by Smith, Skye
She walked slowly towards Erik. He had his back turned. When she was about a foot away he straightened and held that pose, and then turned around. "About a foot, with both of us clothed. How did you sleep?"
"Not at all, like, until the sun rose. It was as if the sunrise made me feel secure, ya know, and I finally fell asleep. How about you?"
"I set the alarm for seven in the morning and looked in on you. I was worried about you. I pulled the sheet over you."
"You weren't worried about me," she said slowly. "You wanted to feel my aura while I was sleeping. Admit it. What was it like?"
"It felt all soft and warm. It made me want to crawl into bed beside you."
"Who wouldn't want to?" said Karl coming in on the last of the conversation. He cast his eyes over the the breakfast preparations while checking out the girl in the lavender silk robe. "Just tea for me. I ate on the plane."
She looked at him and smiled nervously. He was standing closer to her than Erik was. "Do you feel it too?"
"No," Karl said, slipping onto one of the high stools, "but that is to be expected. I've just come from the world of heavy traffic and airports and airplane food. I am totally desensitized to anything natural."
He said thanks as Erik put a cup of tea in front of him. "I had a peek at your graphs while I was unpacking. They are, umm, unexpected, extraordinary. I think I will take this tea upstairs and look at them some more."
Erik motioned to Maya, and she said to Karl, "May I come with you?" and then followed him upstairs. Erik stayed downstairs and ate his eggs and let the two be together without him. Karl was also an engineer, and like most engineers, never believed anything unless he discovered it himself. He would wait until they came to search him out.
They never did. He heard a groan from upstairs and ran up. Maya was standing on the tape measure, nude, and trying to stop herself from laughing. "He's in your bathroom," she coughed trying to hold back her laugher, "the same thing happened to him as to you. This time I was ready for it." She held up an empty condom package. "See?" she waved her arms around the floor, "no mess."
"Oh dear," he said looking towards his suite, "he is actually a very shy person, especially around women. I'll go and get him."
Karl was in his robe sitting on the bed with his laptop. "You've incorporated resonance algorithms. That would have taken you awhile."
"Go back out there and test your aura with hers."
"You've missed something."
"You're stalling," said Erik.
"Only about a quarter of your increase in range is from your added strength. The rest is from her aura amplifying yours. Still a theory. You will have to create a test to prove it. Obviously it will take all three of us. Here, sit and look at my new version of this graph with the new variable added."
"So you aren't stalling."
"Actually, I can't wait to get back to her. She is delightful. Uh, by the way, I need an early night tonight. I have a meeting first thing Monday."
"You're going in to work, despite Maya? Work, always work. When do I ever see you any more?"
"I have to."
"But it's her last day," Erik said, "she has to leave for California on Tuesday."
"Then convince her to stay on."
"How?" Erik asked. "She has a job to get back for."
"So she told me. A job at a coffee shop that she hates. Hire her. Room and board and wages as a ...," he was going to say maid, or cook, but that was such a cliché, "research assistance. Oh come on. If you can get her to agree to stay for, say, three months, then you can put in for a sabbatical for this term at U.B.C." Karl gave Eric a solemn look. "Look Eric, I've watched you haunt Wreck Beach on every sunny day for ten years hoping to find an aura generator. Well you've found one. Make the best of her."
* * *
Maya said 'yes' immediately to the guys' offer. Neither of them were pervs. They were gentlemen. The choice between living in a squalid basement suite in Frisco while working her ass off for few tips at the coffee shop, versus living in a waterfront house in Vancouver and spending most of her time lounging around in a silk robe, was a non-decision.
The arrangements were not difficult for Maya to make. Just a few phone calls and a lot of explaining. She told her bitch of a boss at the coffee shop that she had met the man of her dreams and wasn't coming back from Vancouver, and that her roommate would pick up her last cheque. She was surprised, indeed shocked, that her boss did not complain and actually seemed genuinely pleased for her.
She told her roommate much the same story, and told her to pick up her paycheque and deposit it, and that she would mail her a cheque for the next month's rent, and that her mother would be driving down from Albion to pick up her things.
She told her mother much the same story, and asked her to pick up her things from San Francisco. Her mother harangued her, because that meant she had to borrow a car as her own ancient pickup truck was no longer safe for freeway driving. She then wanted to know everything about this special man.
Eventually she admitted to her mom that she was actually living with two gay men. She waited for the explosion that she figured the truth would cause. Instead her mom lightened up and actually sounded pleased. She even stopped complaining about having to drive to San Francisco.
When she phoned Alicia to tell her the news, Alicia sounded glad for her, but you could never tell with her. She was pleased that this meant that they could sunbathe together at Wreck beach some more, and so they swore they would do that at least twice a week.
Erik was not as successful. It was too late to get permission for a sabbatical from the university, so he would have to start work again in the September term as normal. That gave him less than a month of dedicated free time to figure out what caused Maya to tick.
Karl was involved, but mostly with the monitoring and recording, and the designated driving. The engineering company he was working for was bidding on building a new high span bridge, so he did not have much free time and when he did, he was all stressed out.
