A User's Guide to Make-Believe

by Jane Alexander

  ‘Hi, it’s me,’ she heard him say. ‘Where did you go? Please don’t just vanish on me again. Um. Did you go home, or what? Give me a call, alright?’

  She listened to him jogging up the stairs, waited for the flat door to close behind him. Instead, he came straight back down. This time she could hear he had his bike with him, bouncing down onto the concrete, chain clicking round. The front door opened. Closed again.

  She made herself count to five, then she poked her head out into the empty stairwell. Ran to the front door, and reached the street just in time to see Lewis turn at the end of it, tail light flashing red.

  CHAPTER THIRTY-TWO

  Lewis was stronger than her, much stronger – but he wore a helmet and reflective shorts, and was scared to swim in reservoirs. On her ancient bike, Cassie pedalled non-stop. Ran red lights, cut corners, hopped up onto pavements, shot up the inside of buses and lorries. Imagine Oswald’s face if he could see her, the risks she was taking with his precious upgrade, with their network in her unhelmeted brain. Her legs, lungs, face all burnt as she kept pace with Lewis, lights off in the twilight through the beginnings of rain, and far enough behind that he couldn’t glimpse her with one of his frequent shoulder checks. He cycled like a safety ad: flash, flash, check, signal. She gasped, spat into the gutter.

  When he turned off onto the canal towpath, she guessed where he was heading. She stayed on the road, faster and straighter – but she didn’t ease off, kept pushing uphill with all her strength, all her endurance. The last climb was the hardest. At the top she was dripping with sweat, the cool air a blessing as she coasted the final stretch, swung into her block. She’d already decided the best place to hide. The shelter that housed the bins would conceal her bike, give her a clear view.

  She didn’t have long to wait. Just a few minutes later, Lewis pulled up. He took the time to lock his bike, turn off his lights. She watched, hands clenched; watched as he walked straight to her block, and pressed the buzzer. Pressed again. Then he walked backwards, screen in hand, till he was within metres of her hiding place, and stared up at her window.

  He knew which street to go to. Which block to buzz, which unlit window to stare at. Knew all of this, even though she had never told him where she lived. Never invited him back to hers. She reached for the timber wall of the shelter, as the ground pitched beneath her.

  In silent mode, her own screen lit, flashed his face at her. This time, he didn’t leave a message. Instead he seemed to hesitate, then – still looking up at her bedsit window – he made another call.

  Though she couldn’t hear what he was saying, he was obviously in trouble. He stood with a hand pushed into his hair, shoving it into panicky spikes; he hunched into the screen, then threw back his head, urgency in every movement. She’s vanished, she imagined him saying. It wasn’t my fault. What would they tell him – track her down? Go home and wait? Remain where you are?

  The sweat was cooling on her skin. She shivered in his blank T-shirt, wanted to yank it off, trample it, stamp and spit on it, shove it into the bin. But she couldn’t get into her flat for something else to wear, not while he was hanging around. Was he going to stay all night, staking out her block, making her sleep in here with the bins? As she watched, the front door swung open; she saw her neighbour Ryan emerge, saw Lewis catch the door, disappear inside. Stop him, she thought, and just for a second it seemed like Ryan had heard her. He turned to stare at Lewis. Then he let the door close, and walked on.

  Inside the shelter, Cassie edged round so she had a clear view of her window. If Lewis was going to check out her flat he’d have to break in, because she’d certainly never given him keys. But almost immediately, her light went on. She stared, disbelieving, as he passed in front of the window, and back again. Her keys. He must have copied them. He couldn’t get in the main door because he didn’t know the code – but here he was slipping in and out of her flat whenever he pleased. Had he been there before? When she’d been at work? How long had he been investigating – sneaking round after her – spying on her?

  There was nothing there for him to find. Nothing that mattered. Only the drawer of T-shirts, only a box of Alan stuff: that was all she had that was personal, and none of it would mean a thing to anyone but her. She thought of Lewis reading the track listings of the compilation CDs that had been retro even a decade ago. Opening the cases, reading the notes that said nothing important but were the only evidence she had that, once, Alan had written to her. Thought about her. Known who she was. She thought of Lewis’s spying fingers, and wanted to puke.

