One Small Step, an anthology of discoveries (9 page)

“
Which floorboards?”

Rick frowned. “There’s a hole under a rug. A red and white rug. Under a bed.”

Kaneko felt her stomach lurch. “I know where that is. I know exactly.”

“
There’s your fancy Japanese hatpin, then.”

He was beaming. Kaneko fished in her wallet and pulled out a twenty dollar note. Her hands were shaking. She pulled out another note, a fifty.

“
Thanks, Rick.” She held both notes out. “Tell me. Do you know a young woman who lives in this building? Skinny, wears a lot of make-up.”

“
Can you believe the shit kids put on their faces?” Rick spat, roundly, at the dumpster. “Rots your head, that stuff.”

“
Yeah, well. She’s Tipsy. You ever tell her about your ability?”

“
Maybe.” Rick’s face grew hard. “Why?”

“
I think she’s trying to sell your story.”

“
For money? Rotten bloody junkie.”

“
Rick. Why’d you even tell her?” Kaneko asked.

He shrugged and looked away, his eyes rolling. “Had to tell someone. Couldn’t let the body just rot there.”

“
You didn’t want to tell the police?”

“
Bloody cops. Never find one when you need one. That’s irony, right? Guess I could find a dead one, though.” Rick gave her a thoughtful look. “Never knew I could find bodies. Just things.”

“
How long have you been able to find things?”

He shrugged. “I was always finding stuff, even when I was a kid. Me Mum lost stuff, I found it. Earrings. Bank statements. Remember bank statements?” He said it like bank statements had been wiped from the face of the Earth.

“
Have you ever known other people with powers like yours?” Kaneko asked.

Rick’s gaze had become unfixed. “Some. Hey, you believe all that stuff they’re saying in the papers? About human beings evolving?”

“
I’m a journalist,” she smiled. “I’m not paid to believe.”

“
Well, none of us are paid for that, Annie.”

“
Is paid, none
is
paid,” she muttered, then cursed herself. It was a bad habit, correcting people.
 

Rick winked, like he got it. “Whatever.”

Kaneko thanked him and stood. “How long have you been on the streets, Rick?”

“
Since I was young. Ran away from home. Got lost. Been lost ever since,” he chuckled and stroked his beard with grubby fingers. “Lucky to get this little pocket of heaven, hey?” He gestured around the alley, its stink and grime.

“
Undoubtedly,” Kaneko agreed. “One more question. For the story.”

“
Yeah?”

“
What’s your last name?”

She wondered if he even remembered. This was a guy who’d been living on the streets since he was a kid, who thought bank statements had ceased to exist.

“
Gold,” he said, his head jerking up. “Rick Gold. I sound like a rock star, hey? Always thought I’d be a rock star. The junk got me, though.”

Kaneko wrote
GOLD
.
 

“
But it’s a good power I got. Most of the time.” Rick smiled. “If only I could bottle it, hey, sweetheart? Make a fortune.”

∞
¥
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Ω
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¥
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On the way to her car, Kaneko’s phone rang. It was Merv.

“
And how are you this morning?” he asked. “It’s still morning, isn’t it? And
where
are you, my lovely?”
 

“
Heading back to the office. You sold me a bum steer, Merv. That girl you sent me to is a faker.”

“
A good journalist can always make a story.”

“
Yeah,” Kaneko muttered, more to herself, “I made a story, all right.”

Merv apparently didn’t hear her. Merv didn’t hear a lot of things.

“
Was she a looker, at least?” he asked. “We can send a photographer.”

Kaneko ignored him. “I did come across something interesting. But I’m not sure how much the subject is going to like the attention.”

She got in the car and switched her phone to the other hand.

Merv grunted. “Go with the more photogenic one.”

“
She was faking!”

“
So make the story about that,” Merv said expansively. “Tell the story of the people who
aren’t
superheroes. Show us the ones who’ve been left behind, the ones faking it, not making it. The ones lying to make themselves look like they’re still top of the food chain. Give us the human
soul
, Kaneko.”
 

She drove the car forward and pulled up at lights, listening to Merv drone on about the human soul. Kaneko closed her eyes and leaned back, trying to imagine she was someplace else.

“
And that numbers nut called here looking for you,” Merv said. “I gave him your mobile number. What’s the deal, giving out a desk number? No self-respecting journalist is ever at her desk.”

The drivers in the traffic behind Kaneko began to hit their horns. She jumped and moved her car into the intersection. She wanted to tell Merv to go screw himself, but she was afraid he wouldn’t hear her over the noise of the horns. She sped forward, trying to outpace the traffic.

“
Thanks, Merv. Give out my number to every crazy in the book, why don’t you?”

She dropped the phone into her bag and drove until she reached her apartment block.

∞
¥
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Ω
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¥
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Inside the apartment, she dumped her bag by the door and headed upstairs to the bedroom.

Underneath the bed was the red and white striped rug, just like Rick had said. She shifted it aside, but couldn’t find the gap Rick had mentioned. So she lifted one of the bed legs and kicked the rug out from under. Then she got down on her side and reached a hand underneath, feeling for a space. The floorboards were old and split and the join between each board and its neighbour was wide from age and warping. But not wide enough for a Satsuma bauble. She squeezed herself further in, sliding her hand under the loose rug.

There was an uneven space where a knot in the wood must have worked loose. She pressed it with her fingertips, trying to figure out its size. Then she slid further in until her head was under the bed and she was flat on her stomach with one arm extended. Downstairs, her phone began to ring. Kaneko swore.

Curling her fingers into the small gap in the floor, she felt something hard and cold and round. She inched closer. With two fingers, she traced the shape of the bauble down to the long metal pin at the end. The hatpin. She tried to lift it, but the bauble stayed stuck beneath the floor.

