White Eyes

by Mark Z. Kammell

  Chapter 16.

  “Joshua’s not here” Nat talked to the door.

  “What?”

  “I said… there’s no Joshua here”

  A pause

  “No you didn’t.”

  “Yes I did.”

  “No you didn’t” came the voice from behind the door. “You said Joshua’s not here. Which means you know who Joshua is. Or” and the door flew open with an almighty crash to reveal the frame of a large man, or maybe woman, standing in it, wiping dust off his or her knuckles.

  It was a woman, Nat decided.

  She was wearing a khaki boiler suit, that burst against her ample frame – this wasn’t fat, this was muscle and bone, pushing against the seams, trying to break free. Her neck was huge – and it needed to be – to support her head, which looked like it could have knocked he door over by itself. Her dark hair was swept backwards and was somehow incongruous against the rest of her body. She smiled – grinned, rather – her face cracking open – and she looked almost friendly until she spoke in her gruff, androgynous voice. “Maybe you are Joshua Fucking Reeves.”

  “But…”

  She lifted her left hand, palm forward, and Nat stopped talking straight away. She reached into a pocket in her boiler suit and pulled out what appeared to be a photo, which she brought very close to her face, squinting at it.

  “A very great likeness. Don’t try to tell me you are not Joshua Reeves.” With a swift, surprisingly elegant movement of her hand, she flicked the photo so that it landed squarely at Nat’s feet. He glanced down at the picture of Joshua.

  “But…it looks nothing like me!”

  “Ha! Do not try to fool me!” and she took two steps over until she stood towering over him, the photo in between them. “A very great likeness.”

  “No, it’s not. Look, even our hair is completely different!”

  She snorted. “Hair can grow. Or it can be cut.” She ran her fingers through her own hair.

  “He’s twice my size!”

  “Easy to fool on a photograph.”

  He shook his head, he didn’t even understand this. “His face looks nothing like mine. I mean, look, his nose, completely different. Look, he’s got a big chin, mine’s small. I mean, look” he was starting to babble, “he’s tall, I’m short, he’s got big ears, mine are small, and look, mine stick out, his don’t, I mean… he looks like a fucking movie star, I look like a …” he looked pleadingly up into her eyes.

  “Do not put yourself down. You’re not that bad looking, Joshua. In different circumstances, we may have been doing different things right now, although I do not like your sniveling.”

  “However” and she put a huge hand on each of his shoulders, heavy and forceful, that he almost felt himself being pushed into the floor of the room, “however” she repeated in her husky voice, “unfortunately that is not why we are here. We are here for business, and not for pleasure.”

  She took the last step towards Nat, standing on the photo of Joshua. She was a full head taller than him and as she leant down their foreheads almost touched. Her voice dropped to just above a whisper. “Joshua Reeves” she said slowly, “you owe a significant sum of money to my employer, and I am here to ensure that you repay him.”

  “But… I’m not Joshua…” the woman slipped her arms under his and lifted him easily off the floor, “I mean, I know Joshua, yeah, but I don’t know where he is…” his voice was becoming increasingly frantic, as she lifted him to her height and smiled at him. She took a step forwards, or backwards for him. “I mean, ok, I saw him, earlier today, we had a drink, but then he…” he felt his back touch the cold glass of the window, “he disappeared! I don’t know where he went! Why do you think I’m Joshua? Check downstairs! Ask! I checked in in my own name!” Suddenly he found himself thrown up into the air and he had to quickly shield his hands over his head to prevent it crashing into the ceiling, as the woman, still ignoring him, seemed to work at lightning speed, sliding the window fully open before catching him as he came back down. With a feeling of horror, he found himself exiting the room via the window, the cool windy air hitting him and making him gasp, and without realizing exactly how, he was suddenly upside down, looking down over the concrete driveway and awning of the hotel many feet below, his ankles held in a steel grip.

  “Help!” he shouted, flailing his arms violently in the air, “Help!” he shouted again, in vain to the empty street in front of the hotel.

  “Hey!” came her voice from above, “be quiet! I can be less nice if I want to…”

  “Sorry”

  “Thank you.” He could feel the pressure on his ankles lift, if only by a tiny fraction.

