Suicide Club

by Rachel Heng

  “Bon appétit,” Mrs. Jackman said, placing her napkin on her lap. She cut a precise square out of her rectangle and forked it into her mouth.

  Lea picked up her cutlery and did the same. But as soon as she placed it on her tongue she could tell something was wrong. The paste was heavy, sticky, greasy—it had no discernible smell on the plate but an overpowering one when in her mouth. It smelled of sweat and grass. It smelled of an animal.

  She wanted to spit it out, but it had already dissolved and was everywhere in her mouth, between her teeth, under her tongue, in the corners of her throat. She remembered the smell of steak at the party. This was nothing like it. The taste in her mouth was oily and sweet, almost rotten in its richness. She grabbed her glass, taking a large gulp of water to wash out the taste.

  But it wasn’t water, either. The liquid burned in her throat, and Lea began to cough. Her eyes watered.

  “Slow down, darling, we’re only on the first course,” the man said.

  “Are you all right?” Mrs. Jackman asked.

  The coughing began to subside. “What—what is that?” Lea said, pushing the glass away. “And that?” She pointed down at her plate.

  “Only the finest foie gras,” the man said, rolling his R. “And the drink—that’s in honor of our new dear leader. Aquavit, a traditional Swedish drink.”

  “Manuel.” Mrs. Jackman shot him a look.

  “This is—this is animal meat,” Lea said. Now that the burning was gone, the taste of it returned. Disgusting, she thought to herself.

  “Not just animal meat, darling,” Manuel said, offended. “Animal fat. Pure, unadulterated fat, from the liver of a free-range goose, imported at great expense from one of the last remaining civilized areas in the European territories.”

  “Have you never had meat before, then?” Mrs. Jackman asked. She spoke quietly, the question innocuous. But Lea heard a frisson in her voice, heard the test that was being posed.

  “Of course I have.” Lea swallowed. “But only chicken and fish. Pork, once. It’s so hard to find, as you know. Nothing—nothing like this.”

  Mrs. Jackman weighed Lea’s words, her utensils poised in her hands. The dark pools of her eyes, Lea noticed, were flecked with yellow, like a cat’s.

  “It’s an acquired taste,” she said slowly. “Try it again. If you want.”

  Lea thought of the button on her blouse, thought of her father. And she picked up her knife and fork again, cut a larger piece this time, the size of a stamp. Before she could hesitate, she put the whole thing in her mouth and forced herself to chew.

  “Mmm,” she said, imitating the way Manuel chewed, closing her eyes briefly, sighing loudly. She tried not to think of the triglycerides, the LDLs, the carcinogens and telomere-shortening preservatives. Think long term, she told herself. What’s a few years here and there if you can shut down the Club, if you can save your father. Be an Immortal.

  “She loves it!” Manuel crowed.

  After a long, unblinking pause, Mrs. Jackman smiled. “Glad you like it,” she said, turning back to her own plate.

  Lea had passed the test. Still, she forced herself to keep eating, holding her breath as she swallowed each mouthful.

  “So you know George?” she said, turning back to Manuel.

  “Oh, dear old George. I have unfortunately had the pleasure, yes. A couple of years back, when I was first flagged as being”—he dropped his voice to a stage whisper—“antisanct.” He gnashed his teeth, then stabbed another piece of foie gras and placed it in his mouth, chewing slowly, deliberately.

  Those around him laughed lazily and sipped their drinks. Oh, stop, Manuel, you’re terrible. Don’t tease the newcomer.

  “What happened?” Lea said, smiling too, like a good sport. “How did you get off the List?”

  “Off the List! Off the List!” Manuel howled. “Oh, you’re a funny one. You’ll be the death of me.”

  When he finished laughing, he saw that she was still staring at him, waiting for an answer. The smile fell from his face and he furrowed his brow.

  “Why are you asking?” he said. “Do you want to get off it?”

  “No,” she said quickly, shaking her head. “I don’t care. I just don’t want to have to keep going to WeCovery.”

