Detained

by Ainslie Paton

  Will groaned again. He wasn’t sure he wanted to hear the rest of this. He was a complete twat.

  “You told me I was the last honest taxi driver in Shanghai because I’d only tried to charge you twice, not many times the price of the fare. You asked me if I would be your regular driver and to name my fee. I was intrigued by your strange accent and your confidence. But I still thought you were stupid. I named a price. You said you’d pay me a third of it. Then I knew you weren’t so dumb. You knew exactly the cost of things, and the price of people.”

  Will shook his head. It didn’t sound like any life he’d lived.

  “Next morning I picked you up and took you to an office, big new building. You tell me this is your company’s office and I think you’re lying. You live in a condemned building and you don’t have a coat. I go inside with you and this office is very professional. You have a secretary. So I ask again. And you say, ‘The superior man thinks of virtue, the common man thinks of comfort’. You know Confucius. You tell me your own personal comfort doesn’t matter. All your energy and money goes into building your business. I became your driver that day, and your friend. I have worked for you for ten years.”

  Will closed his eyes. He couldn’t remember anywhere he lived, or an office or being cold. He didn’t know where the French Concession was but he thought maybe he did know Bo. “Teach?”

  “Yes. I taught you Shanghainese and Cantonese. You learned some Mandarin from your mistress.”

  “Miss?” Fuck. That was interesting news. He had a mistress. Was this the blonde woman in his dreams?

  “Yes. All the women love you. You had many girlfriends, but you got tired of them. Too much trouble. You took a mistress instead. More convenient and no expectations.”

  “Where?”

  “You were together a long time, and she wanted to marry you, but Jiao is not the one you love. She is in Shenzen now. You bought her a spa business. You called it a going away present. She wants to come here to see you but Peter said no.”

  He’d had a mistress named Jiao, but he sent her away. She didn’t sound blonde, but he suddenly knew she was elegant and regal and swore like a trucker. He saw a grand old house in a gracious tree lined street. He’d lived there. He saw an apartment high above the city. Glass and wood, sky and cloud. He’d lived there too. He smelled leather and felt warmth in his hand and knew Bo had driven a powerful car and brought him strong black coffee. He turned to Bo. His friend wore a wedding ring, but his wife died of cancer a long time ago.

  There were images in his head. Disconnected; out of sequence, like scenes from dozens of different movies spliced together.

  Hiding in the dark. Dead eyes staring. Spiderman. A pile of books. A steel mill, spooky under moonlight. Black satin sheets in a bedroom opening out onto a lake. Cuffs tight around his wrists. A pocketful of tiny crystals and pearls. A cold steamed dumpling broken in four. Blonde hair and Bruce Lee.

  His surname wasn’t Brown.

  There was a riverbank, it was night and he itched. He put his hand to his nose, straight now, perfect after surgery, but that night, broken for the second time.

  He was starting to remember.

  He wasn’t sure he wanted to.

  32. Spin

  “Choose a job you love, and you will never have to work a day in your life.” — Confucius

  The suit wardrobe provided was pinstriped. They teamed it with a red camisole. You’d only see a small V of it, a hint of lace, an acceptable suggestion of sex, under the businesslike jacket on camera. It was a nice suit, reminded her of a nicer one.

  “You good, Darce? You’ve gone white.”

  Darcy shook her head and smiled at Nadia. “I’m good.” She wriggled her toes, looked down at her bare feet, trying to collect herself. It happened less often now, the sudden disorienting flashbacks to Quingpu, but nearly eight months on they could still catch her off guard. “What shoes for this?”

  “Red heels. But you’re doing this one in the studio, right, you can wear your Uggs if you want to.”

  “Too weird, even though I know as far as the camera is concerned I have no legs.”

  Nadia flattened one hand across her curly hair, the other under her chest in a frame. “That’s the reason they call ‘em talking heads.”

  Darcy stepped into the heels. Red like red bean soup. Red like Will’s blood coating his side and arm, dripping on the floor. Damn. She needed to get some air, get a grip before she went into the studio.

