Easy as One Two Three (Emma Frost) (7 page)

"Why?" Rebekka asked. "I think it’s a great idea. I mean, what harm can it do to check it out, huh? So what if we don't learn anything about where Maya is? At least we will have tried. It's better than just sitting here and waiting, right?"

I looked at her. She was a very pretty woman. And she was so right. I couldn't stand just sitting and waiting anymore. I needed to act. I needed to at least do something. I didn't feel like the police were doing anything at all to help me out. It was brutal to have to just wait for her to show up on her own.

"You're right," I said. "At least we're doing something here. Let's find these people. As far as I can see, twenty-two people other than Mads Schou were supposed to attend this party. I say we contact every one of them and ask about what went on and if they saw Mads leave."

"We'll say it’s for an article," Rebekka said. "Sune can give Morten one of his cameras to make him look like a photographer. Tell them it’s only research so far, no interviews yet. That'll make them talk. People say more if they're not held accountable afterwards. That's why people would rather speak to a journalist than the police. As long as you promise not to quote them for anything."

"Sounds like a plan to me," I said and looked at Morten.

Sune handed him one of his cameras.

"Anything for you," Morten said to me, as he took the camera.

I looked through the Facebook invitation and found the list of people who had stated that they would participate. "Look," I said and pointed at a name. "Signe Schou. That's his wife. She was also going to be there."

"Good," Rebekka said. "Why haven't we heard about her before? I didn't see her at the hospital."

"That's what I've been wondering about," I said. "I’ve been at the hospital to visit Mads every day since we got back and I haven't seen her once or heard them mention her name."

"That's a little strange, isn't it?" Morten asked.

"It's very strange," I said pensively. I scrolled through Signe Schou's profile to see if anything jumped out at me, but nothing really did. Only the fact that the last time she had updated her profile was on the day of the accident. At nine in the morning she had written the letters: YNWA on Mads' wall. Just like her husband had posted on hers the day before. Were they just very big soccer fans? Signe didn't appear to be according to her profile. There were no updates about Liverpool, or any other team, for that matter. She hadn't even put them under interests or groups and she hadn't liked their fan page. Why would she write something like this? Just because her husband was into this?

"So how do you suggest we go about this? There are no numbers or addresses of these people who were at the party. All we know are their names and their Facebook profiles."

I looked at Rebekka. I had a good feeling about this. I couldn't put my finger on it, but something about this direction we were about to take made sense. It simply felt right.

"I suggest we just write a message to these people one after another, explaining to them who we are, that we work for the newspaper and that we're doing a story about Mads and we're going to write about him, a nice portrait about the person he was before the accident and then wait for them to take the bait."

18

April 2012

T
HEY GOT A SUITE
at one of the many five-star resorts stretching along Alanya's silky sand beaches on the southern coast of Turkey. Mads and Signe soon visited all the attractions, sun-bathed during the day and partied well into the night. They took a Dolmuş to visit the Alanya castle and saw the Red tower on one day, on another they took a boat trip and saw all the caves, then they went scuba diving, and later on a Jeep Safari and even rode a donkey one day. They rented scooters or walked and soon they had seen everything. Signe had gotten a nice tan and was bored with lying on the beach, trying to sleep away her hangovers. Mads was getting more and more dull again and she was tired of the way he constantly jumped around and served her, like he was her little monkey. He made sure she had everything she needed and it annoyed her more than ever. They went shopping excessively to make Signe happy, but the joy didn't last long. Spending money like they didn't care was fun at first, but soon became dull. There were no more dresses she wanted to buy and no more shoes or souvenirs she desired. After a week and a half, Signe believed she had seen it all and she was starting to lose interest. In both the town and in him.

"So what do you want to do today?" Mads asked over breakfast.

A small part of the omelet was stuck in his beard as he spoke. He was beginning to look like a bush-man, Signe thought, and felt like shaving him, but even that thought bored her.

"I got another e-mail from my mom," Mads continued.

Signe didn't even bother to look at him. She scrolled her news feed on Facebook. No one at home seemed to be doing anything interesting either. It was still boringly cold in Denmark and they were—as usual—expecting spring to come right around the corner. One of her friends had posted a picture of her and her boyfriend sitting outside in their yard enjoying the sun wearing big winter jackets and beanies. That was Denmark in the spring for you, Signe thought to herself. Who needed that?

"What does she want?" Signe asked without caring about the answer.

"She’s asking us when we're coming home. She found a house that she thinks will be perfect for us."

"She has now, has she?" Signe answered without interest.

"Yeah. So what do you want me to tell her?"

Signe shrugged and finished her coffee. "I don't know. Tell her we don't know. What do I care? She's your mother."

"Yes, but when are we coming home?" Mads asked. "We have to get back at some point. I'm supposed to start in my dad's firm as soon as we do. We should at least give them something to work with, don't you think we owe that to them?"

Signe looked at her husband. She hated that he always wanted to be so sensible. She didn't enjoy that side of him. She liked his adventurous side. She liked it when he went crazy with jealousy or with rage or passion. Oh, how she longed for passion, some sort of spark in him and in her life as well. Something to let her know that they were still alive and not just another dead couple, just waiting for life to be over.

She wanted more out of her time here on this boring earth.

"We don't owe them anything," she said with a grin.

"We are, after all, living off the money they gave us." Mads sighed and rubbed his forehead. "I don't know what we were thinking. I mean, it’s been fun and all, but how are we going to explain it to my parents?"

Signe shrugged with a light grin. "We don't."

"Don't what?"

"Don't explain it," she said and took another bite of the sugary croissant that she had pushed into the middle of the table because she thought was done.

Mads wrinkled his forehead. Signe hated when he did that. It was something a father or an old teacher would do. It was so…bourgeois. So incredibly boring.