  “Think about it,” he said, smiling again. “If you stop going, what can they do? Withhold your extension treatments? Cut your number? Let you die?”

  Everyone was quiet now. They were watching Manuel, watching Lea.

  “Isn’t that what we all want, anyway? Isn’t that what you want?”

  To avoid answering, Lea took another mouthful of foie gras. The taste of it was less unpleasant now. Because she had been expecting it, Lea told herself, because she had braced herself, controlled her gag reflex. But as she cut another square of the processed meat, and another, she felt the saliva in her mouth thicken. She felt the anticipation, the wanting.

  * * *

  Lea attended more meetings. Befriended the others, Manuel especially, for she could see from the way the guests listened to him that he was important. Those at the dinner that night were the core members, she learned, the trusted insiders.

  Why Anja had invited her to that dinner, she had no idea. Lea still talked to her, both at Club meetings and at WeCovery, but try as she did to continue their friendship in the same vein as before she’d found out about the Club, a chill had fallen between them.

  Eventually the Club started involving Lea more, enlisting her for the logistical tasks that came with any large sprawling organization. The things they asked her to do were easy, so mundane they made her head hurt. But now that she had been suspended from her job, her days were long and empty, so Lea willingly moved chairs before meetings, printed flyers, arranged for catering. She wore her camera diligently, filming bits of furniture being moved, fragments of conversation, an invoice here and there. But there was nothing that would give her any information that she could bring to GK, nothing like what she had seen at the party. Even as she felt her mind wilting in boredom, she was in some way relieved.

  She met other members of the Club, learned their motives through gentle questions. Some wanted to avoid even the possibility of getting trapped into becoming an immortal, others simply felt they had had enough and wanted to be in control of their own ends. Others, still, wanted to make a statement. Felt they were fighting for an idea, a fundamental right. Those were the martyrs, the idealists, the principled.

  Those were the self-centered, Lea thought. Like her father.

  * * *

  The days had a strange, dreamlike cast to them.

  When she went in for her next maintenance appointment, Jessie didn’t ask about the Observation or the man who’d come to the clinic looking for Lea, or anything about Lea’s personal life at all. She concerned herself only with the practical issues of Lea’s body. Lea considered asking her about the Third Wave, but the professional glaze of Jessie’s eyes and the quick, matter-of-fact edge to her movements made it clear that there would be no point.

  There was a symmetry to her days, buoyed by the steady rhythm of the Club and WeCovery meetings. They were flip sides of the same coin, as Lea saw it. Now that she had decided on her course of action, her mind was focused on execution, on following the path that she’d laid out for herself. It was oddly peaceful. No Jiang breathing down her neck; no Natalie trying to steal her clients and take her promotions. No Todd following her around the apartment with his languid, optimistic eyes, failing to understand. She hadn’t realized, until he left, how tired he made her.

  So when Lea got the call from Manuel, the call that she had in theory been waiting for this whole time, she felt a surprising twinge. But it wasn’t regret, she told herself firmly, it was the pressure of it all, now that the moment was finally here. Now that she would get the material she needed to get her life back on track. She quashed the feeling, ground it out with the heel of her will, and said of course, she would be there.

  TWENTY-NINE

&
nbsp; The camera the Club gave Lea was heavy, heavier than she had expected. It would require two hands to operate, and she was told to use her shoulder to prop it up. It was intimidatingly built, but they told her it would be easy enough to use. Their regular cameraman, Jonas, had started like that too, standing in at a moment’s notice for someone else. And Jonas managed just fine, so fine he went on to become their permanent cameraman when his predecessor’s turn finally came. Lea didn’t ask what had happened to Jonas, only listened to what she had to do, when she had to turn the camera on, where she had to aim it, which buttons to press in order to immediately broadcast the video via the usual channels.

