I wasn't expecting anything when I got the inevitable invitation again this year. I turned the thick paper over in my hands and read and re-read the gold-leaf lettering. I told myself that this year was my last, that I was no longer going to keep chasing after a girl that barely existed in the real world. Adrienne Hamina existed in magazines that nobody ever read and occasionally, once in a blue moon, her photos would show up on the evening news. I can admit that I've kept a museum of sorts, a catalogued library for my own purposes. Every photo of hers that's ever been published, I have. It's a foolish hobby, collecting her, but I can't stop myself.
When I saw her in front of the Met, I almost didn't believe it was her even though I recognized her instantly. Her hair was shorter and her face was more gaunt and she was wearing a distracting strapless dress, but I knew it was her. When her eyes caught mine, I could almost hear the orchestra swell and the choir sing like I was at St. John's on Easter Sunday. I knew my wait had come to an end. I knew my time had not been spent in vain. But now the dull buzz in the back of my brain is a distracting ringing in my ears and a prickling under my skin. I can't concentrate. I'm unsatisfied. I'm antsy. I'm craving my next fix.
I'm nowhere near finished with her. Far from it.
My man Bryan interrupted us in the museum as I asked him to. I wanted to make sure I didn't lose too much control. Fucking her there would've been a mistake, but now I feel regretful. I had her in my hands and yet, my little bird has still managed to escape again. But I know where she is, now. I'm not going to let her escape again so easily.
I stand and wince. My body is angry at me for not giving it what it wants. My lower half aches with unsatisfied longing. My chest feels thick and I know I've smoked too much. I tell myself no more cigarettes for at least a couple of days. I glance around the room, at the simple but rich furnishings. Adrienne would probably hate a place like this. It's too clean, to easy. Too soft. She'd want me to fuck her against the wall or against the cold, hard tiles in the bathroom. She'd scoff at what my money could buy, because she thinks she doesn't need it. She thinks she's above it. Well, she has to know that I'm not fucking around. I can ruin her whole life. I can make it impossible for her to get work, and to get in and out of the country. I can make her life so miserable that she'll have to come crawling back to me on her hands and knees, begging me for mercy.
Begging me.
I like the sound of that.
It'll take a bit of time and energy, but it'll be a fun challenge to break her. It'll be satisfying to watch her crumble and fall from the lofty but precarious perch where she sits now, staring down at me and laughing. When she falls, I'll finally have her exactly where I want her.
Underneath me, where she belongs.
*****
I lose myself in the sex.
It's easy for me to do. Whenever life gets too difficult, sex has always helped. Nameless, sometimes, and quick, always. I'm not proud of it, but it works. Skin on skin is my drug of choice.
It feels good and I shut my eyes, trying to forget Dorian's face. Trying to forget the way his mouth felt on mine. Trying to forget exactly how good it felt when he hurt me. But when I think about the cigarette burn, I come. Instantly.
I wake up alone and I prefer it that way. I have to get to work anyway.
I get up and dress after a quick shower. I throw a few essentials in my bag before it's time to head out, mentally making a checklist so I don't forget anything. I have a couple extra media cards, a cordless battery charger, my new zoom lens, as well as my trust 85mm prime for portraits, and my filters. I have a small bottle of expired sunscreen and a tube of lip balm and a couple hair ties. I have a head scarf, but I tie it around my neck for the time being as my eyes dart around the room, looking for anything I might've forgotten.
My hotel room is bare-bones, tiny and hot as Hades, but it gets the job done. There's a single bed with a reasonably new mattress and crisp sun-dried sheets. There's brightly colored glazed tiles on the floor and a colorful flower box hanging outside the window. There's no fleas or bed bugs this time, I don't think. I woke up this morning with only a few mosquito bites. Mosquitos I can handle. It's a good place, recommended to me by a friend. The same friend who I happened to fuck the night before.