  A couple of minutes, then the light went out. Thirty seconds later the front door opened. Lewis, unlocking his bike. Cycling towards her, and past her. The world blown apart at her feet.

  CHAPTER THIRTY-THREE

  When Alan had jumped from his bedroom window, he knew he could fly.

  Madness was only a mistake about what was real.

  She had made a mistake, a big one, with Lewis.

  His shirt, its warm clean smell, made her gag. How long? When had Imagen got to him? Perhaps it was only last night, when she woke up and he wasn’t there. It was what she wanted to think. It would mean he’d been playing her for less than twenty-four hours.

  But it wasn’t true.

  She thought of the way the woman had gone straight to Lewis’s bedroom, back in less than a minute with the receivers scooped into her hand. Thought of how quickly Lewis had sourced them – pretended to source them. God, of course, the bioware didn’t even need to be hacked. Not if he was working for them.

  From the start? Could he really have joined Jake’s group – turned up week after week – just waiting for her to come back? She remembered how he’d lifted his hand to his ear, at the meeting – the thrill she’d felt when she recognised the gesture. How clever she’d thought herself. Remembered how she’d signalled back, just as he must have hoped she would. How he’d hung around afterwards, waiting so they could leave together. How he’d invited her back to his. But no – it was her who’d made that move. No one to blame but herself: for talking, listening, opening up, falling straight into his treacherous bed.

  Him spooned behind her, intimate, trusting. Worming his way into her thoughts, her dreams. Him – Imagen – inside her. Imagen inside her now.

  She clutched at her head. Heard blood, loud – couldn’t think for the blood, for the chill creeping across her skull. She’d made a mistake with Oswald, too. She couldn’t trust the papers she’d signed. Couldn’t trust what they’d put into her. The biomolecules that were using her body, her brain as host. Buzzing under the skin of her scalp, pre-loaded with tasks, instructions, agendas. Deep inside, they were getting down to work.

  Her screen, still clutched in one hand, lit with a question mark. Lewis trying from a different device. Or Oswald – or the woman.

  She didn’t know how long she’d been crouched there. Only that it was properly dark. Only that she was cold, and swaying, palm pressed hard into jagged glass from the bottle recycling, so that when she lifted her throbbing hand it was smeared with blood.

  OK. OK. She’d made mistakes. The thing, now, was not to make any more.

  She wiped her palm on Lewis’s T-shirt, leaving a bloody smear. A part of her wanted to chase after him, confront him, persuade him to tell her everything. Why was he watching her? Who did he report to – and what had he told them? What had they promised as payment for his dirty work – was it the same bribe they had used on her: a job, and access to Make-Believe? But if she was to challenge him, she would have to be cold and focused, and what she felt was the opposite. Like she’d swallowed that broken bottle. Like the pain from her cut hand was in her chest, slicing her open. She was scared she’d ask the wrong questions: not why, but how? How could you do it? When we were meant to be on the same side. When we were meant to be the same. She felt the hot push of tears. Swallowed them back, horrified.

  Be cold. Be focused. Her legs gave as she stood up, and her hand slipped on the wet wood o
f the shelter as she balanced herself. She stared up at her bedsit. If the call that Lewis had made was to Oswald, or whoever his Imagen contact might be, by now they would be looking for her. For the moment, right here was the one place they knew she wouldn’t be – but for how much longer? A change of clothes, a jacket … The longer she hesitated, the greater the risk. She pushed her wet hair from her face, shook the drops from her hands, and launched herself into a run across the flooded concrete. Up the stairs, into her flat, and no time to think about Lewis in here nosing at all her stuff, raking through with his spying fingers. In the dark, she changed her clothes. Jeans, T-shirt, jumper, dry socks jammed straight back into wet trainers, her only pair. She grabbed her anorak, shoved her beanie hat in the pocket. Thought about leaving her screen behind, just in case they could use it to track her. But if they found it here, they’d be able to go through her calls, her messages, everything she had saved – and besides, the thought of being without it was too daunting. Instead, she turned it off.

