Mac Slater Coolhunter 2

by Tristan Bancks

  I decided I'd had enough. This stalking business was creeping me out. As the train pulled in and she got out I said, 'Hey-y-y-y ... Melody!' in my best 'There you are! I've found you!' voice.

  She looked at me weirdly. 'What are you doing here?'

  I held up the glove.

  'Oh my God. Thank you.'

  'You left it on the seat at the peanut place,' I said.

  'And you came all the way up here to give it to me?'

  'Well ...' I gave her my best 'It was nothing' look.

  'Thank you. I owe you one. And I'm sorry I left so quickly. I –'

  'Forget it,' I said. 'It's cool.'

  'I was just thinking about you on the train.'

  The platform was empty now.

  'Really?' I said, smiling. 'What were you thinking?'

  She pursed her lips. They were kind of nice.

  'What?' I said, trying not to look at them.

  'Can you keep a secret?' she asked.

  'Me? Yeah, definitely. Why?'

  'What were you saying before about being a coolhunter?'

  'It's like a trend-spotter,' I said.

  'I know what it is,' she said.

  'Well, you've got some cool stuff going on and I –'

  'But can you keep a secret?' she asked again. 'Or are you always in coolhunter mode? I think I like creative, inventor Mac better than coolhunter-wanting-to-film-me Mac.'

  'Yeah, I think I do, too,' I said. 'I can definitely keep my mouth shut.'

  She looked at me with those cute brown eyes.

  'Come with me. I want to show you something.'

  'What?' I said.

  'You'll see,' she said.

  So I followed. We walked out of the station and over a couple of streets. It felt like a sketchy neighbourhood, much lower-rent than where we'd got on the train in Greenwich Village. It didn't look like any other part of Manhattan I'd seen so far. Maybe we were in the Bronx?

  'Where are we?' I asked her as we crossed a street and into a park that stretched into the distance for as far as I could see.

  'Inwood,' she said. 'Some people call it Inweird 'cos of all the artists and stuff who live here now. It's a big Dominican neighbourhood. You've got to try Dominican cheesy pastelitos. So good.'

  I followed her along a track through the park and up a hill.

  'What do you want to show me here?' I asked.

  She didn't answer, just kept on walking.

  After five minutes or so she said, 'Not everyone is allowed to see what I'm going to show you but I think we'll be OK. I think I should take you and I'll just deal with the consequences.'

  'What consequences?' I asked her, trying to keep up.

  'You'll see,' she said. We were winding through a kind of wilderness now. It didn't even seem like we were in a city. We came to a fork in the track and took the right-hand path, still winding upwards. I tried to remember the turns.

  Ten minutes in, I'd had enough of her little surprise. 'I'd kind of like you to tell me where we're going now,' I said, stopping.

  She turned. 'Are you scared?' she asked.

  'No, I'm not scared. I just don't want to keep walking up here until you tell me where we're going. I've got stuff on today.'

  She looked at me and smiled. 'You're scared,' she said.

  I knew I was sounding weird but all I'd wanted was to interview her back at the peanut butter joint. I didn't want to marry her.

  'Trust me,' she said. 'Okay? It's not far. You'll be fine.' And then she walked off. Now I knew how Paul felt with me telling him to 'relax' all the time and to 'just trust me'. It was kind of annoying. I looked down the path and considered heading back to where we'd come from. But we'd taken a few different tracks, there was no one around and I wasn't so keen on stumbling for hours through a forest. Now I felt like I was really lost in New York.

  So I charged on after her. A few minutes later we came to the top of the hill where we could see right out over a river. On the other side were all these colourful trees. I could vaguely hear traffic in the distance but there wasn't a building in sight.

  'Native Americans used to live here,' she said. 'The Lenape, like the guy I painted downtown. They lived in those caves we passed.' I remembered the rocks jutting out of the hillside.

  'That's really great,' I said. 'Where are we?' But she took off and started winding down towards the river. I followed and eventually a building came into view, a big boatshed built over the water.

  'Is that where we're going?' I asked.

  She didn't answer.

