by Zane Lovitt
Hugh Bretzanitz provides a conscientious smile and shuffles in his seat.
‘I take the view that, because so much of what a person does online they do anonymously, these activities are the best indication of what kind of employee they’ll be, what kind of loyalty they’ll show the firm. The reason I’m talking to you now is because if something comes out, and if the firm wants to know why you never owned up, you don’t get to say, Well crikey, mate, you never asked!’
I like this performance bit. It helps to put the candidate at ease. But Hugh already seems at ease.
‘Yes, sir,’ he squeaks. ‘No problem. I’ve done ones like this before.’
Now I shuffle in my seat. Not because I’m nervous but because of the bruise on my arse, purple and marbled like a tattoo of Jupiter.
‘Then you understand that this is not a job interview. I don’t have any say in whether or not you get the position. My opinion doesn’t matter. All that matters is what I find. I pass that on to HR and that’s it.’
‘Yes, mate. I understand.’
One tiny reference to how my opinion doesn’t matter and he’s demoted me from sir to mate.
‘Is there anything you want to tell me at the outset? Anything I’m going to find when I look you up?’
‘No,’ he shakes his head, innocent. ‘No.’
‘Have you got a Facebook account?’
‘No.’
‘What about other online profiles?’
‘You mean…’
‘Twitter, Lucid, Freeball…’
‘No, nothing like that.’
Older candidates don’t represent the kind of risk to firms that younger ones do because they have a different approach to privacy, in that they’ve heard of it. But then, Hugh’s disadvantage is that a younger intern is more inclined to be a doormat for the first five years of their career. Firms are wary of older candidates who might have heard of that other thing…what you call it…self-respect.
I’m like, ‘What about pornography?’
Hugh smiles and lowers his head to look serious.
‘What about it?’
‘Have you ever been involved in the production of a pornographic photograph?’
‘God, no.’
‘A pornographic video.’
‘No.’
‘Of any kind.’
‘No.’
‘If you have then I’ll find out. If you’re straight with me your odds improve in the long run.’
Hugh has a confident smile.
‘How would you find out?’
‘Well, I think the most likely scenario is that you’ll tell me.’
‘But what if I said I wanted to keep it private?’
He’s still grinning, like he’s only testing me out.
‘I’d say you were naive. Believe it or not, I’m trying to protect your privacy. Because one day, when you’re leading a multi-million dollar lawsuit, there will be people out there who do what I do, and they won’t start with a discreet conversation like this. They will drill down, they will go public, and your career will be over. I’ve seen it happen. Have you ever threatened anyone over social media?’
‘No, sir. I don’t use the internet for much.’
Hugh’s nostrils flare, lips tighten—the first clue that someone would rather be someplace else but has too much at stake to go there. And he’s back to calling me sir.
On his CV front page there’s a list entitled Prior Employment. I’m surprised by what I see.
‘You were in the police force?’
‘Yes, sir.’
‘Where did you work?’
‘Drug Squad out of Melbourne.’
‘Why did you leave?’
He performs a guilty smile.
‘Money.’
‘As a cop, shouldn’t you have a predilection for criminal law?’
‘I thought I would, but at school I didn’t.’
‘And the real money’s in commercial law.’
‘That’s right.’
‘Do you know the name Glen Tyan?’
I’m as surprised by the question as Hugh, who’s so ambushed that he chuckles anxiously, with a jiggle of his tummy. But how could I not ask, given the serendipity of it, the fucking timing?
‘Yeah. Of course! Detective Glen Tyan?’
He seems incredulous that someone might not have heard of him.
‘You know him personally?’
‘Well, no, but…’
‘You know the name.’
‘Yeah, but…’ Confusion in his eyes. ‘Everybody knows the name Glen Tyan.’
I chuckle along, as if I know why that is.
‘Christ,’ says Hugh, suddenly bassfaced. ‘He doesn’t work here, does he?’