I don't blame him for leaving without a word. Sleeping together on a single bed in this heat would've been miserable. Besides, I think both of us prefer sleeping alone. He's like me, a freelance photographer. The life we've chosen isn't really one for the kind of people who like settling down. We're nomads, after all. Glorified and slightly more civilized, but nomads through and through.
I'm almost out the door when the old rotary phone on the nightstand rings.
I have no idea who would be calling me here. I'm in a hotel room in the middle of Istanbul and anyone who needs to get ahold of me will call my cell. I check my watch quickly and move to the window. Ignoring the ringing, I fling back the white curtains and check out the street. Despite the strife going on, it seems like business as normal down below. Cars speed and people bustle around the streets, living their lives. I can see a few soldiers with guns, but nothing too bad. I can see the café from the window and I wonder if they're there already, waiting for me. If so, they better have ordered me a espresso and a raisin roll already. I toss my bag over my shoulder and sling my camera around my neck. I tie my big old sweatshirt around my waist, just in case I have to be out late after dark. I glance at myself in the small mirror by the door and sigh.
I look terrible.
I wonder what Dorian would think to see me like this. With another man's marks fresh on my neck and dark circles under my eyes. I wonder if he'd still want me or if he would look the other way. Not that it matters.
Shaking my head, I grab my phone off the charger on my way out the door. I haven't texted Jessica since I got to Turkey. My data card is running low, but that's not the only reason. I've been feeling too guilty. I feel like shit for leaving like I did, but I told her there was nothing I could do. Just because I was in New York, it didn't mean the world stopped spinning. While those pretty, rich people were laughing and drinking and spreading their money around like it was nothing, a war was starting. And now I'm here, because that's what I do. It's only a partial lie. I could've stayed if I wanted to. I could be there now, sleeping in her guest bedroom and letting her take me out to brunch and buy me new clothes and doing the mother-daughter stuff I always hope we'll do. It's pointless to think about it now, though. I have a new assignment. I'm halfway across the world. It's where I need to be.
At least that's what I tell myself.
The phone rings again as I step out the door but I don't stop because I'm late. As I rush down, my boots thumping on the stairs, I type out a quick text for Jessica.
I'll be home for Christmas, I tell her. I promise.
Then I hit send.
*****
The sky is black outside the windows. The skyline of the city glitters outside, reminding me that I'm not the only one still awake at this hour. It's oddly comforting as I stare down at the screen of my new phone and watch the little blip move across the map. Adrienne's on a street halfway across the world and I know each and every step she's taking. I know she was just in her hotel, even though she didn't answer the two calls I made to her room. The tracker is only a few milliseconds delayed from her actual time, after all. It was a mere inconvenience to get her phone hacked; it required a relatively painless favor to a friend in the CIA. But to me, it's priceless.
I have no idea where she's going but she's on the move, starting her day in a city on the brink of disaster like it's any other morning. Maybe she doesn't realize how precarious the political situation there is. Maybe she just doesn't care. I suppose it should be a blow to my pride that Adrienne would prefer a war zone to my company, but it's not a deterrent. Adrienne is not like other girls. She'd rather sprint full-force toward danger than luxuriate in safety. I can't relate but that doesn't mean I approve.
Yesterday, she we
nt off the grid and I lost track of her for three hours and twelve minutes. I didn't know if her phone was dead or if something had happened to her. Either way, I felt an uncomfortable amount of concern in those three hours and twelve minutes. I was distracted through a meeting with the board, sliding my hand over the hard lump of my phone in my pocket, wanting to check the tracker every few seconds to see if anything had changed.
I haven't felt that much concern for someone in a long time.
It's disconcerting.
The next time I see her, I'm going to punish her for worrying me with her carelessness. She's fearless and maybe she doesn't care what happens to her, but that's unacceptable now. As far as I'm concerned, she already belongs to me, whether she knows it or not. And I take meticulous care of my possessions. When I can get away in a few weeks, I have every intention of taking the company jet and going and getting her, wherever she is. The thought is the only thing that makes me feel better as I sit alone in my bed, watching a tiny dot move across a screen instead of fucking away all of the frustration of the past week. I can't sleep anyway.
