“Why are you telling me this?”
The web wrapped tightly around Carlson’s throat and Tomas had to look away. It was clear this was hard for the Kott to talk about but the image of his strangulation was disturbing. “It’s the way he was just gone. I know it’s none of my business but it was just so sudden and, well, Mr. Hess was a really nice man to work for. Funny, you know? Please don’t tell anybody, but we used to stop at bars on the way back from his training. He’d buy drinks and we’d laugh and talk. Even Mr. Adlai would laugh.”
Tomas rubbed his eyes, the strain of trying not to see the pulsing web of anxiety over the driver’s face exhausting him. “What is it exactly that you’re trying to tell me?”
Carlson sighed. “I think I know where he is. I mean, I don’t know exactly, like an address or anything, but I wasn’t the only one who liked Mr. Hess. He had this really nice way about him, not nice like waitress-nice, but sort of funny and crazy that got on some people’s nerves but a lot of us really liked. Especially, you know, us.” He tapped his chest.
“Kott.”
“Yeah. Us. Sometimes, and I don’t mean you, and I don’t mean any disrespect, really I don’t, but sometimes we’re kind of invisible around here. You all will talk around us and say things like we can’t hear you.”
“And you heard where Hess is?”
“Not exactly.”
“What exactly?” Tomas was beginning to regret not getting out at his apartment.
“Just a name. Westin. I think it’s the name of a facility. A private one.”
“Do you know where it is?”
Carlson shook his head. “But I do know that it’s run by Kott. See, when I was driving for Mr. Hess, we went to a confab in Detroit and I met this Kott girl and we started talking. We’re not allowed inside the confabs, so there’s all this time to kill. Anyway, she was going to college and was having trouble because”—
Tomas dropped his head back against the leather seat. Like his grandmother, Carlson could talk endlessly. Unlike his grandmother, however, the driver needed no particular topic. Tomas dug his nails into his palms, struggling to keep from drowning in the ocean of words pouring from the Kott’s mouth. Something about a girl with epilepsy and a PhD. A solitary assignment. Needing to find a replacement. Tomas didn’t want to offend any member of the Kott but he thought his ears might be bleeding from the assault.
“Carlson, please. It’s very late. Can we get to the point?”
“Yeah, sure, I’m sorry. I’m nervous, you know?” He smiled and wiped a line of sweat off his upper lip. “Okay, so here’s what happened. I’m assigned to pick up a new Kott assistant at O’Hare, Katie something or other. She’s real young, college girl, and as soon as she gets in the car, she’s on her cell. And, like I said, I don’t want to eavesdrop but I’ve got ears and I hear things and she asks, ‘How long a drive is it to Westin?’ Well I’ve never heard of Westin but I file it away in my mind, you know? I’m very verbal. Words just stick to me. They always have.” Tomas believed him completely.
“So after she gets off the phone, we start talking. She tells me she’s here for some sensitive—that’s the word she used, sensitive—project and that she’s real excited about it. Then this beep goes off on her cell phone and I think she’s taking another call but no, it’s an alarm and she pulls out a bottle of pills. Well, I don’t want to pry but she sees me looking and tells me she has epilepsy. And I say, ‘No kidding! I’ve got a friend with epilepsy.’ ”
Tomas fought the urge to throw himself out of the car.
“I tell her about Deb and she says, ‘Deb McKinley? You’re kidding! That’s who I’m replacing!’ Then, I guess she figures since I knew Deb, I knew about this Westin place, and she tells me how nervous she is about being alone with just this one guy. I act like I know what she’s talking about because, you know, I don’t want to seem stupid or anything, and she starts talking about isolation studies and how even the Nahan are nervous about this guy and all the security protocols she’s got to learn. You see what I’m saying?”
Tomas had gone so long without blinking his eyes were dry. He squeezed them shut and tried to speak slowly. “It’s very late, Carlson. I’m sorry, I don’t seem to be following you. What do two girls with epilepsy have to do with Hess?”
