But I’m getting ahead of myself. Suffice it to say that I continued to be the ‘Solitary One’, even after stepping off the boat – well, aeroplane actually – when my parents immigrated to British Columbia from Northern Ireland when I was eleven years old. A new country, new school, new friendships that I never quite made; these all conspired to make me even more the resentful loner. When the testosterone kicked in and I began noticing girls, they failed to notice me very much. Needless to say, that bothered me in my teens at high school and it bothered me when I arrived at UBC and witnessed everyone else pairing off. It hurt to be the odd man out.
So was I going to do anything about it now? Not a chance. I just didn’t go up to complete strangers and ask them out. As I said, despite being Irish, I wasn’t the garrulous type, not even with a few pints in me.
Instead, I was my usual slightly creepy self. I followed her. At the end of the lecture I sidled out of my seat and managed to time it so that I was right behind her when we got to the exit. She left the building and walked off down the street, her backpack hanging off one shoulder. I kept back so that she wouldn’t notice me, but still close enough to enjoy a nice rear view of long, slender legs and small hips in tight jeans.
Several blocks later she stopped at the traffic lights. In order to look natural I had to keep walking, so ended up standing close behind her. There were just the two of us and I could see her face a little from the side. I noticed that she seemed distracted, head down, in a world of her own.
The lights changed and she stepped forward. I looked away from her face and saw the bike come flying down the hill straight at us.
It was an instantaneous thing; there was zero time to think about it. I grabbed her arm and yanked her back as hard as I could. She stumbled back into me and I held her by the waist to prevent us both from falling over.
The bike whizzed past, the cyclist laughing.
I let her go immediately and took a step back. She looked at me and then at the cyclist who was now a small figure at the end of the block.
“God, that was close,” she said.
“Stupid moron,” I replied, “Could have landed you in hospital.”
“You’re right, I should pay more attention.”
“You seemed a bit preoccupied.”
“Yeah, you could say that. Could’ve cost me.”
“I’m Michael,” I said, and held out my hand.
She held my fingers in hers for a split second. The faintest of handshakes, but friendly enough.
“I’m Emma. Pleased to meet you, Michael. Thanks for doing that.”
Normally I’m hopeless at these things. Ninety-nine times out of a hundred I’d chicken out and walk off, but it was now or never.
“Fancy going somewhere?” I said, “Maybe a drink at the bar?” Somehow I got the words out, but there was a quiver in my voice.
She looked me up and down and seemed amused. I flushed red with embarrassment and got ready to be rebuffed, expecting to hear a polite version of now you’re pushing it buddy. Then she started to laugh.
Only then did it occur to me that even the Students’ Union bar didn’t open for several hours yet.
“Let’s go have a coffee,” she said, “and talk about idiot cyclists.”
I could have sung with joy.
*
Soon were spending a lot of time together. We didn’t go out much – she said she didn’t have much money and neither did I – so mostly we just watched a movie or hung out in her room or mine. She asked about my family, which was a pretty boring topic, although didn’t talk much about hers.
“What would you do if you had heaps of money?” she asked me one night, about a week after we met.
“Build the world’s largest cat sanctuary,” I replied, thinking it would amuse her.
Instead, she launched into an epic fantasy about going anywhere and doing anything she wanted. I sat back and listened while she went on about spending her summers in Whistler, learning to ski, and her winters in Barbados, sunbathing on her own private beach.
“That would make you happy?” I said.
She laughed. “Of course it would. Wouldn’t it make you?”
“I suppose so.”
“Just think, you and me together, roaming the world. Think of all the good we could do too, while we were enjoying ourselves.”
“Yes, that would be very nice.” I gave her a squeeze. “I can’t think of anything I want more.”
She gave me a serious look. “So how would you get all this money?”
I thought for a minute.
“I’d probably break into the place I worked last summer.”
“Tell me how you’d do it,” she insisted.
That’s what started it. My casual mention of the museum warehouse changed our relationship. Everything afterwards centred on that damned question how? How would I break into the place? How would I locate the most valuable stuff? How would I get out again without getting caught? Initially it was just a silly mind game for me. I was happy to play it; it was something she wanted to talk about every time we met and I wanted to keep her happy so that we’d continue going out together.
After a few days of this, I thought she was getting a bit obsessive about it. She got me to describe the warehouse in detail to her, even to sketch plans of its layout which she pored over afterwards.
“Let’s go down, do some reconnaissance,” she said.
That’s when it dawned on me that she was deadly serious; she actually wanted to do it.
“Come on, Emma, you’ve got to be kidding.” But deep down I knew she wasn’t.
After that, there was a friction between us. The next time we met up her responses were curt, as if she was preoccupied. When I broached the topic of the warehouse heist she became even more sullen.
“I’ll get somebody else to do it if you won’t,” was all she said.
That scared me. I knew I was losing her.