  The counsellor said it was normal to have panic attacks after what she’d been through, but current affairs show hosts didn’t crack up before going on air and expect to keep anchoring the country’s second highest rating news program.

  “Eat something, Darce. I know I’m not supposed to believe there’s such a thing as too thin for TV, but you look like you could do with a good feed.”

  Darcy studied herself in the mirror. She was thinner than she’d ever been in her life, and it hadn’t been hard to get that way. After Shanghai, food lost its attraction and working hard helped keep her weight down. Of course the station bosses liked her this way, so it was part of the package. Part of what she did to earn her seven figure salary. Being thin was synonymous with successful. It was the perfect accessory for her sky-blue convertible, her beach view apartment and her designer wardrobe. It went well with her public profile, those invitations to opening nights, charity spokesperson roles, and social pages pictures. And it supported her newly acquired professional reputation as cool and collected under fire.

  The old Darcy, curvy, slightly untidy, chain store dressed and a fan of food, wouldn’t have gotten to interview the Prime Minister, or attend exhibition openings with pop stars. That Darcy was more at home in shorts than pencil skirts, jeans than evening dresses.

  The only thing old Darcy and new Darcy had in common was a disapproving father who thought she’d sold out and lost her integrity, and a brother who was more skilled competitor than sympathetic sibling.

  She smoothed her hands down her hips. She missed old Darcy. Old Darcy had friends she went to the pub with, could get excited by hot chips with vinegar, and tortured herself about not achieving enough. This 2.0 model had no friends who weren’t part of the media scene, never ate potato, and knew her career to be a thing totally lacking in substance.

  She agreed with Brian, though she’d never tell him. She was a talking head who read the words others wrote for her, and rarely, rarely, got to fashion her own interviews and tell the story her way. There was always a predetermined spin, designed for the ratings. It wasn’t the fact-based journalism she’d grown up with. It wasn’t the search for certainty she’d been dedicated to. It was sensationalism at seven o’clock, designed to attract audience and advertisers with a diet of: scam busting, consumer breakthroughs, nasty neighbours, chased cameramen, miracle cures, celebrity bombshells and whale stories.

  But this was the life she’d carved out for herself from the terror that was Shanghai. From the mess she’d made by thinking she was Lois Lane, Bob Woodard and Carl Bernstein rolled into one—a champion of truth and public good, an investigative journalist who could top the Chinese Ministry of Justice.

  It was the life she’d made from the horror of what she’d done to Will Parker.

  “I’ll bring you a cuppa,” said Nadia.

  “You’re a sweetheart. Thank you.”

  With the room to herself, Darcy sagged. She sat on the couch and closed her eyes. She missed Will now as hard, as deeply, with the same sickening jolt, as when she’d first understood he didn’t remember her and perhaps never would.

  Day after day, she’d gone with Peter and Bo to the hospital to see Will, comatose, almost unrecognisable from the injuries to his face. She’d held his hand and prayed to a God she wasn’t sure existed for him to wake up.

  The medical staff said his prognosis was mixed. Good in a physical sense, he’d repair and with the help of surgery and therapy, he’d be functionally strong again, but mentally, no one was sur
e the extent of the brain damage he’d suffered, and what shape his recovery might take.

  Darcy was there the day he opened his eyes for the first time. He’d panicked and tried to pull the ventilator from his mouth. They sedated him immediately. He’d looked right at her and not seen her. Watching him struggle to wake was almost as terrifying as watching him go down to fists and boots had been.

  But only those terrible fifteen hours when she’d thought he was dead came near the shock of seeing him recoil from her. On that occasion, when he woke he saw her, but pulled his hand away from hers. And in the seconds before he closed his eyes, she saw nothing but irritation in them.

  The specialist said not to read anything into it. Everything irritated Will, it was the emotion he would have most often, accompanied by fear, confusion and anger. But Darcy couldn’t help but think those were the emotions most likely to apply to her after what he’d been through—after what she’d put him through.

