Chick Flick

by Noga Porat

  I needed William, so I went to the pub on Tuesday. Predictably, there he was, sitting at the table with my cinnamon apple pie, waiting for me. What a pleasant sight. I was delighted to see him.

  “How’s my scientist this evening?”

  “I’m a catastrophe,” I said. “And you?”

  “A little tired. I haven’t been sleeping well,” he said, but he didn’t elaborate.

  I told him our news about the meeting with RICPCom. He sympathized, and suggested that maybe I could continue with my other projects and reconsider the chick project. It was true that I did have other ideas to hang on to, but I was so emotionally invested in the chick project that I couldn’t imagine letting it go. Then, when I confessed to him that I had called Caroline and told her about the sequence, he suddenly turned pale.

  “I warned you specifically not to tell anyone, especially not Caroline,” he said.

  “But this might be our only chance,” I cried.

  I was shocked when, next, he got up, took my hand, and asked me to dance. We’d never done that before. We moved to a dark corner of the bar that doubled as a dance floor. He pulled me close and whispered into my ear. I felt like I might faint, though not because of the danger he was warning me of.

  “I have reason to believe that by giving Caroline the information about the sequence, you put yourself in grave danger,” he said. “I want us to finish this dance and get out of here and go somewhere private. We will go somewhere outside, where no one can hear us.”

  After the song ended, I followed him without saying another word. We walked outside, through the narrow streets and small alleyways, past buildings I had never seen in the city before. All I knew was that we were going west, in the direction of the sea. We reached the beach and walked for a half an hour on the sand, quickly, until we reached a secluded cave area beside a cliff.

  “Let me check your purse,” he said. “Please. They might be listening.”

  I gave it to him and he sorted through it, checking methodically for bugs. I trusted him, but he was acting a bit too strangely for my taste. If this was a trick to get me alone, I wasn’t going to be happy.

  I looked out at the sea and waited for him to finish searching. Eventually, I just got tired and laid my head on my jacket on the sand. He did the same, next to me.

  “William,” I said, whispering, “what is going on?”

  “They don’t want you to do this,” he said, “and they’ll go to great lengths to see that your work stops.”

  “But who?!” I asked.

  He didn’t answer. Instead, he put his hand on my face and pulled my hair back softly. Then he played with one of my curls.

  “I am so sorry,” he said, “I wish things could be different.”

  “William! You must tell me!”

  “I don’t think it’s Caroline or RICPCom. I think she’s on your side, like she claims,” he said.

  “Then who is it? Who is causing all this pain? Is it Cole?”

  “Avian Industrial, Scarlet,” he said. “It has to be.”

  The words felt like fire in my ears. “But we could save them so much money!” I said, my voice involuntarily rising above a whisper before William reached out to hush me. “Isn’t that what all businesses want?”

  “But that’s just the thing, Scarlet. It won’t save them money. It’ll cost them.”

  I don’t know if it was the beer or simply exhaustion, but I wasn’t on my game. My head was fuzzy, and it felt like I couldn’t follow what he was saying.

  “Come again?”

  “There’s a proposed bill making its way up the chain in the capitol,” he said. “Technologies categorized as ‘green’ will be mandatorily incorporated into existing businesses. If a technology exists that can give an industry access to cleantech, they must use it, or pay the price.”

  “So you’re saying—”

  “I am saying, Scarlet, that if your chick-sexing technology becomes accessible, the public has a right to demand its use—for the ethical reasons as well as the environmental reasons.”

  “So the general public is actually my customer!” I realized.

  “Yep!” William smiled, a rare occurrence for this strange and serious night. “That is the good news. But the bad news is that it makes Avian your enemy rather than your ally.”

  I was furious. This was all about saving money—millions of dollars, yes, but it was chump change to a company that had revenues like Avian’s.

  “They’d rather not loose an extra cent and leave things as they are.”

  “Cheapskates,” I spat. “I would do good things with that money.”

  “I know you would, sweet Scar.”

  He looked at me, leaned in closer, and kissed me on the nose. Then he leaned over and kissed my lips. His kiss tasted like, well, like sweet cinnamon apple pie. I did not want to hear any more that night. I just wanted to feel his arms around me.

  William explained it all to me later. He said it was a near certainty that the law would pass, and that we had thrown a wrench in the works by involving two competing companies. Someone was bound to end up helping us develop the technology, and that’s what kicked Avian into high gear. Caroline had naïvely been informing them of my progress all the while, as she had thought that it would make them want to buy RICPCom.

  “They had to do something, Scarlet,” William said. “These people don’t like to lose from the bottom line.”

  “But taking Debauchee? Are they going to take out everyone who wants to develop a chick-sexing solution?”

  “I wouldn’t put it past them. That’s why you’re in danger,” he said. “Now, about the sequence. You didn’t write down anywhere, right?”

  “No,” I said. “I listened to you about that. It’s only in my head.”

  “Very good, Scarlet. Now we just have to lie low for a while. Meanwhile, we also need to transfer your tubes to Joel, so that he can continue working on developing the prototype,” he suggested.

  “Is that a good idea? Will Joel be safe working on it?”

