Tangle's Game

by Stewart Hotston

  ‘Is it so bad to want to belong?’

  ‘To want to belong?’ he asked, pursing his lips as if considering the idea. ‘You don’t want to belong. You do belong. You’re an investment wanker, you’re into white guys, you went to Oxbridge and have all the money in the world.’ He held his hands up, lips curled and nostrils flared. ‘You’re a master of the universe. Your parents are a doctor and a professor, respectively. Pillars of the community, all of you.’ He slid the tablet onto the table and turned his whole body in her direction. ‘Success generates resentment as poverty generates repulsion. When pogroms come, everything is a reason to unpick that integration you’re so proud of.’

  ‘I’m not integrated,’ said Amanda. ‘I’m from here. There’s nothing to integrate, because I didn’t start out different.’

  He laughed. ‘You and I are very different.’

  ‘You’re not the yardstick by which my citizenship is measured,’ she said.

  ‘Am I not?’ He narrowed his eyes. ‘Why are you here, then?’

  Whatever fight had been coiled in her chest unwound then.

  He turned to the uniform. ‘You can leave us.’

  ‘Sir, I can’t.’ The tone said Sir, surely you know this, that Crisp’s request was as irregular as it was pointless.

  Crisp clenched his jaw, the line along his cheek showing in the light as a momentary shadow.

  ‘Get undressed,’ he said.

  Amanda froze. From the door she could feel sudden attention from the uniform, his eyes on her for the first time.

  ‘I’m sorry?’ She dropped her hands below the table so he couldn’t see them shake.

  ‘Get undressed. I want to see you put on one of these.’ He held out the bag of dirty underwear. ‘I don’t care which, your choice.’

  ‘You don’t have to comply with that request,’ said the uniform, stepping away from the door. ‘It is inappropriate.’ Crisp dropped his arms to his side, his hands relaxed, open.

  Feeling an edge of freedom glinting at her, Amanda watched the two men square off.

  ‘“It’s inappropriate,”’ mocked Crisp. ‘The casual racism was okay, was it? That’s how immigration rolls? I didn’t ask her yet if she knows who Byron was, or if she can name the last four Prime Ministers. I didn’t ask her if she had sympathies with Islamic ideology or whether killing innocent people was justifiable. So I guess I had quite a long way to go on that front. Nice to know you draw the line at sexual humiliation, though.’ He twisted his face to Amanda. ‘Tea or cappuccino? Masala or Roast Beef? Remember now, only one of these answers means you’re white enough on the inside to stay.’

  ‘Sir, can you please leave the room?’

  Amanda watched them, could see the uniform hesitating, holding back from calling an end to whatever was happening. It felt like a conflict between two systems; like the battles between the head of trading and the head of structuring over who’d get recognition for a big deal. She realised they were from different agencies, that Crisp wasn’t immigration. Crisp remained relaxed, insouciant. He stared at the ceiling, at the uniform’s shoulder, his waist, but never returned his gaze.

  ‘Have you searched her?’ His tone accusing, implying any answer other than ‘yes’ meant immigration had failed in a basic duty.

  The uniform didn’t reply, but reached for the walkie talkie at his belt. Before he could lift it to his face Crisp was on him, moving so swiftly Amanda didn’t realise he’d been punched to the floor until she registered the bloody splatter from his nose between his legs. It was quiet, soft—a squelch and a bump rather than an explosion—but the effect was dazzling. The uniform sat where he landed, blood painting the lower half of his face black and red as it ran onto his trousers.

  ‘C’mon, get up. You’re not so useless that one punch is all you’ve got.’ Crisp’s arms hung loosely at his side, like nothing had happened. A softly stuffed doll.

  The uniform collected his wits and started to get up, and Crisp feinted a lunge with a little roar. His victim, as Amanda now saw him, flinched, crying out, and Crisp laughed.

  ‘Go on, fuck off and get back up, security, whatever’s going to make you feel better. I’ll be waiting for you to help keep our borders safe, you miserable little shit.’

  The man scrabbled on his hands and knees to the door, his backside sticking up into the air. He reached for the door handle and was gone.

