The 22 Murders of Madison May

by Max Barry

  “This is Hugo,” the woman said, and the man said, “Don’t . . .” and then shook his head. The woman arched her eyebrows. “Don’t what?” The man was silent. The answer, obviously, was Don’t use our real names, which was amazing, and fit perfectly with Maddie’s lurid theories. “Don’t be polite?” the woman said. “Don’t use my manners?” She looked at Maddie. “I’m Felicity. I’m sorry, I should have introduced myself before.”

  “Maddie,” she said, even though it was pinned to her shirt. “Hi, Felicity. Hi, Hugo.”

  The man didn’t respond. Instead, he glowered at Felicity and she glowered back. Maddie risked a glance at Zar, like Are you fucking getting this, and Zar, hunched over the coffee machine, was like Oh my God, yes. “What?” Felicity said finally.

  “It’s better not to get attached,” Hugo said.

  “Really?” Felicity said, then again with more emphasis: “Really?” She smiled at Maddie. “Could you give us a moment?”

  “Sure.” Maddie pocketed her notepad and returned to the counter.

  “What was that?” Zar hissed.

  “I don’t know,” she whispered. “Serious shit.”

  “Maddie,” called Alto, from the back room.

  “Not now,” Zar called. “She’s busy.”

  “Maddie.”

  “I’ll be quick,” she said. “Do not serve them until I get back.”

  She pushed through the grimy door with the gold-ish plaque that read staff only. Alto was overflowing his chair, an unpacked sandwich spread across the desk in front of the monitors. “Maddie, what are you doing?”

  “What?”

  He gestured at the monitors. “You did not smile.”

  “Didn’t I?”

  “I saw you.” He shook his head. “No smile.”

  She might have neglected the smile. It was possible she’d let it drop toward the end, when the woman pretending to write about serial killers had gotten into an argument with the mysterious man who didn’t want her to use his real name. “I’m sorry.”

  “This is business of family.”

  “I know. I’ll do better, Alto.” She edged toward the door.

  “You are prettier when you smile. That is what customer want to see. Not this.” His face dropped into a pantomime scowl.

  “Okay, Alto.”

  “Show me.”

  She paused at the door. “Excuse me?”

  “Show me smile.”

  Oh my God, she thought. But there was a high-tension drama playing out at the rear table beside the patisserie cabinet and she was missing it, so she inhaled, doing a thing they called finding your center, and projected bright, open joy onto her face. BZZZT. Like that.

  “Much better. Happy smile. Do that.”

  “Got it!” she said, easing out of the room. “Will do!” She ran back to Zar, who was using a rag to dry a glass without looking at it.

  “He’s a spy,” Zar said. “The guy. Probably Russian.”

  “What? How do you know?”

  “He looks Russian.”

  She peered at him. He could have been Russian. But also not. “He doesn’t sound Russian.”

  “Oh, but they don’t,” Zar said. “The sleepers. The embedded secret agents.”

  The woman, Felicity, glanced in their direction. They busied themselves with cups. Then there was a rush of customers, and the man, Hugo, left. Afterward, Felicity seemed distracted and irritable. Just before the end of Maddie’s shift, she rose and walked out.

  The next day, both of them were back. Hugo turned his chair so that its back rested against the wall and jutted his legs sideways, at ninety degrees to Felicity. The two of them then conducted a guarded conversation that Maddie and Zar couldn’t overhear from behind the counter. Felicity ordered coffees; Hugo drank water.

  “Oh my God, he’s telling her about his wife,” Zar said, returning from wiping nearby tables.

  “What?” Maddie hissed. She handed a customer correct change and smiled, for the security cameras.

  “He just said his wife loved carrot cake.”

  “Loved?” she choked. “Loved?”

  “Yes. Past tense.”

  This was amazing and changed everything. How, exactly, Maddie didn’t know. But it demanded a recasting of Hugo, whom they’d pegged as the brooding villain of the piece.

  “He’s divorced,” Maddie guessed. “No. Widowed.”

