Here's chapter 3 of this year's magnificent nanowrimo. In today's installment, Paige meets her mysterious future employer, Wellesley is mean again and strangely childish, and Paige has a conversation with a drunk guy.
Chapter 3
I’m the goddamn Batman.
-Batman, All-Star Batman and Robin The Boy Wonder, Issue #2
I was inside a completely white room. This must have been what it was like to be in a mental asylum. I couldn’t even see where the walls met the ground, making for a very disorienting feeling. A white envelope was lying on the ground and I didn’t even notice it at first until I saw the writing on the front, the black of the calligraphy contrasting sharply with the white of the floor. I picked up the envelope and ripped it open, letting it fall to the floor. There was another card with the words Escape from this room on it. Nothing else. Just escape. How I was supposed to do that without doors or windows, I wasn’t really sure.
Someone, I assumed Ella, started pounding on the door. Of course! Why not just go back? But then how would I move forward? The question sounded existential, but it was irritatingly felicitous for my situation.
I turned back to the door through which I had just emerged and turned the handle. Locked. What the hell? I took the key from my pocket where I had stashed it, and turned it in the lock. Nothing. How was it possible that the door locked from both the outside and the inside? What kind of locksmith voodoo was this?
I gave up and put the key back in my pocket. I wasn’t sure why - I probably wouldn’t need it in an emergency. But who knows? In video games, things you pick up are always useful later. Ella paused in her assault of the door but soon attacked with renewed force.
“Hey!” I barked. “I can’t open the door! So shut up so I can think!” It didn’t help. I tried to ignore the thumps and concentrate on the task at hand. If these annoying little “challenges” were anything to go by, this job consisted solely of finding doors where you thought there were none. Just like in the laser tag challenge, I walked the perimeter of the room, feeling the walls for cracks or buttons, but there was nothing. My eyes started to hurt from the constant whiteness of it all, and I wished I had snow goggles.
Then came the floor. I crawled around the room on hands and knees, feeling for some sort of invisible manhole or something. Nothing. This was proving more difficult than I thought. I stood in front of the wall and kicked it.
“Dammit!” I exclaimed, hopping backward on one foot. I was so stupid. What was I supposed to do, punch a hole through the wall? There had to be a way out of the room, but I had no idea how to go about finding it. There weren’t any doors as far as I could tell. What exactly was I missing?
It didn’t take long for me to give up. I sprawled myself out in the middle of the floor like a starfish.
“Jeremiah was a bullfrog…” I started. “Was a good friend of mine…”
I paused.
“I never understood a single word he said, but I helped him to drink his wine. And he always had some mighty fine wine.” I stood up and simultaneously got louder.
“JOY! TO THE WORLD! ALL THE BOYS AND GIRLS! JOY TO THE FISHES IN THE DEEP BLUE SEA! AND JOY! TO YOU AND ME!”
I paused. There was nothing. I’m not quite sure what I was expecting.
“IF I WERE THE KING OF THE WORLD. I’D TELL YOU WHAT I’D DO! I’D THROW AWAY THE BARS AND THE CARS AND THE WARS AND MAKE SWEET LOVE TO YOU!”
I didn’t know what else to do. So I kept singing, hoping that maybe someone was listening and they would be so annoyed that they would let me out just to make the singing stop. I hoped that person would be Wellesley.
“SINGING JOY! TO THE WORLD! ALL THE BOYS AND GIRLS! JOY TO THE FISHES IN THE DEEP BLUE SEA, AND JOY TO YOU AND ME.”
“Be quiet!” a voice, unmistakably Wellesley’s, yelled. I jumped, as if it was the voice of Jigsaw emanating from the ceiling.
“I HAVE A VERY LARGE SONG REPERTOIRE!” I yelled, looking around to see if I could find out where the voice was coming from. “HOW DO YOU FEEL ABOUT SHOW TUNES?”
A door slid up in the side of the wall and Wellesley stepped through it, entirely unamused.
“Hey, buddy!” I said. “What’s up?”
“You are the most irritating human being I’ve ever come across,” Wellesley said.
“And yet, I’m the only one to make it through, aren’t I?” I grinned. “Doesn’t that just make you want to throw things?”
“Follow me,” he said, gesturing unenthusiastically into the next room. I started walking across the room.
“So, uh, do you guys have some kind of pathological aversion to normal doors with hinges?” I asked. He didn’t answer. “’Cause, uh, I notice that there are all these slidey doors and stuff. None of them really have any doorknobs. Except for that one back there, and that door locks from both sides. How in the world did you manage that, by the way? I mean, doors don’t work that way-”
“Has anyone ever forcibly told you to be quiet?” Wellesley asked. “Because I’m very close to doing so.”