When I went home that night I sat in my room with the light switched off and thought long and hard about it. Emma was the most stunning girl I’d ever seen, brainy too, and had a whacky craziness that blew away any small defences I might have had left. I could hardly believe I was going out with her. Truth was, I was wild about her. If I wanted to keep her, I knew what I had to do. I rationalised things, convinced myself it was a victimless crime, a one-off never to be repeated.
I called her the next morning and told her, and we met that evening. We began planning in earnest. From then on she took a different tack altogether, praising me for my planning abilities and telling me I had a gift for this kind of thing. By the time she was done, I felt like Clooney in Ocean’s Eleven.
I have to admit, there was some truth to it. After a while I didn’t need much encouragement. She lit the torch and, once I’d made up my mind, I ran with it. I went downtown for a ‘recce’, the first of many, and discovered scaffolding along two sides of the Orthodox church. When my eyes lit on it, a thrill of elation ran along my spine and my brain started buzzing with possibilities. I walked all the way around the church, checked out the courtyard at the back – the sign said ‘Garden of the Immaculate Virgin’ and had a statue in it – and noted some small trees and shrubbery where tools could be concealed.
I crossed the street and stood directly opposite the church’s scaffolding and the warehouse roof next to it. From this vantage point the gap between them seemed tiny. A temporary plank bridge might do it. Perhaps our crazy idea really was achievable via the roof.
From that point on there was no holding me back. The intellectual and practical challenges of planning the break-in completely consumed me. Before I knew it, I was handing essays in late and getting in trouble with my professors because I was too busy working on the heist.
*
I knew from working in the warehouse that the best stuff was kept in the big room on the top floor. Trucks from the museum were unloaded at the back of the building and their freight, usually packing cases, brought up in the big
service elevator. The top-floor storage room was more like a small gallery – I think a dividing wall had been knocked down at some point – and it was this room we had to get into.
“The only possible way in is from the roof,” I told her. We were sitting in a Starbucks, near the warehouse, after completing another ‘recce’. “We’ll use the scaffolding. A plank bridge will get us across.”
She seemed doubtful. “We don’t know if we can get inside from the roof.”
“There’s a door out to the roof,” I replied, “I saw it when I worked there. Never been through it though. We should be able to crowbar it open.”
“Hmmm . . . sounds a bit noisy, very noisy if it’s alarmed. And it’s a way for the cavalry to catch us if we mess up,” she said thoughtfully. “We have to fix that.”
“We could climb down a rope to the ground.”
She snorted. “Are you kidding? It’s way too high up. I’m not risking a broken back.”
“I’ll work on it.”
She looked up, gave me a thin smile, and I knew she was about to hit me with something I might not like.
“Mike, we have to be absolutely certain we can get away from there if something goes wrong. We can’t leave anything to chance; which means we have a bit more work to do.”
“What are you suggesting?” I said.
“We go up there and see for ourselves. Find a better way in, if possible.”
I nodded. “When?”
“Tonight.”
*
After dark we took a late bus downtown and got off a few stops short of the warehouse. When we arrived we groaned simultaneously. The builders repairing the church had erected additional lighting inside a cage of secure wire mesh high up on the scaffolding. We approached it cautiously and saw that it also held a pulley that went all the way up to the top. It would have been a neat way up for us, assuming we could have knocked out the light; but the cage was padlocked, so not something we could use.
“Perhaps it’s for the best,” Emma whispered, “We’ll keep it as simple as possible.”
“Yeah, I’m not James Bond,” I replied.
We went around the back of the church, where the scaffolding was unlit and climbable. At sidewalk level there was a fair degree of shadow cover for the most dangerous move – climbing up the first, ladderless section.
I pulled on my gloves, took a quick look around, and clambered up onto the bottom rung of the scaffolding. Emma followed closely behind and I felt pressure to climb quickly. It wasn’t too difficult and I just kept going until I got to the top.
We rested there a while and then took a look around. I heard a hissed “Yes!” and she waved for me to come to her. At the corner of the building, where a roof buttress above us jutted into the sky, the builders had left some old scaffolding planks that they were no longer using. We pulled one out and gave each other a high-five. It seemed long enough.
There was only one way to find out for sure.
We moved it across to the nearest point to the warehouse roof and heaved it into position. The far end clattered down noisily, but stayed in place.
She gave me a nudge and I knew I had to take the lead.
“Hold it steady,” I said.
She did and in the end it wasn’t difficult. On the others side we found our way onto the flat of the roof and began exploring. I checked the door and noted the gaps between it and the frame. The domed skylight occupied most of our attention and we gave it a thorough examination with flashlights.
When we were done we retraced our way back without any problems.
In her room that night I made up a list of the equipment we’d need.
*
We decided we’d do it the following Tuesday night. The Friday before is when the ‘Strange Incident’ happened. That’s how I think of it. Before the heist I dismissed it as unimportant. Afterwards? Well, judge for yourself.
“We have one more thing to do,” she said, when we met in the Students’ Union bar at six p.m. after lectures.
“What’s that?” I wondered, thinking it would be some sort of ‘recce’ thing.
“I want you to meet someone.”
“Who?”
“Someone I have considerable faith in. She’s a clairvoyant.”
