up a pen again. But at the same time she longed to write one, and to nurture and cultivate it as it grew. But she needed order. She needed stability. She needed segregation. Everything had to have its own separate compartment. It needed to be that way. Or all the boundaries between the universes would crumble, and she would descend into chaos.

'Just another short story,' Emily said eventually.

Sam picked up her fork again. 'What's it about?'

'A girl,' Emily answered.

Sam made a winding motion with her hand to prompt Emily to elaborate.

'A girl who's so lost she doesn't even realise that she's lost. And she wakes up one day and she doesn't know where she is.'

Sam nodded as if the idea appealed to her. 'Sounds good babe. Want me to proof-read it for you?'

Emily tried to smile, 'Nah ... you've got enough to do.'

Sam snorted in amusement, 'Too bloody right,' she agreed. 'Speaking of which, we've got a lead on that break-in.'

Emily looked immediately back out of the window. It was still raining like it would never stop. 'Yeah?' she asked quietly.

'We think it might have been an inside job,' Sam said.

Emily frowned, but continued to look away. 'Why's that?'

Sam swallowed the food she had in her mouth hurriedly, like she was excited about telling someone. 'Well, we interviewed everyone in the office, and there was a photography technician that said someone was sent to the plant room to check the phone connection, but they never came back.'

Emily whipped back round to face Sam. 'So?' she said. 'Maybe the phones were down. The phones might've been down, you don't know.'

Sam looked puzzled at the speed of Emily's answer. But she just shook her head and continued. 'Yeah but the point is, a maintenance check was just performed on the alarm that day. So they must've been working fine after that. This person that went down after: I think that might be our guy ... or, y'know, girl.' Sam shovelled another forkful of food into her mouth.

Emily clenched her jaw. She wondered if she should tell Sam that she was heading in entirely the wrong direction. But what if that led to her finding out Naomi was there? What if that, in turn, led to her finding out that she had seen Naomi there, and had honourably let her go? It was too risky. Wasn't it?

The walls around the worlds were crumbling and the chaos was seeping through.

'Did ... did this technician remember who it was?' she asked.

Sam shook her head. 'No she didn't see them. She just over-heard someone say it.'

Emily sighed out a breath she was unaware she had been holding. 'Well that's hardly any proof at all.'

'True,' Sam agreed, 'but we'll know more once the security camera's fixed.'

The rain seemed to pelt down harder than ever at that moment.

'Security camera?'

'Yeah. Someone jammed a screw-driver into one to stop it working. They managed to miss all the vital organs though. Reckon we can still get something from the discs. They won't work on the players at the scene, but we're getting them ready to send off to the lab.'

Emily felt like she could barely hear Sam's voice over the rain.

'I mean really,' Sam went on, 'A screw-driver? You think they'd have a bit more sense.'

Emily folded her arms and sat back heavily against her chair. 'Yeah ... you'd think so wouldn't you?'

...

'The sun's shining Naomi!'

Naomi screwed her closed eyes shut even tighter and groaned.

Must be 8.15.

The door opened, the cup was set down, her hair was unwelcomely ruffled.

'Mum?' Naomi said, not bothering to open her eyes, 'The sun is not shining. In fact, over forty percent of the time that statement is a complete lie. I don't appreciate you coming into my room and telling great big whoppers.'

The mattress beneath her shifted and she opened her eyes to see her Mum sat down next to her on the bed. Naomi sat up, scratching at her messy hair and rubbing her eyes.

'You had a phonecall this morning,' Gina said with a smile.

'I did?' Naomi asked. She would have been nervous, if it wasn't for the smile on her Mum's face that betrayed any hazardousness of the situation. 'From who?'

'Have a guess,' her Mum said.

Naomi rolled her eyes. 'McGruff the crime fighting dog?'

'Nope,' her Mum continued smiling. 'You'll never get it,' she decided. 'It was Emily Fitch. Remember her?'

Naomi's stomach did a little flip. She tried to ignore the feeling. 'Yeah I remember her.'

'She wants to see you,' Gina gave her a playful poke in the side, which Naomi flinched irritably away from.

'What else did she say?'

'To meet her this evening at her house at eight o'clock,' Gina was positively beaming now.

