New World Fairy Tales

by Cassandra Parkin

  ‘I didn’t know you and Jennifer —’ I bite my tongue, but it’s too late.

  ‘That’s because you never come around except when you want something. Didn’t you notice I was pregnant last year?’

  I think back. Last year was the Flores case — a high-schooler who faked a trip to the Grand Canyon. He had it all worked out, called when he said he would, friends sending postcards for him at strategic points. Only thing he hadn’t allowed for was good old Uncle Pete trying to meet him for dinner. I found him in Atlantic City. He was running an online gambling company from the school library; he’d gone to meet his backers. Carolina helped me track his rental car. I remember thinking she’d put some weight on, and that it suited her.

  ‘That’s so like you.’ She shrugs. ‘I’m happy, I don’t need you, so I’m invisible. All your attention goes on your work.’

  It’s nothing but true, which makes it worse.

  ‘I’m sorry.’ She takes my hand remorsefully. ‘That was mean.’

  I don’t want her to see me hurting. But I don’t have anything else to use.

  ‘How sorry?’

  ‘Ruth, for God’s sake . . .’ she laughs. ‘You’re unbelievable, you know that?’

  I keep looking at her. It’s not in Carolina to say ‘no’ to anyone. That kid of theirs will grow up more spoiled than a tub of warm yoghurt.

  ‘Okay,’ she sighs. ‘Hit me with it, Ruth.’

  And now I’m walking away from the rental office, and I’m definitely not crying, because that’s just not my style, and I’ve got a name. Thomas Anderson. I’ve prostituted myself for two words on a Hertz-branded sticky-note. I wonder if there’s a way to calculate self-esteem, bill it as an expense item to Angel.

  It’s late that evening. My living room’s filled with dirty glasses, cigarette butts, paperwork and other people’s personal business. I pick up a highball with a dried-up lime wedge in the bottom, then put it down again. Why pick on that one thing when there’s so much else to go at?

  Thomas Anderson is an insurance manager from Wisconsin, which makes him a damned long way from home. I look again at the photos, wondering how he knows her, what he is to her. Sweet Jesus, she’s beautiful. Even when she’s screeching like a banshee, she’s beautiful. I’m watching Necklace for the fourth time.

  Something’s nagging me, and I just can’t figure out what. What have I looked at that I haven’t seen? What have I heard that I haven’t listened to? I’m tired; it’s been a long, strange day, and I’m not proud of my part in it. Before I can stop myself, I remember Carolina’s face. I was up all night with the baby. Damn babies, everywhere babies, I swear the world would be better without them . . .

  And then I’m leaping out of my seat, riffling through the photographs, and it’s staring me right in the face, and I’m furious because I hate being wrong, but at least I’m the only person who knows how wrong I was. On the upside, I’m now sitting on a goldmine, a story big enough to keep me in anything I want for the next ten years; Angel will have to pony up a lot more than five grand to get his hands on this one. On the downside, if I take the money, I’ll be worse than Angel’s ever been.

  I have a decision to make.

  I’m sliding on my belly through the undergrowth, freezing, when the guards pass, peeling off an entire outer layer of clothing and hiding it in the California lilac so I can go in clean and leave no trace, jimmying the French doors to Kate’s bedroom. Kate and Brad are at the premiere of Lost in Vegas. There’s no intruder alarm; this place is more like a hotel than a home, and more like a prison than both. I slide through the gap and hold my breath for thirty seconds. But nobody hears me. I’ve cut my hand, but I’m feeling no pain; I’m high as a kite on adrenaline. I wrap it in a strip of my discarded outer T-shirt. I can’t afford to leave bloodstains.

  Her room’s beautiful, minimal to the point of emptiness, a style only sustainable for those with infinite closet space and an army of minions to pick up after them. But there’ll be something, I know it. Women always keep souvenirs. Beneath my bed, I have a scruffy cardboard box with letters, photographs, a blue T-shirt stiff with seawater. It’s poorly hidden, but I have no-one to hide it from. Kate has maids, security guards, a jealous husband, plus her own personal staff, because a secret like this would break the loyalty of anyone.