  For all the good it would do, she locked the door behind her as she left.

  CHAPTER THIRTY-FOUR

  On her bike she set off south and east – going nowhere, going anywhere away from her usual route. Head down, rain crackling off her hood, she ran through the list of everyone who might give her a bed for the night. Felt herself sagging as she came up empty. Meg … Family is where they have to let you in – but there was no possibility her sister might help her. Nicol … If she arrived on his doorstep, he might let her crash on his couch – not that she was certain of where his doorstep was. But she was wary of involving Nicol, of leading Imagen to him. And Harrie … It wasn’t Harrie who had reported her to Imagen. She knew that now. She thought of Harrie opening her front door wide, sitting her down at the kitchen table and placing a pot of tea between them, listening as Cassie talked about Lewis, how he’d betrayed her. But after her last visit, she couldn’t be sure of her welcome. Better not to ask for help, than to force Harrie to refuse.

  Though she had no destination in mind, she found herself speeding up, slicing through puddles – her pedalling fuelled by anger as much as urgency. At Lewis, yes – but more she was furious with herself. She kept trying to visualise his face, to hear the tone of his voice; though it was far too late to do any good, still she felt a savage need to catch a shiftiness in his expression, a hesitation in his speech that would nail him as a liar. Instead, the episode on a loop in her mind was that first falling-out, when he’d tried to persuade her to bargain or blackmail her way back to Make-Believe. They’d have to let us back. She heard the twist in his voice, saw the longing that had darkened his eyes, so fierce it had scared her. Whatever else he’d lied about, he was a real addict. She’d stake everything on that.

  She swiped the rain from her eyes, swerved to avoid a stretch of broken tarmac. Didn’t want to think of what she and Lewis had in common. In such a short space of time, she had come to rely on him. Stupid, so stupid. Before she had met him, she’d been used to her loneliness. Then, to have a companion … It had made things better, more bearable. She’d allowed herself to feel safe. Even to have fun. Turned out, she’d been on her own all along; she just hadn’t realised. And now—now, right now, she refused to think about it. Now she needed to focus on what happened next. As the night grew late the roads would empty, and she’d become conspicuous to anyone out looking for her. At the next junction she took a turn towards the city centre, seeking the camouflage of crowds. But even here in the centre, sharing the roads with late buses and taxis, she felt conspicuous. Drunken groups called out to her as she passed. ‘She’s coming home with me,’ shouted one man as he made a lunge for her, and she swerved abruptly, managed a burst of speed before her cadence slowed, faltered. In the relative safety of a street lined with pubs, steady with drinkers weaving from one bar to the next, she pulled up at the corner of a close and tucked herself up in the dark alley mouth. She couldn’t remember the last time she’d felt this tired.

  She let her head drop to her hands. From a gutter above, a river of rain made the sound of a waterfall.

  Here.

  A voice, up close. Too close. Cassie snapped her head up, ready to scramble to her feet, make a run for it. But the voice was gentle, and the woman who’d spoken crouched, her arm outstretched. Something held in her hand. A banknote.

  ‘For a bed for the night,’ she said.

  ‘Oh, no …’ I’m not homeless. That’s what Cassie was going to say – but perhaps it wasn’t true. And perhaps it didn’t matter. Though a hostel bed was something she couldn’t risk, she would need to eat at some point, and her wallet was almost empty. She reached out. Took the money. It was a twenty.

  ‘Thank you,’ she said, and her voice skidded a bit on the last syllable.

  ‘Look after yourself, alright.’ The woman straightened and, with a brisk nod, carried on her way, like what she’d done was nothing very much.

  Cassie focused on the note, slippery under her damp fingers. She couldn’t keep hold of anything, any kind of truth. What was real? What was real? Start with the rain that was crackling off her hood, puddling the uneven ground, soaking her trainers. But if that was real, then what about the Make-Believe rain that had fallen on her and Alan, on the leaves above their heads? She had heard it, seen it – and if that wasn’t real, the rain on the leaves, why should she trust the wet that was trickling down her neck right now? As soon as she made a category called real, placed something inside it, the outlines blurred, became porous. There was nothing to hang onto, and too much she still didn’t know.