“They didn’t just have epilepsy. They both studied the psychology of prisons and prisoners. Deb got her gig the week Mr. Hess was taken away. She’s done and this girl is brought in. Same major, same illness, same hush-hush status. Now I don’t claim to understand how you all operate in there but Mr. Hess told me things about what he did for a living. Most of it didn’t make sense, you know, and he liked to pull my leg a lot but you could tell that he was treated differently inside that complex just like you are.”
“How do you know how I’m treated inside the complex?”
Carlson held his palms up. “People talk. And they don’t see us when they do.”
“Apparently not.” Tomas chewed the inside of his lip. The lines that had entangled Carlson’s head were thinning and fading now that he had unburdened his soul. “So why didn’t you tell any of this to Adlai? He’s been looking everywhere for his friend.”
“He hasn’t been looking here. I know him and Mr. Hess were good friends but they weren’t much alike. Mr. Adlai is one of those guys who doesn’t look at us, any of us. He’s, um, kind of cold, you know?”
Tomas laughed without humor. “I know. Trust me. Can you find out where this Westin place is? Do you still stay in touch with this Deb lady?”
“Yeah, but she won’t tell me.”
“Even if you tell her it’s important?”
“Look, Mr. Desara. I really want to help Mr. Hess. I’m worried about him. It’s not like him to just disappear like that but I’ve got to be careful. Deb’s not going to say anything because they made it really clear that it was top secret. I know I told you sometimes we Kott are invisible but we’ve got to assume we’re not, you get what I’m saying? I mean, this is not the kind of job you get fired from, if you get my meaning.”
Chapter Nine:
PETILN
Petiln: literally to desire another; the requests for life guidance from Storytellers
The industrial park was nearly empty. Tomas covered the hallways, passing darkened offices of common and Nahan alike. Carlson’s words haunted him. He walked past these doors every day. How many people did he just blow by without noticing? The two common security guards waved him on into the secure blue-carpeted area and the Nahan receptionist smiled up at him as if showing up at night were the most natural thing in the world. He pressed his thumbprint to the scanner and entered the halls of the Council complex.
Most of the offices were dark; Vartan’s light was off. A few people whispered among themselves in the Communication Room but for the most part the business of the day was over. From the very last conference room on the right side of the hall, light spilled out from under the door. Tomas poked his head in and found Dalle kicked back surrounded by files. The Storyteller scribbled a note, tossed the folder onto the floor, and reached for another one. When he saw Tomas in the doorway, he paused mid-reach.
“Good lord, tell me I haven’t worked all night.”
“No,” Tomas said. “It’s still night. I couldn’t sleep.”
Dalle gestured to an empty chair. “You feel okay?” Tomas slipped into the seat quietly. “It’s not a trick question, Desara.”
“I feel okay.” He wished Dalle would look at him. “I’m sorry. About leaving the way I did. Have I really fucked things up?”
Dalle made a sound that could almost be a laugh. “Oh, on the list of fuck-ups that have come from this building, yours isn’t even in the top one hundred.” He smiled at Tomas.
And there it was, the flood of Dalle’s attention, like a warm front pounding across the room. Tomas couldn’t have explained it to anyone, he didn’t have the words, but he felt it pour over him, easing the pain in his chest.
“You’
ll find, Desara, that the line between good decisions and bad is very, very blurry. But that’s what we do as Storytellers. We keep making decisions.” He tapped a pile of folders in front of him.
“What are those?”
“Petiln.” Dalle said.
Tomas cocked his head. “Infidelity?”
Dalle looked up. “That’s kind of literal. Petiln are our day job. You didn’t think we just sat around poisoning each other, did you? These are the itsy-bitsy pieces that make up our big world. Complaints, requests, job recommendations, identity swaps, you name it. Most of the time people make their own decisions, for better or worse, but sometimes they feel stuck or unsure or just bored with their own decisions and they request advice from us. Here’s one.” He slid a folder before Tomas. Inside was a photograph of a young Nahan woman at a desk in a cubicle.