  “Now” came the voice, “shall we get down to business?”

  “Erm…”

  Nat heard something, a noise, a shuffling, from behind him, until he realised it couldn’t be behind him, that was a cold brick wall. It was to his left, he thought at least, but looking round he couldn’t see anything except for the empty pavement and of course the sky. The noise came again, this time it was a bit more distinguishable, shuffling of feet and even something else, even voices. He squinted into the darkness and could make out some shapes, people, of course, on the pavement, coming this way. Two people, a man and a woman, or actually, more likely a boy and a girl, he was sure, holding hands, walking, talking, laughing, a bit loud. Nat tried to glance upwards to see what was going on, whether she was going to notice them, do something about them, whether she could see what he was doing, but all he could make out were the giant fingers wrapped around his legs. He looked back down and they were fast approaching, almost beneath him, and he was thinking quickly, how to draw their attention without letting her know. In a moment of inspiration, he pulled at the buckle of his watch, held it tight in his hand and, just as the couple was about to step close to him, he threw it, clearing the canopy of the hotel and landing at the pavement in front of them. He watched it land, watched it make a little bounce and rest, face up, in front of them. Its case caught the light from the hotel entrance and flashed back at him, and he took one last watch at the watch that was a present from his father, a final legacy of his past, a watch that, he had been told, had been given to his father by his own father. At least that’s what he’d been told, though he had suspected that, as with so many things, his father had put a few scratches on a cheap trinket and turned it into a makeshift heirloom, as a cheap way of fulfilling his commitments to his crashing disappointment of a son. Ha! He was right there, Dad, if you could only see me now! He thought as he watched the couple, in unison, stop, even step back slightly in surprise and look down.

  “Hey, look! A watch!” said the girl.

  “Cool.” The boy knelt down to pick it up.

  “Hey!” Nat tried a loud whisper

  “What was that?” asked a voice above him.

  “Did you hear something?” asked the boy, getting back up. “Hey, look at this watch. It’s quite old. Maybe it’s worth some cash.”

  “Hey!” Nat tried again, slightly louder.

  “Here, let me see.” The girl took the watch and rubbed at its face.

  “What, you think a genie’s going to come out of it?”

  “Hey!” Nat was getting desperate now.

  “What are you saying?” asked the voice above him. “It’s time for you to start providing me with information!”

  “Just trying to clean the face. Look, it’s all scratched. I think it’s worthless.” She started to put the watch in her pocket.

  “Hang on!” said the boy, loudly, sounding annoyed. “Let me see it. What do you know about watches anyway?”

  The girl pushed him away. “I’m telling you, it’s not worth anything. I’ll chuck it as soon as I get home.”

  “Come on, give it back, I found it!”

  “No you didn’t” the girl snapped, “it was me. You just picked it up. It’s mine.”

  “Hey!” the boy’s voice was getting angry now. “Don’t you
fucking dare! This is just like that other time, when I got you that ring and you…”

  “Yeah? You got me that ring and what? I told you, I lost that ring!”

  “Like hell you lost that ring!”

  “What are you saying?”

  “How you could suddenly afford to get that facial, and that massage, and all them fancy clothes, just suddenly after you lost that ring? I’m not fucking stupid, Linda!”

  “Ha!” she laughed.

  “Don’t you dare call me stupid!”

  “Yeah?” she spat at him. “Why not? You treat me like shit, you don’t show up for a date, you forget to call, and where are you, down the pub with your mates? And you think you can buy me a fancy ring and it’s all all right then don’t you. Stupid git” she added, muttering.

  “Jesus…Do you have any idea how much that ring cost?”

  “Yeah, course I do! I took it back to the shop, got the money for it and bought myself stuff, didn’t I? Christ knows why you would spend so much on a ring. And you say you’re not stupid. Where d ‘you get the money from anyway? You’ve never got any money”

  “I fucking borrowed it didn’t I! Wanted to do something nice for you didn’t I! Wanted to, you know, show that I was committed and stuff…” he trailed off.