Naomi chewed on her lip for a second. Her brain rattled through possible reasons for why Emily would need to see her so soon. As much as she wanted it to be a simple, friendly inquiry as to her health, she couldn't stop the niggling suspicion that it could only be bad news. She looked back at her Mum's smug face.

'Okay mother, you can stop grinning like a maniac now. Will that be all?' she asked, bringing her knees up to her chest.

'Yes that was all,' Gina said standing up. She moved over to the door. 'Except for 'Emily likes Naomi, Emily likes Naomi –' she repeated in a childish sing-song.

'Get out Mum!' Naomi shouted, and Gina retreated into the landing, continuing her taunt.

Naomi rolled her eyes and sat back against her pillows. She frowned, clenching her jaw, her mind racing as to what on earth could have gone so wrong that Emily needed to see her tonight. Despite all the fear, all the anxiety, and all the chaos that could potentially be traced back to this very moment, Naomi felt a smile tug at her lips.

...

Emily had barely explained anything when Naomi had showed up at her door, smoothed down her hair and clothes, checked her reflection in the glass panel on the door, and calmly rang the buzzer.

The door had been roughly yanked open, and Emily had stepped out immediately, grabbing Naomi by the hand and tugging her away from the house.

'Emily? What the fuck?' Naomi had asked, not wishing to be dragged back out into the cold night that she had just emerged from.

'You're turning into a really big problem for me you know!' Emily said irately, by way of a greeting.

Naomi frowned, wrenching her hand from out of Emily's grasp and shoving it petulantly into the pocket of her coat. 'Are you going to fucking explain to me what's going on? Or are you just going to yell?'

'First I'm going to yell, and then I'm going to explain,' Emily paused, 'But I'm going to yell while I'm explaining.'

Naomi sighed. 'Great.'

'I am so mad at you,' Emily added.

'I've noticed.'

'They've got fucking security cameras, Naomi,' Emily said.

The air temperature seemed to drop a degree colder.

'They ... they don't,' Naomi stammered. 'I got them.'

'Did you?' Emily asked, 'Or did you stick a screw driver in them and hope for the best?'

Naomi chewed her bottom lip and scratched at her nose.

'Yeah,' Emily said maliciously, 'thought so.'

Naomi rolled her eyes. 'Okay I get it. I did bad, you're angry, but what the hell are we doing here?'

'We're going back to the studio,' Emily explained, 'and we're getting the disc.'

'Oh ... great fucking plan detective,' Naomi said. 'How do you propose we do that?'

'Just shut up and follow me,' Emily muttered, striding forwards leaving Naomi stood momentarily dazed in the street, feeling the first fledgling drops of rain of what promised to be a wet and filthy night.

When they got to the magazine's head office, Naomi's stomach and chest tightened painfully with nerves. She stopped just before the police tape that was strung across the door like a sticky strand from massive cobweb. Naomi couldn't shake the feeling that she was going to get strung up and devoured.

'Shouldn't there be like ... a guard or something?' Naomi asked. It was the first words she had spoken to Emily since they embarked upon their quest. The girl had stayed several paces ahead of her the whole way, leaving Naomi, characteristically, hanging back in a sulk.

Emily didn't respond. She merely tapped away at the numeric panel on the door. Her fingers flew across the metal buttons, graceful and nimble like some wild prairie animal.

'How the fuck do you know the code?' Naomi asked.

Emily didn't look up from her work. 'Sam had it in her notepad.'

'Sam?' Naomi practically spat, 'Why would Sam have it?'

Naomi heard the hollow, echoey sound of the door latch clicking free. 'Emily?' she prompted as she stepped through the glass doors and into the reception.

'Because she's working on the case,' Emily said quietly, pulling the door shut behind her and typing in the code again. The buttons tapped metallically like a dozen clawed animals running across a roof.

Naomi blinked in the dim room, slowly processing the information that had been carelessly flung in her direction. She tugged Emily's right shoulder, forcefully spinning her round to face her.

'You're boning the police officer that's after me?' she demanded incredulously.

'No!' Emily shouted back, 'I'm going to marry the police officer that's after you!'

Naomi clapped her hands over her eyes, emitting a guttural groan. 'This could just not get any fucking worse,' she observed.

'Yeah?' Emily challenged, 'Well it's about to unless we find that fucking disc.'

...