“This is Elena. Just outside of Indianapolis. She’s working in an insurance firm and has been very helpful putting paperwork through for us on a number of medical claims. She’s reaching her first century mark, needs to flip, doesn’t know what to do with her life. The Council wants her to stay in the industry, albeit under another name, doing what she’s doing now because she’s good at it but she wants a change.”
“So what do we do?”
“We look at her,” Dalle said, “dream about her and come up with something for her.”
Tomas looked up to see if he was kidding. “How am I supposed to do that?”
“I already told you.” Dalle held up the photo of Elena. “Look at her, Desara. Dream about her. This isn’t rocket science.”
“But won’t I just be making it all up?”
Dalle spoke in a singsong. “Maybe that’s why they say ‘Life Could Be a Dream.’ Just try it. No harm in it. She doesn’t have to take your suggestions if she doesn’t want to.”
Feeling silly, Tomas leaned back in the chair and studied the photo of Elena the Insurance Agent. He focused on nothing really, just letting her eyes look into his through the camera lens. As he stared, the planes of her face began to lighten, the shadows under her eyes darkened. He saw her bitten fingernails and the paper cut on her right index finger. Behind her, her in-box overflowed and a cup of paperclips had spilled on the blotter. The tail end of a croissant stuck out of a crumpled wrapper next to a short cup of espresso. On the bulletin board behind her, he could just make out a picture of a full moon. He heard a faint whispering in his head and sighed.
“Can she go to Paris? Fashion? She’s got an excellent head for business. Do we have any boutiques she could run? Or be a personal assistant? She’d like Paris.”
“We’d all like Paris.” Dalle grinned.
“Yeah, but I think she needs it.”
He slid Tomas a pen. “Write it on there.”
“What? Where?”
“Right there on the bottom of the situation request. Say ‘recommend Paris, business training or personal assistance.’ We’ll forward it to Resources and they’ll find her a match. There’s always someone who needs an assistant somewhere.”
“Just like that?”
“Just like that. If she takes it, you just cost the Council several tens of thousands of dollars and a reliable insurance agent.”
Tomas hesitated in his writing. “Is that a problem?”
“Does it feel like a problem?”
“No.”
Dalle laughed and opened another folder.
The offices around them were coming to life by the time they’d cleared half the files. Despite the hours of work, Tomas felt energized.
Dalle was also bright eyed. “This part of the gig doesn’t suck, does it?”
“No, it doesn’t. It would be nice if this is all there was.”
Dalle straightened a stack of folders from the floor. “I hope you’re not waiting for me to tell you that’s how it is because it isn’t, but there are some bright spots. And for your first crack at petiln, you did a pretty nice job. Expensive but nice.” He stood up and stretched his back. “Come on, let’s go see what Sylva has in her snack drawer.”
In the darkened office, Dalle moved easily, finding Sylva’s stash of snacks. Tomas flicked on a small silk-covered lamp, bathing the room in a soft golden tone. He and Dalle flopped on the couch.
“It’s a good thing you came back, kid,” Dalle said, holding up a bag of Reese’s Pieces. “Sylva got these just for you.”
“Those are my favorite.”
“I know.”
Tomas rolled his eyes. “Of course you know. Want some?” His mentor picked out a few pieces and popped them into his mouth. “Dalle, how long have you been here in Chicago?”
“I moved here when they built the complex. We used to be in St. Louis until we got this land and built this center. It was quite a feather in the Council’s cap.” He glanced at Tomas and shook his head. “It’s strange to think how this must look to you. You’ve never known anything but the Council, have you? They’ve been established your whole life. In this form, I mean.”
“Was there another form?”
Dalle waggled his hand. “It hasn’t always been so formal, so established. In many ways it has made things easier for us, even for, you know, us. Less minutiae,, less squabbling. Or at least, we don’t have to squabble.” He laughed to himself. “Now we have professional squabblers, little people who just love fighting over minutiae. It’s practically Vartan’s reason to breathe.”
When Tomas said nothing, Dalle nudged him. “Does that make you uncomfortable?”
