Something You Are (32 page)

I lifted my hands in the air in front of me, demonstrating.

The bottom of Mark’s glass made a gurgling sound as he sucked the last of his drink up his straw, cutting me off.

I raised my eyebrows.

‘Sorry,’ he said, pushing the glass away. ‘But you didn’t see these guys though? You didn’t see the men the kid saw?’

‘No. If I did. . .’ I swallowed. ‘If I’d been there they would have killed me too. I know that. But by now it’s been so long they probably don’t care enough to. . . to want to track me down or anything. Sometimes I think about it, you know, if I’m scaring myself at night. I wake up and I wonder if they’re still out there looking for me, or whether their job was just done and finished then, regardless of whether I was there or not. I just. . . I don’t get why they wouldn’t come back for me. Why would they let me go just because I was lucky and wasn’t there?’

‘They won’t still be looking,’ Mark stated with some confidence.

I worried he was about to make some sort of inane gesture of comfort or support, like touching my arm or something. But he didn’t. Of course he didn’t. He wasn’t an idiot.

‘How do you know they’re not still looking?’

‘Well, they would have to be pretty shit to have taken nearly three years to track you down.’ He pulled the glass back to him again and frowned down his straw at the remaining bubbles of his drink. ‘If I ever took three fucking years to carry out a hit I’d retire.’

‘And do what? Knit?’

‘I’ve never thought about it. I’m doing what I want to do and. . . we don’t tend to retire, we tend to die. But I’m all right with that.’ He nodded, and grinned. ‘I’m unsure sometimes, whether I’d avoid retiring just in case my job slipped into a hobby. . . and then who knows? No more rules then.’

‘Hasn’t it already become a hobby with you doing this for free?’

‘Maybe.’

Silence.

He added, ‘This isn’t a frivolous act, my wanting to work for you. I’m not doing this for fun. It’s just not very often life confronts you with a real mystery, a chance to solve a real mystery.’

I could hear someone playing
Angry Birds
behind us with the volume turned up to an antisocial level. I straightened my skirt, pulled it down a little and tried to ignore the noise.

‘So, you go upstairs. . .’ He waved a hand at me, drawing a circle on the page with the word ‘Details’
written within it. ‘You don’t have to describe it all to me. Just any extra personal information that forensics might not have picked up on, if it occurs to you. I can find the case file and photos and stuff, no problem.’

All I could hear was the fucking
Angry Birds
.

‘Someone called the police?’

I nodded.

‘And what happened then?’

‘I. . . What?’

‘What happened then?’

‘Wait.’ I turned, knuckles white around the back of my stool, and snapped, ‘Hey, can you
shut the fuck up
?’

The girl with braided hair stared at me, gormless. People around us fought to restart their conversations before anyone noticed them eavesdropping. The sound of the game ceased and the girl stood up and flounced out.

I am sitting on a mountaintop
, I thought, taking a deep breath.

‘Your father was never. . .’ Mark seemed pensive for a moment. ‘Apologies if this comes off as an insult, but your father was never involved with Yakuza, was he? He didn’t associate with anyone like that when you lived in Japan?’

I knew he didn’t mean it to be offensive, but the very sug­gestion sent a reactionary shot of anger and defensiveness up my spine. I almost said something scathing about Mark’s tattoos, implying sarcastically that he looked more like Yakuza than my dad ever had. But I stifled the comment.

‘No,’ I said, pursing my lips. ‘He might not have died with all his fingers but he had them all before that.’

‘It’s OK, I didn’t think so, but sometimes you have to ask the obvious questions.’ He shut his notepad. ‘What are you doing now, just working for Noel and Ron?’

‘Excuse me?’

‘What were you doing before?’

I felt embarrassed all of a sudden. ‘Nothing, really. Mum wanted to me to go to uni but Dad was happy for me to stay at home and try to. . . make it as an artist. So I was just doing that, just painting every day. I was thinking about art school a bit but. . . it’s all really expensive, higher education, you know.’

It sounded ridiculous, even to me. I couldn’t believe now that I’d ever been stupid enough to think anything would have come of my staying at home painting. But Mark didn’t seem to share my contempt; he at least humoured me by asking another question.

‘And you don’t do that any more?’

‘Well, I’m only good at two things and one of them was art. You’d have to be pretty damn stupid not to head down the other path if one of the only two things you’re good at is art.’

‘What’s the other thing?’

‘Sex.’ I smirked. ‘Sex and art.’

‘Then you’re right. Best to stick to the former in this climate.’

I thought of the Relatives’ Room, the comb-over and small black eyes, the way he kept saying my name. . .

I
’m truly sorry for your loss, Kiyomi.

‘Can you let me know the names of everyone you came across that day? Even if they were kids, it would still help to know. They might have seen something.’

‘Well, there was Jensen McNamara; he lived across from me. I could find his address for you but I’m sure he’s on Face­book. The kids I spoke to were the Williams kids. I can’t remember all their names but they lived a few floors below me, I think. And. . . there’s something else,’ I said, trusting my hunch. ‘It was kinda what made me call you actually. There was a man who came and talked to me just after. . . I don’t know who he was. We were alone, which was weird, and he asked me a lot of questions but I lied to all of them. But he knew I was lying.’

‘And he didn’t identify himself as a police officer?’

‘No. I would have asked but I was really out of it. I don’t know, he could have been anybody.’

‘Not if you were alone. A police officer wouldn’t sit alone with a female borderline minor and ask questions. Don’t take this the wrong way but you look about sixteen.’

‘I’m twenty-one. I was eighteen then.’ I began talking fast. ‘It wasn’t just me. I spoke to a. . . well, he wasn’t a friend, but I spoke to Jensen McNamara yesterday and he said the same man had come to question him too. He described him and said he had a black comb-over. It was the same man.
And
one of the Williams kids, the oldest one, was killed not long after in a drive-by shooting. He might have seen who did it and now all of a sudden he’s dead. Doesn’t that seem like too much of a coincidence?’

Mark scanned the café behind us, but no one appeared to be listening.

I made a mental note to lower my voice, having forgotten we were in a public place.

‘A drive-by could be coincidental,’ he said.

‘Well, you could check, right? They apparently caught the kid who did it and he’s in a young offenders’ place.’

It was starting to become dim and crisp outside. We didn’t have much longer here.

My heart was racing. I tried to slow it down, slow down my breathing.

‘I can check it out,’ Mark said, with a firm nod. ‘You’ve definitely given me, as the professionals say, a “solid line of inquiry”
.
’

The last rays of the sun falling on the red overhangs of the shops outside reminded me of Tokyo.

‘Noel said you’ve never failed at a job. Is that true?’

There was no trace of modesty in his expression. ‘Yes.’

‘Seriously, why are you doing this for free?’

‘Because I don’t do my job for the money. I never have.’ He observed the tattoos on the backs of his hands and his black-painted fingernails. ‘That’s why I’ve never failed.’

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