  I tripped on some rocks, stumbled and then regained my footing. I was staring through the trees, trying to get a good look at the boatshed and see if there were any goons hanging there ready to take me out. Maybe she's part of a cult, I thought. And I'm their latest recruit. My mum had told me about a cult she got involved with when she was a teenager. I couldn't believe what a loser I was coming all the way up here. I tried to tell myself that Melody wasn't a psycho. But why wouldn't she just tell me where we were going? Maybe this was where they dumped bodies on the island? Was I about to swim with the fishes? I wiped my sweaty palms on my jeans.

  I'd told Paul to push boundaries and 'be scary'. What an idiot. Why didn't I make up a peanut allergy? He wasn't scared of life. He was scared of dying. That's why he wasn't being lured into some kind of weird death trap in the woods. Maybe now was the time to make a run for it?

  We came to the water's edge next to the boatshed where I could see a bridge to my left. It looked like the George Washington Bridge, which meant that this had to be the Hudson River and that was New Jersey on the other side. A bunch of boats steamed by. At least there'd be someone to find my body, I figured. All bloated and floating on the surface.

  The shed was painted green and had moss and vines all over it. The gutters sagged with leaves. It was about as big as our school hall. Maybe bigger. There was no regular door that I could see. Just an old roller covered in vines. Most of the shed was suspended over the water on wooden pylons. It was a perfect mob hideout. Was this chick mafia? Didn't I say she looked Italian?

  'Hey, where'd you say your folks were from?' I asked her.

  Melody pulled some branches away from a pile to reveal three little wooden canoes sitting on the river bank next to the boatshed. She dragged two of the canoes into the shallows. This girl was strong. Then she handed me a paddle.

  'What?' I said.

  'Get in,' she demanded.

  'No way,' I said. 'Tell me where we're going. To the other side of the river?'

  'No,' she said. 'Just 'round to the front. You enter from the water side.'

  'We're going in there?' I asked her.

  'Yeah,' she said, getting into the canoe.

  'Not a chance,' I said. 'Look, thanks for the little nature walk. It's been fun, but there's no way I'm going to follow you into some old boatshed in the middle of nowhere.'

  A jogger ran past on the path that wound along the riverfront.

  'This isn't the middle of nowhere. It's New York City!' she said.

  But I wasn't going anywhere.

  'Okay,' she said. 'I'll tell you. But it'll ruin the surprise.'

  16

  The Hive

  The side of my canoe bumped against the rotting wood of the old dock in front of the shed. Melody reached a hand down to pull me out of my boat. I took it and the canoe lurched to the left, taking on water. I tried standing and it wobbled dangerously. Then I lunged for the dock. Some rotting boards fell away as I landed on the deck but I managed to stand. Melody tied the canoes to a pylon covered in barnacles. The dock was a metre and a half wide and it stretched about six metres out from the boatshed before the timber boards fell away, collapsing into the river.

  The boatshed looked even scabbier from this angle. Its peeling green paint was thick with black soot, probably from boat exhaust fumes.

  'Now just act normal,' Melody said. 'Like you're meant to be here. And if Joe Gatt comes up – he's a black guy, around six feet tal
l, kinda runs this place – let me handle him, okay?'

  'Whatever you say,' I said and followed her along the jetty, dodging missing planks. Even though I'd demanded to know what was going on, all she'd said was that this was The Hive and that she knew I'd dig it. Somehow I'd bought that and jumped into the canoe. She just had this way of persuading you.

  Melody rapped on an old door – wooden panels stained with moss. The knock had a certain rhythm.

  'That wasn't a secret knock, was it?' I asked.

  She smiled. What kind of place has a secret knock? I remembered my dad taking me to a gangster movie double feature at the community hall when I was a kid. The Godfather and the one I fell asleep in. There was something about this place that said 'mafia'. I was waiting for the door of the shed to swing open – there'd be a dozen guys called 'Paulie' counting mountains of cash, and pretty soon I'd be running jobs for them. And when you're in, you're in.

  The door opened a crack and we stepped inside. A young guy with dark, curly hair was holding it open for us.

  'Hey Jamie,' Melody said, kissing him on both cheeks. 'Thanks.'