  It dawned on Amanda she was alone with a man who’d just assaulted an immigration official for trying to intervene on her behalf.

  Trembling fingers reached for the buttons of her blouse.

  ‘What are you doing?’ he asked, a disgusted tone to his voice. ‘I’d rather watch paint dry.’ He thought about it. ‘No offence. I just needed that arsehole out of the room.’

  Amanda’s fingers fell to her sides. ‘Who are you?’

  He shook his head. ‘That’s a stupid question, Ms Back. Your profile says you’re pretty fucking smart; smarter than me, anyway. So for the dummy in the room, please tell me about Tangle Singh.’

  Amanda’s breath caught in her throat.

  ‘I’m glad you’re not denying you know him.’

  ‘We haven’t spoken in a long time,’ she managed, wondering what last indignity he’d held back for her to stumble into.

  ‘That’s not an answer to my question, though, is it? We haven’t got a huge amount of time here. And as you’ve probably worked out, I’m about to become massively unpopular for breaking someone else’s rules.’ He cast his thumb over his shoulder. ‘Dipshit will be back shortly, and although it would be fun, even I’m not allowed to beat the crap out of more than one immigration official a year. You can stay quiet and it’ll all be over, or I can make things difficult.’ He stepped away from the table, which was a welcome change, but a continent away from far enough for Amanda. ‘Your choice.’

  ‘We haven’t spoken for nine years,’ said Amanda. ‘I have no idea where he is, or what he’s doing.’

  ‘No idea at all?’

  She sucked at her teeth. ‘I hope he’s dead. Properly dead. But I guess he’s probably stacked up on some designer drug bought with someone else’s money.’ She shook her head. ‘I really don’t see what this has to do with me.’

  ‘So you’ve not heard from him?’

  ‘I told you, we haven’t spoken.’

  He sighed as a parent might at a wilful child. ‘I didn’t ask if you’d spoken. I asked if he’d made contact with you. You could have ignored it, I couldn’t give a shit. What I want to know is; has he tried to contact you?’ He stared at her, his eyes wide. ‘We’re pressed for time here, Ms Back, and in need of answers we think only you can provide.’

  She shook her head, still trying to work out what was going on.

  ‘Does your employer know about the bad debts and the bankruptcy?’

  She clenched her fingers into her palms, ignoring the pain of nails biting into flesh. ‘He did that, not me.’

  ‘It’s your name on the court proceedings, though, which is all that really matters.’

  The truth was she hadn’t mentioned it in her interviews and they’d never raised it even when they ran her background checks. She was suddenly pleased it had happened before social credit scores had become a thing.

  ‘No,’ said Amanda. ‘He hasn’t sent me anything. He hasn’t tried to make contact. I wouldn’t entertain him if he did. He’s a high-leverage type of person and I have no interest in that kind of risk.’

  ‘Was he always a drug addict?’

  She remembered when they’d first met at a winter funfair in Hyde Park; all bright lights, huge rides and glühwein. The firm had been hosting clients at the OktoberFest tents, a stein-fuelled evening of conversations about family, holidays and deals they’d done together. One client’s flirtation had crossed into awkward territory; his hand on her back, his face too close to hers. Bored of the perpetual necessity of dealing with morons who refused to see it was her job to be nice to them and not her natural state, Amanda lef
t the huge Britpop themed tent for a few gulps of crisp cold air.

  ‘Wandering hands too much for you?’ asked a tall, gorgeous Asian man. Clean shaven, curly hair and green eyes. She remembered glancing at his hands, long fingers and elegant.

  ‘What’s it to you?’ She didn’t need another man trying to sympathise with her.

  ‘I could spike his bank account if you want?’ His face was totally serious except for his eyes. His eyes danced with a green fire that even then she knew was dangerous; but unlike the inept bankers waiting for her in the pavilion, it was actually interesting.

  She’d turned down his offer, but they walked a circuit of the funfair, talking about networks, influence and the future of the internet. She asked for his details, deciding she wanted to know more about the world he inhabited.

