Altered States (21 page)

‘Sure,’ was all I said and I turned away. Something about that moment as I turned away caused my mind to snap to a different time and place. I was overcome by sinking dread as my mind was seduced by a vivid image from the past. A night-time alleyway, tall buildings towering above on either side, smoke snaking from grates in the road. And a girl. Tearful. Arms clamped around me.

It took me a long time to realise how stupid that had been. After a lot of soul searching I’d come to some conclusions about myself. I was different from everyone else, it was true, but the rules didn’t change just for me. Sometimes people think things you don’t want them to think, feel things that you’re not comfortable with. But that’s just tough because that’s the way it is. It may be worse for me than anyone else but that doesn’t make it any different. I realised I had to learn to live with these things else forever live alone. And I’d decided that it was Gemma I wanted to learn with. Of course, by the time I’d figured all this out, it was too late.

Jackson Burch had no involvement with the incident a year ago; the virus that infected Pearle and Gemma. Most likely, no one had. Most likely, there was no foul play at all, as originally declared. But ultimately it made no difference, because only one person was responsible for expunging them from
my
world, and I have to avoid the awkward stare of that person every morning of my life when I stand in front of the mirror. I walked away from them and now it’s too late to walk back.

My mind snapped back to the present. A light-headedness washed over me and I had to reach out to the back of a chair to steady myself. As I paused I swirled the remains of my beer around the sides of the bottle and collected my thoughts.

It was all very clear.

It was time to stop walking away.

‘I thought I said –’ the mystery woman began on my second approach.

‘I know, I know,’ I cut her off as politely as I could. I may not be able to read her, but I still had my other abilities. I still knew how to pull off non-threatening and innocent, or any persona, better than anyone. And I had to assume she was not also impervious to my charms, so to speak.

‘Okay, I am not involved in fashion in any way. I don’t know who you are or what you do. I don’t even know your name. But I need to speak to you and the reason I need to speak to you is very difficult to explain.’ I spoke with urgency because I knew her patience-clock was ticking. Plus the use of succinct phrases engenders a belief that you’re actually going to get to a point.

‘Try me.’

I hesitated momentarily, not quite knowing how to continue most efficiently. ‘It has to do with the adage “Since we cannot know all there is to be known about anything, we ought to know a little about everything”. And I know
nothing
about you.’

She snorted a sardonic laugh. Damn it. That was not good. I was floundering. This would be so much easier if she were a murderer. Maybe she was.

‘Okay, what about him?’ She nodded to a man standing nearby, swigging from a stemmed glass and talking energetically to a woman in a red cocktail dress.

I looked at him for a short moment.

‘He works in the city as an actuary but says he’s a banker because no one knows what an actuary is, and he chats up women – not very successfully – by lying about the size of his bonus last year.’

‘She’s your friend. She met you in here where you both work. She hates working here because she wants to be a designer. She told you that some guy was asking after you that was a bit odd but had a nice ass.’

She smiled coyly – genuinely I presumed – then looked at me with a questioning brow.

‘Okay, how about these two?’ She motioned to the couple on the next table.

I didn’t need to study them. They’d been in my line of observation for long enough for me to already know what I needed to. But this time I decided to give more away ... about me that is.

‘From their clothes we can tell this occasion is of a romantic nature, yeah? A date. But there is a stiffness in their posture, a nervousness in their movements, which suggests they are not well acquainted. So, this is maybe a first or second date.

‘The guy is quite a snappy dresser and seems confident enough; the type who would know his way around the drinking establishments of town. Yet, when he went to the bathroom a few moments ago his companion pointed him in the right direction. It seems unlikely that this guy hasn’t been to BlueJay before if he lives here. So I figure he’s from out of town. I’d say they met on an internet dating site. You’ll probably find that he has trouble meeting girls because he works in a male-dominated industry – maybe IT.’ I took a casual glance at the couple. ‘There’s one more thing. He has this weird fidgety thing with his right hand. I think he’s a smoker but he lied on his profile. Although with good intentions because he wants to give up.’

‘Well, there was a pause in his response which is not surprising because I caught him on the hop. But also, when I asked the question his left hand involuntarily moved to his jeans pocket, where he usually keeps his lighter.’

There was a moment of silence before the enigma woman spoke again.

‘Okay, so you know things about people. What does that have to do with me?’

She was sitting at a high-table and I was still standing across from her. Sitting would be the wrong move; considered as a sign of arrogance.

‘You may not know this, but you seem to be quite special. I can discern a few things about you from your clothes, skin-tone, etc. But that’s it. You demonstrate none of the involuntary behaviours I am used to analysing: gestures, facial expressions, voice patterns.’

She looked totally confused at this point, so I continued quickly.