  “It doesn’t matter if it’s a good idea, or a safe idea. It’s the only idea. It’s the only way to get you out of this. As long as they know you are alive and you have that sequence, you are a ticking time bomb. They have managed to gain control of the injection company indirectly, but you are on the loose. They underestimated you.”

  That may be the case, I thought. But every inch of me still trembled with fear.

  William pulled me close.

  “Everything will be fine, Scarlet. You can trust me.”

  He held me tightly, and we didn’t say anything. The minutes ticked by. Then, suddenly, he spoke.

  “I have a confession to make, Scarlet,” he said.

  I felt my heart clench like a fist. I couldn’t handle any more bad news.

  “Please, let it be something good,” I said.

  “Our meeting was not accidental. I mean, at the bar that first night.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “Caroline phoned me shortly after your first call and asked me to keep an eye on you. You were right on the money: RICPCom was searching for any lead they could find on the chick-sexing method, and I was the person they wanted to help them get that lead,” he said.

  “So you’re not who you said you are?” My heart was falling into a dark abyss. I could barely find the words.

  “No, I am. I am a newsman and I do own a website. A few years back, I did an article on the injection machine and I met Caroline. We kept in touch. After you called, she asked me to meet you. I thought I might get an inside scoop, so I followed you to the bar that night.”

  “I thought you were on my side,” I said, anger and sadness fighting for top billing in my heart.

  “I am!” He grabbed my hand. “As soon as I met you and came to know you, I knew you really wanted to accomplish the chick-sexing. I told Caroline just that.”

  “You were a double agent? You told her everything I said!?” I cried.

&nbs
p; “I was their agent at first,” he said, “but I’m a single agent now. Yours, only yours, Scarlet. You’re the one I want to protect. You’re the one I want to be with.”

  “Against all odds?”

  “Against all odds, my dear Scarlet,” William said, and enveloped me in a warm kiss. The night, as horrible as it had been, turned out to be perfect after all.

  I was ready to spring into action—or as ready as I’d ever be, now that I had a plan. The next morning, I made a call to my friend at the lab and told her I would not be into work today and that, in fact, I probably would be away for a few days.

  “I need a favor,” I told her.

  “Anything,” she said.

  I gave her specific instructions. She was to open the fridge and take out the blue tube box on the second shelf from the bottom and put it in her bag and take it home with her. I asked her to put it in the fridge when she got home. The next morning, she was to take it to a mutual friend’s home and leave it with him. I’d send Joel to pick it up from there. Finally, I asked her not to mention that she had spoken to me, especially if someone came to the lab and inquired about my absence.

  William was coming out of the shower and came into the room wrapped in a towel to give me a kiss good morning. My heart thumped in my chest at the memory of our first night together.

  “Joel will pick up the tubes tomorrow morning,” I said to William, filling him in on the execution of our plan.

  “Does that mean we have the rest of the day off?” he asked with his devilish smile.

  “Pretty much,” I said. “I think we’ve got to lie low today and hide out.”

  “That sounds like a perfect plan to me,” he said. He moved closer and wrapped his strong arms around me. “In the meantime, you should just rest. We need to keep you safe.”

  I started to talk about all that needed to be done; Joel should set up another lab so that we could eventually get back to work. Without the daily routine of the lab, I felt like a fish out of water. But William was right. The stakes were too high for me right now, even if I was uncomfortable. Well, I thought as I looked into his eyes, I’m not totally uncomfortable . . .

  “Safe sounds good to me, if you are nearby,” I said. I crawled back into bed and waited for him, delirious with joy. When I finally let go of my need to be in the lab, spending the whole day in bed seemed like a dream come true. I could do this for a long time, I thought, or at least two or three weeks.

  And so, while we waited, that’s what we did, staying inside during the day and secreting out at night. We went skinny-dipping by the light of the moon at the beach. We spent a night out at the theater and took in The Lion King, although William joked that Beauty and the Beast would suit us better. We held each other close each night, and lulled ourselves to sleep sharing our secrets and hopes for the future. Pillow talk was my favorite.

  “My dear Scarlet, I can’t find the words to describe what I feel for you. And words are my job. Explaining how much I love you and why I love you would be like describing how water tastes; it’s impossible. I love seeing you happy and my biggest reward is seeing you smile,” he whispered in my ear.

  “Aww, go on,” I said, blushing to my bones.

  “One word from you changes my whole mood. I only chat with you for a second, and it makes my day. One text or one call would set me free.”

  “But we never text, silly, we just meet at the pub.”

  “I know, that’s why I am chained still. Unchain my heart!”

  “You mean, unchain your phone number! Give it up! Oh! I forgot to ask: are you even single?”

  “Yes, of course,” he said, surprised that I would even suggest otherwise.

  “Just checking,” I said, smiling. “So, no kids either?”

  “Scarlet, you have this incredible way of making my heart happy. My love for you will never end. My smile for you will never fade. I will love you always! I only want kids with you.”

  “You promise? Even when this whole mess is over, with the chicks and all?”

  “I will love you as I have never loved another or ever will again. I love you with all that I am and all that I will ever be. The hardest thing I could ever do is to forget about you. I looked forward to seeing you every week and became attached to you. What more can a man say to the woman who opened her heart to him, allowing him to feel the warmth of her love across the distance that separates them?”