  The door bashed shut behind us and I took a few steps inside before I stopped and stared. The place wasn't grey and dingy with a single light-bulb hanging in the middle of the room. Far from it. It was clean. Super-clean. It looked like Paul's mum had been at it. Only it had taste.

  It was a big, open warehouse, painted white all over, with exposed wooden beams in the ceiling and clear panels in the roof, letting light flood into the room. There were stairs at the back leading up to a small, open-plan second floor. My eyes darted immediately towards a three-wheeled vehicle parked up there. It was silver with a curved roof and a front windscreen that seemed like it belonged on a fighter jet. It was maybe a quarter of the size of a regular car and beautifully sleek. It looked the way Paul and I always imagined the weird vehicles we created. But then we'd go and build them out of pieces of old scooters and junk from the tip and they'd end up looking demented.

  'Don't stare up there,' Melody said, dragging me by the arm.

  'Why not?' I asked.

  'Just don't,' she said. 'I'll show you everything else but not that. Not now. And, remember, if Joe gives us grief, leave him to me.'

  She led. I followed. I tried not to look up at the car, but it was hard. I felt as though, somehow, that machine was the reason I'd come to New York. I just had to figure out why. Melody glared at me again and I diverted my eyes.

  I noticed there was lots of old furniture all around the room. But it had been painted with big splashes of colour – bright red desks, orange artworks, green light fittings. Music was playing – an R'n'B track. There were workbenches, people building things, writing, a girl painting on a canvas. And at the back of the building, written large on the wall, were the words: 'Create or Die'.

  Everyone in the warehouse looked young. They buzzed about at the ten or so workstations across the room. They all stared as we walked by, looking me up and down. Seemed like they weren't that used to visitors around these parts. There was a guy sitting at a laptop on the far left-hand side of the building next to a window. The sun was shining in through gaps in the vines that hung outside and he had what looked like a little solar panel plugged into the USB port on his computer.

  'Is that what I think it is?' I asked Melody once we'd gone by.

  'Sure,' she said. 'There's no power in here apart from what we create. I've got a little wind-powered USB, too, for when I'm out in the park.'

  We stopped at a desk in the corner at the back left-hand side of the warehouse, beneath the second floor. Melody picked up a small windmill from a bunch of stuff on a round white table. It had a USB plug connector.

  'That's genius,' I said. 'Where'd you get it?'

  'You know that guy we passed, Solomon, on the laptop?'

  'Yeah.'

  'He built it for me.'

  'Is everyone here an inventor?' I asked.

  There was a loud whirring sound and a massive BANG from somewhere in the building. I hit the deck. It felt like a bomb had gone off. Little bits of black plastic scattered all over the floor and a chunk of magnet landed not far from me.

  'Damn!' said a voice from the floor above.

  I looked up at Melody. She was still standing. Then I looked around at the other dudes. They were all on their feet, too, most of them looking at me. No one had even batted an eyelid. Clearly it wasn't the first time this had happened.

  Melody laughed as I peeled myself off the floor. 'That was Joe,' she said. He's working on something that's trialling in a couple of days but he keeps blowing it up.'

  'What is it?' I asked.

  'Like I said, don't ask.'

  Her eyes flicked to someone behind me. I spun around.

  Joe Gatt, I figured. He was a tall African-American dude with a shaved head, wearing a New York Yankees cap a little off-centre, a sensible-looking, short-sleeved, checked shirt, light blue vest and jeans. No shoes. He had tattoos covering both arms. He must've been about nineteen, I guessed.

  'Who's this?' he asked.

  'This is, this is my friend, Mac. He's an inventor. From Australia,' Melody said, coming to stand next to me as if we had more chance against him if we stood united. My mum would have described him as 'a very big presence'. His back was dead straight. His eyes drilled a hole right through you.

  'I don't care where he's from. I just want to know why he's here,' Joe said forcefully.

  'He's ... Can we talk about this in private?' Melody asked.

  Joe stared at me as Melody walked towards the stairs.

  'Give me a second. Make yourself at home,' she called.

