Meet Me In Manhattan

by Claudia Carroll

  Jeez, I thought, this guy doesn’t take prisoners. I stayed firm though and, with sweating palms, tried to stick to my resolve.

  ‘I’m afraid so, yes.’

  ‘And that’s all you have to say?’ he said, like he was just gunning for a fight.

  ‘Tony,’ I told him crisply, ‘I can’t fashion a whole feature for you out of thin air. And that’s all there is here. Trust me, we have nothing to go on and the best I can do is come up with other pitches for you that would work equally well instead.’

  ‘Well, you’d better,’ were his last words, almost sounding threatening now. ‘And fast. Because you have seriously let us down here.’

  ‘So what in the name of arse did you tell them both there was no story for?’ Joy asks, mystified, as soon as I’ve finished.

  ‘Because I gave my word to the McGillises, and given everything they did for me, I think it’s only fair to stick to that. Besides, I’m protecting an underage source here.’

  ‘But Holly! She’s your boss, and supposing she finds out?’

  ‘How will she find out?’

  ‘Oh come on, you of all people know how little it takes these days for something to go viral! And your job could well rest on this, everything you’ve worked so hard for! You don’t know what’s going on in New York right at this very minute. You’re assuming it’ll all blow over and no one will get wind of it this side of the Atlantic, but do you know how unrealistic that is?’

  ‘I know, but I gave my word …’ I start to say, but she doesn’t let me finish.

  ‘All it takes is for one ill-judged tweet to get re-tweeted and you’re up shit creek, missy. I mean, I could walk right out of here now, strip down to my bra and knickers and do cartwheels across Grand Canal Square. All it takes is one eejit with a camera phone to notice me, and twenty-four hours later, I’m suddenly a YouTube sensation with two million hits and a guest appearance on this Friday’s Late Late Show. I’m not telling you anything you don’t already know!’

  ‘Course not,’ I say flatly. I knew the risk of what I was doing all too well. She’s preaching to the choir. I knew it and I still made the call to stick to my word, for better or for worse.

  ‘And from what you’ve just said, this could well turn into something pretty sensational.’

  ‘I’m hoping it won’t come to that …’

  ‘But let’s just say that it does. Worst-case scenario, it could well reach the ears of not just News FM, but Channel Six too.’

  ‘Don’t, please,’ I tell her. I already feel nauseous just thinking about all the permutations and combinations of what might happen. ‘Besides, there’s every chance this’ll just fizzle out and no one will be any the wiser. I mean, look at what happened to me. I went over there all guns blazing and that came to nothing, didn’t it?’

  ‘Jesus, Holly,’ Joy sighs worriedly. ‘I don’t get it. For such a smart girl, why do you insist on playing with fire?’

  *

  That night, Mike calls and, I swear, just the sound of his voice does me good to hear. It’s a brief, truncated chat though, as he’s calling me from the back of a taxi.

  ‘So how does it feel to be back home in Ireland?’ he asks straight off. And I find myself softening, just remembering back to those magical carefree days, such a scarily short time ago. Almost seems like a mirage now. The two of us in Grand Central Station, The View, sipping hot chocolate in the Rockefeller Center, fecking snowballs at each other in Central Park while he tried to teach me how to sled.

  Funny, I think disconnectedly, how it’s possible to have people in your life for years and years yet never really come to know them properly. Then you run into someone like Mike by nothing other than the most random of chances and, in the space of a few short days, I end up feeling like there was never a time when I didn’t know him.

  ‘Well … it’s not Manhattan here, that’s for sure,’ I say, and even though I can’t see him, I can still picture that crooked little half smile of his.

  ‘It hasn’t been quite the same here since you left either, I can tell you,’ he says. ‘I think even Mom is missing you. I’ve lost count of the number of times she’s said, “If only Holly were here now …” in the past twenty-four hours.’

  ‘Give her all my love. And Harry too, of course.’

  A long pause just at the mention of Harry’s name.

