The Diver's Clothes Lie Empty

by Vendela Vida

  You stand in front of the window, looking out at Casablanca as it presents itself below. A modern tram snakes through the city. You pour yourself the last of the champagne and stare out at the clock in the distance: it’s 10 P.M. You stop noticing anything new. You simply focus on the patterns pedestrians make as they crisscross through the square below. Unlike your sister, whose brain is a beehive, and who has excelled at continuously plotting her next step, you have always been good at staring out of windows for long periods of time. You try not to calculate how much of your life you have wasted doing exactly what you are doing now.

  In the morning you shower and wash your hair, using the small hotel bottles. Yesterday they made you smell like someone else but today they smell like you. At home you wear something floral. This new scent you’ve adopted smells of tangerines and honey. The robe is back on a hanger, its sash tied at the waist once more. As you untie the belt you feel as though you’re undressing someone else.

  You are too hungry to wait for room service. In the lobby you approach a waiter and ask where you sit if you want food. He says anywhere. He tells you one side of the lobby is nonsmoking, the other smoking. There’s no wall between the two.

  You order coffee and an omelet, and look around you, catching shards of conversation. Businessmen chatter over cappuccinos in French, Portuguese, and Arabic. Five women dressed in high heels and showing bare calves have arranged themselves around another table. If you didn’t know better you would think they’d come to Casablanca to celebrate one of their fortieth birthdays. But you know better. No one comes to Casablanca to celebrate anything. Your guidebook to Morocco (also in your backpack) was right: the first thing you should do upon arrival in Casablanca is get out of Casablanca.

  Which is what you’re trying to do. But you’re not sure where you’ll go. Your plan was to go to Fez, to Marrakech, to the desert, but these places no longer have appeal. You try to imagine when they did have appeal. You try to remember the person you were when planning this very trip.

  Across the lobby, in the nonsmoking section, you see the woman who slightly resembles you. The stand-in for the famous American actress. She’s not wearing the wig. She’s sitting with two other people you haven’t seen before. The woman is older; she is pale, professional, precise. She wears practical but expensive shoes that have low square heels, and her hair is cut short in the style favored by women who don’t want to make a fuss, who don’t want to present themselves as overly feminine. She is perhaps fifty. The man sitting with her is an unlikely match: he’s wearing black jeans and a white shirt and has tattoos on his arms. The stand-in appears to be crying.

  The tattooed man and the pale practical woman seem agitated with the stand-in. They are reprimanding her, and you assume that their words are the cause of her tears. What has she done? Who are these people causing her to sob? Still, as she buries her head in her hands it’s clear why she’s a stand-in and not an actress; her gestures are dramatic, obvious choices.

  You are two tables away and wish you were closer. You wonder what is happening. Witnessing someone else’s troubles right now is a very welcome distraction.

  The waiter approaches with your omelet and coffee. You stare at the basket of bread and scoot yourself forward on the chair. The waiter steps away for a moment and returns with an oversize suede pillow from a nearby couch and places it behind you so that you can comfortably reach the table, so you don’t have to sit on the edge of the seat.

  “Merci,” you say.

  With the first sip of coffee your mind begins to work through your options. Is going to the embassy out of the question? Yes, you have no police document. You could be under suspicion the moment you walk in. Susan Sontag made note of you. She could have obtained your photo from the security cameras.

  By now, Sabine Alyse’s credit cards have probably either been reported, or if she’s suffered a fate as terrible as you fear she might have, you are certain that there will be inquiries about what happened to her. You should not be staying at a hotel under her name. You cannot stay another night at this hotel.

  As you finish your coffee, the waiter comes and refills your cup. You start thinking that it’s madness to be in this lobby at all. Every minute that you’re sitting here increases the likelihood that if anyone’s looking for clues as to what happened to Sabine Alyse, and to her backpack, they will find you here. At the very least, you will be charged with stealing her possessions. At worst, you will be charged with playing a part in whatever happened to her.

  The tattooed man seems to be repeatedly glancing over at you. Why is he staring at you? He looks as though he could be a security guard. The stand-in gets up and leaves. The tattooed man talks intensely to the pale professional woman, and now she’s looking at you too. She looks like she could be in the CIA. No one else in the lobby wears shoes like hers, no one else wears their hair in the style she does.

  Something’s wrong. They know something about you and Sabine Alyse.

  You tell yourself you’re being overly suspicious of them. You tell yourself to look down at your food for ten seconds. You tell yourself that if they’re still staring at you when you look up then they are onto you. If they’ve looked away, you can relax.

  You stare at your plate. You count the seconds. When you look up they are staring at you more intently than before, while having a very serious discussion.

  You have to leave the restaurant. You have to leave without paying. You can’t sign Sabine’s name again. You need to go to your room and pack your things and get out of this hotel.

  You try not to run as you make your way across the lobby and up the elevator to your room. You place the backpack—the evidence—inside your suitcase, and throw your clothes and toiletries on top. You zip up the suitcase and make your way to the elevator.

