Biofire, page 30
Miranda’s eyes were washed out, the deep brown now looking diluted, as if half the color had been sucked from the irises and replaced with murky water, giving them a paleness that looked cold and empty. Like all the others Jorgan had seen, these particular eyes, Miranda’s eyes, did not even blink as they stared unwaveringly at him. Not once.
“Where are you going, Dr. Jorgan? Why did you pack your bags?”
“I do not have to report my every move to you, Miranda,” he said, teeth still clenched to make his unsettled voice sound more confident.
“Of course you don’t.”
Neither of them moved for a while. They stared at one another as Miranda’s fingers dug deeper into Jorgan’s elbow. Then, quite suddenly and without any gradual lessening of pressure, she dropped her hand so heavily that it slapped against her thigh. But her gaze held firm.
Jorgan debated with himself: simply walk away without looking back, or say a few words to remind her who was in charge and to let her know she was walking on very thin ice. The words won out.
“I can’t say much for your behavior, either, Miranda,” he said, his teeth apart now, but with a definite edge to his voice. “You’re a bright girl with quite a future ahead of you, but not if you make a habit of this kind of insubordination and…well, frankly, erratic behavior.”
Finally, he pulled his eyes from hers—but not without difficulty—and went to the doorway, where he stopped and turned around slowly. Her back was to him, head bowed low now. “Why don’t you go home to bed, Miranda. That’s where you belong. You look as if you could use some sleep.”
Her head was sagging so low now that, from behind, it looked as if she had been decapitated, leaving only her round, dropping shoulders and no neck. Her head hung so low that Jorgan half-expected to hear the wet sound of it peeling off her neck, the crack of it hitting the floor, and the muted, lumpy, shuddering sound it would make as it rolled under his desk.
“And why aren’t you in bed, Dr. Jorgan?” she said, her body remaining so still that her voice seemed to come from another part of the room.
“That’s none of your damned business,” he said, genuinely angry now. “Now go home. I’ll see you in the morning.”
“Will you?” She still did not move.
Jorgan’s lips parted to speak, but he paused a moment as he stared at the back of her headless body—to steady his voice, to make the lie work.
“Well, of course I will. Where the hell else would I be?” He started to leave, but stopped long enough to say, “And stay out of my damned apartment unless you’re invited.”
Then he left quickly, slapping the light switch hard with his palm, turning off the office lights, as if to emphasize his words by leaving her in darkness.
Jorgan was anxious to put as much distance between himself and Miranda as possible. He had long known that his involvement with her was a mistake, but he had never been as certain of that fact as he was at that moment. Something was not right about that girl. That familiar and disturbing look in her eyes was a sign of real trouble, evidence of a flaw in her wiring. Under different circumstances, he would have fired her on the spot. Under these circumstances, there was no point. As of that night, he was no longer an employee of OdysseyCorp Labs, so whether or not she remained was no concern of his.
As anxious as he was to get away from Miranda, Jorgan was even more anxious to get back to his apartment, get his bags, get into his car, and go find Emma.
A mission in the city. He knew of four, although he was sure there probably were more in a city of such size, and with so many homeless winos and druggies staggering through the streets and alleys. But there was one mission in particular that came to his mind. A big one. Huge.
The South Street Mission. That was where he would begin his search.
Miranda stood in Dr. Jorgan’s office and listened to his footsteps fade down the corridor, just as she had stood outside his office earlier, listening to him talk to Mr. Shaw on the phone. She stood there for a long time, just listening, until his footsteps became ghostly taps in the distance, and then faded away.
When there was only silence, she raised her head a bit and walked slowly to the window. She looked through the pouring rain to the parking lot, where rows of bleary pools of light were cast by the tall lamps. A few small clusters of cars, hers among them, were parked around the lights. But she did not remember driving back to OdysseyCorp. She knew she had done so, but could not remember doing it because everything was simply too dark inside her head.
The rain, of course, only made her feel worse. But the rain was the least of it now. If it were only raining—if that were all, and nothing else—Miranda knew she would not be nearly this bad, because it rained most of the time in this city. But there were so many things, so many other factors piled one atop the other, so many bad, dark things that were making everything around her dim, as if God himself had turned down the lights on the world, casting those long, engulfing shadows everywhere, shadows that went from a pale gray to a deep purple to the deepest, blackest black imaginable. Cold shadows that made her bones hollow and her chest thick with so many things: bitter anger, strangling sadness, overwhelming self-loathing, utter helplessness…and a rolling desire in her gut to banish that helplessness, to exorcise it like a possessing demon by taking things into her own hands and doing something, anything, whatever it might take to make things better, to make the shadows go away and bring back the light that was now missing from her life only, no one else’s, no one else in the world.
That one feeling, of needing to take control and do something about the problem, was very strong now, perhaps stronger than it ever had been. It was drawing her mind out of its darkness, forcing it to think in that direction, to consider ways of brightening the darkness by her own hand rather than waiting for it to happen on its own.