  She filed one more story. This one described the riot and how Will was caught up in it suffering serious injuries. It was a short piece. She made no mention of her own role, or any deep detail of Will’s injuries. She quoted Peter. The Ministry of Justice denied the riot occurred, and Andy did a profile on the prison, taking a tour inside and putting officials and prisoners on camera who described Quingpu as a model facility, rejecting any suggestion of discontent, let alone a revolt. Andy’s story cast doubt on Will’s reputation all over again.

  And running out of money, she waited for Will to be awake enough to look in her eyes and remember she loved him. It never happened.

  It was obvious Will didn’t remember any of them. And he didn’t want them around. His anger was a cyclone, radiating out from him and sucking in everything in his reach. He ripped out drips and pushed machinery over. He broke crockery. He fought with orderlies. He refused to eat. He was silently locked in a battle against a brain that refused to let him understand who he was, where he was or how to get better. His once iron control and ready humour were reduced to unfocused anger he could neither manage nor direct.

  He might be like this for the rest of his life.

  Peter told her to give Will time, to go home, that he’d keep her in touch. Peter, who could have been angry with her, was sympathetic and compassionate, but he was also incredibly stressed and time poor. Parker Corp suffered. Contracts were cancelled, regulations tightened, and Peter admitted he didn’t have Will’s skill of keeping twenty key issues in the air at once without dropping anything.

  Without hope, she came home, and the job offers started to roll in. While she was sitting at Will’s Shanghai bedside she’d become a minor celebrity in Sydney. She was the Australian journalist who cracked the Will Parker kidnap story and followed it up by discovering his innocence, capping that with the announcement of the riot and his hospitalisation.

  Gerry called. Gerry texted. Gerry emailed. Gerry sent flowers. She ignored, deleted and returned. Mark called and left a message telling her she could have any role she wanted with the paper, with full reinstatement of her previous benefits, but he hoped she’d stretch her wings and fly.

  Col Furrows wrote a story claiming she had an insider’s relationship to the Will Parker story. And more job offers came. It was Mark she called when the offer from Channel Five came in. More likely to be balanced than Brian, who thought everything Channel Five did was commercial muck. Mark took her to lunch and told her to go for it. He said the worst that could happen is she blew it, got sacked and had her contract paid out—she’d still make more money in six months than working for him for five years.

  It was a smart move. It was getting on with her life. She took the job. She weathered the nightmares and panic attacks with help from a counsellor, and she’d told no one what happened. And she waited for Will to remember.

  When she came off the air after the program that night, Alan Dunlop, the show’s producer pulled her aside.

  “Tired, Darcy?”

  “No, I’m fine.”

  He looked at her sceptically. “Something was off tonight.”

  “No, not from my end.” Not that she could ever tell Alan, or anyone else for that matter, there was anything amiss. Her only friend on the show team was Nadia. Everyone else wanted her to fail either because they wanted her job or because she’d come from print journalism and hadn’t done a proper TV apprenticeship. Darcy knew there was even a book on her chances of success with almost no one taking odds she’d survive beyond two ratings seasons.

  “Hmmm. If you say so. I want you to take a night or two off anyway.”

  She bristled, one little beat out of tune and Alan was talking about sidelining her. “Are you going to tell me what I did wrong?” There was no denying she was new at this, there were dozens of better-trained presenters around, so it was no use pretending failure wasn’t an option.

  “You just look tired, not yourself tonight. I’m not being kind about the nights off. I need to trial Liarne Bennett on the desk so you can do the occasional field assignment. It has to be in a non-rating season so next week, okay. I thought that’s what you wanted?”

  “Oh, it is what I want.” If she could get back to doing some genuine reporting she’d feel better about this job, as though she had more control over the content. “Sorry, I am a little tired.”

  Alan hmmed again. It was a sound she was starting to develop a distinct dislike to. “Tell makeup to be more careful and get some rest over the weekend.”

  She nodded and watched him leave the set. She had to stop herself from bolting to her car. She was so close to tears from her flashback, from that almost dressing down, from the continual fear of failure. There was one more show to do this week and then she could sleep for forty-eight hours, longer if Liarne Bennett did Monday’s show.