  But you can’t go downstairs. The pale professional woman and the tattooed man are there. The manager is there. By now they might have all figured out who you are—or aren’t.

  Inside the elevator you see the button for the rooftop pool. You’ll go there, wait an hour or two until the people who were so interested in you have left the lobby.

  The elevator opens directly to the pool. You walk out with your suitcase. The pool is a blue square without a diving board. You sit on a chaise longue. The sun is not yet warm enough for sunbathers and there’s only one swimmer in the pool, a woman. She stops swimming and looks at you. You can see she’s wondering what you’re doing there, fully dressed with a suitcase.

  You think quickly and find the door to the women’s locker room. You wait in there. Then you realize how strange this is. The woman in the pool could report that there’s a woman who entered the changing room and never left.

  Your only option to appear as normal as possible is to swim. And besides: swimming has always soothed you. You remove a dark blue one-piece from your suitcase. You didn’t bother packing a bikini because you feared it would only mock your body in its current condition. You pull on the blue swimsuit and hoist the front up over your chest, and adjust the elastic down over your rear. You stash your suitcase under a massage table that for some reason is in the changing room. Maybe they bring it outside on nice days for poolside massages.

  You dive from the edge of the pool where it says NO DIVING, and swim underwater to the other side, not once coming up for air. The water is a good temperature, neither too cold nor too warm. You are not a casual swimmer. You competed on swim teams starting when you were eight, and you attended college on a diving scholarship. You swim quick laps and realize that you are following the other woman, that you’re too close to her feet. You slow down your strokes so it doesn’t appear that you’re chasing her.

  The woman gets out of the pool. She goes into the changing room and a minute later leaves the pool area via the elevator.

  You swim twenty more laps without stopping. You relish your turns, the way you glide as you push off from the edges of the pool. You’ve always gained speed on turns; they’ve long been your s
ecret asset as a swimmer. You can feel your mind being cleared. Water does this to you.

  You towel off your shins and arms thoroughly, the way you did with a shammy before your next competitive dive. When you look up you see two other hotel guests exiting the elevator. As they approach, both fully dressed in pants and shirts, your heart seizes. It’s the couple from the lobby, the pale practical woman and the tattooed man.

  You glance around to see if they could possibly have another objective than to talk. Nothing and no one is around you.

  “Hello!” the practical woman calls out. You see her face change to a smile. You realize she’s performing for you.

  “Hello!” the tattooed man shouts.

  You wave hello. A smooth motion of your hand, as though you’re wiping the front window of a car.

  You pull the towel around your chest, tucking one edge into the top of the other so the bulk of your body is concealed. It seems strange to be wearing a swimsuit while they are clothed. And why are they approaching you? You consider fleeing to the locker room. Was there an exit there? You can’t recall.

  The unlikely duo sits down on the chaise longue next to yours. “Sorry to interrupt your swim,” says the pale practical woman, not seeming at all sorry.

  “Yes, our apologies,” says the tattooed man, seeming a little more apologetic. His tattoos bear words in Arabic and one, DESTINY, in English. He speaks with a slight British accent. Your guess is he studied in London as an exchange student. Now it all makes sense. They work for Interpol. You eye the elevator door, assessing whether if you run, you can escape. But the tattooed man looks athletic. You have no chance.

  “We saw you downstairs,” the pale practical woman says. “Did you see us?”

  What is the right answer? The pale practical woman is American. Maybe she works for the embassy. She’s one of Sontag’s minions.

  “No,” you lie. “Maybe.”

  The tattooed man says, “We were in the lobby. We noticed you across the room. Are you staying here in the hotel?”

  This is a trap. You need a lawyer. You shouldn’t answer any of these questions.

  “Yes,” you say. You need to end this conversation. “Excuse me, I’m in the middle of my laps . . . I was going to go back in.”

  “I’m sorry,” the pale practical woman says. “We’re being so cryptic.”

  “We’re making a movie,” the tattooed man says. “You might have seen our crew?”

  Could this be true? Could these two be members of the film crew instead of intelligence operatives? You begin to relax.

  “I think so,” you say.

  “It’s a medium-budget film with a major American movie star,” the pale practical woman says.

  “What’s your name?” the pale practical woman says.

  What is your name? Sabine Alyse? Megan Willis?

  “Reeves Conway,” you say. It’s the name of your sister’s baby. She is two months old. You feel closer to her than anyone else in the world.

  “Nice to meet you, Reeves,” the tattooed man says, without introducing himself. “What brings you to Morocco?”

  “Vacation,” you say.

  “How nice,” the pale practical woman says. You can tell she doesn’t think much of vacations; they’re probably a waste of time for her. “Are you here alone?”

  “Yes.”

  “And you’re from the States? Canada?” the pale practical woman asks.

  You still have no idea what they want from you.

  “Florida,” you say, telling the truth.

  “How long will you be out here?” the pale practical woman asks.