  “He’s a narcissist,” said Zar, who was less forgiving.

  “He’s learning to love again.”

  He’s a con man, Zar messaged her later that night, while Maddie was lying alone in her double bed, thinking about installing Tinder. Outside her window, someone argued with a ride-share driver. He scams women with his bullshit story about a dead wife.

  Yes, she said, because the rules of this game had come from improv class: You couldn’t block an idea, only add to it. Never: No. Instead: Yes, and. So Hugo was a widowed Russian spy who was also learning to love again while he scammed vulnerable women. But Felicity knows. When he least expects it, she’s going to murder him to add to her collection.

  The argument outside died down, and, for a moment, it was quiet.

  I’m thinking about getting on Tinder, she messaged Zar.

  y are u not on already???

  A good question. Because I’ve only been single for 3 weeks?? she replied, which sounded like a good answer, even if it didn’t completely feel like one. She and Trent had dated for twenty-two months. Logically, it made sense to take some time to figure out what kind of person she might be without him.

  u been single for a year, Zar said.

  * * *

  —

  She installed the app the next day, using a publicity photo of herself from A Streetcar Named Desire, swigging directly from a bottle of whiskey, dressed sloppily in a sheer satin dressing gown, her hair a copper explosion, one eye closed. For her profile, she wrote:

  Occasionally misrepresent things. Rarely touch liquor. Have always depended on the kindness of strangers.

  A description of Blanche DuBois, which felt safer than writing about herself. And, maybe, would prompt some interesting conversations. She began to swipe. That was how it worked: She had to look at profiles and decide whether to right-swipe (yes) or left-swipe (no), and if both she and the dude right-swiped, then they could message each other. She was easing her way into it, though, and left-swiping everybody.

  “What do you mean?” Zar said after class. They were changing in the Peabody room, which was full of racked costumes and smelled like mothballs and dry sweat. “Why would you left-swipe everybody?” She peered at Maddie’s phone.

  “I’m getting a feel for it.”

  “It doesn’t work if you left-swipe everybody. The system breaks down. I thought you knew how to use social media. You’re on Insta.”

  “Only to post pictures of houses,” Maddie said. “I don’t talk to anyone.”

  “That’s another thing we have to talk about,” Zar said. “Your weird obsession with houses. But one thing at a time. Here.” She began to swipe. “Yes. No. No. Yes. Yes.”

  “Wait,” Maddie said.

  “You don’t have to marry them. You don’t even have to talk. You just drop the trash.”

  Her phone blooped. She stared at it. She had a message.

  “There you go.” Zar peered at her screen, then made a noise of disgust.

  “What?”

  The right-swipe was a blond boy in a baseball cap with his arms slung around two other boys. His message said: Hey.

  “Never reply to those,” Zar said. “The heys.”

  “Why not?”

  “It never gets better.” Zar began to wriggle into jeans. “You don’t want to go downhill from hey.”

  “I can’t just ignore him.”

  “Oh, yes,
you can. Trust me, there will be more.”

  Her phone blooped again. This time it was a Stephen, hugging a Labrador. His message also said: Hey.

  “I see,” Maddie said.

  She did some right-swiping on the train home. It turned out to be fun and addictive and a decent pick-me-up, in the sense that she liked having people who wanted to talk to her. Although no one had mentioned her Streetcar reference yet. And several seemed to believe her photo was of her apartment. And this was the easy part, of course; it was always fun in the beginning, before anyone had to say no. Still, it felt like progress. Life progress. She was glad she was doing this.

  * * *

  —

  She was approached during break. She didn’t look right away because she was sitting on the back step of the store, near the dumpsters, reading a Tinder profile. Then she peered up and saw a Knicks cap and a lopsided smile. It was a young guy with a map, a paper one, like a tourist from ancient history. “Pardon me.” His face was ringed by bright sky, but she recognized him: the guy Felicity was writing an article about. The fucking psychopath guy. “I’m sorry to bother you—”

  “Sorry, my break’s over.” She went inside and shut the door.