  Joe Gatt followed Melody. They disappeared upstairs but he glared at me through the open staircase as he climbed.

  I breathed out heavily. Who the hell was this guy? Why did he care so much that I was here? And did he destroy the whole car upstairs? I took a few steps out from beneath the second floor and looked up. It was still there. But what was it? I had a quick flash of me taking it for a spin and I actually salivated. Was I some kind of animal with no control over my bodily functions?

  I tried to take my mind off the car and peered around Melody's little corner of the room. There were clippings and photos and bits of coloured paper stuck to a pinboard on the wall. There were quotes like 'Creativity can transform the world' and 'Make Art, Not War' and 'The best way to have a good idea is to have lots of ideas'. There was a lot of pink stuff. There were T-shirts on hangers with images like the one she'd painted on the wall downtown. There was a round white table and another desk with drips of paint all over it. The Rollerballs were underneath. I scooched down to have a look, picking one up. It was heavy. I so wanted to take them for a ride.

  I looked around to see if Melody was coming. She wasn't, so I had a look through the stuff on her desk. There was a thin, homemade-looking book called The Swarm by Joe Gatt and a whole bunch of designs for clothing and gadgets. One, in particular, caught my eye. It was a sheet with four or five vehicle designs. One of them was identical to the thing up on the second floor. It had the word 'Perpetual' written beneath it. To me it looked like a cross between a car and a motorbike. Two wheels at the front, one at the back. It wasn't like anything I'd seen before.

  'Cupcake?' said a voice.

  I let the papers drop to the table.

  Melody was standing behind me, holding a tray of cupcakes.

  'No, I'm okay,' I said, feeling guilty about rifling through her stuff.

  'These are life-changing cupcakes,' she said. 'I made them yesterday afternoon but they're still soft.'

  She offered them up.

  'How old am I? Five?' I asked, grabbing a cupcake with blue icing.

  She laughed.

  'You get a good look at my work there?' she said, laying the tray on top of the papers I'd been looking at.

  'Sorry,' I said, guiltily taking a bite of cupcake.

  'Good, huh?' she said.

  They were. They were almost h
ead-sized doughnut good.

  'What's in these things?' I asked.

  'Secret recipe,' she said.

  'Is everything a secret round here?' I asked.

  'Almost,' she said. 'Now, I'm really embarrassed to say this but Joe's kinda said you've got to leave. I thought he might be cool with you but this is his place and –'

  'Can you just tell me what this place is?' I asked. 'What other stuff are people making here? Is this where you made the computer glove thing? And what about the skates? How do they work? I need to know.'

  Her eyes darted towards the stairs. No sign of Joe.

  'I'll walk you out the long way. C'mon,' she said, heading off towards the far side of the building. She spoke quietly.

  'Joe's from Queens,' she said. 'He used to be a hip-hop promoter. Made a bucket of cash when he was, like, fourteen, but got sick of hustling. He wanted to get creative, work with artists, designers, inventors, engineers, writers. Kids with original ideas come here to develop stuff. We all work together.'

  'Is that why it's called The Hive? You guys are like bees?' I asked as we weaved our way through the workstations.

  'Joe calls it Swarm Creativity,' she said. 'A group of minds is always smarter than the brightest person in the group. We're a swarm, like a mini-internet. We solve problems together. It's the future but it's happening now.'

  'And do you pay rent here or ...?'

  'It was abandoned. We're kind of looking after it for a while, rent-free, if you know what I mean.'

  I looked back over my shoulder, up to the second floor. Gatt was there, staring right at me. The three-wheeler was covered now. Why didn't they want me to see it? What was the big deal?

  'Don't look at him,' Melody said.

  'Sorry.'

  'He's super-touchy right now. Like I said, this trial's in a couple days and he gets edgy when things aren't going right.'

  I liked the way she said 'couple days'. Her accent was cool.

  'What's that?' I said. We were walking past Jamie, the curly-haired kid who'd let us in. He was wearing a hat made of rubber and metal and standing in front of a TV. One second he was crying and then he'd start laughing and a second later he'd get angry and swear at the TV. The dude had problems.