  The man who taught her how to use the camera was a nervous, soft-spoken thing, with elegant hands like those of a dentist or a neurosurgeon. He looked like someone who had a good day job, someone who could even be a Tender himself. But what Lea had learned over these past few months was that all the Club members, including her, looked like people who could have good day jobs. The man talked slowly, as if she were a child, explaining what the Record button did, the difference between Pause and Stop. He didn’t know that while he told her all this, her own camera was hidden in the folds of the dark silk shirt she wore, its lens peeking out under the second button from the top, watching and listening to everything he said.

  “When it’s over,” the man said, “just leave the camera in the room. Lock the door behind you. Cleanup will handle the rest.”

  “Cleanup? You mean the people in charge of setup?” Lea asked.

  The man frowned, as if she had asked him a personal question he’d rather not answer. Still, he said: “No. Different people.”

  Lea nodded. She had discovered, from watching and listening over the past few weeks, that that was how it was done. Different people for every step of the process—a loose measure to make sure no one ever had enough evidence to testify against the Club. Though, of course, that wasn’t what stopped them from doing it. Everyone who was there, as far as Lea could gather, seemed to truly want to be there.

  When the day came, Lea arrived at the appointed place an hour early. She’d hoped to catch the people setting up as well, to chat with them and somehow get them on camera, so she’d have the full day documented, the whole process, from beginning to end. But when she got to the building, a nondescript office block on the outskirts of the Central Boroughs, it occurred to her that she hadn’t been told what floor or unit they’d be in. Someone was supposed to meet her downstairs.

  Perhaps, however, they weren’t upstairs yet, and if she sat somewhere inconspicuous, she could spot and film them coming in.

  The streets were teeming with office workers. She found a bench in a small square across the street, where she had a direct line of vision into the lobby. It was abandoned and quiet, with its windows taped over and its glass doors blocked by signs proclaiming its decommissioned status. A single bored security guard sat at a booth in front of the doors.

  Lea sat down on the bench, easing the strap of the camera bag off her shoulder. She rubbed her back, digging her fingers into the hard flesh, enjoying the painful release. She realized it had been weeks since she last attended Swimlates. She would need to go back soon, or it would start showing in her maintenance numbers. Not that Jessie would ask why she hadn’t been going, Lea thought.

  It was a glorious, crisp day, and Lea wasn’t the only one who’d stopped to linger in the square. She watched a rounded man dressed in a red shirt and matching red shorts, his stark white socks pulled up high and resolute, stroll by with two large huskies. The huskies had their tongues out despite the autumn chill and they walked reluctantly, pulling at the leash that the man held. Despite their sluggish pace, their bearing was straight and proud, their eyes magnificently dark. Lea wondered what it must be like for them in the summer, and felt a sudden urge to knock their red-faced owner down, undo their collars, and set them free.

  Lea looked up. There they were, a trim, upright woman in a loose silk shift that billowed in the wind and a man who was slight and thin, wearing a deep maroon shirt that set off the dark glow of his skin. There was something familiar about the man. It was something about his hands, the way they moved from his hip to his elbows to his face.

  After speaking to the security guard briefly, the couple pushed the frosted-glass doors open and went into the building. Lea waited a few minutes, then crossed the street.

  “Hello,” she said to the security guard, surprised at how normal her voice sounded.

  He looked up from his tablet, face creased in boredom. “Yes?” he asked.

  “I’m with them.” She bobbed her head toward the building. “The couple that came in earlier.”

  “Oh.” He furrowed his brow. “Oh, yeah, they said someone would be coming. But later. You’re not supposed to be here so soon.”

  “God. They keep doing this! Every single time. I mean, how difficult is it to remember—”

  The security guard winced. “Why don’t you just go up? It’s no big deal.”

  “Thank you.” Lea flashed him a smile.

  “No problem.” He turned back to his tablet. “Oh,” he said without looking up, “elevators are off. But three flights isn’t too bad a climb.”