  “Ha!” she started laughing. “It was an engagement ring, wasn’t it?” And when he didn’t answer she started again “Wasn’t it? You wanted to get engaged didn’t you! Jesus! And you didn’t even have the guts to ask!”

  “So what if I did” he muttered.

  “Oh my god. Oh my god. I mean…” the girl stopped, almost speechless. “I mean” she tried again. “I mean, Jesus, look at you. I mean, seriously, Tony, what have you got going for you.” She threw her hands up in the air. “Don’t even answer that…”

  “Hey!” shouted Nat, realizing that the time to try and subtly draw their attention to him was well and truly over.

  “What goes on down there?” boomed the voice above him.

  The conversation ended abruptly and they all looked up.

  “Hey, look!” shouted Linda.

  “Hey, it’s some dude hanging upside down from the window!” shouted Tony.

  “Don’t say dude! You’re not American!”

  “Oh, give it a break, Linda!”

  “Hey hey hey” shouted the woman, “stop this fighting!”

  “Hey, man, why you hanging upside down from the window? You sound like a girl, you know”

  “I need help!” shouted Nat

  The woman leaned her head out of the window so it became visible between Nat’s legs. “It is me, holding him up here!” she shouted.

  “What you doing that for? You’re going to give him a headache” Linda shouted.

  “The only headache anyone will acquire is through all this shouting and fighting!” she shouted back.

  “Yeah, well it’s not my fault!” shouted Linda, “it’s my loser of a boyfriend…”

  “Fiancé…” muttered Tony.

  She turned on him. “We’re not fucking engaged!”

  “Hey hey hey, whatever your name is” she turned on Tony. “Tony, I think, yes? The lady says you are not engaged. You need to respect her wishes.”

  “But I bought her an engagement ring!” he waved his arms in frustration.

  “Ah, but that is not enough” she shook her head. “The lady, she has to accept the engagement ring. And why would she do that if you continue to shout at her?”

  “Exactly” Linda folded her arms in triumph.

  “My boyfriend” the woman continued, and she waved her left arm in the air, letting go of Nat’s ankle. He swung violently round and crashed into the hotel wall. “Ouch! Jesus!”

  She continued to hold him with just one ankle, without any effort. “Be quiet!” She scolded. “My boyfriend proposed to me at one point.” She leaned further out of the window, exposing the massive bulk of her body.

  “Brave man” muttered Tony.

  “Excuse me?”

  “Nothing…”

  “He said…” Linda shouted up, “that your boyfriend was a brave man!”

  “Jesus, Linda, what you trying to do?”

  “You knew my boyfriend?” she asked.

  “What?”

  “Did you know my boyfriend?” the woman asked, slowly. Her heavily accented English added an extra level of tension to the question.

  “What? No, of course not” Tony said in despair.

  “Then why do you say that he was brave?”

  “He’s just being a fucking chauvinist”

  “Linda, for God’s sake…”

  “Yeah, well, it’s true!” she shouted, turning on him. “You think that you can just do what you want and then buy me with some cheap trinket… You…”

  “It wasn’t cheap!”

  Linda ignored him. “You see this lady up here… excuse me, I don’t know your name?”

  “Dark Angel” she called down. “My pleasure to meet you…”

  “Hello Dark Angel.” She turned back to Tony. “You see this lady, erm, Dark Angel, here, and because she’s big and strong you probably automatically assume she’s a lesbian…”

  “What?” cried Tony.

  “Hey! I am not a lesbian!” Dark Angel shouted down.

  “What sort of name is Dark Angel anyway?” asked Tony.

  “You don’t like my name?”

  “I didn’t say I didn’t like it, just that it’s a bit… unusual?” he didn’t quite sound sure of himself.

  “Of course he doesn’t like it. He’s afraid of anything a bit different! It doesn’t fit neatly into his world view of some nice, pretty little housewife stuck at home, doing the washing whilst he’s out drinking with his mates…”

  “Since when did you become such a feminist?”

  She turned on Tony. “I’ve always been a feminist!”

  “No you haven’t!”

  “Erm, I don’t wish to intrude, but maybe you are both not ready to be married to each other” Dark Angel shouted down. “You do not seem to know each other all that well”

  Linda looked up at her. “You’re quite insightful, you know. Are you some sort of marriage guidance counsellor?”