‘No no. I’ve not met him either. I know him through another client. Just my…Another client.’
‘Tell them to watch out.’ The chuckling is back but muted. ‘The nicest thing you can say about Glen Tyan is that he’s unpredictable.’
‘Ha! Yes!’ This is an entirely honest guffaw.
‘They called him the Polygraph. In the Homicide Squad. Did you know that?’
I shake my head, willing Hugh to continue.
‘He had a talent…Well, this is what they said. He could tell if someone was lying. I mean, always. Branches all over Victoria used to bring him in for interrogations, he got that famous for it. He was a legend. For a while.’
That pulls the curtain back on last night. Perhaps Tyan knew I was no journalist from the start, from the moment I called him with my face to the glass in the smoking grotto downstairs. He met with me and nodded along to my questions, all the while seeing through my bullshit with a superpower he’d cultivated for years and which is, I can say with confidence, not hereditary.
‘Did he ever help you out like that?’
‘Not me. People I worked with, yeah. It got to the point where career crims were making deals just so they didn’t have to talk to him. But of course, that was before…you know.’
‘Sure,’ I say.
No idea what he means.
‘I guess I don’t consider him the laughing stock that other police do. To me it’s more sad than anything else. Every bloody year they do a skit about him at the Union Ball too, and that’s brutal. I mean, the whole thing happened, what, ten years ago? They’re still so brutal. I suppose it is funny. But it’s just sad more than anything.’
‘Right. Yeah. That’s a good way of putting it.’
‘He’s the cautionary tale, right? The thing every officer is scared of becoming.’
‘Can I ask…’ I try to seem chatty, ‘Do you know exactly why he left the police force?’
It’s the question that bugged me last night, that seemed to bug Tyan even more.
‘Well, I mean, that’s…that’s what I’m…’
Suspicion comes. I’ve misstepped. Hugh’s face pinches.
‘Maybe I shouldn’t be discussing this—’
‘No no no,’ I say, too earnest. ‘It’s all right. I’m just curious.’
But Hugh can see that that’s not true—his polygraph kicking in, his brain backpedalling.
‘I mean…I don’t work there anymore, but VicPol kind of doesn’t like it when people talk out of school.’
Somehow my body language or my tone of voice has communicated to Hugh that this interview has gone off the rails because it’s gone off the rails, not because ‘Stan’ is an accomplished interrogator who finds relevance in the most obscure coincidences.
‘Hey, man, I’m not going to tell anybody. I just know he retired young and I’m wondering why.’
I grin like I only want to be in on the joke, keep my features cool, my body still, wait for Hugh to dive down the rabbit hole in the interest of getting a job.
You often reach the point in an interview when something in the air of the room changes. The subject’s eyes and lips and hair, all of their face, their nose, it all kind of slumps, and they come clean and tell you about the article they once wrote
for High Times magazine, or the anger management course they took to avoid a conviction for assault. You do this job for whatever years, you come to recognise that face. The face that comes right before the confession.
Hugh’s got it now. The surrender in his eyes.
Then the door to the conference room swings in and there’s Madison. Doesn’t even knock. She’s eating something and touches her mouth delicately with her painted nails as she speaks, self-consciously hiding the food in there.
‘Just to let you know…’ She directs this at me. ‘Your last interview today has cancelled. Off to work at the UN, believe it or not.’
‘Okay.’
‘Ummm…’ She frowns, swallows, rubs her pregnant belly. ‘I’m done for the day. Be in touch soon? We want to announce the harvest next week.’
‘Okay.’
And she slips away. The door cruises to a close. Just the two of us again. Hugh’s apprehensive face.
But what I think is: fuck Glen Tyan. I’ll never see Glen Tyan again. The guy pushed me into a toilet. What do I care about his personal history or his professional history? It’s a victory, I say to myself, if I show no interest in him whatsoever. Let him have his secrets. Nobody cares, least of all me.