  Human beings measure time by the beat of their heart. It seems an age I’m in there, but Mr Seiko tells me it’s only been thirty-five minutes when I find what I’m looking for: a legal-sized envelope taped to the back of the erotic Hiroshige print above her make-up stand.

  Leave now, my heart tells me, pounding and pounding. You’ve got at least twenty minutes, Mr Seiko insists. I can’t listen to my heart; what’s in the envelope can’t leave this room. I tip the contents onto the bed. I’m expecting the letters, but not the yearbook, which falls open at a page two-thirds through.

  There’s Kate, younger and fresher, her hair in a ponytail, her make-up inexpert and smeary. And there’s Thomas Anderson, beside her on the bleachers, those eyes piercing me, wary and watchful. I’m transfixed. There he is. There they are. Kate Miller and Thomas Anderson.

  The handle of the door turns.

  But you had time, insists Mr Seiko, ticking like thunder. Told you to take it with you, my heart screams, now we’re screwed, aren’t we? There’s nowhere to go. Even if I had time to make the window, which I don’t, there’s no way to replace the evidence. I never get caught. But until the day you die, never’s only not so far, and the way my heart’s clawing its way out of my chest, that day could be today — Kate limps into the room, wearing a demure and simple white sheath dress. The boat-neck caresses her immaculate collarbone, the sleeves cover her elbows but stop short of her wrists. Her hair is a heavy chignon, tendrils coiling onto her neck. Her nude peep-toe Manolos and her perfect French pedicure make me feel under-dressed. She drops her purse, pulls off the heavy diamond ear-rings and snatches off her shoes in one continuous gesture of disgust that flows seamlessly into the moment when she looks up and sees a strange woman, hair shoved under a woollen hat and dirt under her fingernails, riffling through her most intimate business.

  I can’t begin to imagine how she must feel.

  We stare at each other. I watch her pass from amazement to terror to horrified understanding. She subdues her instinct, which is to scream. My heart has taken all the pain it can tonight; I don’t think it can cope with watching her silence, the mark of her isolation.

  ‘It’s all right.’ The words come up out of my gut; my brain gets no say in it. She shakes her head, and she has a point; how can it possibly be all right?

  ‘You’re press,’ she whispers. ‘That guy in the diner . . .’

  I cross the room and take her hands in mine. They’re impossibly silky and soft. I think about the hours that go into their care: creams, hot towels, massages. My bandage smears her fingers. ‘My name’s Ruth Boone and I’m a Private Investigator. And I can help you.’ A scream bubbles in her throat. I have to silence her, for her sake as well as mine. My mouth finds hers before I even know what’s happening. Her lips part for me, I taste her tongue against my own. What am I doing? We’re both trembling when I pull away.

  ‘How can you help?’

  I can hear voices in the corridor outside. Someone will be here in seconds to help her out of that dress, to return the jewellery to the vault. I have fractional moments to find the right words. My brain finally decides to help out.

  ‘I can help you with Miranda’s father,’ I tell her.

  I sit in my living room and watch the sunrise. It’s a sad fact that even the dawn can look worn-out seedy when it struggles to reach you through a haze of cigarette smoke.

  What have I done?

  ‘His name’s Thomas Anderson,’ I tell Angel, over an espresso brought by his assistant. I don’t drink it, on the somewhat flawed principle that, when wilfully withholding the
story of the decade from the man paying your fee, the moral thing to do is to take as little else from him as possible. ‘They were at high school together. No romance. Just catching up on the past. Bad luck.’ Every word I tell him is true, but truth and honesty are more distantly related than you’d think. I hand him the photographs, minus one.

  ‘I see . . .’ Please God, he won’t see. ‘Krabitz, get your ass over here.’ A skinny guy eating cold noodles out of a box ambles over. ‘This the guy?’

  Krabitz looks. ‘Yeah, that’s him.’

  ‘Fucking hell.’ Angel glares at me, like it’s my fault his mark isn’t having sex with a Wisconsin insurance salesman. Part of him wants to let go; he’s already pissed away five grand on nothing. But the bigger, hungrier part still hopes. He taps his fingers against the glossy paper.

  ‘How about you tail her a bit longer? I’ll pay three a week for the next five weeks. You never know, right?’

  ‘What did Brad King do to piss you off?’