She had awakened that morning with a horrible feeling she had not experienced in a long time. She had opened her eyes and stared up at the ceiling of her bedroom with the absolute certainty that she was not lying on her bed but was actually a part of it. In it. She had awakened with the feeling that she was no longer solid—a bad sign. The fact that it had been a long time since she had experienced it was no comfort, because the longer it was gone, the longer it stayed when it returned. She had been unable to shake the feeling before going to work.
She had gone through the day quietly, hoping no one would notice how terribly thin her existence was, hoping no one would catch a glimpse of something through her, and hoping things would not get worse. Because what typically followed the realization of her vaporousness was much worse. Much darker. It was followed by the shadows. They came next.
But in spite of her efforts early in the day to fight off what she knew was coming, they had come after all, those shadows, in spite of her Herculean efforts to maintain a pleasant disposition and go about her business. They had come when she returned to the building that night and had gone into Dr. Jorgan’s apartment, expecting to find him, planning to throw herself at him, to have rabid, noisy, unashamed sex with him in order to repair her ghostly state of being. Instead, she had found his packed suitcases waiting by the door while he was away doing something else. No doubt preparing to go away. To leave her.
And she had little doubt that he was preparing to go away with that bitch, that rich, spoiled cunt who probably had been solid every second of her life. Emma Shaw.
Miranda had gone to Dr. Jorgan’s bed, which was the biggest piece of furniture in the small, cramped apartment, and planted her behind onto the edge of it, fighting to retain her posture as she stared at the suitcases. She cried silently at first, then sobbed, and felt her body curl up on the bed like a singed string. She felt her muscles melting and her bones becoming soft, pliable shafts of warm clay, felt herself dissolving into Dr. Jorgan’s mattress, becoming part of it. Disappearing.
So Miranda had stood to prevent herself from disappearing, and brought her violent crying jag to an abrupt halt. She had gone to Dr. Jorgan’s office and stood outside his door, listening to him talk. Miranda had heard everything he told Mr. Shaw, and she had known it was a lie.
But she knew what he was up to. She had known that as soon as she heard the lie, and Dr. Jorgan had confirmed it when he had asked Mr. Shaw where Emma was.
That was what she thought about as she stared out the window at the wet and glimmering parking lot with its tall, glowing, bone-thin sentries—what Dr. Jorgan was up to.
He was trying to find that whore so he could save her, that bitch, that cunt who was so rich and so spoiled and so solid.
Not like Miranda, who was little more than a cloud of smoke. She knew it was true now, because she had seen the utter shock in Dr. Jorgan’s eyes when she had tried to touch his arm and her hand had simply oozed into his elbow with hardly any impact at all. Soon, it would pass right through. He had looked at her with absolute horror. Miranda knew now that it was true. She was a ghost. Nothing more.
She knew, also, that Dr. Jorgan was leaving. Running away from his job and from Mr. Shaw to look for that woman.
And she knew where that woman was. In a mission. Somewhere in the city, there was a mission in which that woman was being cared for, as if she were not rich enough to buy the place, tear it down, and put up a luxury high-rise condo. As if she were not solid enough to take care of herself. Someone was taking care of her as if she needed it. As if she deserved it. And she probably thought she was hidden from everyone.
Well, if that was what she was thinking, then she was wrong. Because Dr. Jorgan knew. And Miranda knew.
She was certain she could find that rich, whining twat with no trouble at all and take care of her before Dr. Jorgan found her. He would know then—she would make him know—that Emma Shaw was not what he needed. He would learn that Miranda was the only one who really mattered, who really cared for him, loved him, who could give his life meaning.
Although she was sure there were plenty of others, Miranda knew of only one mission in the city. The big one. In that huge, ominous old building. She thought it was South Street, but she was not certain. It hardly mattered. She knew where it was, and she would find it. She would start there, and if she could not find Emma Shaw there, Miranda would work her way through the phone book if necessary.
Miranda knew she could find Emma Shaw before Dr. Jorgan because she was almost completely invisible. And she could pass through walls.
29.
Dinner Conversation
* * *
When he opened his eyes and saw all the pipes and wiring running along the ceiling above him, McNolte bolted upright on the bed and wondered how long he had been asleep.
“I was about to wake you.”
Emma stood at the foot of the bed, facing him. Behind her, a card table was set up with two trays of food on it. He caught a whiff of something that smelled delicious and his stomach rumbled.
“Are you hungry?” she said.
He rubbed his bleary eyes and yawned, his hands feeling heavy, as if he had been drugged. “Doesn’t seem like that long ago that I was eating,” he said, standing and stretching his arms above his head, “but I’m starving.”
“Well, soup’s on.”
“How long was I out?”
“Oh, about an hour, a little less, maybe.”
McNolte’s pant leg was still rolled up, so he leaned down and tugged it back into place.
“I couldn’t help noticing you’d hurt yourself,” Emma said, nodding toward his leg, “so I had Mama Charity bring down some bandages. I’ve got some bumps that could use a little attention myself. I’ll wrap that ugly lump on your leg, if you’d like. But if you don’t mind, I need to eat first because I’m starving.”
Seating herself at the table, she began scooping food onto her plate.
There was something different about her. He watched her closely as he took his seat, trying not to be too obvious about it but wanting to identify the subtle change in her.