  “Ha ha no! I am an enforcer.”

  “I told you she was scary” Tony muttered.

  “Cool!” Linda replied. “What sort of things do you do?”

  “Well… I get involved when my boss wants things to happen, and they are not happening exactly in the way that he wants. For instance, this man,” she shook Nat’s ankle and he wobbled dangerously against the wall, “he will not pay what he owes to my boss, and so I am here to ensure that he does pay.”

  “You’ve got the wrong man! Seriously, I don’t owe anyone anything!”

  “Don’t you? Wow, that’s cool!” said Tony. “I wish I didn’t. I’m up to my neck in debt”

  “Loser” said Linda

  “Hey, listen, please” Nat directed his attention to Tony. “Go and get some help!”

  Tony put his arms up in the air. “Hey, look, man, don’t drag me into this. If you owe cash you can’t pay, you gotta face up to the consequences!”

  “I wish you bloody would” said Linda.

  “But I told you! She’s got the wrong man!” shouted Nat.

  “You look pretty guilty to me” said Linda.

  “Thank you, Linda” said Dark Angel.

  “What! No I don’t!” Nat shouted.

  “You need to pay the money back” said Dark Angel. “My boss wants you to know that he is very serious. He expects you to pay it back, as agreed. He wants me to remind you that you agreed to pay him by the evening of the fourteenth, which was yesterday evening. He wants me to inform you that is very disappointed that he has not yet received payment. He wants to be clear that the protection that you received until recently is at an end.”

  “I don’t even know who your boss is!”

  “He does, you know. I can tell he’s lying. His fa
ce has gone all red” said Linda.

  “That’s because I’m hanging upside down!”

  “Typical man. Just another excuse.”

  “Do you understand what I’m saying to you?” Dark Angel’s voice was firm.

  Nat looked despairingly at Tony, who nodded sagely to him. “I’d say yes to that if I were you, mate.”

  “But I don’t have any money!”

  “Mmmm, yeah.” Tony scratched his chin. “I’d keep that to yourself if I was you.”

  “Keep what to yourself?” Linda asked sharply, looking up. She’d been distracted by something she’d seen on the ground. “Hey, Tony” she said cautiously and pointed. “Is that what I think it is?”

  “What?” He followed her gaze and looked down. “Jesus.” He knelt down and leaned closer in. “Christ, Linda, it looks like a… Fuck, where the hell did that come from.”

  Nat felt a sudden chill go through him and he reached into his pocket, both pockets, empty, oh no, he felt again, pulled the insides out, felt around, but clearly there was nothing there. Oh my God, he thought, oh no, it’s fallen.

  Both Tony and Linda were staring at him. He swallowed. “This is yours, isn’t it” Linda said, her mouth dry, as she pointed at the finger lying on the pavement.

  Nat didn’t say anything and they looked at each other. “C’mon Tony, we better go” said Linda.

  “What’s happening with you?” Dark Angel asked.

  Tony and Linda together turned and started walking away, quickly. “Hey!” shouted Dark Angel “where are you going? We were just getting to know one another! Could I have your phone number?” but they were already fading into the night.

  Nat felt a chill rise in the air, felt the world go silent except for a muffled sound above. He could just make out the finger that must have slipped from his pocket as he looked down. What the hell was he going to do now?

  Not a question that he needed to answer as he suddenly found himself yanked upwards and thrown with a superhuman force back into the bedroom, landing in a crumpled heap on the unmade bed. He cried out in surprise but mainly pain as he felt something sharp and jagged digging in to his left calf. He reached down to feel something pressing in there, he could feel the warmth of blood as it seeped out around the wound. “Jesus” he cried, as he realised that it was the stem of a champagne glass that had embedded itself into his calf, and he cried out again in pain as he yanked it out and put his hand over the wound to try and stop the blood, to little avail.

  Dark Angel stood watching him, a wry, amused smile on her face as he struggled, as he grabbed a piece of the bedsheet and wrapped it around his leg and as he tried unsuccessfully to tear it off and tie it in place.

