by Sarah Noffke
Chapter Six
May 1988
Unable to stomach school and tired of skipping it, I decided to graduate a year early. I didn’t graduate early because I was an exceptionally good student or test taker, but rather because my teachers were easy to manipulate into thinking that I was exceptional. They weren’t alone in this opinion.
By that time I’d saved up enough of other people’s money to make the big move to London. Mum was utterly heartbroken by the decision, but I had warned her it was coming. Pops thought it was a mistake, but this was the same man who’d confined me to Peavey for all my life. I can’t say many things bad about my parents, but they were a bit squeamish when it came to new experiences. They said they’d done enough prior to starting a family and now they preferred the quiet life. Later, much later, I’d come to agree with them. I’d understand their making this decision. But at the age of seventeen I was ready for a loud life, full of bright lights and ladies who wore too much makeup and had weak minds.
My pops was also all too aware of how I was funding my venture to London. Mum probably too, although she never would have spoken directly to me about it. Pops had asked me to consider a more honorable way of earning money, but I shrugged off his concern. I told him I never took all of the money of the people I scammed, and I mostly stole from the wankers who had that shifty look in their eyes. Pops knew at the end of the day that I wanted out of Peavey and that I was going to do anything it took to make it happen.
“What do I tell people when they ask what my son does for a living?” Pops asked right before I left for London.
“Tell them to mind their own bloody business,” I said.
“Ren, people will be curious. They’ll want to know how my son maintains living in an expensive city like London.”
“Tell them I’m a venture capitalist,” I said.
“What does that mean?”
“It means I steal money.”
Pops didn’t respond, only gave me a small disapproving look.
I did regret leaving Jimmy behind. His father had lost his job at the mill which meant that he was even more bad-tempered than before. Jimmy never stood up to his father. Not once. He always said his father didn’t know any better and the abuse made him stronger. He probably thought he deserved it. He didn’t.
Jimmy dropped out of school the year I graduated early. He landed a full-time job as a cook at McGreggor’s pub. Jimmy couldn’t cook, but at that establishment that didn’t matter. Dropping a basket of chips into hot grease isn’t really cooking, but it’s all he had to do most of the time. I did everything I could, short of mind control, to convince him to join me in the city.
“Ren, how am I going to support myself in the city?” Jimmy asked. We were sitting on the roof of farmer Gretchen’s barn. We moved a dozen hay bales out of the barn to create the makeshift ladder. No sooner had we made the climb up those bales than a persistent mist started. I pulled my cap down low over my eyes to shield my face, but there was no help for the hay. Damp hay is ruined hay.
“I’ll cover your expenses until you find a job,” I said to Jimmy. “It’s a city. There’s loads more job opportunities.”
“This is all about you trying to be my sugar daddy, isn’t it?” he said, a genuine look of offense on his freckled face.
“Only if you put out,” I said, trying to lighten his sour mood.
“I don’t want your charity,” he said, narrowing his eyes at me. “I’m not going unless I can pay my own way, and there’s no way I can do that on the wages I’ve saved up.”
“Then help me run a few scams,” I said, eyeing the grease burns on his hands and wrists. “We can split the profits.”
He stared off at the rolling hills and seemed to consider it for a minute. “Naw, that won’t work either. We both know you run those scams. I’d be fooling myself if I thought my involvement made a lick of difference.”
“I could concoct a new scam. Something elaborate where I needed another player. You,” I said.
From his jacket pocket he pulled out a cigarette and offered it to me. I grabbed it and threw it off the roof. “Smoking? Really? You’ve taken up smoking? God, you really are going to get yourself killed if you don’t stick with me.”
His scowl wrinkled his long forehead. “Oh, come on now. Those things are expensive,” he said, throwing his arm in the direction I tossed the cigarette.
“Save your money then and bank it for London,” I said.
“Oh, fine,” Jimmy said, resigning a bit of his sudden anger. “But I can’t leave yet. I’ve got to work more. I’ll join you once I’ve saved up more money.”
“All right, I’ll accept that. Now give me the rest of that pack of fags,” I said, holding out my hand.
Jimmy eyed my hand and then me. A few seconds later he gave a defeated sigh and reached into his pocket. He placed a wrinkled pack in my hand.
“You almost smoked the lot of these,” I said, inspecting the pack quickly before catapulting them through the air, hitting a dumb goat in the head.
“Work has been stressful,” he said.
“Well, get a different job. A better-paying one. I expect to see you in London before the summer’s over.” I stood up, holding my chin high, allowing mist to hit my face straight on.
“When you leaving?” Jimmy asked.
“Well, since you’re too much a git to join me I don’t see any reason for delaying,” I said. “I’ll be in London by nightfall.”
“Tonight?” he asked in astonishment.
I blinked down at him dully. “Yes, tonight.”
“How you going to get there so quickly?” he asked.
“There’s a machine that Dream Travelers use to generate our body. You dream travel to it and it brings your body through the physical world to where your consciousness is on the machine. It’s called a GAD-C and there happens to be one in London.” I said the whole thing like it was the most boring piece of knowledge ever.
“Like a teleporter?” Jimmy asked.