Emma seemed much more relaxed, for one thing. Perhaps the shower had helped. Even her voice sounded more natural. She still looked exhausted, but there was something else, too.
The plaid shirt and jeans were gone. Now she wore a pair of baggy men’s pajamas, dark blue with large gray buttons down the front. And the auburn hair that looked so spiky and jagged and greasy before was now smooth and shiny and had a slight bounce to it when she moved her head. It was growing wild, with no order to it, no direction, which somehow served to give it a more intriguing look. Her face was clean and her skin was pale and smooth, without a blemish. Her hands were clean, too, and he watched them a moment as she put food on her plate, marveling at the length of her lovely fingers, which somehow had appeared short and stubby earlier, when they had worn a thin layer of mottled grime. She did not look at all like the woman he had met, the bundle of nerves and fear in the rubber poncho.
“Do you know that you’re staring?” she said softly as she set her plate before her with one hand, picked up her fork with the other, and began to eat without hesitation or shame, unlike any woman McNolte had ever eaten with before. She shoveled the food from her plate into her mouth, and her face took a sublime look of almost sexual pleasure.
“I’m sorry,” McNolte said. He lifted his plate and dished up some food: a couple of slices of pressed turkey breast meat, mashed potatoes and gravy, jellied cranberry sauce, mixed vegetables and a hot roll. There were two cans of generic cola in the middle of the table. Emma had not touched hers, but McNolte grabbed his and snapped it open.
Emma chewed for a long time, her eyes closed beneath raised brows. She swallowed, then dabbed a napkin over her lips.
“If it’s my hair,” she said, “I don’t blame you. It looks terrible. I used to have long hair. Really full, too.” She picked up her knife, pinned down a slice of turkey meat with her fork, as if it might get away, and sliced with rapid, emphatic strokes of the blade. “But they shaved it all off for the two operations. Now it’s growing back like wild shrubbery, or something. I despise it. But I suppose it’s better than being bald.” She speared a couple of chunks of the meat, slid them into her mouth, and chewed with great relish, eyes closed again, jaw working slowly behind lips that only barely remained together.
“No,” McNolte said. “It wasn’t your hair. It’s just that you seem so…different now. Than before, I mean.”
“Amazing what a shower will do, huh?” she said with half a smile, mouth still full.
“And I think you’re being a little hard on your hair. I’m sure it looked fine before, but it looks good now. Very, um…hip, I think.”
“Hip. I’ve never been hip in my life. Whether I try or not, I’m never hip.”
He spent a few seconds staring at her again and muttered, “Timeless.”
“I’m sorry?”
His neck burned with embarrassment. He was not sure why he had said the word. He had thought it, but had not meant to speak it aloud. Apparently, he was still groggy from his hour-long nap. He avoided her eyes as he took another bite of the food.
“What did you say?” she asked.
He swallowed, cleared his throat, and said, “Timeless. You strike me as a woman who doesn’t take to passing fads. You know, timeless. The kind of, um, beauty that’s always in style. That sort of thing. That’s what I meant.”
She laughed as she put a forkful of mashed potatoes into her mouth and chewed, making the tendons in her long, slender neck stand out against her pale skin, then swallowed. “That’s very nice of you to say. But I’m afraid my hair is still atrocious.”
“You seem much more relaxed.”
“I think that’s because we’re down here.”
“Oh? Why is that?”
“I’ve got a slight buzz in my head right now. It’s very quiet, probably just from the fluorescent lights. They do that, you know, especially when there are a lot of them, like the long tube lights in here. But other than that, I’m fine. We’re pretty isolated down here. There’s not a lot of interference. I can think clearly. Have a conversation.”
“That kind of thing really bothers you, huh?” McNolte said. “Like the microwave back at Wee’s?”
She dabbed her lips with the napkin again, then reached for the cola and opened it with a hissing pop.
“You know how an AM radio station sounds when it’s just in range enough to hear the voices, but just enough out of range for the voices to be garbled by static?”
He nodded.
“That’s what it’s like inside my head when I’m around a lot of electrical appliances. When I was on the street in the city, I really thought it was going to go insane, because I had nothing but garbly static in my head all the time. It varied in intensity, but it was always there. I could barely hear over it. And it got worse if I was around something like, um, say, a radio or TV station, something like that. Nothing but constant hissing static, everything so garbled. My head felt…swollen. Like it was inflated with static and might just split open at any second. Like a melon. And all this wiry electrical stuff would just tumble out of my broken skull.” She chuckled shaking her head, as if embarrassed by her own words. “That probably sounds crazy, but that’s how it felt. And because of that, my nerves were raw all the time. Like every single nerve in my body was exposed and had cold air blowing over it. The biggest toothache in the world inside my head. At the lab, it was much different. Quiet and calm, no interference. It’s not as quiet here, but at least I can think.”
Emma sliced into the turkey meat again. “To tell you the truth, I don’t care if I ever leave this basement. Really, I don’t. At least, that’s how I feel right now. It’s quiet, and I feel safe.” She lifted the fork and plucked the meat from it with her teeth.
