So, while writing this I may have unwittingly driven our starcrossed lovers (hehe) further and further apart. I might even have painted myself into a corner. But just noticed a few millimeters of bare floorboards here. Must paint some more…..
Lovers and scumbags
"If a series of events can go wrong, they will do so in the worst possible sequence."
Murphy's extended law.
It is already late when they arrive. They tread warily along the narrow pier, in total silence. The easygoing cheerfulness left behind as they take in their new home. The air feels different here; clammy and impossibly humid. Inhaling is like drowning a little, pulling in mouthful after mouthful of syrupy liquid. Even the cicadas seem to suffer in the stifling night. The critters rustle up a racket, louder than a gang of bragging soccer moms. A hysterical welcoming committee.
It is also the only welcome awaiting them. The brusque reception by the diminutive runt-sized Mr. Ceccherini, head caretaker of the Hydra station hardly qualifies. He has been blessed with a vinegary sour disposition and a posture that can only be explained by having a giant broom permanently lodged up his peevish arse. A little well-spruced Errol Flynn moustache accentuates the abnormal smallness of his petulant O-shaped mouth. His thin peculiar lips move as if constrained by a drawstring rubber band causing his little jaunty moustache to flex like a caterpillar as he doses out his tart introduction.
Three seconds.
Three seconds is the time it takes for Kate to reach a point where she yearns to pull out his sick little hirsute mishap with a pair of rusty pliers.
Given half a chance - she would.
Hugo is disquietingly subdued. He looks straight ahead, his large back bent in defeat.
The pint-sized weasel hands him the keys and leaves them standing there, outside a big barn-like building with its utilitarian corrugated aluminium roofing. It's a far cry from their cheesy little houses back at Dharmaville. No fake suburban gardens and swings here. No Stepford wife either, Kate thinks with a certain satisfaction.
" So, okidook…ehem.. " Hugo exclaims, rocking back and forward on the balls of his feet. " This is, um… I don't know what…"
"It isn't exactly Club Med." Kate adds but in all honesty, she doesn't mind all that much. She sort of remembers the premises but then again, those days in captivity were all in a blur. This will be better than the bear cages at any rate. And it is a relief to be away. From them, Barbie and Ken, and from him. From Miles – the snide little narcissist.
" No it sure isn't – more like the funny-farm," he states a little hesitantly as he chews his bottom lip. The type of facility that he himself is intimately familiar with.
" Come on, lets check it out Hugo!"
She snatches hold of his sleeve and pulls him in through the large double doors of the barrack they've been assigned to. Hugo checks the numbers on their keys. They are attached to gigantic tacky plastic key-chains with the ornate Hydra logo stamped on one side and the number on another. Three and seven.
"Dings for dig number seven!" says Hugo throwing her the other key.
She catches it with a high-handed leftie and proceeds towards her door. The doors wouldn't look amiss in a high security prison. Heavy and coated with sheets of metal and equipped with small peepholes. For looking in or out? The key chain clinks against the metal as she turns the key in the look.
" Mmm-hum, cosy!" Kate surveys the little cell-like room that is her new living quarters. "Very bunkerish, very last days of Berlin."
One small narrow rectangular window positioned high enough to let in some light but too high to be able to see out. Like a cellar. She turns to grin at him. She forces herself to make it one hell of a smile. Hugo looks completely forlorn. His whole face droops like a Dali painting, melting in the sweltering evening air. It scares her more than anything. He leans over her shoulder in a quick inspection.
" Oh man… Cosy like a death-row dungeon." He grows pale. All the blood abandoning his face in an instant. The room is eerily reminiscent of something else. Santa Rosa. Yep. He isn't sure he will get any sleep here.
" Look, look! We will be snug as a bugs here!"
Kate throws herself on the narrow cot attached to the wall. Ouch. As soft and bouncy as concrete. The leap effectively punches all the air out of her. She is trying too hard, she knows. Overdoing it. It is just that, she can't stand how absolutely pathetic and despondent Hugo looks as he stands there.
"Yeah, yeah. Just swell…" He looks anxiously around." Hey, what do you think this place really is? There doesn't seem to be many folks around at all."
" Nah, Horace told me there are just the scientists and the two other manual workers at the station. Don't worry Hugo! Trust me, this accommodation by far outshines my previous experiences of the hospitality here, delightful as they were. Oh, and the company too!"
Hugo's cheeks turn a peachy pink, pleased with the offhanded compliment. He waves at her a bit awkwardly and trundles off down the corridor towards number seven.