“Sure, whatever,” I said.
“But you won’t have anything with you,” Jimmy said.
“I’ll have a wad of cash and my brilliance. That’s all I need.”
Jimmy stood and flashed me an envious grin. “You know, I’d do just about anything to be you.”
I clapped him on the shoulder. “Oh, believe me, I know.”
Chapter Seven
The city was as fantastic as I thought it would be. I’d dream traveled to London so many times that I actually knew the city better from the nightly exploration than most of its longtime residents. I could thank my photographic memory for my intricate knowledge of London. I knew the name of every major street, the pubs with the prettiest ladies, and the perfect places to scam tourists.
And when I generated my body and stepped onto the slick streets I realized how much better it was being in the city in physical form. Steam rose from the road and actually clung to my clothes. Smells of pollution and sweaty people and the spices of an Indian restaurant all wrestled for the attention of my olfactory center. I’d never smelled so many different things at once because I didn’t have that sense while dream traveling.
People jostled by me on the busy street, most all of them invading my personal space. I was standing stock-still on the pavement in the middle of Regent Street. It was half past eight in the evening and the streets of Piccadilly Circus were jammed with people. Back in Peavey the townspeople would be drawing drapes. The pub getting ready for last call. I held out my arms, like in an attempt to embrace the city. Pedestrians knocked into me.
What’s his problem?
Dude, move.
I’m hungry.
The thoughts of the various people brushing past me streamed through my consciousness when I inadvertently touched them. It was overwhelming. It was exhilarating. I was finally alive. I’d arrived.
I opened my eyes wide and swung around. People had now moved away from me, giving me a bit of space. “London, you are so bl
oody lucky. I’m finally here!” I boomed, my lungs bursting with excitement.
And then something likened to a bull rammed into my shoulder and I was knocked forward.
“Move it, kid,” a bloke said as he barreled past me.
I’d forgotten that I was a kid still. I had a bank account larger than most working-class professionals, an impossibly high IQ, and a more thorough knowledge of the world than ninety-eight percent of the population. But I was still a kid and that was everyone’s first impression of me, which was an obstacle in some ways. I needed to change my appearance. I was a badass but now I needed to look like one. Relying on my detailed knowledge of the city, I headed for a high-street clothing store.
***
I only had money and the clothes on my back when I moved to London. Many had immigrated to this city with the same as I did but most didn’t land as firmly on their feet as me. I leased a flat, had a closet full of suits, and had doubled my bank account by the end of that first week. There were a lot of things I loved about London, but most of all I loved that the people had lots of money. The tourists had money. The locals had money. And all of them were perfect subjects for my scams. People will tell you that money doesn’t buy happiness. They’re bloody right. It buys experiences and power and influence and that’s a whole lot better than stupid happiness.
I had been in London for a month when I got the call.
“Hello,” I said, sticking the wireless telephone receiver to my face.
“Renny, this is your mum,” she said.
“Mum, you don’t have to tell me it’s you. I already know. You’re the only one who calls me that,” I said, pacing to the windows on the other side of the flat. From there I had a penthouse view of Hyde Park.
“I have news,” she said, and I made notice of her Irish accent flaring in her words.
I stiffened. She had bad news. “Is it Lyza?” I said, an ounce of hope in my tone. “Has something happened to her?”
She paused. “Actually I wouldn’t know. I haven’t heard from her since she left for Oxford.”
That rotten bitch still hadn’t returned any of Mum’s calls. Our parents’ money was good enough for Lyza to take to fund her university years but she couldn’t even answer her bloody phone. All logic failed to explain why my parents kept footing her damn bills. Pops said I’d understand unconditional love one day when I had my own kids. There were too many ridiculous things in that one sentence. Unconditional love. Understand. Kids.
“It’s Jimmy,” my mum said on the other side of the phone.
I cast my eyes on the door to the spare room ready for him. I’d already taken the liberty of stocking it with high-end furnishings. I was going to tell him the flat was fully furnished when I moved in. It wasn’t. I bought everything in it.
“He’s been in an accident,” my mum said, her voice trembling.
I sat in the plaid armchair and pressed the receiver more firmly into my ear. “What happened? Did his father do something to him? Is he all right?”
“It wasn’t his father,” Mum said. “We had a storm last night and a gale rushed through here. He was walking home from work and a large branch broke off a tree and hit him in the head. It knocked him out.”
I shot into a standing position. “What? Is he okay? Did they take him to St. Paul’s?” That was the closest hospital, three towns over.
“No, Renny,” my mum said, her voice cracking. “Jimmy is dead.”
I dropped the receiver. Raised up my foot and stomped down on the phone. The plastic cracked under the weight of my force. Again and again I slammed my foot down until wires and broken buttons and a sharp antenna were sprayed all over the parquet. Even later after I cleaned up the destroyed phone pieces the reminder of the call was still scratched into the floor. And if that wasn’t a constant reminder then there was Jimmy’s room. Stocked and ready for him. We were going to rule the streets of London together. But just as I always joked, without me around, Jimmy went off and got himself killed.