  ‘So,’ I say tentatively, which is my roundabout way of bringing it up. ‘I have to know, Mike. How it’s all starting to play out?’

  ‘Do you really want to know? Because it doesn’t look pretty. Nor is it over yet, in spite of my best efforts, not by a long chalk. I’m desperately trying to contain it and do some damage limitation here, but—’

  ‘But …?’

  ‘I just can’t help feeling that I’m sitting on a time bomb.’

  Chapter Twenty-Eight

  The minute Mike is off the phone, I’m straight over to my laptop and Googling away. Oh dear God, but there it is, just waiting for me.

  The chat forum has been named To Catch a Catfish, appropriately enough. And even though the thread I find is dated from about three weeks ago what really strikes me is just how innocuously it all starts off.

  I start off just skim reading through the introductory threads, all pretty general posts to begin with, lamenting the amount of catfish out there and, worse still, how they somehow manage to get away with it.

  And then my eye locks onto one that suddenly makes my blood run cold.

  Posted by Mary-Clare 17 days ago at 15.40

  Help me! I’ve met a guy on a dating site, but there’s something seriously weird going on and I’d really welcome your advice.

  This guy is a pilot, he told me. Working on Delta Airlines and based in Atlanta. He’s a widower as well with a little boy aged just six.

  I swear, my heart constricts in my chest as I read this and suddenly I’m finding it hard to breathe.

  I’ve to actively force myself to read on.

  So of course, I was like a Vegas slot machine where a whole row of golden apples comes up, one right after the other. I thought chi-ching! A widower with a great job, and a family man to boot? Couldn’t have been more perfect for me.

  An exact mirror image of what I once thought myself …

  Anyway, we’ve arranged to meet on three separate occasions and just now, tonight and for the third time, he’s emailed me to cancel. The excuses were all perfectly plausible, but still. And can I just say, he couldn’t be more charming about it.

  ‘I know being apart is tough,’ were his exact words. ‘But not being together is unthinkable.’

  Still though. Reading this blog sent a shiver down my spine and your advice would be greatly welcomed. Because frankly, I’m starting to worry now that I’m being catfished.

  You’re starting to worry? I think, frantically scrolling down the page till my eye lands on the very next post.

  Posted by Hannah 16 days ago at 23.56

  Hmm. An instant alarm bell rang with me as soon as I read your post, Mary-Clare. My older sister is dating someone she met online, who so far she’s only ever had virtual contact with. No face-to-face, but several cancelled dates. And TBH, her guy sounds so suspiciously like your pilot, it’s uncanny.

  Leave this with me, will you? I’ll check in with my sister and report back.

  Oh God, oh God, oh God, I think, gulping back air before I can read on …

  Posted by Mary-Clare 16 days ago at 07.54

  Huge thanks, Hannah. My pilot just called – yet again – and it turns out his son was ill and had to be rushed to hospital, which is why he’s had to cancel our date. He sounded so convincing and it all rang so true, I felt like a complete bitch for ever doubting him in the first place.

  Oh, and will you tell your sister his name is Andy, by the way. Captain Andy McCoy.

  Nononononononono …

  Then words from other posts start coming in thick and fast, swimming in front of my eyes as my heart rate spirals off into panic.
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  Posted by Kelly 15 days ago at 13.05

  Sorry for butting in girls, but did I read that right? You really said Captain Andy McCoy? Because a guy with exactly the same name has been in touch with me via the anotherfriend site and I honestly thought that he and I were a thing! Where I’m standing, I think we’re most definitely being catfished, ladies. And even though it drives me crazy, I guess it’s better to find out sooner rather than later, right?

  I actually find myself involuntarily stuffing my fist into my mouth before I can bring myself to read any more. Yet another post from someone called Natalie claiming ‘Captain Andy’ has been dating her online too. Then my eye falls on this:

  Posted by Hannah 14 days ago at 17.56

  OK, I got something to add, but you may not like it. My sister’s guy is also called Andy McCoy and, no surprises here, is also a pilot. So let’s just distill down to the basic facts we know about this guy. Or at least that we think we know.