Gently she pulled the hatpin until she found a spot where the gap widened and she could draw it free. She clutched the pin close. The golden dragon watched her, his lips pulled back in a grimace, his long moustache lifted by some invisible breeze. Even in the dark under the bed, he shone. The five tiny claws on each foot sparked with light. The cracklature of the Satsuma glaze around him made him, in contrast, seem long and lithe and smooth.

Her phone was ringing again. Kaneko pulled herself free of the bed and the ringing got louder. Then she realised the noise was coming up the stairs towards her.

She scrambled to her feet, clasping the pin in her hand, the dragon pressed to the web of her thumb.

A shadow stepped into the room, and then the man who owned it.

“
Who are you?” she asked.

“
Your next appointment,” the man smiled.

He raised the phone and shook it, like he was expecting it to rattle. He was pale and bald.
A shop dummy before they applied the wig, as featureless and bland as a canvas, as uncanny as a walking corpse.
 

He said, “I got your number.”

“
But how’d you know my address?” Not even Merv was dumb enough to share that information.

“
I followed the numbers,” the man said. “The ringing of your phone. See? It’s my gift.”

Freak.

Kaneko found herself taking two steps back for every step he took forward. Her back was against the wall before he’d even taken four steps. She slid sideways, the hatpin clenched stupidly between both hands.

“
Let’s get this straight,” Kaneko said. “You look like you’re planning something violent. Is that right?”

The man grinned. “You’re very direct.”

“
That’s right. And I want you to know, if you try something on me, they’ll find you.”

“
How?”

“
I’ve got your number, too, remember? My boss spoke to you.”

“
Who’d believe it?” he asked. “We haven’t met, we’ve never spoken, you’ve never come to my house. Don’t you see? I could be anyone. But it’s very unlikely I’m the person who owns the phone number in your phone.”

“
The police might believe it,” she said. “They have a taskforce for people with creepy powers like yours.”

He hesitated, but just for an instant. Then he laughed.

“
Oh? That should make all the difference.”

He lunged and she whirled. She leapt over the bed and towards the stairs behind him. He came for her. She ran, one hand to the wall. She’d made it down five steps before he had her. He wrenched a fistful of her hair and she spun. She screamed. She reached up her hands to save herself.

∞
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¥
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“
And you stabbed him with a hatpin?” the detective asked.

“
Yes, Detective Palmer. A hatpin,” Kaneko replied.

Detective Palmer had a habit of wincing whenever Kaneko spoke. She had brown skin and dark eyes and a long brown plait like a cable that hung straight at her back.

Kaneko memorised the word
cable
, determined to use it later.
 

“
How many times?” Palmer winced.

“
What?”

“
How many times did you stab him with the hatpin?”

Kaneko shrugged. “Enough that he stopped coming for me.”

She held her hands still in her lap. There was blood to her elbows, blood on her skirt, her shirt, blood — sprayed and dried — across her face. She could feel it catching at the sides of her eyes when she blinked. She tried not to blink.

Palmer was looking at Kaneko’s hands.

Kaneko said, “Is that going to be a problem?”

“
Could be. Depends.”

“
On whether I have previous convictions, that sort of thing? Whether I’m a good person?”

Palmer made a note in a small, black notebook. “Depends who’s doing the deciding.”

“
Right.”

“
You’d never met him before?” Palmer asked.

“
He said he had my number.” Kaneko replied.

Detective Palmer nodded. Just like that, she nodded. As if she’d heard it all before.

One of the paramedics handed Kaneko an ice pack. Not knowing quite what to do with it, she pressed it to her temple. She tried not to look at the browning smears on her arm.

She asked, “Who else can do that? Just, hear a number and follow it to a phone? Across miles?”

Palmer winced. “No one I know.”

“
Right,” Kaneko said. “Right. That’s good, I guess.”

There was a pause, during which time Kaneko’s mind was blessedly, remarkably blank for the first time in a long time. She felt swept clean.

Palmer stood beside her. Not even waiting. Just standing.

“
You believe me, though, right?” Kaneko asked her.

“
Yeah. I believe you.”

Kaneko let out her breath. She pressed the ice bag to an ache along the top of her shoulder. Her notebook was open across her knee. She’d grabbed it before she’d even reached for the phone. But the open page of the notebook held nothing but blood-red smears.

Around her, the forensics team dusted the balustrade for prints and took photos of the spatter on the steps.
Spatter
. Not a big enough word for the mess the stranger had left behind.
 

She watched someone bag the fallen hatpin.

“
Will I get that back?” she asked.

Palmer glanced up at the forensics team. “Eventually. It’s a nice example. Satsuma, right?”

“
Yeah. Family heirloom.”

“
Nobody wears hatpins anymore,” Palmer lamented.

“
Nobody wears hats,” Kaneko reasoned. “It’s all baseball caps nowdays. Is he dead?”

“
Oh, he’s dead all right. You doubted it?”

“
The hatpin’s so small.”

“
Sometimes location is all that matters,” Palmer told her.

“
Good.” Kaneko reversed the ice bag, letting the cold numb her. “I mean…”

“
I know.” Palmer made another note in her notebook and looked up, like she was seeing the room for the first time.

“
Will I be charged?” Kaneko asked.

“
I can’t say for sure.”

But the detective fixed Kaneko with her gaze and gave a slow shake of her head.
No.
 

“
I don’t understand why he came after me,” Kaneko said. “I mean, why
me?
”
 

“
He probably figured he’d found the perfect randomiser,” Palmer replied. “Random victim, random crime. Worst damn things to try and solve.”