“Aw, but you can’t bring yourself to, can you, Wellesley?” I said. “That’s so sweet.”
“Wait here until she wants you,” he said, exiting back through the white room. I was in a lush carpeted room with two arm chairs against the wall. What the hell was this place?
I sat down in one of the armchairs and slouched down comfortably. I jumped up as a door to the adjoining room opened and someone said, “Come in.” Pulse picking up, I stepped into an office of some sort. The carpet was a deep red, and the walls had wood panelling - mahogany, I believed. There were tasteful paintings on the wall and I dark red wooden desk dominated the space. Sitting behind it was a woman. She had long, impeccably straightened hair and long bangs pulled back, forming a perfect bump of hair that not even a Bump-it could hope to achieve. Her fingers were long and thin and ended in perfectly shaped nails. She had bright blue eyes and a button nose. She looked, dare I say it, cute, but she had an outward coldness that suggested she could break all my fingers and not feel any remorse. She was like a perfectly formed ice sculpture. I went ahead and sat in the chair opposite her. Her eyebrows raised at the impropriety - I assumed she was the kind of girl who wanted people to wait for her permission, but I wasn’t the type to wait until someone told me what to do.
“Is someone finally going to tell me what’s going on here?” I asked.
“Miss Parker,” she said. Her voice was cool and slightly husky. “Tell me how you got to this point?”
“Well, I was born to a university professor and a non-fiction author…” I started.
“I don’t want your life story,” she snapped. “How did you pass the challenges?”
“I’m assuming you were watching, like some kind of creepy voyeur,” I said. Her eyes narrowed but she didn’t lose her composure. I had the feeling that she hadn’t let her emotions run unchecked in a very long time, possibly forever.
“I want to hear it from you,” she said. She leaned forward and clasped her hands on the table. I sighed.
“So for the redonk laser tag challenge, I took off my vest so that I couldn’t get shot, and if my vest happened to get shot ten times, they wouldn’t be able to find me.”
“Why did you do that?” she asked.
“Because I knew I would never win otherwise,” I said.
“Without cheating,” she said.
“Yeah,” I said. “Anyway. For the weird water challenge, I swam across the pool.”
“But the note said not to touch the water,” she said. “Why did you swim it?”
“Because there was this insane gymnastics champion chick there! I knew she would beat me unless I swam across the pool. I would never have caught up to her if I had to follow her on the ropes.”
“And you didn’t stop to think that that could get you disqualified?” she asked.
“Look, you said complete the challenges to get to the end. I did that. If you didn’t like it, well, I didn’t have to take the job. It didn’t matter to me either way.”
“So you’re willing to cheat,” she said bluntly.
“If there’s no other way,” I said.
“Interesting,” she said, leaning back in her chair. “And what about the third challenge?”
“What, you mean that white room was a challenge?” I asked.
“You had to escape,” she said. “That’s what the card said.”
“I didn’t escape though,” I said. “Wellesley let me out.”
“So you escaped.”
“I guess, technically…”
“How did you do it?”
“Well, I tried to find any hidden doors or windows but I couldn’t find any,” I said. “So I gave up and started being as annoying as possible.”
“Have you ever committed a crime, Miss Parker?”
“Crimes against fashion,” I said. “I wore these Uggs once…” I shuddered. “Terrible.”
“Have you ever broken in anywhere? Shoplifted? Vandalism?”
“Sure, hasn’t everyone done vandalism at one time or another? I threw rocks at street lights. Every twelve year old has,” I said.
“Would you be averse to committing a crime?” she asked. I frowned.
“Okay, what exactly is going on here?” I asked, getting progressively more and more frustrated. “This is for a job as an assistant, right? What’s with all the crazy challenges and the weird questions? Would it kill you to just be straightforward?”
Her questions suddenly went in abeyance as she eyed me analytically.
“Do you know who I am?” she asked.
“Should I?” I asked. “I mean, you seem to be some kind of childlike sociopath, what with the laser tag and the challenges and everything.” She smiled, but her eyes remained cold and hard.
“My name is Claire Queen,” she said.
“Oh right, right!” I said. “Claire Queen. Queen Corporation.”
“So you know who I am?” she asked.
“Everyone does,” I said. Claire Queen was consistently on lists of the top whatever richest women in business. I wasn’t quite sure what her company did, but she was one of the richest women - richest people - in Arrington. Curiouser and curiouser. “So if you’re Claire Queen, one of the most powerful women in Arrington, what are you doing here with this whole big contest thing?”