  1.This guy is based in Atlanta.

  2.Flies with Delta and travels all the time.

  3.He’s a widower.

  4.Plus he’s got a six-year-old son named Logan.

  Ladies, I think we can all agree we have a prime catfish on our hands here. So the question now is, what are we going to do about it? What this guy is doing is a felony if you ask me and I’m not prepared to just let him get away with it.

  The reply to that one comes within half an hour.

  Posted by Mary Clare 14 days ago at 18.29

  You know what, ladies? Reading your posts makes me so darn angry. Just look at us, we all seem like smart women who ought to know better, and yet this idiot catfish is stringing us all along?

  I for one am furious and I’m 100% with you, Hannah. I’m all for investigating this a little further and maybe even for taking him on.

  If you ask me, he’s got it coming.

  Chest tightly constricted like someone is twisting a knife into it, I force myself to keep on reading, to keep on scrolling down the page …

  Posted by Sam 12 days ago at 11.32

  Great thread, ladies, and I hope you’ll forgive a guy barging in, but just so you know, there’s actually a psychological name for what you refer to as ‘catfishing’. Munchausen’s by Internet. Munchausen’s, as you know, is where someone consistently feigns illness in order to attract attention to themselves. Munchausen’s by Internet is actually a variation on that theme, whereby someone hides behind a false identity online, so that they can gain attention from the opposite sex. They do it purely and simply because they can. No other psychological reason for it.

  But it’s his next sentence that really turns my bones stone cold.

  Anyway perhaps I can offer to help? I work at a mobile internet security company and if you could give me some details, I’d be more than happy to dig a little deeper for you? You’d be astonished how much information we can glean just from a person’s IP address, plus we can now geotag any mobile device too.

  Glad to help out, if I possibly can.

  My eyes are swimming now and the words almost seem to dance across the screen at me. So I slam my laptop shut, unable to read a single line more.

  Enough is enough.

  Chapter Twenty-Nine

  I hardly sleep a wink and the following morning the very thoughts of breakfast turns my stomach. It’s way too early to contact Mike, with the time difference, so with my brains practically turned to mince and fit for absolutely nothing else, at 6 a.m. I get straight back online and Google away the one subject that’s consumed me for the past twenty-four hours.

  Oh dear Jesus. Overnight, it’s got progressively worse and worse. Now one of the ‘To Catch a Catfish’ gals has posted an online blog, minutely detailing exactly how they came up with their plan and, more importantly, how it’s all about to unfold.

  Needless to say, I read it the same way I would a paperback thriller, white knuckles stuffed into my mouth. You can almost get a sense of their rising bile practically steaming off the screen, but that’s not what’s making my stomach churn with worry.

  Fact is, I’ve lied to just about everyone I work for. I’ve told everyone there’s absolutely no story, nothing to see here, guys, so kindly move along please … and now here it is, unfolding right before my eyes, for all the world to see. My worst fear realized.

  I knew this might happen; I took a risk, albeit a calculated one, hoping against hope that it might all turn out to be no more than a storm in a teacup over on the far side of the Atlantic.

  But you know, with luck and a lot of prayers, I might just be able to contain this, I try my level best to convince myself. Maybe it’ll stay small. After all, this is just one small, little blog in a whole sea of billions of them. I didn’t even stumble on it myself before I went to New York while I was actually researching the story. It’s only since all this broke that I specifically went looking for it, didn’t I?

  Maybe it’ll all blow over like a tropical storm.

  Maybe.

  The very first ‘To Catch a Catfish’ blog post is dated Christmas Eve. No more than a week ago, but it seems like a whole other lifetime to me now though. That was the day that Mike unexpectedly pitched up at the Roosevelt Hotel looking for me. The day he whisked me off to brunch, insisting that I see Grand Central Station, the Guggenheim and the Met, all followed by another long, leisurely natter sitting by the skating rink at the Rockefeller Center.