At the end of this interview, it’s home time.
‘All right,’ I say. ‘Let’s talk about online dating.’
12
Spatafina’s is one of those pizza joints with red neon in the front window and old Campari ads framed on the walls, plastic tablecloths and stained cutlery. We haven’t spotted the owner tonight so maybe he’s out playing bocce or concreting his front lawn but his two kids are here, neither of whom has finished high school yet and the girl always seems to avoid us. The boy is the kind of waiter who wants you to know how much he hates his job. Marnie and he have a special kind of spite for each other which she enjoys and which I dread because scorning your waiter is like scorning your neighbour etc. When he brings our drinks I’m telling her about my panic attack on Monday. She interrupts to say:
‘I’m sorry. This is a white wine glass. Could I have my red wine in a red wine glass please?’
He rolls his eyes almost imperceptibly, scoops up the beverage and scurries away, leaving behind the phenomenal power of his aftershave.
‘It’s the pressure of all that court stuff, Stevey. You should meditate. I could teach you.’
Her hair is brown today. I told her once that with all her hair colours she reminded me of Ramona Flowers and she was thrilled with the comparison.
‘But I’ve done evidence in court since forever. This only started a year ago.’
‘So what happened a year ago?’
‘Um…’
I’m genuinely surprised she has to ask.
‘My mother died.’
‘Right…’ Guilt streaks across her face, pursued by doubt. ‘So you get anxious because your mother died?’
‘It’s more just, like…not having that person in your life…that kind of relationship anymore…’
She nods vaguely, about as unenlightened by my stilted claim
The room wasn’t private. She shared it with an oldie who was babbling in French and didn’t notice us, didn’t seem to know where she was. The only words I recognised were ‘mon dieu’ and she was pleading with an anguished desperation. Mum grabbed hold of my hand and spoke with her eyes shut but I couldn’t hear over the prattle and I asked the staff if they could move the French screamer someplace else and the first terrifying thing that happened that day was that they did.
as my stilted claim warranted. Perhaps I should tell her about the last two days. About Glen Tyan and how I have no explanation for why he’s a VicPol punchline.
The problem is: I told her once that my dad was a software designer who died when I was a baby, and my practice is to hold off on revealing to people what a liar I am unless it’s absolutely, painfully necessary.
Her eyes silently panic. It’s like the eighth awkward pause since we sat down and they wouldn’t bother me except that she seems to experience them right in the pit of her stomach. She asks, with an air of desperation:
‘Your mum was a cook, right?’
I nod. Her red wine returns in what I assume is a red wine glass because she says nothing to the waiter. I look hard at that glass, try to discern a trace of spittle or botulism.
‘You never got the urge to pick up a spatula?’
‘Not really.’
‘What about, like, football or tennis or something?’
Every couple of dates like this she sniffs around the edges. Usually I sidestep with a broad, meaningless comment before guiding the conversation back to Game of Thrones. Maybe tonight I can spare a little more.
‘I was the boy who hated sport. Mum said it was because I didn’t have a dad. I said it was because I didn’t have a backyard. You know that cliché of the kid trolling the internet from his mother’s basement? That was me. The original vitamin D deficiency.’
‘Right. So the computer thing has been, like, since forever?’
‘The first real hobby I ever had was, I used to do a thing on PlayStation where I could dox players with just their gamertag and IP and I could tell them, this is live while we were playing, I could tell them their real names, their family members. I called them on their mobile phones. I said I was a psychic and it freaked everybody out. My tag was Mofo the Magnificent.’
When she realises this is a funny anecdote from my past, she chuckles. Marnie is too much in her head to ever respond spontaneously.
I ask, ‘What about your parents?’
‘What about them?’
‘What do they do? Back in Kerang.’
‘My mother runs a cleaning business, Dad is…’ She sighs. ‘I don’t want to talk about my parents.’
This is also nothing new. That she’s from Kerang is about all she’s ever confessed.