  ‘He cheats at poker, the little shit. You gonna follow Kate for me?’

  ‘This is about poker? No deal.’

  ‘Why? My money not good enough for you suddenly?’

  ‘I’m telling you, Angel, there’s nothing there.’ A huge lie, my first. Already Kate Miller is corrupting me.

  ‘Everyone’s guilty of something.’

  ‘Let it go, Angel. The story you wanted isn’t there. And it’s against my code of conduct to exploit my clients.’

  ‘A PI with morals? I’ll call the taxidermist.’

  ‘Did you just use a four-syllable word? I’ll get him to stuff you while he’s here.’

  He grins, and looks me up and down. It’s a long way from amicable.

  ‘Okay. You win. We’ll call it quits at five. Nice shoes.’

  ‘Thanks. Nice veneers.’

  ‘Thanks. Don’t fall off those heels on your way out.’

  It’s three days later and I’m staring at a cheque for five thousand dollars. The apartment is tidy. For weeks my cupboards will be teetering death-traps and I won’t be able to find anything. Apparently a cluttered environment implies a cluttered mind, so what does an empty one mean? My mind is far from empty; it obsessively circles the memory of Kate’s mouth like a dog round an empty food bowl.

  The knock at the door yanks me out of my chair. I don’t know what to do with my hands, or my arms, or my voice. My body has become a strange land. Kate Miller in my apartment is like a unicorn in your bathtub.

  ‘Can you really help me?’ Kate begs. It should sound gauche, but beautiful women can break all the rules.

  ‘Yes,’ I tell her, this being the one thing I am sure of. ‘Everyone has a secret. I’ll find his.’

  ‘How did you know?’

  I hand her the photo I withheld from Angel; Thomas, glancing warily up at the camera he didn’t know was there. She’s shocked, as people always are when they find they’ve been observed.

  ‘I didn’t see you,’ she says.

  ‘That’s the idea.’

  ‘Who paid you?’

  ‘Doesn’t matter. They didn’t get this.’ I remember the first thought that crossed my mind as I watched them. ‘Thomas Anderson is blackmailing you, isn’t he?’

  ‘How did you —’ She stops. ‘Yes, he is.’

  ‘But it’s not for money.’

  ‘No.’

  ‘Access? To Miranda?’

  A tear rolls down her cheek. If I touched my tongue to its path, would the taste be salt or sweet?

  ‘I’m so scared,’ she whispers. ‘If anyone, anyone sees them together —’

  ‘Tell me how it happened.’

  ‘You’re the detective. If you’re so good, you tell me how it happened.’

  Kate needs a miracle. I need her to believe I can deliver. I begin with what I know.

  ‘You knew him at school,’ I say slowly. ‘In Silverwood Falls.’

  She nods. This much I know from the yearbook, but that’s as far as the script goes. I begin to improvise.

  ‘You left him behind when you came to Hollywood,’ I say. ‘Your father brought you.’ She’s sceptical, this was in the press coverage. I take a guess. ‘Your dad told everyone his daughter would be a star.’ I’m looking for the smallest signal, a flicker of an eyelid, a twitch of a pinky finger. Nothing. ‘They smiled, but kindly.’

  She nods.

  ‘Okay.’

  Okay? What does that even mean? ‘He parlayed his way past studio security into — into your future husband’s office. He made a fool of himself and embarrassed you, but you caught Brad’s eye, and he put you into Necklace. It was a publicity stunt. There were nasty rumours coming out of the set; he wanted a positive story. Plus, if it flopped, he could blame you.’ Too much? I can’t tell. ‘But it was a huge hit. Because of you.’

  ‘Thank you.’

  ‘We both know it’s true.’ I can’t fit Thomas Anderson into the jigsaw yet, so I keep going. ‘Then came Ring, lower net but bigger gross, the third one was a cert. Then Brad said for a joke in an interview that if Cradle grossed over five hundred mill, he’d marry you.’

  ‘Hollywood romance.’ She smiles, but it’s brittle. I remember a strange caesura in the Cradle coverage that tells me there’s a nasty little secret they had to bury. A tiny item from a cub reporter — Kate collapsing on set from ‘nervous exhaustion’— which absolutely nobody picks up on. After months of coverage, three weeks of nothing. Sometimes you learn more from silence than words.