Chapter Eight
June 1990
I was twenty when I realized I’d wasted all my life scamming people for money. There were better ways. Smarter ways. There was gambling. I’d never thought of using mind control to put the odds in my favor. I was too busy playing trivial pranks on innocent people and scamming old ladies. And yes, before in Peavey I only scammed shifty wankers, but then I realized that old ladies were the shiftiest people out there. They just wore better disguises than the rest. People saw them as feeble or sweet or unassuming. Excuse me, but these creatures had a large bank account because they’d made a man work for it and then sucked out his health, ending his life ten or twenty years before hers. There’s a reason men die before women. Because the beast with the Y chromosome knows how to kill us through annoyance.
Monte Carlo opened its doors to me with a welcoming embrace. On my first trip to the casino, I stepped around the doorman, taking in the squeaky marble under my ostrich cap-toe shoes. Gold columns with intricate crown molding flanked the casino entrance. Chandeliers dripped with jewels hanging overhead. Fuck the Seven Wonders of the World. That casino was utterly gorgeous. The only thing more breathtaking was me. My new Armani suit was a dark forest green. Some think gingers aren’t attractive with our freckles and unearthly red hair, but there was nothing more striking than my green eyes and what they could do to every single woman in that casino. And this new lucrative venture into gambling had freed up considerable hours in my schedule. I found with only minimal weight lifting I’d already sculpted my freckle-covered muscles. One lucky woman in that place was in for a treat. Then I smiled to myself and thought, Hell, why limit myself to only one tonight?
But before pleasure, papa needed to make some money. I strode past a few tables until I found the perfect one. Choosing subjects is highly important when gambling. It was foolish to walk up to any table and exert my influence on just any player. Some people are easier to control than others, although everyone can be controlled.
Lonely people. Distracted ones. Uneducated Middlings. They’re the easiest. And in a high-security locale such as Monte Carlo I needed to be careful how I played my tricks. I’d made a lot of money and I planned to make a whole lot more. My bank account would never be large enough.
I picked a table with only two players playing Texas Hold’em. I didn’t really care for the game. Hell, I hated cards altogether. I wasn’t there to play cards though. I was there to play people. I took an empty seat between the two players, both with their heads down. One was an Asian man about my pop’s age. He was wearing a suit that wasn’t as nice as mine, but close. He had a suave confidence that I would have admired except that it was slightly irritating. I’ve never admired anyone. Instead I’ve observed and copied worthy attributes, adding them to my repertoire. Everything is a competition. Everything. And those with the best skills win every time.
I nodded at the Asian when I took the seat. He didn’t return it. On my other side was a woman. She wore a backless red dress that clashed awfully with my orangey hair. That was fine because I had no interest in her keeping it on. I was there to take the Asian’s money and then the woman’s dress off of her. I love one-stop shopping. I didn’t grace the woman with a look. Actually I pretended as if she didn’t exist and for the time being she didn’t. Business before pleasure.
The dealer, a bit older than me, dealt me in when I laid my chips on the table. I folded the first three hands hardly looking at my cards. The Asian took two hands. The woman who had absolutely no idea what she was doing got a weak win. Even losers win every now and then. She reminded me of the popular girls in school. No talent but a spark in her eye that somehow garnered her people’s favor. She was newly married by the look of her unscuffed wedding band, not yet welded to the engagement ring. I bet they got married there at the Monte Carlo. But I wondered where the groom was. Probably making the money to afford that four-karat atrocity on her finger.
On the fourth hand I played. My cards were shit. I did
n’t need good cards to win. Mr. Asian-Businessman had a good hand by the glint in his brown eyes. Plucking a chip off the table, I twirled it through my knuckles. Again and again the chip glided over knuckle, under finger, and then back across. Again and again. He’d caught the hypnotic gesture. Luckily he was the only one. I doubled the bet.
“You going to play?” I said to him, a calculated control behind the words.
His eyes were still on the chip gliding nimbly over my fingers. He nodded, not breaking out of his trance. “I’m going to play,” he said in a robotic voice, pushing his chips forward.
The river came and I didn’t have a hand. He did though. I was certain of it. I doubled the bet again. He was still fixed on the chip making a rapid motion through my fingers. He eyed it and then me.
“Are you going to fold?” I asked, as more of a statement. An alluring inflection on the last word. A commanding one. This was how my hypnosis worked. Rhythmic actions and forceful words. Combined, they got me anything I wanted.
The Asian nodded again, pushing his cards forward. I dropped the chip and as I pulled in my bounty a small clarity returned to his eyes. He seemed to want to grab for the cards he threw away but refrained. I knew I’d have to play this guy fast. I used the same hypnosis on him on the next hand. Mrs. Legs beside me folded immediately. I put in half my chips before the river. Ten grand. The man had that and more but I didn’t want it all. No need to be greedy. And I couldn’t have him go all in with the shit hand I had. Never play the cards.
To my relief he called after the river. Now the game would begin. I threw in another ten grand. The man’s confidence had considerably waned. From the corner of my vision I knew his eyes were back on me. Again the chip began its dance through my fingers. I flicked a sudden menacing gaze at him. He almost flinched. I had him right where I wanted him.