  “Maybe I can help you” she suggested, and before he could answer, she reached forward and with a single, swift movement, the bedsheet was ripped clean in two, the remaining sheet tightened in place around his leg, the flow of the blood stopped, for now at least.

  She pulled away and pulled herself upright and crossed her huge arms. “You looked very funny.”

  “What?” Nat asked, scowling, still in pain.

  “You… you were very funny. There was a glass of champagne stuck in your leg. You looked maybe like you had an alcohol problem.”

  “Why would I do that? I don’t even drink that much.”

  “You are too tense. You should see the funny side.”

  “How on earth am I supposed to see the funny side? You almost kill me, then…”

  “I did not kill you. I did not come anywhere near to killing you.”

  But Nat ignored her, “why did I listen to Joshua…”

  “Ha! You are clever. You try and trick me that you are not Joshua. Why do you make it so hard on yourself? Just give me the fucking money and I will be leaving.” The way she swore, in her strange accent, made the word stand out, seem incongruous, as if it were just a common adjective, and Nat picked up on it, with a strength he didn’t feel, with a level of courage he didn’t have, he pulled himself up off the bed and stood face to face with Dark Angel, looking way up into her hard, amused face, and spoke very slowly. “My… name…. is… not… Joshua…. Reeves. My… name….is… Nathan… Jones…. And… I… do… not… have… your … fucking…. Money.”

  She looked at him for the longest moment; he could feel the thoughts race through his head, shit, she’s going to head-butt me, shit, my brains will be all over the floor, I’ll be picking them up with a magnifying glass. She put her huge hands onto his shoulders and squeezed; somehow, he realised it was meant to be gentle and supportive but her strength made his bones feel like they would dissolve, like they were being squeezed into mush. But something had happened, something had softened in her eyes and Nat knew that today, at least, he would avoid having the life squeezed out of him.

  Dark Angel stepped back and allowed her huge frame to sink into the leather sofa, the same one, Nat thought, that Terri had, he thought at least, sat in, just a few minutes before. Or maybe a few hours, it was becoming increasingly hard to tell. For his own part, Nat slumped down to his knees, fell back on the floor and lay against the side of the huge, disheveled bed and stared at Dark Angel, her face glowing brightly in the orange light of the room.

  “You are not Joshua Reeves. You do not lie to me.”

  “Oh thank Christ” he breathed.

  “But” and she put a huge hand up, “you do know Joshua. My boss is very keen to talk to him, and to extract from him what he is owed. It will not be pleasant for Joshua if he continues to avoid our contact.” Her voice had no trace of malice or threat.

  “I..” Nat found he was breathing heavily, “Yeah, I do know him, yeah, but I’ve got no idea where he is, believe me. I haven’t seen him for…”

  “Ah ah” she interrupted him and wagged her finger at him, “you should not lie to me. You were seen together, earlier this evening, drinking together in a bar called…” she scratched her head and her rough hair parted to reveal scars cut across her skull - all deep, all violent. Nat flinched involuntarily, but she didn’t seem to notice.

  “in a bar called…” she continued, then sighed, “ah, my memory, it isn’t always so good. But…” and she paused, “you were seen together, earlier tonight, and you left the bar together. So I am imagining that you want to protect your friend, because he is a friend of yours. But I need to tell you” and she leaned forward, “I do need to tell you that protecting him is not good. It is not good for you, and it is not good for him. Joshua Reeves, he is not known in this town. None of us, we really don’t know this town. It is, what do you say, a shit hole. Don’t you agree?”

  “Well I live here…”

  She nodded, sagely. “Yes, it is unfortunate, I agree. However, people must live in a shit hole, otherwise, of course, it is no longer somewhere that people live, and it therefore ceases to be a shit hole.”

  Nat shook his head, having somehow lost the argument somewhere. “But…” he started, because he didn’t know what else to say.

  “Joshua, he is not from this town. He came to this town to run away” she explained patiently.

  “Run away from you…”

  “Exactly.” Dark Angel gave him a big smile with her cracked, broken teeth. “There are quite a few of us, we want to talk to him. I am not from here…”

  “No?”

  “Ah, you are making fun of my accent. No, I am from another country, however I was asked to come here in order to help to find him. I have specialist skills, you see.”