I almost dropped my beer glass. Emma hadn’t shown the slightest sign of believing in such things before now.
She raised a defensive hand in response to my evident astonishment. “Don’t laugh. Maria will prove you wrong. I have absolute confidence in her. OK?”
I scanned her face, her very beautiful, sincere face, and knew that she was being totally serious. I also knew that I had to play along. “I’m not laughing, Emma. I’ve been known to walk around a ladder or two myself,” I lied, “I just didn’t realise you were the same.”
Emma seemed reassured. “It’s just that Maria’s predictions . . . advice, whatever you want to call them, have been uncannily accurate in the past. So much so that I consult her on important things. With something like this . . . well, she’s a must.”
I nodded sagely. “Are her séances expensive?”
“It’s a reading, not a séance,” Emma replied, “And there’s no specific charge. Normally I give her a hundred.”
“A hundred bucks?” I was astonished at the usually parsimonious Emma’s generosity, especially for a ‘service’ I considered worthless. “Can you afford that?”
“Well, fifty each should do it, Mike.”
I groaned inwardly. “Do we have to?”
She looked serious. “Absolutely, Mike. I can’t do Tuesday night otherwise.”
So off we went, took the Skytrain all the way out to Metrotown. As the train rattled along I watched our reflections side by side in the window and decided we were two naive idiots. No doubt ‘Madame Maria’ would utter some vague mumbo-jumbo and expect our awe-stricken, gullible gratitude. Well, she might get it from Emma but not from me. I’d endure it, nothing more.
We wove our way through crowded streets until we arrived at Maria’s abode, a swanky apartment on the sixth floor of a new high-rise building. In the elevator I reflected on how much money there must be in her game. At the end of the carpeted corridor her door stood out from the rest because of its zodiac decorations. I marched up to it and gave it a few hearty bangs.
Emma grabbed my arm before I could deliver any more blows. “Maria, its Emma. I’ve brought a friend.”
Just a friend, eh? My hackles were sky high by now. The door opened a crack, a beady eye peered out, the door closed again, and the chain came off. She’s supposed to be psychic, I thought, shouldn’t she know who’s at her door?
The door opened wide, revealing a Gypsy Rose figure. Maria was about seventy years old, short and slim, with plenty of wrinkles in a face surrounded by suspiciously black curly hair tumbling down on to her shoulders. There was a gleam in the small, coal-black eyes. Long earrings dangled and shone, and her fingers were covered in a variety of fancy rings. A patterned shawl covered her shoulders, framing a low neckline that revealed far too much breast for a woman of her age. I had zero difficulty looking elsewhere.
She stared long and hard at me, like a snake oil salesman weighing up a prospective customer. “Take off the sunglasses,” she said.
I’d been wearing them as protection against the setting sun and hadn’t thought to take them off on the way up. I did so now and she stepped closer.
“Give me a look at your eyes,” she said.
I leaned over and obliged. She peered up at me, moved her head from side to side, and tut-tutted with her tongue.
“I see a troubled soul,” she said.
As if my eyes really were windows to my soul. “Nice one,” I thought.
At last she’d seen enough. “If it’s a reading you’re after, I’m not sure I’m up to it tonight. The spirits don’t come at my beck and call, you know. Still, I can only do my best.”
At that she stepped back and waved us in. She drew heavy drapes across the windows until
the room was in darkness, then lit a squat, aromatic candle which she placed at the side of a small, round table. I was disappointed that there was no crystal ball in the middle of it. I wanted the full works for my fifty bucks. We sat around the table, our knees virtually touching.
Madame Maria, as I now thought of her, swayed her head back and forth, which presumably helped, and then we joined hands. As her bony claw grasped my hand under the table, she leaned forward and I caught a whiff of whiskey on her breath.
Emma gave me an encouraging smile. “Maria, can you do Mike first, please?”
Without answering, Maria broke hands and fished an ancient dog-eared pack of Tarot cards from the folds of her dress.
“I’m not feeling the spirits tonight, but I’ll try.”
So, according to Emma this wasn’t a séance, eh? She could have fooled me. Reluctant spirits were a handy excuse for her to hedge her bets.
Maria spread the cards out on the table in a well-practised motion. She gathered them up again, cut the pack, and laid the top four cards down in a criss-cross pattern.
“Each one tells a tale,” she muttered. There was a long silence as she seemed to ponder their significance, then she raised her gaze and looked at me.
“You must shun a dark-haired woman,” she said, “She is a bad omen.”
I’d sat up late the previous night, had a long day today, and before I could stop myself my face creased up and I let out a massive yawn. I felt a sharp kick under the table from Emma’s side.
“Maria,” Emma said quickly, “Mike and I are going to do something a bit dangerous soon. Will it be safe or not?”
Madame Maria seized on the hint at once. She stared at the cards, then back at me. “I see a tall building.”
My heart stopped.
“It’s brightly lit. A holy place, I think. A dark place stands next to it. You must not go there. You are not welcome.”
Meaner Things Page 3