“Have you heard of Siege Spinner?” she asked.
“Yeah, she’s that masked thief or whatever,” I said. I wasn’t sure if I was just being slow but I had no idea what all these disparate elements had in common - the job offer, Queen Corporation, Siege Spinner…I just couldn’t seem to make it make sense in my head, no matter how hard I tried.
“What if I was to tell you that I - the head of Queen Corporation - was actually Siege Spinner?” she said.
“Um…I would wonder why in the world you were robbing banks when Queen Corporation has made you a millionaire,” I said.
“Have you ever experienced the rush of being in danger?” she asked.
“Once,” I said. “My sister burped in my face. I thought I was going to die.”
“You can’t understand the rush of it until it happens to you,” she said, ignoring my response. “Crime…satisfies me.”
“And since you’re rich, you can escape from any potentially sticky situations,” I said. “Of course. That makes sense.”
“So you’re not scared,” she said.
“Of what, you?” I asked. “Is there a reason I should be? You steal things. I have nothing you want. Plus, I’ve been in your mansion for a few hours now, and you haven’t done anything to me yet.”
“You know, you’re rough around the edges,” she said. “You have your own mind. And you’re brave.”
“Stop it, I’m blushing,” I said sarcastically.
“I’m not sure if those traits will turn out to be an asset or a downside,” she said. “But I’m going to offer you the job anyway.”
“But what exactly is it?” I asked. “Something to do with Queen Corporation? And why exactly did you tell me that you’re Siege Spinner?”
“You’re so slow,” she said. “We’ll have to fix that. I want to offer you the job of villain support. To me.”
“Villain support?” I said slowly. “You mean…a sidekick? Like Robin?”
“I despise the word sidekick,” she said. “Villain support.”
“You want me to turn to a life of crime,” I said. “Exactly how much are you paying me to leave ethics behind?”
“Look, if you’re so worried about your morals, you don’t have to accept the job. You can walk out of here. Of course, you know who I am so…”
“So you’re going to kill me if I refuse?” I said. “You know, I think I can go to the Labour Standards with this…”
“I’m not going to kill you, you idiot,” she snapped, dropping her perfect poise. “I’m just going to…wipe your mind a little.”
“Wipe my mind a little?” I exclaimed. “Is that like being a little pregnant?”
“Don’t be a child,” she said. “Just your memory of the last few hours.”
“That’s a little invasive, don’t you think?” I said. “And where in the world did you get memory wiping technology? The men in black?”
“I have money,” Claire said. “Lots of it.”
“I won’t tell anyone who you are,” I said. “Pinkie swear.”
“Ah, but I can’t be too sure of that,” Claire said. “A woman in my position can’t be too careful. You understand.”
“What happens if I leave right now, dodge Wellesley, and get to the outside world? I can take you down in a second.”
“Really?” she said, raising an eyebrow. “I’m richer than half of Arrington put together. Do you know what I could do to you with that amount of money?”
“Lock me in a room with it and force me to swim through it, Scrooge McDuck-style?”
“If you somehow manage to escape from here, you’ll never be able to do anything to me. I can take anything you decide to throw at me.” I paused.
“Why would you go through all this effort, risk detection by wiping a bunch of memories - because I’m assuming everyone who went home forgot they came here - just to get a side- villain support?”
“I can do anything I want,” she said. “And you’re rapidly running out of time. What’s your answer?”
“Wait, wait, wait,” I said. “I have a few questions.”
“Fine,” she said. “What are they?”
“How much am I getting paid. Is it salary or like, commission, or…?”
“You’ll get a cut of what we get,” she said. “It will start fairly small…”
“You said ‘high wages’!” I protested.
“…But it will increase once I see how helpful you are to me,” she said.
“How dangerous is this? Like, will I die?”
“You’ll be robbing banks and prominent people,” Claire said. “They have guards, dogs, and alarms. What do you think?”
“So I can get killed,” I said.
“There’s always a risk,” Claire said. “Are you going to let that stop you?”
For the first time, I was actually interested - dare I say it, almost enthusiastic - about something. The element of danger definitely appealed to me. Growing up, I had the most boring life imaginable. Nuclear family, no deaths, not even any normal school drama. Maybe my apathy towards life was a by-product of never having anything to care about. And now things were starting to get more exciting, and I found it difficult not to get caught up in everything. Objectively, I knew that I could die. Objectively, I knew it was a stupid idea - if I went to jail, my mom would kill me. But I couldn’t deny that the glamour, the danger, the excitement of a criminal lifestyle was very attractive. Plus…money. And I didn’t want my memory wiped, of course.