  Think: what could she trust? If the choices she’d thought were hers had been theirs all along. Sleeping with Lewis. Playing detective with Professor Morgan. Returning to Make-Believe. Ignoring Jake, giving up on her family, on every hope of reconciliation. Could she blame it all on Imagen? Every step she had taken?

  She’d come loose in the world, couldn’t figure it out on her own. But when she worked her fingers into the pocket where she’d folded the banknote, it was there still. Proof that a stranger had seen her trouble, and done her a good turn.

  Some people would do that for you. But how would they know they were needed, unless you told them so?

  It was time to ask for help.

  CHAPTER THIRTY-FIVE

  When Nicol saw Cassie’s face flash on his screen, he shook his head. He’d been expecting her to get in touch – and then he’d given up expecting anything. He flipped his screen upside-down on the desk, turned back to the code he was working on. ‘Too late, pal,’ he said under his breath.

  The second time, she called just as Jo stuck her head round the door.

  ‘Not going to answer it?’ she said.

  ‘It’s Cassie.’

  ‘Ah, OK.’

  ‘Want a beer?’

  ‘Aye. Beer would be epic, thanks.’

  Honestly, he should have known from the first time he met Cassie that she wasn’t to be relied on. Had known, really. The alarm had gone off: steer clear. You could always tell the damaged folk. It was in the eyes, or something. But her ad had been intriguing: successful small business … expanding our academic services … opportunities for highly qualified applicants in the following fields … And he’d needed the money. And then, he’d got to like her. She was funny, even if sometimes he wasn’t sure whether she meant to be. She was chaotic, but she tried hard to be efficient, and she cared about the product. She might be running a business that sold academic fraud, but she was honest about it. You could almost say she cheated with integrity. And she was stubborn as fuck, and that was a quality he’d always liked in a woman.

  He’d have thought she would leave a message, given she’d bothered to phone him twice. But no; there was nothing. He checked again, just to be sure.

  Now it was niggling at him. Thing was, it was unusual for her to call; she’d normally send a message. So perhaps it was something important … But she couldn’t expect him to give a shit, when she so clearly didn’t – plus it was basica
lly her fault he was so behind with this project.

  She’d phone back, if it really mattered.

  When Jo came back with his beer he grabbed her hand, stretched up and gave her a quick kiss. ‘Thanks.’

  ‘Glad to be of service,’ she said, and made herself scarce. It was cool, though; he’d done the same for her, all those years when she was volunteering, and then when she was training. Tea on the table the nights when she had to work late. Hot bath waiting after a long bad day, of which there were way too many.

  When Cassie called a third time, he was right in the middle of a tricky portion of code, like right in the middle – and he wrestled with himself, just for a moment. On the last buzz, eyes still fixed on his monitors, he picked up.

  ‘Yep?’

  He heard the sound of outside, and of someone not speaking. A silent connection.

  He looked at the screen. It was Cassie, for sure.

  ‘You there? Cassie? Are you hearing me?’

  ‘Listen,’ she said, like he wasn’t already. Her voice was low. Urgent. ‘I’m about to ask you for help. Something above and beyond. No reason why you should, and now’s your chance to hang up.’

  His turn not to speak. He slung himself back in his chair, still facing the displays, the program he’d been working on. The program he was debugging at what, eleven at night? – because he was astronomically far behind, because of the summer school assignments he’d finished this week which he wouldn’t get paid for because Cassie had pissed off without a word, hadn’t answered his messages, had left him with no way to contact the client who had now, presumably, failed. Fuck’s sake. And here she was playing at spies, like properly getting off on it, like all of that wasn’t just some game to make her life more interesting. She was wired to the moon, lately. And giving him an option not to help … as if all the other shit he’d helped her with – scamming the uni security, say, or free print credit, or setting up their untracked payment system – like all of that wasn’t already above and beyond.