Sometime during the night she hears him entering her room. The gentle shuffle of his large body as he lowers it on the floor next to her. She is hardly awake to register it at all but when she wakes at the crack of dawn she finds him snoring on the rough
concrete floor on just a sheet, hugging his pillow as if it were his one true love.
The morning fog lies thick as soup over the yard outside their barrack. It is still extremely humid, and they both find their hair reaching equally alarming heights of spiralling frizzyness. Nearly narcoleptic as they stand swaying and yawning, rubbing their eye sockets free of sleep. Slouching in attention like good new recruits while Barbara, the other Hydra worker, their new colleague-slash-overlord, lets them in on the rules of the game at their new home.
She's all menacing angular shapes and bony scrawny legs. She has a face like a sourpuss possum, skin completely monochrome and devoid of colour. Her eyebrows and eyelashes have almost the same light tone as her complexion, making her a little reminiscent of a translucent newborn mouse baby.
Um - yes – and she has the warmth of a German POW camp director.
Hugo's shoulder sag in utter disappointment as she briskly informs them that she is the one in charge of the cooking and the indoor duties at the Hydra station and that they are to do outdoor menial work, assisting the scientists with their zoological research projects. Hugo's display of disgruntlement is all but discreet behind his hefty hand:
" I bet there'll be raw fish and baby seals on the menu."
Kate's giggling far exceeds what the joke warrants. She knows it is childish but the relief of seeing Hugo perk up is enormous. Barbara torpedoes him down with a single evil albino-glare that would have put a James Bond villain to shame. She hands him a shovel and a bucket and just points them pinch-lipped towards the polar bear cages.
They march merrily along, swinging their buckets. Kate doesn't know why. There is no reason really because Barbara isn't even the remotest bit friendly, but still she finds herself immediately warming to the freaky-looking pallid woman. This, in spite of the thing she has about rodents, and even though Barbara makes it sound like they have arrived to the first circle of hell.
Perhaps not so strange after all. Just look at the Sawyer thingy. She obviously has a weakness for the chaffing backbiting type. Oh and Miles. There is no reason whatsoever to like that surly, disagreeable bastard either.
And still - she does.
Every bone and muscle in her brittle body smarts as Kate finally conks out on her bunk She is hot, exhausted and reeking of sweat and polar bear waste. They've been bossed around like bonded serfs all day long alternating between Ceccherini's shrill whiny orders and Barbara's Gestapo-like commandeering. She hears Hugo's painful groan down the hall as he similarly collapses on top of his cot. The bunk lets out it's own shrieking complaint at the sudden weight demands.
" Draconian rule of Hydra, not something for weaklings huh?" she hollers to him in a attempt at cheering him up. She hears his large feet hobbling along the hallway like a monster truck with a flat tire . A moment later, he appears outside her wide open door, towel thrown across his bent shoulders, moving with the grace and agility of a 95-year old cripple.
"Dude, you said a right word there. Come on, we need some R&R. Grab your towel and lets hit the spa, princess!" he smiles wryly nodding his head sideways.
The showers are at the other end of the same barrack. She shudders, remembering the last time there. A lifetime ago. The frilly sundress, Ben and his mind games. Sawyer. She shakes it off. This is now. She is different now and it is different now. The facilities have a locker-room adjacent to it and harsh fluorescent morgue-like lightning. Not fancy, but equipped with clean and warm water if her memory serves her right.
And it is.
They shower at the opposite sides of the large tiled partition that separates the men's section from the women's.
Kate closes her eyes as the stream hits her face in a soothing cascade. The water enfolds her like a warm embrace. Her muscles ache and she is tired as hell but she feels pretty good. Safe. She smiles to herself as she hears Hugo's humming from the other side of the wall suddenly escalating into downright crooning. Roaring out of tune like a bazooka in a string ensemble; horrible, loud and alarmingly happy:
" Me and,…. me and,… Mrs, Mrs Chang, Missus. Chang, Missus CHAAAANG!!"
She joins him while frenetically working up a big foamy hill of soapsuds on the top of her skull.
" We got a thaang going ooooon…"
" We both know that it's wrong!"
" But it's much too strooong!"
Wailing at the top of their lungs until Barbara's mole-like head appears at the entrance of the shower room, Just about visible if they peer across the partial walls. They expect her to bellow like a drill sergeant to zip it. To shriek that the polar bears are getting all worked up and antsy out in their cages as are the seemingly invisible scientists in their office. But she doesn't. She just watches from the entrance for a moment with vacant watery eyes.
" Mrs Chang?" she repeats. Her voice suddenly inexplicably muted, creepily sweet even. " You know Lara?"