  “Why are you locking door?” Alto called.

  Everything in her body felt loose and electric. “Just a minute, Alto.” He called again, but she ignored him and pushed into the coffee shop. It was a Tuesday, which meant no Zar, but Felicity and Hugo were camped out in their regular corner. Maddie walked to their table. “I think I saw him,” she said, and she was trying not to overreact, but her voice came out high and thin, like an old recording.

  Before she could clarify, Hugo bounced to his feet, his chair sliding backward. “Where?”

  “Out back, but—”

  He jumped the counter. His boot caught a glass jar of cookies, which flew into the wall and spilled. He hit the staff only door and barged through it.

  “Get behind me,” Felicity said, seizing her arm. “Sit. Sit.” She had one hand in her bag in a way that suggested she had something in there, mace or similar. She shuffled in front of Maddie, forcing her toward the wall.

  A minute later, when this was beginning to feel slightly ridiculous, Hugo returned and shook his head. “Gone,” he said.

  “Gone gone?” said Felicity, which made no sense to Maddie. Hugo shrugged.

  “It might not have been him,” Maddie said, extracting herself.

  “You did the right thing,” Felicity said. “You can’t take chances.”

  She nodded, but she was feeling foolish now. Other customers were staring. “Thank you,” she said, although she wasn’t sure what for. She returned behind the counter and began to clean up broken cookies.

  * * *

  —

  She messaged Zar, but even as she was explaining what had happened, it felt like a joke, an extension of the game they were playing, where customers were spies and murderers. On reflection, what were the odds that an actual serial killer would wander up to her and say hello—out back of a coffee shop where there was a reporter writing a story about him? It was too unlikely for words. So already the whole thing felt dreamlike. And she let this leak into her retelling and wound up focusing not on the Knicks-hat dude who was possibly a serial killer, but instead the over-the-top reactions of Hugo and Felicity.

  “They’re falling in love,” Zar told Maddie on Saturday, buttering bread. They could see Felicity and Hugo in the reflection of the specials board above their heads.

  “Are they?” Maddie said, and caught herself. Yes, and. “Of course they are.”

  “She isn’t sure if she can trust him, but at this point, she doesn’t even care anymore. She can’t stop thinking about him. She wants to hand over the codes and flee to Russia.”

  “I thought he had the codes.”

  Zar flapped a hand. “They both have codes.”

  “Yes, and,” she said, “he doesn’t want her to come to Russia, because she’ll be executed by his people.”

  “Mmm,” Zar said. “A pickle.”

  “Can they both go on the run?”

  “They’d always be looking over their shoulder.”

  “They could go to Venezuela. He has a house there.”

  “Oh, nice,” Zar said.

  “He’s never been there. He inherited it.”

  “It’s a beautiful house, isn’t it?”

  “Thank you so much,” Maddie said to a woman dropping dollar bills into the tip jar. “Yes, it’s in the woods. There are deer. And a lake. It’s a house on a lake. They could start a new life there.”

  Zar sighed. “We should write this shit down. Make our own parts.” It had been a lean few months in terms of auditions. Maddie had gotten close a few times, particularly with a small part in a studio film titled By the River Blue, which would have been amazing, but instead went to an actress named Aria Astwell. That felt like Maddie’s new normal: close, close, close. She was tiring of it.

  “Hey,” Zar said, nudging her.

  She looked up in time to see Hugo reach out and put a hand on Felicity’s. Just for a moment. Then he stood and left. Felicity gazed after him in a way that Maddie found complex and indecipherable, then opened her laptop.

  “Mmm-hmm,” Zar said. “This is all about second chances.”

  * * *

  —

  Funny she should say, because a few days later, while half-watching TV, who should pop up on her Tinder but her ex-boyfriend Trent. He’d used the same picture as his Facebook profile, one Maddie had taken herself, sneaking up on him as he sat waiting for her on the steps of the New York Public Library the previous winter. He was gazing into the distance, the low sun catching his jaw just right, casting him as relaxed and smart. It was a truly great picture. She wasn’t sure how she felt about him using it to attract women. Fine, she guessed. She was fine with it.