It was Karl's suggestion after analyzing the data, that Maya's aura was not constant, but pulsing. He suggested redoing the range tests while monitoring her pulse and blood pressure. Using a cheap instrument that they rented at the drug store, they did find out that the range seemed to follow the same trends as her blood system, but the equipment was too crude to identify a pattern.
* * * * *
* * * * *
MAYA'S AURA - the Awakening by Skye Smith
Chapter 5 - In present day Laurel Canyon, Hollywood
Mike slowed around the last hairpin before the road reached the ridge high above Hollywood. There was a brand new 'for sale' sign above the intercom at the driveway gate. The house had been for sale since the housing market started to crash years ago. A new sign meant a new agent. Nothing was selling these days. Not even the wealthy were buying.
Mike punched in the codes at the high steel driveway gate, and it rolled out of their way. He chirped the tires starting up the steep driveway because it was lightly coated in a greasy slick from the smog. Most of the time this house, on top the first ridge of the hills facing the sea, was smog free, but sometimes the smog would be forced up the slope and would billow over the ridge and leave a sticky residue on everything. Over the ridge, down in the canyons that led to Laurel Canyon, those that left their cars on the street often covered them in a light tarp every night, or at least every night during smog season.
Maya was so glad she was allowed to borrow her friend's house whenever she had to be in LA. Once you sat up on the hill and looked over and down on the smog, you couldn't imagine living in it, breathing it, contributing to it.
She went straight upstairs and showered. The Jacuzzi tub was tempting, but it took too long to fill, and besides, LA was in a drought. People had even given up on lawns and were putting in astro turf. She came out of her bathroom drying her hair on a towel. After figuring out how to un-snick the pin locks, she opened the sliding door to the balcony, but
then immediately closed it again.
LA was a noisy city. Twenty-four hours a day you could hear the hum of the freeway. The sirens never stopped their sporadic bursts, from all directions. Drivers honked their horns a lot. Planes and helicopters were always circling. Something else to miss about Vancouver. It was a quiet city at night.
She draped a bathrobe around her, turbaned a towel around her hair, and went downstairs to get something to eat. Mike had beaten her to the sushi and was already warming the sake that he had bought. He had the tiny TV in the kitchen tuned to the local news, but muted. He kept looking over to see if Maya had made it into any of the Glover Walland coverage.
She grabbed some chopsticks and snapped them apart and then claimed a slice of raw tuna, her favorite. "You can have the fish eggs," she said. "I've never cared for them."
"Shhh, we're on." He flapped his hand at her, and un-muted the TV.
It was all political blah blah blah to her. The newsman was asking questions of boring men, about other boring men. The people around the cameras and in the background must have been staged, because the people she had seen at the hotel had not jumping around excitedly with placards.
"Did you ever notice that politicians are a lot like actors?" Mike said. "Like, what is that guy doing right there but putting on an act for an audience?"
"Hopefully they are smarter than actors," she chuckled. "Be careful with that wasabi. I just blew out my nostrils."
"Don't hold your breath." She looked at him quizzically, thinking wasabi? nostrils? She clued in as Mike started again. "Don't hold your breath about politicians being smarter than actors. I mean, think about it," he said, "if you were some powerful billionaire, would you go into politics and put in the hours, and live in a fishbowl, and take all the abuse? Not likely. You would hire some actor to do all that for you. Some actor on the make, and eager to please you, while you sit back, take it easy and tell him what to do."
"So you think the president is an actor, a puppet. I don't know. He has an awful lot of power."
"He has the power," Mike added, "but he is not the boss. When he has an important decision to make, he goes to the real bosses and asks them what they want. Then he does it. Yeah, he has a lot of power but only while he is president. The guys he works for always have a lot of power no matter who is president, and we don't even know who they are."
"You sound like one of those conspiracy guys on the web."
"Hey, there you are. Aw, they zoomed in so you can't see me. Why do you have your eyes closed?"
"I told you I wasn't feeling good. Hey, turn the sound on and see if they got my name right."
He put the sound on and then sighed in relief. "Oh good, they skipped to where you have your eyes open again. Is that a smile or are you gritting your teeth? Oh good, you moved in front of him and put one of his arms around you."
"I didn't do that, he did. Gosh I look busty in that dress. Hey, hear that? They plugged me and the movie. Mission successful, Captain." She poked at another piece of tuna, but decided to have some sake first. " I felt better as soon as he let go of my hand. I don't trust him. I hope someone else wins the GOP nomination."
"What does GOP stand for?"
"I really have no idea. That's what the news reporters sometimes call the Republican Party. In school, I slept through history. About the only thing that I remember is that the Democrats and the Republicans used to be two sides of the same party. All my friends in San Francisco think they still are the same party. The war party. Come to think of it, I really, really hope he doesn't win."
"How come?"
"Well, I have this theory that my hand can sense evil people. That's why I wear gloves around strangers, otherwise if I accidentally shake hands with an evil person, I kind of wilt."
"So you're saying that Glover there, is evil just because you didn't like his handshake?"
"Promise not to laugh?"
"Promise," he said.