  The lobby was cool, cold even, and the only light filtered in through the grime-covered windows. The way the lobby was laid out was not dissimilar to Lea’s own office, with the receptionist’s desk in the middle of a large empty space, and the elevators lining the far wall. It was strange to imagine that perhaps the building of glass and steel where Long Term Capital Partners resided would one day be empty too.

  Three flights. The stairs had a musty smell. She craned her neck and looked up. They were there, somewhere, maybe already in the room where it was meant to happen. The tessellation of steps blurred before her eyes.

  She gripped the cold railing to steady herself and started climbing. When she reached the third floor, her breath came in short, sharp bursts, and her heart pounded in her chest. She stepped out into the hallway. It was obvious where they were, for all the doorways were dark except for one.

  * * *

  She would never forget the look on the man’s face when she opened the door. His eyes were dark stars in his face, his full lips curled in a surprised O.

  “It’s you,” he said.

  His hands were still now, cupped in his lap as if over a fluttering bird eager to escape. He sat in a chair with a black mesh back and shiny silver legs on wheels, the kind of chair that wouldn’t look out of place in her own office. The people who’d worked here must have left it behind when they moved out, Lea found herself thinking. She’d already seen the maroon shirt when he was standing outside the building, but now she also saw that he had on clean, pressed gray trousers and a pair of dress shoes, midnight black and so shiny that that they almost looked plastic.

  “Ambrose,” Lea said.

  * * *

  She had seen him just last week; he’d sat across from her at WeCovery, partnered with Susan. She’d thought he’d seemed better, calmer. She’d noticed that his posture had improved. He’d been sitting with his feet flat on the floor, rather than having his knees curled up to his chest or his legs crossed on his chair.

  He sat like that now. Again, she noticed that his hands were still.

  “Lea,” he said. “I didn’t know—” he stopped. A look of surprise flitted across his face, but just as quickly as it had appeared, it was gone. “Well, it doesn’t matter, does it. What matters is you’re here now. Do you have the camera?” He gestured at the large bag slung from Lea’s shoulder.

  “I—yes, I do.” She fumbled with the strap, lowering the bag to the ground.

  Her mind raced. Ambrose. She had steeled herself for this, had watched the previous videos over and over till the sick feeling in her stomach receded, till all that was left was an empty, numb spot. She was ready, she’d told herself and told Manuel; she was ready to watch, to film. More than that, it had turned out that the weeks of footage from other Clu
b events and meetings would be useful after all, for GK had said that they now had incontrovertible evidence that Mrs. Jackman had close personal ties with the lieutenants of the group, those who carried out the dirty work, who made the calls, who arranged for the pills, the cameras, the distribution of videos. Lieutenants like Manuel, whose phone call to Lea stating the place and time of Ambrose’s suicide had been diligently recorded, diligently sent along. Now all they needed was the final piece. The proof that the act had been carried out.

  Her hands were cold as she unzipped the bag and lifted the camera out of it.

  “Wow,” Ambrose said. “That’s a large camera. The tripod’s set up right here.”

  He pointed to the three black legs standing about a meter in front of him. He said it matter-of-factly, as if they were setting up for a charity dinner.

  She screwed the camera onto the silver base. The screws were stiff, and it took her several tries to get it right. It wasn’t because her hands were trembling, she told herself; that was not it at all. Finally she had the camera in the right place. She tightened the latch slowly, then turned the camera so that it was facing Ambrose, taking great care to make sure that he was squarely framed, that the image was straight. The camera found his face and auto-focused. His sharp features came into view.

  Ambrose was photogenic, very photogenic. Lea suddenly saw that he was impossibly handsome. He had cut his hair, no doubt in preparation for his appearance, like the shirt, the pants, the shoes. Now that the black curls no longer obscured his face, she saw that his eyes were bright and intelligent, his soft round cheeks smooth like a baby’s. She saw that his dark pink lips were full and plump, his neck solid, his shoulders slim and straight. His hands, now so still in his lap, slender like a pianist’s. She wondered if Ambrose played any instruments. She wondered if Ambrose liked music, what he dreamed of at night, whether he had ever been in love.