I’m like, ‘How’s work?’
‘Fine. Owner’s on my case again.’
‘Same as before?’
She nods. ‘Poor customer service. But, like, I don’t suffer fools lightly, Steve. What am I supposed to do?’
‘Yeah,’ I raise the beer to my lips. ‘Working with people. It must be lame sometimes.’
‘I wish I had a job like yours. Stay at home all day. Not talk to anyone.’
‘Uh-huh…’
‘Though it might be nice if you came out from behind your computer every now and then.’
‘I come out from there all the time.’
‘Only to scurry back as fast as you can.’
‘Not always.’
‘Well, I may not be Mofo the Magnificent,’ she looks down into her wine glass. ‘But I reckon you will tonight.’
‘Maybe,’ I say with a pinch of my shoulder, and I understand in that gesture that tonight is the night. Marnie is based, her hair is giving her confidence, while I’m mourning the loss of someone I’d never met before yesterday. The demise of a mere possibility, but one that has occupied so much of my brain for so long. And as it further dissipates with each passing minute, I want that void to be filled with something meaningful, if not also tall, friendly and familiar.
In fact, the resolution comes to me now that tonight I’ll tell her everything. It was never that much of a lie to begin with—she knows I never had a dad and she knows how I feel about that. I’ll tell her all about the men’s room last night and Hugh’s story today, and how I’ve never told anyone before that my father was alive because I never wanted anyone to steal away the daydream that one day I would meet him and then I’d be a real boy.
‘Look, Marnie,’ I say, lowering my voice. She’s always had terrific posture, but now she goes rigid, like she’s expecting bad news. My lips part, my vocal cords squeeze together to initiate the first word of the first sentence of my confession—
My phone rings.
It doesn’t recognise the number, just displays it dumbly onscreen. I recognise it though, gape at it for a few stupefied seconds, then lo
ok to Marnie for help. She thinks I’m asking permission to take the call and says, ‘Go ahead,’ with no idea of the consequences. I have to answer and so I do.
‘Hello?’
No coughing this time, just a sharp rasp in my ear.
‘Where are you?’
‘What?’
‘Where are you?’
‘I’m getting a pizza, Glen. What do you want?’
‘Prove it. Prove you’re not outside my house right now.’
13
Tonight is late closing at Doncaster Shoppingtown so it’s weirdly busy, which is good, makes me feel safe. Wrapped in layers of warmth I shiver at the people wearing T-shirts and tank tops, resign myself to the fact that my fear of the common cold is greater than theirs. When I catch my ghost in a store window I think of the little boy at the courthouse on Monday: all bundled up, going home with his mother…
In the food court half the eateries are closed but the other half do a slow trade. I suppose it’s the movie crowd that comes hungry, intermittently: young couples feeding soft serve to each other; lonely men scoffing cheap dinners; screaming children hopped up on their own exhaustion.
I drop into a wonky metal seat and remove my beanie.
Marnie must have heard Tyan’s bluster from across the table. I’d forgotten he had my number and here he was with more accusation in his voice than even last night. My instinct was to hang up and be done with him. But pride had a point to make. I was no longer the guileless doormat he’d met yesterday.
‘I’m sorry?’ I said, calm.
‘That was you. Just now. Behind my house.’
‘No,’ I said. ‘That was not me.’
‘Where are you?’
‘In Kensington. A restaurant.’
‘Put a waitress on the phone.’
‘What?’
‘Put a waitress on the bloody phone!’
‘Why?’
‘Do it or I’ll know it was you.’
Suddenly I realise how hungry I am. I trudge across to a Portuguese fast food stand and buy a chicken burger, smear my face with mayonnaise and lettuce and eat and wait. I hadn’t so much as ordered a pizza before Tyan called. When I held out my phone to the waiter behind me and said, ‘Someone needs to talk to you,’ Marnie’s eyes were two big pizzas, wide and confused.