“Okay, yeah, whatever,” I said. “I’ll do it.” She smiled slowly, languorously, like a cat. Would I regret this later? Tough to tell.
“Great,” she said. “I’ll send Wellesley and some others to pick up your stuff and you can move into the mansion.”
“Hey, whoa now,” I said. “That’s not happening.” Claire’s expression hardened.
“What exactly are you saying?” she asked.
“Look, Claire, or Siege Spinner, or whatever. I have a life. I have school. I have a place to live. I’m not putting everything on hold for you.”
“That wasn’t part of the deal!”
“What are you talking about?” I almost screamed in frustration. “There was no deal! You gave us no information about this was! In fact, you lied about it. Assistant my ass! And you’re getting mad at me for not being able to read your mind and somehow divine all these conditions?”
“You’re in school?” she said quietly.
“Is that going to be a problem?” I asked.
“You didn’t tell us this,” she said, her voice even.
“You didn’t ask,” I said. “Is this going to be a problem?”
“What are your days like?” she asked.
“I’m out be three every day,” I said.
“I’m assuming you don’t have much of a social life-”
“Hey!”
“-so this shouldn’t be too much of a problem.”
“Uh…thanks?”
She stood up and came around the desk so that she was standing beside me. “Stand up,” she said.
“Huh?”
“It’s two words,” she said. “You really need me to define them?”
“Ha, ha,” I said sarcastically. “Why should I stand up?”
“Just do it,” she said.
“Like Nike,” I said, sighing. I got up and she looked me up and down. “Um…I feel a little uncomfortable…” She snapped her fingers, and an older lady holding a tape measure walked in and started measuring different parts of my body.
“Um…what is this for?” I asked.
“You need to have a costume, of course,” she said.
“Of course,” I said. The lady finished and silently left.
“I’m going to need you back here tomorrow at around midnight,” Claire said. “That’s all.”
“How do you know you can trust me?” I asked.
“Are you saying I shouldn’t?” she asked.
“I’m saying if you want to keep something a secret, maybe you should be more careful.”
“I’ve managed this long,” Claire said. “I know what I’m doing.”
“I don’t know how to get to your place,” I said, changing the subject. “If you’ll recall, I rode here in a limo with tinted windows.”
“Then you’ll get here the same way,” Claire said. “Someone will be waiting outside your home with a limo. You’ll be here at noon. Don’t make the driver wait.” Claire snapped her fingers again and Wellesley appeared. What, did everyone in the place have superhuman hearing? Were they just standing around waiting for Claire to snap her fingers? And did they have some kind of telepathic powers to enable them to figure out which one she was calling with a snap of her fingers? Or did they orchestrate the whole thing just to intimidate me? I couldn’t even begin to guess at Claire’s motives.
Wellesley gestured with quick, brusque movements to me to follow him. I followed him back out into the waiting room. He stood in one spot and I went beside him.
“Wellesley, old buddy?” I said. “Can I get out of here?” Wellesley didn’t answer and the floor shuddered and started slowly descending. Well, not the whole floor. A little square about six feet by six feet started moving downwards, like a little dumbwaiter.
“So…how long have you worked for Claire?” I asked, attempting to break the awkward silence. Wellesley didn’t say anything.
“Hey,” I said. “Baptistin. What’s up with the silent treatment?”
“I would much prefer it if you refrained from speaking at all,” Wellesley said, looking down his nose at me.
“Listen, buddy, I’m not appreciating the attitude,” I said. “I haven’t done anything to you, and yet you immediately decide that you hate me. Well I’m going to be around for awhile, so you better deal with that.” Wellesley suddenly leaned down so that his face was inches from mine.
“Just because Claire chose you doesn’t mean that you and I have to be friends,” Wellesley said. “I’ve been in her employ for a lot longer than you have. If it comes down to the two of us, you’ll be out of there.”
“Lurch, it’s not a competition,” I said. “You’ve got a little crush on Claire, whatever. It’s not like I’m going to come in between you guys.”
“I do not have a crush on Claire,” Wellesley said. “I just think you’re a little snot.”
“Ooh, my innocence,” I said sarcastically. “You better find a way to deal with me, Wellesley. I’m not leaving.”
“There’s the door,” he said, gesturing. The dumbwaiter had stopped in the downstairs waiting room while Wellesley and I were arguing.