"I don't understand."

Of course you don't. It doesn't fit with your desperate need to please your parents, does it?

"Don't answer the e-mail, don't call them. Don't talk to them at all. Then you don't have to explain anything, see?"

Signe leaned forward and grabbed his hand in hers. "Let's see where life takes us. We can't go back. I don't want to go back to that boring old country and sit in some house from the eighties and spit out kids that will ruin my body and then bother me till I die. I want to live, Mads. I want to really live."

She paused and waited for him to fully understand what she was saying. She’d had this feeling ever since they were in that restroom in Egypt looking at the bartender lying on the tiles bleeding from his head. The adrenalin, the excitement, she needed it. She craved it. And she knew she could never get it back in boring old Denmark. Somehow, she sensed that she was never going home again. There was no way she could go back.

"But…but…our families?"

"What families? I only have my mother and I'm not missing her, to be honest. Think about it Mads. With what happened in Egypt, I don't think it is even smart for us to go back. They might come looking for us. It's better to lay low for a little while."

Mads nodded. He knew what she meant. He had worried about it too. Signe knew that and didn't feel guilty about using it to get her way. Signe was smiling. She could tell he was about to cave in now. She had him wrapped around her pinky.

"Okay. I guess I won't write back to her then," he said. He paused and looked at the screen of his iPad with the expensive alligator skin cover that his mother had bought him for his birthday. The cover alone was worth more than four thousand dollars, Signe had seen on the Internet. If everything else went wrong, they could always sell that. That or her engagement ring that had cost almost thirty thousand dollars.

"So, what do you want to do today?" Mads asked, slightly shaken with the decision he had just made. He put the iPad down.

Signe looked up from her phone and their eyes met. She felt a tickling sensation inside of her again. She never wanted it to go away. 

"I think we should do something really fun, what do you say? Let's spike things up a little. I have an idea."

19

April 2014

"
I
'M GLAD YOU CAME
this fast," the man said to the numerologist.

They were walking down the hallway with the many doors on each side all looking the same, except for the numbers changing from door to door.

"Of course," the numerologist said.

"She woke up only fifteen minutes ago. It's right in here." The man pointed at the white door with the number fifty-seven on it.

"Thank you," the numerologist said. "I'll take it from here."

The man nodded and backed away. The numerologist waited a few seconds till she was certain he was going away, then opened the door.

She was sitting on the bed. Her feet pulled close to her body. She looked like a very young girl. She turned her head and looked at the numerologist when she entered. The numerologist smiled what seemed to be a friendly smile.

"Hi Zelllena."

The girl looked confused. "Who are you?" she asked. "Where am I?"

"I know you probably have a lot of questions, Zelllena and I will try and answer most of them."

"Zelllena?" the girl said. "Is that my name?"

"Yes. That is your name. You're here because we're trying to help you. You got yourself in trouble some days ago and we're trying to help you get better."

The girl looked troubled. "Why don't I remember anything?"

"You suffer from amnesia. But it's all for the best. This way, we can give you a fresh start. You need to let go of your past."

The numerologist felt so excited, but tried to tone it down. Being able to help Zelllena out and get a new life for her was just so giving of herself. It was the best feeling in the world.

"I feel so strange," Zelllena said. She looked out the window. The sky was gray and heavy clouds were building.

The numerologist knew it was going to take a while for her to accept her new life, but she would come around. She was going to enjoy it eventually.

"It's this month," the numerologist said. "It seems to be bothering most people these days. It's the planets and the numbers, you know? April is a big month. It is one of the most pivotal months of the whole entire year."

The girl seemed interested. "What do you mean?"

The numerologist smiled. She loved when people wanted to know more. Numerology and astronomy were her passion and she loved to talk about it and teach people how to improve their lives with very few changes. It was truly a blessing to have been given such an insight to this world and its energies.

"There is so much dynamic and vast energy in this month," she said and sat on the bed next to Zelllena. "We're in Aries in the start of the month, it's the first sign of the Zodiac and Aries is all about a fresh start and new beginnings. So that fits well for you, I think. Aries is, in general, the celebration of the self. But this year, Mars is currently in the sign of Libra and Libra is all about relationships and harmony, plus it is in retrograde, meaning that, from the earth's perspective, it looks like it’s moving backwards. This means you have this strong forward moving planet that is now being feminine and moving backwards. Now, what does all that mean? Well, it means that every time we feel like we're moving forwards towards something, it can feel like we're taking some steps backwards. So I believe that what the universe is telling us this month is that, instead of moving forward with all of our goals and dreams, it wants us to pace ourselves and make sure that we have harmony and balance in our lives. And that is what I want for you to have Zelllena. You need a more balanced life. But this explains why you might feel a little frustrated right now. There is so much you want to do with your life, but you can't because life gets in your way. You certainly were frustrated and very angry before you came to me for help. You weren't feeling good. And this explains it. Plus we have to remember that 2014 is a seven universal year. Let's not forget that, right?"

The numerologist broke into laughter and poked Zelllena in the side with her elbow. The girl didn't laugh. She still looked confused, the poor thing.

"Seven is the number of the soul," the numerologist tried to explain, but the girl didn't seem to get that part either. She really didn't know anything, did she? "If you add the numbers two, zero, one and four you get seven, so that's how you calculate the number of the year. But we also have a lot of opposite planets this month and if you draw them, you get a square, and squares are all about tension. When you have a square, you can feel like you're being boxed in…a lot of pressure without an outlet. I’ve decided to help you release that pressure. But I want you to remember that April 2014 is an eleven universal month. Eleven is the number of intuition. It is also the number of light. It's all about bringing more light into your life. This eleven energy is going to bring light to all the dark places inside of you. The parts of you that haven't been given any attention will all be coming to the surface. So, what do you say? Are you excited?"