  “You mean the distance of the length of the table that separated us in the pub each meeting!?” I asked, laughing. “I’m not trying to be sarcastic here, it’s just that you always make me laugh.” I lowered my eyes, listening to him quietly.

  “I try to put my feelings into words, but I fail miserably. The feeling of both being scared and at peace with holding you, of having butterflies and a sense of calm.”

  “You do fail miserably, but it’s so cute beyond words. I want to put you in a bun with some ketchup, mustard, and pickles and eat you up,” I said. I laid my hand on his cheeks softly.

  “I am serious, Scar, hear me out.”

  “Yes, of course, go on, I am writing this down. You will sign at the bottom.” I pretended to text on my iPhone. I didn’t know what to do with myself in the midst of his declaration.

  “My dear, I never thought I had the capacity to love anybody as much as I love you now. Yet my love continues to mature, growing beyond the realm of my heart. It seems that you have become the fiber of my soul, the very reason for my existence. I prayed so long to find someone like you.” He suddenly had such a serious expression on his face.

  “Yes, we never like to think of failure, but it’s manageable if you are loved, if you have a safety net.”

  “A love so passionate as yours, I could never dream to find and you brought peace to my aching, cold, empty heart,” he said, and held me close. “I love you unconditionally.”

  Tears began to run down my face.

  If I tried hard enough, it was almost like I could forget that we were in hiding, that if anyone knew where I was, I would be in danger. Instead, it felt like we were on vacation. It was heaven, somehow, even in the midst of the hell we were in.

  Todd called me every day to update me on a secure line that William had arranged. We also used a special code that William had developed and installed on my laptop, so that we were able to e-mail back and forth with some confidence that nothing was getting passed on to the wrong hands. Joel also communicated with us, telling us about the work that was progressing on a daily basis, even while I was hiding away. Todd, though he wasn’t naïve, was still flabbergasted by the dangerous developments. He said he’d learned a valuable lesson, and would never underestimate what money and corporate interests could do. I told him not to be so hard on himself, that there was no way we could have predicted this turn of events. I think I was trying to convince myself as much as I was trying to assuage his guilt.

  My friend, Bob, the property manager, had given me many sets of keys to apartments all over the city, and we kept relocating our safe house every so often. I was so much in love with William during those weeks we spent together, moving under the cover of night. It was also the first time I had felt so loved in return, even though, at times, he still felt distant and unknowable to me.

  One night, our little nest was in a building on the bad side of town; the apartment was worn down and the paint was peeling from the walls. The oven didn’t work and there was no balcony to overlook the beautiful city lights. But something about it reminded me of home—something about the simplicity of it. Since I hadn’t been home in a while, I became a little melancholy, and William could tell. He helpfully suggested that we try to find a local pub, perhaps one with some decent pie. That put a smile on my face. We went downstairs and walked through an alley, avoiding piles of garbage and trying to hide our faces from the light in the event that we were being followed. Suddenly, I heard a noise, and when I turned around, we saw two men running toward us. William grabbed my hand and we sprinted down the alley, eventua
lly turning into an old, vacant building.

  I gagged on the strong smell of urine that permeated the air. William, still holding onto my hand tightly, pulled me under an old bed, its rusty springs sagging onto the floor. I caught myself thinking about when I’d had my last tetanus shot. We hid underneath the bed as the sound of heavy boots entered the room, walking around and eventually being silenced by a much worse sound: a gunshot. I covered my mouth as we waited.

  When the danger seemed to have passed, we scurried out from under the bed and went through the building’s back door, which connected directly into a dance club. Hiding ourselves in the throng of bodies, we shouted into each other’s ears to be heard above the thumping bass line.

  “That was close,” William said, pulling me near. He shouted that he had gotten a glimpse of the men. One was younger, the one with the heavy boots. He had a tattoo of two hearts pierced by an arrow on his upper right arm. The other was older, about two hundred pounds, with shiny white shoes. He was the one holding the gun. When we were reasonably sure that we were safe and hadn’t been followed into the club, we slid off to a corner booth to gather ourselves. Part of me didn’t care if they shot me right there; I would die happy and in love.

  “This is getting bad,” William said, trying to crack a smile.

  “It’s not so bad,” I said, trying to keep the mood light although I was shaken up, too. “You’ll take care of me, and we can go anywhere in the world with Roseword’s help. Plus, Bob probably has some apartments in other countries too.”

  He held my hand and we sat in silence for a while.

  “May I have this dance?” I asked, and we did, the nightmare fading into a dream.

  The next morning we woke up, packed our bags and took a bus down south. We talked and talked, discussing our past and our future, trying to avoid the delicate subject of our present. We talked about kids. He wanted six, and right away. I smiled and marveled at the mess I’d gotten myself into.

  At the bus station, the men hawking vacation-apartment rentals were easy to find. We rented a room by the beachfront, on an upper floor, so we could look down below us and see the lay of the land. We felt a little safer, but we knew not to take that for granted; who knew what tomorrow would bring. They could easily be on our tail, whomever they were.