Hugo stares at her stupidly above the tiled wall. Mouth left slightly agape and bewildered like a large wet tuna-fish. Frozen in a pose with his arm above his head, lathering up his armpit.
"Yeah, and so…?"
Barbara seems to find herself. She backs out hesitantly, tugging the door with her and they hear an almost inaudibly:
" No, nothing, nothing."
As the heavy door clicks closed, they gawp, stumped and speechless. Then each does a private little what-the-hell?-shrug and let their hushed musical massacre ebb out. Kate peaks over the partition, she can just make out Hugo's soaking wet auburn corkscrews.
" So Horace found out? He's the one who sent you off ?"
Hugo shakes his head so that the crazy Shirley Temple curls jump. Excessively expressive. She is just making small talk.
" No, no, Goodspeed doesn't know! It was LaFleur…..sent me here to keep it all hush-hush on the down-low. But I bet I know who like, told him about us. We were discreet and all, me and Lara. She is classy like that," he says stretching so that she can just about see his round brown eyes above the wall.
" So who squealed Hugo?"
He disappears behind the parting. Turning up the shower at its fiercest.
" Miles." His voice is muffled as if he is letting the water collect in his open mouth.
Kate glowers at nothing in particular. At the Dharma soap in her hand. She squeezes it so hard she leaves an imprint of her fingers around the edges.
Knew it!
That son-of-a-bitch!
She has a gut feeling that he somehow is behind her sudden and inexplicable banishment too. Probably set the whole thing up. Had a good laugh at her expense. Yes probably – and likely.
The soulless prick!.
" Miles huh? Why does that not surprise me at all?" she mutters.
" Yeah, well, like, I couldn't believe it either – thought we were buddies you know. But he saw us and then went all-out mental on me!"
" Doesn't seem like Miles' style. He is usually more of a persistent, grating, pain-in-the-neck, bugging people to hell and back kind of guy…" It doesn't sound right. She has a hard time picturing Miles loosing his cool. Can't imagine that knowing smirk, that absolute confidence ever slipping off.
" You think? Well, that's what I thought too. Made me think, like he has some kind of thing, or somethin' for her, ya know? I've caught him following the Changs around more than once. Weird like…. Stalking sort of…
" Really? Wonder what the heck is that man's problem?"
" Beats me dudette. Beats me…"
Hugo cuts of the water, killing off his shower. Stamping the floor as if he is trying to stomp himself dry. They both silently ponder annoying enigma that is Miles Straume.
Kate can make out the placid padding of wet feet on tiles and the soft rustle of clothes being pulled on, legs knocking against something, on the other side. What the hell is wrong with Miles? And what on god's earth is wrong with her? It defies all common sense, all that is intelligent and normal and healthy. The way he lingers in her mind. His Siamese cat-smile and that funny inverted u-curve of his upper lip. Cinnamon, nutmeg and coriander. Bet he tastes like that too. Bet he tastes like….
Ugh.. This - has – to- stop – now.
" Don't blame him though." says Hugo after a while. "I mean, she is incredibly hot an' all." The wood complains loudly as he sits himself down on the bench by the men's lockers.
" Yeah, she is"
It is Lara this, Lara that. Wonder if it's right to tell him? Probably better off not knowing. After all, it was nothing. And she would rather cut her ear off than hurt the wonderful human being that is sitting on the other side. Her only friend, it seems. She braces herself against the wall. Immobile. Indecisive. The water trickling rhythmically on the crown of her head.
" Couldn't believe it that she'd want to get together with lardpuppy like me," he sighs wistfully…." She says I am her little dumpling. We were gonna' go away, take the sub with her little critter and get the hell out of this place. I was gonna' be a daddy."
U-hu. It seems pretty serious. The kid and all. – Shit.
"Hugo."
Oh, hell. How is this going to go down? If she'd known… He might not understand. But he should know. He shouldn't build his whole future on this woman without knowing who she is. But then again, who is she to judge?
Shit. She doesn't deserve his friendship.
" Hugo…I have.."
" She says I'm her moon cake. She loves the way I look. Can you believe it!? She is going to ditch that miserable son of a bitch…For me! Can you freaking believe it?!"
" Hugo…You know how I am, I like anyone who likes me, can't help liking them… Was helping her out with some groceries…."
Shit. She is a rotten person, rotten to the core. Only right if he hates her. Like everyone else.
"What?"
" No self-control… I was going for the cheek and she sort of turned her head…So sorry Hugo…"
"WHAT?!"
"I may have accidentally kissed Lara, Hugo."