  Amanda understood what Crisp wanted and who he was, and in so doing felt as if she’d found solid ground under her feet.

  ‘No. He was only a genius then. Making stupid decisions like the rest of us, but not yet living with the consequences.’ She paused, looked at Crisp, forced her eyes to stay on his. Smiling now, playing a role she understood. ‘What do you think he’s sent me? Why didn’t you just come to my place, ask me there?’ She kept her voice light, as casual as she could. Because there was something about this that couldn’t be legitimate. There was something about this that Crisp thought she wouldn’t like, that made him decide it was better to coerce her than ask her cooperation.

  ‘If it was that simple—’ started Crisp, relaxing as if he’d found a friend.

  ‘You’ve been to my place?’ asked Amanda, phrasing it as a question only for Crisp’s benefit.

  ‘You use a bunch of end-to-end encrypted communication channels, even if you don’t know it. I wanted to make sure he’d not talked to you, sent you something that way.’

  She shook her head slowly, thinking about the messages she’d received over the last week. ‘What sort of timeframe?’ The key to getting out of the room was to be as cooperative as possible, to leave him regarding her as a colleague and not a suspect—or worse, an obstruction. ‘After the way we split up I think I’m the last person he’d contact. If you’ve been to my place’—she left her assumption that he was bugging her unsaid—‘then you know what I’ve received, who I’ve spoken to. Tangle’s number isn’t in my contacts list.’

  Crisp’s look then—pitying, but calculating—told her Tangle might be desperate enough that she was his only option.

  ‘What has he done anyway? Why would anything he’d be involved with be of interest to you?’ She sighed, hoping it wasn’t too dramatic. ‘The last I saw him, years ago by the way, he was on the kind of decline from which people don’t return.’

  ‘Our time’s almost up,’ said Crisp. ‘He will send you something, a package. It contains material important to the state. You shouldn’t access it at all, for your own safety as much as others’.’

  ‘That seems epically unlikely,’ said Amanda.

  A fragile silence stretched between them. She had no more words to say; she couldn’t, and wouldn’t, promise him anything and he wasn’t asking for a response so much as dictating how she should behave.

  The door chimed open and two huge men stepped into the room. Behind them stood the uniform, now joined by a woman in a suit. He pointed at Crisp, blood congealing on his upper lip, a furious fear glinting in his eyes.

  The suited woman stepped into the room and with a cursory glance at Amanda addressed Crisp. ‘Your clearance has been revoked. My staff will escort you out.’ Her words were clipped, a statement daring him to argue, her accent Yorkshire.

  ‘I’m not done,’ said Crisp, sounding like a child who wasn’t ready to go to bed.

  ‘Yes. You are.’ She looked at Amanda. ‘You have my full apologies and are free to go. If you can wait here, we’ll find someone to sort your status before you leave.’

  ‘Now, that’s above your paygrade,’ said Crisp, pressing his fingers to his nose as though to calm himself. It was the first time Amanda had seen him express anything but the bland confidence of privilege and power.

  One of the guards put a hand on his shoulder and Crisp twisted, dropping and turning so that, somehow, he had the guard’s hand bent in the wrong direction, forcing him to his knees. The other guard stepped forward, but Crisp waved his finger in admonishment. ‘You want to break his wrist, take another step.’

  The guard froze, turning to look at the woman.

  ‘Let him go,’ was all she said.

  ‘I don’t like being touched,’ said Crisp when they’d stepped back. The guard grasped at his wrist.

  ‘I expect most people would happily oblige you in that sentiment,’ said the woman sweetly, and Amanda wanted to shake her hand. ‘Right now you’ll ease off and leave. If you don’t, I’ll have them tase you until you don’t know what day of the week it is.’

  Crisp stared at her then laughed. ‘Fine. Amanda, if you find anything, I want to know,’ he said, before ducking out of the room.

  Amanda relaxed, her shoulders drooping in relief.

  The suited woman looked her up and down, appraising and appalling in its calculation. It occurred to Amanda that they weren’t on the same side, just that they’d been united by Crisp for a few moments.