  ‘While you were filming Cradle,’ I try, feeling my way into the sentence, ‘you and Brad —’

  ‘It was consensual.’

  Has a woman in love ever used the word consensual? And then afterwards, she had to marry him. I try not to shudder. This isn’t showing me Thomas. I need to look at motivation.

  ‘Walking onto set was like being locked in jail,’ I say tentatively. ‘Strange people, lights, endless pressure. And Brad, breathing down your neck . . .’ At last I’ve got a reaction; a miniscule flinch she can’t restrain. ‘The story was you’d had acting lessons since you were six, but nobody came forward and claimed the glory.’ Her eyes are huge. ‘Kate, did you call Thomas because you needed a friend?’

  ‘He directed me in the high school play,’ she confesses. ‘He stayed in this god-awful little hotel near the airport, and he visited every single night. He coached me. Thad Englemann got the Oscar, but they were Tom’s films, every one.’

  It’s too bizarre to be anything but true.

  ‘And . . .’

  She dips her head.

  ‘Just once,’ she says, from behind her hair. ‘After Cradle wrapped. I wasn’t in love with him, but . . . you know . . .’ I do know. ‘I was sure the baby was Brad’s. Then we did that photo-shoot.’

  It’s an elusive thing; not colouring, not features. It’s the wary way they glance at the camera, the look in their eyes . . . but it’s unmistakeable.

  ‘I got the first letter a week later. Can you really make him stop?’

  ‘I already found this much,’ I say gently.

  ‘Why would you help me? This story could go for millions.’

  ‘Because . . .’ I can’t get past because. Too many answers to choose from. ‘Because . . .’

  And then I can’t think any more, because she kisses me. Kate Miller kisses me. Kate Miller kisses me, and she’s murmuring with pleasure, provoking me to nip her lower lip beneath my teeth. Her frail sweetness, my need to consume and devour, make me think of meringue, and as I lead her to the bedroom where, thank God, the sheets are clean and the ashtray on the night-stand has been emptied, it occurs to me to wonder why I always compare the women I find attractive to desserts, and if this has any bearing on why, ultimately, they always seem to leave me.

  Timewipe: a week later. I’ve driven all the way from Los Angeles t
o Benton, Wisconsin, to discover that Thomas Anderson is a nowhere man, living in limbo, putting down no roots, leaving no memories. He’s been with United Insurance for the last three years, joining from Mid-West Allied. He rents a by-the-numbers-average apartment, in a building you’d struggle to describe even if you lived there. He has three weeks’ worth of mail in his mailbox, five pornographic magazines in his closet, a Glock in his sock drawer, for which he has a licence, and every Carly Simon CD ever released. He earns a mid-range salary, wears a suit and tie, and even when prompted with a photo, his co-workers are uncertain who he is. He dates, but is currently single. The one old girlfriend I manage to track down seems bemused by my interest. She murmurs vaguely about a lack of commitment, and is much happier going steady with a fireman. His life reminds me of someone I can’t quite place. Somewhere between Benton and Silverwood Falls, I realise it’s me, and nearly crash the car in disgust.

  Now I’m simultaneously in Silverwood Falls, Kansas, a coffee shop, three-day-old jeans and a vile mood. I’m the only customer, and the lady who pours my coffee smiles warmly and calls me honey. I’m tired and convinced I smell. I promised Kate a miracle, and I can’t deliver. The photo of Thomas is furry from handling.

  ‘That’s Donna Anderson’s boy,’ says the coffee pot lady. ‘Are you looking for him?’ She sees the look on my face. ‘Welcome to small town life, honey.’

  ‘You know his family?’

  ‘I reckon.’

  I can’t quite believe what I’m hearing. I’ve seen this played out a hundred times on the screen. Can it really be this easy? I pat the seat beside me. She sinks gratefully into it.

  ‘They don’t live here no more, though,’ she continues, and my heart sinks. ‘They moved here from some city, stayed about ten years. Left when Thomas went to college. They was nice people. Quiet, but nice. Mr Anderson, Gregory, he worked at the garage. He was a good mechanic. Donna did a lot for the church. She would have liked more children, but that wasn’t God’s plan.’