  Just remembering back, it seems like I dreamt it all now.

  Read on, you’ll see why.

  To Catch a Catfish by Mary-Clare Travers, December 24

  I’ve never actually written a blog post before, so please go easy on me if I make mistakes. But here’s the thing. I’m so angry right now. White-hot want-to-smash-something angry.

  Thing is, I recently met a guy online who seemed really promising and the killer is that he’s now turned out to be a complete and utter catfish. So are you ready for the punchline? Turns out my Mr Perfect, the same gorgeous, warm-hearted soul who I honestly felt I was in a virtual relationship with, has no fewer than – get this – five different women on the go, all at the same time. FIVE. And they’re only the ones we know about: that could easily turn out to be the tip of the iceberg.

  Which is when a guy called Sam came on board. He’d accidentally stumbled across our thread and very kindly offered to help. As miracles would have it, Sam worked for a mobile internet security company and said that with just a few details, he might be able to trace our catfish’s computer using its IP address. If we had a mobile phone number, he told us he could trace this, too.

  Now I didn’t, as ‘Captain Andy’ was very careful to sidestep me whenever I asked him about his cell phone, but it turned out one of the other ladies, a girl called Kelly from New Jersey, did have an emergency number for him, which we duly passed onto Sam. And then we waited.

  Then only just last night, Sam got back to us via our online forum with some seriously big news. Turned out just about every tale this guy had spun each of us was a downright lie. For a start, he didn’t even work for Delta and never had. And he certainly didn’t live in Atlanta either, as this asshole had originally claimed; his computer could most definitely be traced to New York City. Best of all, we even had an address for him.

  Now, here’s how I feel about this and here’s what’s really got to all us ‘catfishees’, as we’ve taken to calling ourselves: if you lie in any real-life situation, you get caught out pretty fast, right? if you’re caught lying repeatedly in work, your ass is so fired. If you lie to a boyfriend or girlfriend, it’s sayonara. And yet we live in an age when people can go online and pretty much do what the hell they like. If you ask me, the Internet is a bit like the Wild West was, circa 1850: anything goes. You can say and do as you please. It’s utterly unpoliced. And it’s frightening.

  So I went back to our To Catch a Catfish forum and put it to the other ladies fair and square. I suggested we didn’t let this idiot get away with it. And here’s the thing: I’m h
ere in California, but will be travelling to Connecticut to spend the holidays with my family. Now, given that Connecticut is just a short train ride away from NYC, I was thinking of springing a little Christmas surprise on Captain Andy. I threw it out to the others, fully expecting the answer ‘no’, considering the time of year. And yet two of them astonished me. Turned out Kelly would be in New Jersey for the holidays and had been planning a trip to NYC anyway. ‘Count me in,’ she told me, after we swapped phone numbers to liaise.

  And, lo and behold, another Christmas miracle, I got a message from another catfishee, a smart-sounding lady called Natalie who is right about my own age. ‘I’m based in Philadelphia,’ she wrote to me just last night, ‘but I’m coming to Albany in upstate New York to spend the holidays with my folks, so if you need any back-up, Mary Clare, you can count on me.’

  Natalie even had a suggestion: why don’t we video it on our phones and upload it onto YouTube? ‘It’ll be exactly like making a TV documentary!’ she said excitedly, and I could only agree.

  So now we’re a little army of three. Just one little thing to take care of first, and that’s to let ‘Captain Andy’ know that his days of getting away with this behaviour are numbered.

  So I do exactly what he does, to give him a taste of his own medicine and just see how he likes it. Late on the 26th December, I set up a fake username and profile, just like he did, and I sent him a message that I hoped and prayed would turn the blood in his veins to acid.

  Like Natalie said, he had it coming.

  We can’t get to NYC just yet because of this snowstorm, but it’s due to clear in the next twenty-four hours.

  So either watch this space, or else watch the hourly news bulletins because, mark my words, that’s where this whole story is headed.

  With sweaty palms, I have to shove the laptop away from me and remind myself to breathe.