  “I’m not sure,” you say. You were supposed to go back in ten days, but now you really don’t know how that will happen.

  They look at each other and the pale practical woman nods. A decision seems to have been made.

  “We have a proposal for you,” the tattooed man says.

  “A proposal?” you say. It sounds illegal as you repeat his words back to him.

  “A job offer,” says the pale practical woman. “Please hear us out.”

  “Okay,” you say, tentatively. You have no money and no ability to access money. You had not thought of getting a job, but now it seems logical, necessary.

  The woman clears her throat, as if about to say something very discreet, very important. “I am the personal secretary to the actress starring in the film,” she says.

  She waits for you to say something, for you to be impressed.

  “Okay,” you say.

  She studies you as you say this, and the calmness of your response seems to please her.

  The tattooed man jumps in. “I’m not sure if you know much about how it works with a film, but with the big stars we have stand-ins. The stand-ins help us block the scene so that we can make sure the lighting and the camera angles are correct before we bring the star out. This helps with several factors. Firstly, we make sure the star does not exhaust himself or herself . . . in this case clearly we’re making sure that she does not exhaust herself. Secondly, we limit the number of onlookers who have time to spread the gossip that the star is appearing. If the star comes out first, then it gives every person standing on the street the chance to text and tweet and before long”—he snaps loudly here—“we have a mob situation.”

  The pale practical woman is looking at him disapprovingly, impatiently. This appears to be the natural state of her face. When he glances over at her she smiles at him.

  You are wondering what any of this has to do with you.

  “You are probably wondering what this has to do with you,” the pale practical woman says.

  You shrug, as though you have been enjoying a story and have no concern or intrigue as to why you are being told this story.

  “The young woman, Ivy, who has been playing the stand-in has had an emergency and has to fly home,” the tattooed man says.

  “It’s unlikely she’ll be returning,” says the practical woman.

  “We are a Moroccan crew and don’t have anyone who resembles the movie star in skin color, height, or size, but we think you might be right,” says the tattooed man.

  “Should we continue talking?” the pale practical woman asks.

  “Yes,” you say.

  They both look relieved.

  “Great,” the tattooed man says. “I can imagine how bizarre this must all sound to you. We were just getting desperate and we saw you alone and—”

  The practical woman cuts him off. She has no time for stories of desperation, especially now that she senses a possible solution.

  “Can I ask how tall you are?” asks the practical woman.

  “Five foot seven,” you answer.

  The tattooed man looks at the practical woman. She tells him that the actress is five foot six and a half. “So that’s . . .” The Moroccan man uses his thumb and forefinger to try to measure how big a gap half an inch is.

  “Less than that,” says the practical woman.

  He, who is not used to measuring outside of the metric system, brings his thumb and forefinger together.

  “That’s okay,” he says to the practical woman.

  “Yes, I think so,” she says.

  She turns to you. Suddenly you are involved in their conversation again. “You will have to wear flats on set.”

  “And a wig,” says the tattooed man to the pale practical secretary. To you he says: “Your hair is a little short, not dark enough. Also the movie takes place in the sixties. It’s a period film. The wig will help.”

  “Yes,” the pale practical secretary says, “she should just use Ivy’s wig. I’ll make a note of the wig for the costume department.” She takes out her iPhone and makes a note of it.

  “You probably have some questions about the job,” says the practical woman.

  You have no questions. You want this job.

  “Yes,” you say. “I have a couple.”

  They stare at you, expectantly.

  “When would the position start?�
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  “You’d probably meet her this afternoon. Just to get to know each other,” the pale practical secretary says. “Unfortunately I don’t know if you’ll meet the director today. He’s attending to some personal business.”

  The tattooed man glances at her, and smiles. She does not smile back. You wonder about the nature of the personal business he’s attending to.

  “You’ll meet the security guards,” the practical secretary says. “They’d have to get to know you.”

  “You may have seen them with her around the hotel,” the tattooed man says.

  You nod. You want to ask about pay, when and how much, and are about to ask, when the practical secretary preempts you.

  “You’d be paid in cash. Long story,” she says.

  Your mouth drops open. You close it.

  “You’ll be paid five hundred dollars a day, at the end of each week,” the practical woman says. “This week will be prorated given we’re almost halfway through it.”

  She must have misread the expression on your face as one of alarm, of concern, because the practical woman says, “And of course we’d cover your accommodations.” Then she frowns. “Unfortunately we don’t have it in the budget for you to continue staying at the Regency.”

  “Where would I go?” you say. You cannot return to the Golden Tulip.

  “There’s a hotel next door called the Grand,” says the tattooed man. “It’s not so grand but it’s where the crew stays. We have a whole block of rooms.”

  Your mind is strangely sharp—you attribute this to your swim—and you find yourself working two steps ahead. You know you cannot check into this new hotel under Sabine’s name. You cannot check in under Reeves’s name. You have no way to check in under any name—not without a passport. You can’t even meet anyone at the front desk. But the stand-in who is leaving surely has a room, and has surely vacated it.