“Well, obviously, I’m leaving now,” I said as I realized that I was, in fact, leaving. ‘But I’m not leaving this job!” I headed for the door. “See you tomorrow, Wellesley!”
When I got back to my room, I heard voices inside. Not a good sign. I opened the door and was assaulted by noise. Cat had evidently decided to invite a bunch of people to our place for a party. Just lovely. I dropped my bag in my room and ventured out to the living room. If I wasn’t going to get any sleep, I may as well join the party, even though that was completely not what I wanted to do. All I wanted to do was go to bed and process everything. My roommates were making that impossible.
Indeterminate club music blared from someone’s iPod, which was hooked up to some speakers. Everyone in the apartment was crowded around a beer pong table, cheering and laughing. No one seemed to notice my return, which was fine.
I found vodka in the kitchen and mixed myself a drink. I thought that after the day I had, I needed one. I wandered into the living room and stood against the wall. Why was I here? I hated parties. They bored me. Why wasn’t I in my room with my earplugs in?
“Having fun?” someone yelled in my ear over the music. I jumped, spilling a little bit of my drink on my shirt. Great. I looked over at the intruder of my personal space. He was tallish with short blonde hair and bright blue eyes. He had a round baby face and soft features. He was wearing a sky blue t-shirt and faded jeans and was holding a beer.
“Tons,” I said laconically, hoping if I didn’t talk much he would go away.
“I can tell,” he said, after a pause. He grinned impishly. “I’m Owen.”
“Uh huh,” I said. I took another drink. Damn. I mixed the vodka too strong.
“Usually you’re supposed to reply with your name,” Owen said. The ping pong ball escaped from the semi-drunk people surrounding the table and hit the wall between my head and Owen’s head.
“Is that so,” I said. “How about you guess.”
“Make me work for it,” he said. “Okay, I’m okay with that. Hortense? No? Henrietta? Um…Douglas?”
“Douglas?” I said. “Really?”
“There are some crazy unisex names these days,” he said. “Anne Rice’s real name is Howard.”
“Paige,” I said.
“What’s that?” he asked.
“My name,” I said. “It’s Paige.”
“I’ll just call you Hortense,” he said.
“You can call me Paige or I’ll break your finger,” I said sweetly.
“Not into the flirting so much, okay,” he said. “That’s fine. How’s your night going so far?”
“Terrible,” I said. “I just got this crazy new job and then I come home to find strangers in my apartment. I’m never going to get to sleep tonight.”
“You can come sleep in my room tonight…I’m sorry, that was very…whoa,” he said, without taking a breath between the two thoughts. I wasn’t sure if this Owen person was this verbose all the time, or if he was just nervous at being in a social situation. I wasn’t quite sure how to reply to him. “What kind of job?”
“Holy non sequitur, Batman,” I said. “It’s a…” How should I put this? “Job as an assistant.”
“That’s exciting, very exciting,” he said. “To who?”
“I believe it’s ‘whom’,” I said.
“Pardon me?”
“Whom,” I said. “Not who. Whom.”
“Huh,” he said. “Let me guess - English major?”
“History,” I said. “Close enough.”
“How is that close enough?” he asked.
“We both write a lot of essays,” I said.
“Let me ask you a question, Miss Paige, to see if we can really be friends,” Owen said.
“This sounds serious,” I said. “Shoot.”
“How would feel right now if I did the yawn and stretch?”
“How drunk are you right now?” I asked.
“I will not lie - I’m a bit tipsy,” he admitted. “But that just makes me more charming, yes?”
“That just makes you more charming, no,” I said. “But to answer your question, if you did the yawn and stretch, I would probably get freaked out and leave.”
He nodded, thinking. “So…no yawn and stretch.”
“No yawn and stretch.”
“I’m gonna go to bed,” he informed me.
“Good for you,” I said.
“Could you maybe walk me to my room? You know, just to make sure I don’t get mugged on the way,” he said.
“I’m sure the dorm is completely safe, but yes, I would love to walk you to your room,” I said. “Come on.” I led the way out of the room, with Owen drunkenly stumbling his way behind me.
“My room is on the fourth floor,” Owen said. Two floors above mine. I started up the stairs.
“So, Owen,” I said. “What’s your major?” I didn’t particularly care, but I didn’t like the awkward silence.
“Journalism,” he said.
“Hmm,” I said. “Interesting.”
“This is my room,” Owen said. He got his keys out and turned around to face me.
“So…” he said, slurring just a little bit. “This is the part of the date where I kiss you.”
“This isn’t a date and you aren’t going to kiss me,” I said. “Good night, Owen.”