‘Okay, I know this sounds like I’m totally crazy, or the most elaborate chat-up routine ever, but ... but I really need you to let me buy you a drink.’ Pause. ‘Ten minutes of your time is all I ask. Then I’ll be gone. I promise.’

Whilst I was fetching the drinks I had time to contemplate the best way forward, considering potential time constraints ... and drink-being-thrown-in-face constraints.

‘Right,’ I began on my return, this time allowing myself to take a seat opposite her. ‘I don’t want to waste too much of your time so I’m just going to jump right in with a little experiment.’

‘Okay,’ she said apprehensively.

‘Nothing complicated. I’m just going to ask you five questions and I want you to lie on one of the answers, but don’t tell me which. Okay?’

‘Okay.’

I asked her five questions. All with simple, objective answers, but which would involve recall such that she’d have to pause and think. I asked her the colour of the door of her last house, the model of her first car, what she had for lunch yesterday, the name of the first person she kissed and her last holiday destination.

She answered each one without a flicker of discernable difference: eye movement; flushing of cheeks; pacing of words; tone of voice. Nothing.

‘You definitely lied on one of them?’ I enquired.

‘Yes, first person I kissed was called Steve not Ben.’

Well, that clinched it. If the original answer hadn’t been a lie then her last statement was, and there was still no change in delivery.

‘Don’t take this the wrong way,’ I said. ‘But you are the best liar I have ever met.’

‘Gee thanks.’

‘No problem,’ I said. Then I thanked her for her time with a smile and stood to leave. I didn’t want to leave, but that was the deal and sticking to it was the only way to build trust. But before I walked away she put out a hand.

Different Views

Conner wasn’t entirely sure why he was heading to BlueJay right now; what his key motivation was. Considering, that is, that he had been threatened – by various parties to varying standards of persuasiveness – to stop pursuing the Bigby case.

Maybe he hadn’t consciously thought it through at any point and it was just an impulsive reaction to receiving the tip-off.

Maybe he was personally intrigued as to how Bigby managed to pull off being in two places at once: holed up in a prison cell and yet also in a bar doing a deal.

Or maybe ... maybe he just wanted a beer.

Whatever the reason, that’s the way his feet were taking him.

He’d met up with his informant in one of their usual shady places. His name was Jaz. He teetered on a very low rung of the Scrips hierarchy, but his brother was a much bigger player. Conner had arrested him a couple of years before and the trader was more than happy to cut a deal to get off the hook. That’s how most grasses start their relationship with the cops. Through his sibling, Jaz could glean information that would otherwise be way above his pay grade, and he was always willing to share it – for the right price.

On this occasion what he knew was this. Some new suppliers had turned up on the rug dealing scene of New Meadows, saying they had several containers full of gear arriving at the docks in California. They had made a provisional deal with Scrips, and had arranged a meeting with Bigby to discuss shipping their ‘wears’ to New Meadows. Bigby was kind of the FedEx of the underworld. He knew how to get things from A to Z, avoiding all the right letters in between so as not to come to the attention of any authorities. According to the sellers, this meeting had taken place the previous evening. But the Scrips buyers knew that Bigby was incarcerated and, indeed, incommunicado.

For Conner, this was not particularly useful information but it was at least intriguing. And if he had been officially on the case he would have requested the previous evening’s surveillance recordings from BlueJay. Simple as. But he was
not
officially on the case, and moreover there was the whole aforementioned being-threatened business to consider. As such, low-profile was the order of the moment.

The best low-profile plan he could think of was to head to BlueJay and discreetly flash a picture of Bigby at a few members of staff. As to be expected, the plan didn’t get him very far. The picture of Bigby met with only blank expressions. After a while he was starting to grow concerned that he was pushing his luck, and was happy to arrive at the conclusion that his motivation in being here had been beer all along. That was a goal he was confident in achieving.

Conner sat himself down at the bar and was shortly furnished with his cold beverage of choice. He glanced up at the screen above the bar, which was showing a baseball game. He watched it for a while without really watching it, and shortly it slipped into a commercial interlude. He was greeted by those two beaming faces again; the celebrity couple of the decade, Danny Rubeck and Sadie Winters. The advert was as mysteriously uninformative as all the rest, only hinting at some event, some four-weeks hence. The evasive nature was supposedly a tactic to heighten tension. Conner had less than no interest in whatever it was the stars were peddling, and so was particularly annoyed that he was totally sucked in by the ploy; that he found himself wondering on the subject – just for a moment. He strived to shake the thought from his mind, figuring it would have no bearing on his life.

‘I wouldn’t say that,’ the man replied. ‘I actually quite like her as an actress. It’s just that she represents a lot of what’s wrong with the world today.’

‘And what’s that?’

‘Extreme inequality. Consumer exploitation. She earned eighty million dollars for her latest movie. She may be supremely talented, but is she worth that? Is she eight thousand times more talented than an unknown actor?’