  Home was a sanctuary. Contained, private and half empty because she’d not had time to buy any furniture for it, and half wondered if she should bother. At least until the second ratings season was over.

  On the floor in the living room, a red light blinked on the answering machine. It would be Brian with a comment about the show she could do without hearing. It represented the very worst of journalism as far as he was concerned, yet he watched it every night, and was somehow disappointed that by her very presence she wasn’t able to transform it into something more acceptable.

  Very few other people had this number. It might be Brian, but it might be Peter. She went to the bedroom and ditched the suit; the bathroom and trowelled off the makeup. She shoved on sweat pants and a t-shirt, and went back to the living room, barefoot and anxious.

  Brian’s calls made her feel sour because she mostly agreed with him and gutless because she didn’t want to tell him that. Peter’s calls made her feel hopeful for about two minutes during which he asked after her and she asked after him, and until he told her how many laps Will was swimming, how good he was looking, and how little change there was to his mental health.

  And then she felt empty and raw and aching.

  On nights she spoke to Peter it was better to get drunk before she tried to sleep, otherwise the nightmares were like bathing in scalding water, and in the morning she felt like her skin had been stripped off her bones.

  She sat on the floor in front of the answering machine and hoped there was a bottle of wine in the fridge. She pressed play and Peter said, “He’s back. Call me whatever time you get this.”

  She sat on the floor in front of the answering machine and tears streamed down her face. She was still crying when Peter answered.

  “Oh Darcy, don’t cry. It’s good news, it’s all good.”

  “I’m sorry, it’s just...”

  “Yeah I know, I bawled too. Don’t tell anyone. Especially not Will.”

  Darcy mopped her face with her t-shirt. The idea of talking to Will was a stopper in the open bottle of her crying. “Can I talk to him? Fill me in.”

  “Today he remembered Bo. And he remembers me too. And he’s not just being polite or humouring us. He re
members details. He remembers his apartment and the mansion house. He remembered how Bo’s wife died. He fucking well remembers I failed tax law, and the name of the first girl I crushed on at uni.”

  “That’s incredible.”

  “He’s come back so strong so quick in just a day. Dr Yang says everything we’ve told him about Will suggests he was biding his time before he declared himself. But Yang also said given the passage of time he thought Will might not recover at all, so I’m not sure exactly where we are on this roller-coaster, but I’m happy not to have been chucked off the ride.”

  Darcy squeezed her eyes tight shut; they were stinging from the residue of industrial strength makeup mixed with the saline of her tears. “What else does he remember?” A spineless way to phrase the only question she wanted answered.

  “He remembers customer names and cars he used to own. He remembers Aileen’s wedding, and every chick flick Jiao made him sit through. He remembers he hates olives, anchovies, and chilli chocolate. But he doesn’t remember much about Tara or anything about being kidnapped, or the jail or the riot. The doc says that’s normal for him to block out the worst of the trauma.”

  She gulped. As the cause of Will’s trauma, what right did she have to be remembered?

  “I don’t know if he remembers you,” Peter’s voice softened. “He hasn’t mentioned you, but it’s only been a day, and his memories are patchwork. He can remember things from fifteen years ago but not from two years ago. Are you there?”

  “Yes, yes. I’m...it’s overwhelming.”

  “I know. I didn’t want to leave him tonight. I was scared it was a random glitch, and if I let him sleep, he might forget it all, go back to being silent and closed off. In the end he shouted at me to go. Best thing ever to have Will shout at me again. You should come see him.”

  “Is that fair?”

  “Fair. What’s been fair about any of this?”

  “If he doesn’t remember me, is it fair to force him to?”

  “Oh, I see. I spoke to the doc tonight. He sees no reason now for Will not to make a full recovery, but he also said Will is in control of the pace of that recovery, and he may choose not to remember certain painful things. Kind of like a defensive reaction. It’ll be his choice if he wants to remember what happened.”