Tomas knew there was no point in hiding it. “Yeah, kind of. I mean Mr. Vartan is the Coordinator of the Central Council. My mom works for the Council. The group I grew up in, everyone works for the Council. The Coordinator is the boss; he’s responsible for everything.”
Dalle patted his knee. “Oh Desara, you have a lot to learn. I don’t envy your transition, coming up in the middle of a Council family. I have to make a note to address this in Heritage School. Vartan is a bureaucrat. A good one, if such a thing exists. He knows protocol; he likes meetings; he’s good at surrounding himself with smart people. But he operates within strict guidelines. He has profits to make; he has to protect the Kott; he has to stay on top of the paperwork.” Dalle grabbed some more candy. “I wonder what you must look like to him.”
“What do you mean?”
“I mean that for the first time in his life, he may think there’s a Storyteller that will call him boss. Someone that grew up in Heritage School. Make no mistake, Desara”—Dalle pointed his finger at Tomas—“you don’t call him Mr. Vartan anymore. You don’t answer to him. He answers to you. We try not to flaunt this obvious dominance of authority but it seems we may need to refresh the point. I need to keep reminding myself how new this must seem to you, questioning the Council.”
“Believe me, Stell is on board with teaching me that lesson.”
Dalle laughed out loud. “I like her. I’m glad you have her. I even like that she told me to shut up.” He nudged Tomas. “But tell her not to do that again. It’s good that you’ve had her with you through all this. She’s quite a girl. A black stone, indeed.”
“It hasn’t been easy.” Tomas knew Dalle could hear the strain in his words.
“I know, kid. It never is. It’s such a strange pairing, Storytellers and acul ‘ads. Irresistible but strange. We’re both able to do things that the rest of our people cannot. But for all we can see, it’s hard to understand what drives them. But there must be a reason behind it because there are two things every young Storyteller has—a grumpy mentor and an acul ‘ad friend.”
Tomas took the risk. “Like Hess and Anton Adlai?”
“Exactly,” Dalle said. “If you think I’m grumpy, you should have seen Lucien. He suffers from vivid dreams, prescient, sometimes even apocalyptic. That’s one of the reasons Lucien can be such a prick.”
Tomas laughed. “That’s not how I imagined Storytellers talking about each other.”
“We’re still Nahan, kid. We still screw up and want
things and fear things and forget things.” He sighed. “We’re still human. Lucien wakes up a nervous wreck half the time. When he realized Hess had those same types of dreams, long before his induction, Lucien felt a sort of kinship toward him, kind of an empathy. Me? I never could get a handle on Hess. We were always apart, at corners to each other.”
“You didn’t like him?”
“It’s not like that. We just didn’t connect. He was nervous and prickly and tough, always being funny and looking for the angle. I found him exhausting. And she never said it but I think he irritated the shit out of Sylva. And as for Anton Adlai,” Dalle chuckled at Tomas’s groan. “Acul ‘ads are a story unto themselves.”
The crowd was thin at Petey’s, the Nahan bar that had so surprised Stell her first night working with Adlai. The bartender set two beers before them as Adlai pulled out a cell phone.
“I thought you didn’t carry a phone.”
He finished reading the message. “No. I said I don’t carry a Council phone. This is private. Just like the job.”
“What is the job?”
“It may not be anything. Or it may be something you’re really going to like.”
The bartender slid a small cloth-wrapped bundle across the bar. Adlai pulled back a corner of the rag, revealing what looked to Stell like a wad of electrical tape and gum. He nodded his approval and slipped the package into his jacket pocket.
“Hopefully I won’t have to use this.”
The bartender laughed. “Yeah, I know how you hate violence. You got the address?”
Adlai nodded and tipped back the last of his beer.
He pulled the bike up to the freight elevator of a factory building not far from Petey’s. Stell watched as he pulled out key after key on his key ring, unlocking a labyrinthine lock system, before lifting the gate and rolling the bike into the grimy car. She hopped in behind him and Adlai pulled out even more keys to make the elevator carry them to the top floor.
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