  For the fun of it, she right-swiped. Or maybe not fun, exactly. She was curious as to what her ex-boyfriend was up to. Only a minute later, he messaged her:

  How’s the dating pool?

  Shallow, she replied. You?

  Closed for the summer.

  She smiled. She doubted he was having much trouble finding dates. But that was nice of him to say. Uncharacteristically nice, almost. Potential evidence of a newfound maturity. She sent a crazy-face emoji, to which he didn’t reply. That was fine, too. That was relaxed and smart, like his picture. She watched the rest of her show. While brushing her teeth, she checked the app, in case Trent had messaged her back, but he hadn’t.

  * * *

  —

  Finally, someone got her bio. His name was Mitch. He was twenty-two and looked like a swimwear model, so much so that she thought he might be a bot, or else catfishing. He wrote:

  Streetcar, right?

  She was delighted. It had been more than a week. You’re the first to get it.

  I’m named after one of the characters.

  She found that odd, because the Mitch in A Streetcar Named Desire was not a great guy. The best that could be said about him was that, unlike the other guy, he didn’t go right ahead and commit sexual assault. Maddie had questions for Tinder Mitch’s parents.

  Have you seen it performed?

  No but I read the script. Your picture makes me want to see it.

  She wasn’t playing Blanche anymore, so that couldn’t happen. She could invite him to a Macbeth, though, which she was doing in the fall. If he was a real human being.

  “Oh, he’s fake,” Zar said, when she showed her the screen. They were grabbing lunch in the Village, a little corner café with foldout windows.

  “What?” Maddie said.

  “His picture is fake. No way he looks like that.”

  “But he wants to meet.” Tinder Mitch had moved fast. And she was tempted, because of all her swipes, he
was her favorite. Not just because of the profile pic, she hoped. “Why would he ask me out if he doesn’t want me to know what he looks like?”

  “Ten minutes prior, he’ll message you asking if you’re superficial and only care about looks.”

  “No,” she said, gazing at her Mitch profile in dismay.

  “He knows it might not work, but if he used his own pic, you’d have never swiped in the first place.”

  “That’s not necessarily true,” she said, although maybe it was true. She had become brutal with her swipes. There were a lot of boys and she had gotten into the habit of judging them in a split second. She sighed. Mitch had been a breath of fresh air, following guys who ran out of things to say after five messages, or had nothing to begin with. “That sucks.”

  “You just gotta . . .” Zar said, and trailed off. Her eyes fixed on something over Maddie’s shoulder. “Look look look.”

  She turned. The sidewalk was full of people. Then she saw what Zar meant. Across the street were Felicity and Hugo. As she watched, Felicity raised an arm to hail a cab.

  “Were they watching us?” Zar said.

  “They think we’re CIA,” Maddie said, thinking: Yes, and.

  “No,” Zar said, “I mean, I think they were really watching us.”

  Felicity and Hugo climbed into a cab.

  “The city’s not that big,” Maddie said. “You can run into people. They might think we’re stalking them.”

  Zar looked at her. “I didn’t want to mention this. But a few days ago, I saw inside her bag. She has a gun. For real,” Zar added, to Maddie’s expression. “Not make-believe spy games.”

  “You’re saying she might be . . .” She trailed off.

  “I don’t know. I’m just saying.”

  “Saying what, though?” she said.

  “I don’t know,” Zar said again. They looked out at the street.

  * * *

  —

  Mitch pinged her twice more during the day, but Maddie didn’t reply. She tried conversations with some of her other swipes, to fill the Mitch-sized void, but they went nowhere, and Maddie grew dissatisfied and irritated, as if she were shopping for a thing and everywhere had the wrong color or make or was out of stock. She was making it hard for herself: Her attitude was bad. She was entering conversations like a pugilist, seeking openings for jabs. Eventually she forced herself to stop.