She stops moving a few moments later. I stare at the unmoving dot for the next ten minutes, my eyes going blurry as I wait with bated breath for her next move. But there's only so much I can take. I have to be up in two hours, so I give in to the need to rest. I turn off my phone and set it facedown on the bedside table. I lay on my back and stare up at the ceiling until I fall into a shallow sleep, alone in my big bed. Any other night, that would've been just the way I wanted it. Tonight, I wish someone was beside me. For a brief moment, I consider going down the hall and slipping into my wife's bed, but in the end, I decide it's more trouble than it's worth. Selene is not the woman I want to fuck and I hate consolation prizes.
I want the grand prize. Always.
I wake with the beep of the alarm and sit up without hesitation. I know I'm late before I even check the clock. The sun is too high in the sky. My dick is hard and aches with neglect, but I ignore it. I reach for my phone without thinking but I let my hand hover over it, telling myself not to check for her yet. I must maintain some self-restraint, after all. I stand and stretch, then I grab my iPad and my business phone from the desk in the front room of my suite. I quickly scan over the front pages of the Times, the Post, and the Journal. I flick on the news before I head for the shower, cutting out my morning cycling. I tell myself I'll swim extra laps at the gym on the weekend to make up for it.
I don't allow myself to look until I'm in the car on the way to work. Bryan sits in the front seat, as stoic as always, and we don't talk. We don't have to. That's what I like about Bryan. He doesn't have to speak for me to know he doesn't like the unlit cigarette dangling from my lips. I told him to punch me in the face the next time he sees me smoking, but I'm not technically smoking. If I lit up, I wonder if he'd actually do it, but I'm not too keen on finding out. The taste and feel of the stick on my lips is enough, for now. Besides, it's a welcome distraction as I slide the tracker phone out of my suit pocket to check Adrienne's location.
A flare of annoyance shoots through me when I realize she's not there. I stare down at the clear screen, using my thumb and forefinger to zoom out and check the surrounding area. The blip is nowhere to be seen. I poke the filter of the cigarette with my tongue and put the phone back in my pocket. The temptation to call her hotel again comes over me but I tell myself that if she was at the hotel, I would be able to see her there. It's only if she roams out of the area that I can't see her. That's my theory anyway. Besides, she wouldn't answer anyway.
It isn't until I'm at my desk that reality hits me in the face harder than Bryan ever could. The news is playing on the big widescreen in the background as I conduct business, my ear to the phone as my fingers fly on the keyboard. The three screens are all tuned to different stations but suddenly, they're all reporting one story. The footage is grainy and low quality on the HD screens, but it's not old footage. It's new. Shots of a bombed-out building. Shots of people covered in blood and dust. Shots of body parts, unmoving and covered in debris. It doesn't sink in until I hear a Turkish reporter speaking. I can't understand the language, but I recognize it by ear. I glance up at the television screen and find the TV remote on my desk and turn up the volume. My eyes follow the scroll at the bottom of the screen, reading faster than my brain can process the rest of the information. Three American Journalists feared dead after a bomb blast ripped through a sidewalk café in Istanbul today, it says.
Bomb blast.
American journalists.
Dead.
The words are important but I can't process it until three pictures flash on the screen and I stand without thinking. My desk shakes with the force of the action and the framed photograph of my wife rattles but I barely notice it. I can only stare ahead at the TV. The picture that flashes on the screen is old, probably from her college days or soon after. Her hair is still long in the photo, her eyes just as haunted as they always are despite her small, mysterious smile. Adrienne. Her name whispers through my brain like a fall breeze. Adrienne is one of the names on the news. Adrienne is one of the journalists they're saying is dead. My ears start to ring and I don't hear the rest.
“I call for my assistant, who appears instantly. “Get me Jessica Stockton-Hamina on the phone. And the U.S. Consulate in Turkey. Now,” I say and she nods, no questions asked. I pat my pockets, looking for the tracker phone. I can't stop myself from checking again, no matter how foolish it may be. There might be a mistake, after all.