"Then, yes. That's exactly what I am saying. I learned all about creeps and psychos when I lived in Vancouver. And I don't mean those ghouls that you get to play vampires in your movies."
* * * * *
* * * * *
MAYA'S AURA - the Awakening by Skye Smith
Chapter 6 - Three years earlier at U.B.C., Vancouver
Erik, being staff, asked around U.B.C. and got permission to use one of the Psychology department's laboratories which were designed to monitor nervous system reactions to stimulus and stress. Unfortunately, the department demanded that for liability reasons, one of the departments staff must be present during all testing.
Fortunately the only person free was Dr. Schonfeld, MD, PhD and one of U.B.C.'s leading lights in the study of psychopaths. This was not fortunate because of the qualifications, but because Dr. Schonfeld was Dr. Emma Schonfeld, a woman. Maya was a little intimidated at first by all the letters behind her name, but Dr. Schonfeld's appearance belied her impressive resume.
She was in her late thirties, and not at all professorial. Middle height with sandy hair falling out of a slightly dishevelled chignon, and hazel eyes that were frank and appraising, but quite warm. She reminded Maya of some of the professional and career women customers from her old coffee-shop job. The ones that always asked her how her day was going, and were pleased whenever she made the effort to remember their orders without prompting. She felt herself relaxing in the other woman's presence.
Once Erik had explained that Maya seemed to have paranormal powers in animal magnetism, Emma was eager to help design a test. The equipment she chose was the latest version of the polygraph lie detector. Emma did not bat an eyelid when both Maya and Erik undressed, but she did pull some standard release agreements from a drawer and had them each sign one.
"Even with the signed release, I would be thankful if you did not mention that these tests included the use of a nude young woman," Emma said. She had to remind herself not to stare at Erik, who was in an embarrassing way. When Maya pulled a condom out of her tiny purse and asked her to turn her back for a moment she complied, despite being wildly curious. She allowed herself a quick peek to make sure that the young woman was not being violated.
After an hour and a half of constant testing, Erik ejected the memory stick containing the polygraph data, and the comments that he had been keying in to explain the timing points. It was Emma who suggested that they go to the faculty lounge for a drink and discuss the test.
"What I saw on the polygraph was not unusual. You tell me that there are these auras, and since there are two of you that sense them, I will not doubt you. I am sure you had a good reason to monitor the body's reactions with the instruments, but I think you are missing something. Something critical.
Think about what happened with the condom. Hey, I peeked, so sue me. Obviously these auras stimulate the sex organs, and obviously Maya is able to channel part of her aura through her hand."
Erik was silent, blushing and thinking. "Yes, I agree with you. We have so many basic tests to do and so much data to interpret that we have been purposefully ignoring the sexual effects. With sex there are just too many other variables and heightened senses that would confuse the data."
"So you don't think that these auras are a manifestation of the healing powers of the laying on of hands that have been documented for centuries, but as yet are scientifically unproven."
Maya listened to the two eggheads spew out their complex words and sipped her red wine. It was all so much blah- blah- blah to her. Besides, here she was sitting next to a very educated and successful woman, who was probably less than ten years older than her, and so she didn't want to listen to Erik. She could listen to him anytime.
She felt the urge to engage Emma in conversation. For some reason she didn't want the older woman to have the impression that she was just the bimbo assistant on this research profect. She screwed up her courage and took a breath.
"So, what do you do?" she asked Emma, interrupting Erik's jibber jabber. Always a gentleman, he politely
stopped talking.
"I do research into sick minds," Emma said. "Right now, because of the serial killer that is loose in the Vancouver area, I am on loan from U.B.C. to the police as an advisor to the special task force that is working the case."
"Oh! Oh, I heard about that even in California," Maya said. "Lots of low income young women have disappeared."
"That is the case. The shame of it is that because they were all troubled women, until recently they were treated as individual missing person cases. As if they were runaways."
"And now they think it's, like, a mass murderer?" Maya asked.
"A serial killer. If a psychopath is of low birth, or low education, then at their worst they become serial killers. Usually after four or five murders they are caught, and that's the end of them. The other kind is far worse."
"The other kind?"
"Much the same mental disorder but born into privilege, so they are educated and pursue vocations of power such as officers, lawyers, bankers, politicians. At their worst you get mass murderers. Thousands, perhaps millions of murders. Their individual evil is multiplied and expanded in relation to how powerful they become in society."
"There are lots of movies about serial killers. How come there are no movies about these other kind if they are so dangerous?"
"Well, that would be telling. That is one of the chapters of the book I am writing," said Emma. "Let's just say that there are a lot of powerful people who don't want the ordinary man thinking that a lot of the powerful people that they work for may actually be psychos."
"Do you enjoy working with the police?" Maya asked. Not only was this interesting, but she didn't get left behind like she was with all of Erik's babble.
"Absolutely not. The police are frustrated because they need a breakthrough and they aren't getting one. I am frustrated because I can't convince them that there must be more than one killer. At least three. One kidnapping women of the night. One kidnapping children from playgrounds. One attacking women along empty beach trails."