  ‘You better come with me,’ said the woman, and the flatness of her expression reeked of a shit show beyond Amanda’s comprehension.

  CHAPTER TWO

  THE NON-DISCLOSURE AGREEMENT had typos in it. Confidential became Cofnidential and in two places her name had been spelled as Black.

  They don’t have these laying about, then, thought Amanda as the suited woman, a senior supervisor who’d eventually introduced herself as Jan, hovered over her shoulder urging her to sign the document.

  There was little to gain in pointing out their errors. She knew that if it came to it—under what circumstances she couldn’t imagine—poorly drafted legal documents, rushed or otherwise not cared for, rarely fared well in court: the typos wouldn’t do it, but the lawyers would look all the closer at the wording because sloppiness only encouraged them to find fault. It wouldn’t help much, and she had no intention of breaching what was clearly the Home Office’s attempt to cover its arse with both hands, but the thought comforted her as she scanned the text.

  Jan breathed heavily, moved around, kept coming back to see if she’d signed yet. The room was a step up from her previous residence; a window looked out on luggage trucks rattling past, people in high vis jackets and hard hats walking along lost in their own cares as they helped run the world’s busiest airport.

  ‘I’m going to sign,’ said Amanda on the sixth pass. ‘It’s not like you’re giving me a choice.’ It occurred to her that she could have refused, but she wanted to be away, to get home, to down a very large gin and tonic before trying to figure out who at work would give her the hardest time for not going into the office after her flight.

  Amanda sighed. ‘I want to know just what you’re proposing to do if I speak about that maniac and my treatment here, the racism, the abuse.’ She was happy laying it on thick, she had enough stress to share it around.

  ‘We’ll re-examine the flag Crisp’s people put against your profile,’ said Jan. ‘That piece of paper doesn’t say that, but it’s what will happen.’

  The document was drafted so broadly they could, if they chose, fly her to the moon and dump her there permanently. It was the type of language she’d have smashed in any deal shown to her, but some battles weren’t worth it. And the situation the document addressed seemed so remote, so unlikely, there was no point trying to sort the wording out.

  As soon as Amanda signed the document, Jan showed her out.

  Amanda stood alone in flat metallic air a hundred yards down from Arrivals, cars zipping past on their way out of the airport. Rain had come and gone while she’d been inside, the tarmac pooling with oily puddles. She glanced up at the clouds in case they decided to start over and marched to the taxi rank, keen to
get away as quickly as possible.

  In the taxi, she emptied her bag to repack it more carefully but got distracted when she came to her tablet, stuffed up against her dirty knickers. She couldn’t shake Crisp’s presence from her mind, his violent calm resting on her skin, a ghost who wouldn’t leave after the lights were turned on.

  Her tablet blinked with hundreds of unread messages, but the idea of starting in on work filled her chest with a lightning she couldn’t master. She left them growing untended.

  ‘YOUR BOOK’S ARRIVED,’ said Adil when she got home. He opened the door for her with a broad smile and, as she numbly followed him into the atrium, darted into the space the concierges used, reappearing with a small cardboard package.

  She took it, suspicion growling in her bones. Seeing her face, Adil smiled again. ‘A gift, maybe?’

  ‘You know me,’ said Amanda. ‘Books aren’t really my thing.’

  It occurred to her that Crisp hadn’t found what he was looking for because she hadn’t got it yet. If he’d been watching, he’d have seen nothing come her way; and who’d have thought to check down here? No wonder he’d approached her directly.

  Adil chuckled briefly, bowing his head in acknowledgement. ‘Not all the world has the joy of reading their books floating in the air like kites.’

  He loved his stupid holographic frame as much as his own children. In his opinion, often voiced over his wife’s samosas, it was what linked the two of them when so much else set them apart.

  ‘Any visitors?’ she asked, curious to confirm that Crisp had been to her apartment while she’d been away.

  Adil checked notes left by his colleagues and shook his head. ‘Mrs Ayman always asks if you have a gentleman friend coming to visit. She worries about you.’

  ‘Children aren’t for all of us,’ said Amanda, smiling.