Just a few short hours ago, I could see her moving. I could see her alive. But in the flash of a second, everything changed. While I was sleeping, Adrienne Hamina walked into a sidewalk café and got herself blown up. While I was sleeping, she somehow ceased to exist on the planet.
I looked away and she disappeared forever.
*****
Before the day is out, I'm on Armstrong Global's private jet, flying across the world. No one at the consulate had good enough answers for me. Only some bodies have been recovered, not all. No identifications have been made. No one knows anything. That is unacceptable to me. With a dogged focus I haven't had since the night in the museum, I plan on finding out exactly what happened at the café. I plan on finding Adrienne and bringing her back to New York.
I'll bring her back, no matter how many pieces she's in.
The area around the café smells like smoke and death. I've never smelled death this strong before, but as soon as I smell it, I know it instantly. It's quieter here than I thought it would be, even though a lot of people are about, inside the rubble and watching. As Bryan pulls the truck to a stop, strange thoughts and questions start to pop up in my brain. I wonder how Adrienne would see this same scene. Would she take pictures of the onlookers first or would she dip underneath the yellow tape and try to get a taste of what's inside the café? Would she want to see all the things that normal people would never want to see? What would she be looking for? Would she be immune to the smell of death or would it disgust her, like it disgusts me?
It's pointless to want answers to questions that can never be asked.
The Turkish driver parks our truck it alongside the emergency vehicles in front of the café. Our team consists of six men besides me and Bryan – four that I've hired before for various dirty jobs over the years, including a couple mercenaries who are used to this kind of scene, and the two Turks Bryan found before we got on the ground. I move toward the bombed-out remains of the café without thinking, because I know she's in there. As soon as I clear the ambulance on my right, I see a body on the ground. I can't see the face; the figure is covered in a white sheet that's stained with soot and rust-brown blood splotches. I stop in my tracks, the overwhelming need to lift the sheet and see if it's her taking over me. But something holds me back. I flew halfway around the world to do this. I've had no sleep and no food. I've been going non-stop from the moment I heard about the explosion until now, with only one focus. Now that I'm here, however, everything feel
s like it's stopped moving.
“I'll talk to whoever's heading the investigation,” Bryan says, close to my ear. His voice is low and grounding. I nod my head and life speeds back up.
“I want it to be us who finds her,” I say. “I want everything. I want her clothes. Her shoes. I want the fucking coffee cup she was drinking from.”
“I know,” he says. My eyes burn and I reach up and rub them. It's going to be a long day, I can feel it. It's already been. And it's only getting longer. I take a step forward and then I feel a hand on my shoulder. “Maybe you should start with the hotel,” Bryan says, his voice lower than before. He pulls the scarf that's hanging around his neck up to cover his mouth and nose and I suddenly feel completely out of my element. I have no idea how one gets used to this kind of chaos. I wished I could've gotten the answer from Adrienne, but now it's too late.
“I'll stay,” I say and just like that, the decision is made. For just this one day, I want to live like Adrienne lived. I want to see the things she saw. I want to experience everything, including her death. I don't care how disturbing or disgusting or uncomfortable. I have no other choice, really.
I throw some money around and we eventually gain entrance to the site. Jessica Stockton Hamina sent me recent pictures of Adrienne. Two of the men go around and show them to the workers and ask questions. The rest of us search. It's not an easy task, nor a clean one. It's also nearly impossible. In the afternoon, my men find her camera by chance, a melted and pockmarked hunk of plastic and metal, across the street, under a bush. We know it's hers because her name is etched on a silver plaque that's screwed to the bottom of the camera. “Property of A. Hamina,” it says, along with the barely legible address of a PO Box. When they hand it to me, I almost don't want to touch it. I'm wearing gloves, but it still feels like a desecration of a holy object. I run my thumb over the edge of the plaque, reading her name over and over. It's only then that it truly sinks in.
Mansions Page 5