  “But it does not help that I have not met him, and therefore I do not know what he looks like. My eyesight, it has suffered a few years ago, and I sometimes see things that are not quite there.”

  Nat laid his head back on the bed. “And you mistook me for him.”

  “Yes, that is exactly right. And it would be in your best interest to tell me where he is.”

  “My best interest?”

  “Yes, exactly. Your best interest.” She didn’t seem to pick up on th
e sarcasm in his voice this time. “You see, I found you, very easily, and that means that others will, too.”

  “But what would they want from me? I haven’t done anything.”

  “No, it may be so that you haven’t done anything, but you are a friend of Joshua. And then, of course, is the key question.”

  Nat scratched his head. “You mean about Terri?”

  “Excuse me?” It was Dark Angel’s turn to look confused.

  “Erm, nothing”

  “Who is Terri?”

  “Sorry, nothing, it was just a mistake. Sorry.” He felt flustered, and she looked at him quizzically for a second.

  “Perhaps we will come back to this Terri. What I was meaning, the key question. I mean, Joshua Reeves came to this town to escape, yes. But why did he choose this town?”

  Nat crunched his hands together nervously. “I thought you said, because it’s a shit hole?”

  “Ah.” She raised her finger. “Yes, it is a good place to escape. No, but there are many shit holes in your country. Why did he choose this particular shit hole?”

  “Erm…”

  “Because” she smiled, “of course, because of you.”

  “Me?”

  “What is it that connects you to him?” She let the question hang in the air.

  “Well, erm, nothing…”

  “Ah. That is not true, is it. You are Nathan Jones, am I correct?”

  He swallowed. “I thought you thought I was Joshua.”

  She chuckled. “Yes, I did, you are correct. However, now that we have established that you are not, then of course you must be his friend, Nathan.”

  Nat didn’t reply. This wasn’t really good news.

  “His only friend in this town. And therefore, I would assume that he trusts you, or, more probably, that he needs you. Where we, therefore, find you, we may also find him.”

  Now Nat was feeling quite worried. “So, other people may be looking for me?”

  She opened her eyes and smiled broadly again, leaned forward and gave him a friendly smack on the leg. “Exactly!” she cried. His leg felt like it was going to explode. “You understand perfectly! And I am a pussycat compared to…”

  She lowered her voice. “There is one man, I do not know him. But I have heard of him. He has a reputation that is spread over many countries. Many, many people, they know of this man. He is not a man that one wants to have business with. But I understand that Joshua Reeves had some business with him. I cannot imagine how it is that this man has heard of Joshua Reeves, or how it could be that Joshua Reeves became directly involved with this man, but I am told that this is true. It is very unfortunate. And I understand that this man wants very much to talk to Joshua Reeves.” She leaned forward and almost whispered in his ear. “Are you following me?”

  Nat nodded his assent. There was something strange about her eyes. The sharp lines of her body, her face, accentuated the power and command that she so clearly held. Her bulk, that she held easily and powerfully, only served to reinforce her control. But her eyes didn’t quite tally. There was a clarity, a softness in her eyes that spoke of something different, that drew him in and made him forget his fear of her and trust what she was saying.

  “Who is this man?” he asked.

  “Best that you do not know him. Best that you know nothing about him. I only serve to remind you that it would be dangerous for you to protect Joshua. Dangerous for you. He has done many bad things, let him be accountable for them. Do not allow your friendship to guide you away from this. Joshua Reeves is not your friend.”

  “But…” started Nat. “But… he was trying to help me.”

  She smiled. “Like many people, he preys on the weak. Now. You must tell me where he is.”

  Nat shrugged. “I don’t know.”

  Her eyes sparkled as she studied him. “I think I believe you, Nathan Jones. But I would like to understand, where and when did you last see Joshua Reeves?”

  “Well, it’s like you said earlier, we were in the bar together, and then we were coming back to the hotel, and then, well, he suddenly disappeared…”

  “I see. And why was it that you were together in the bar?”

  Nat sighed. “It’s been a long day. It’s a long story.”

  She opened her hands expansively. “We have all night.”