The Family Remains(25)

‘Fucking amazing!’ I agree.

Saffron laughs. ‘Never heard you swear before.’

‘I’ve never felt the need before. That’s truly great news, Saffron. Truly. Keep me posted. When are you expecting more updates?’

‘Within the hour. They’re fast-tracking everything. Watch this space.’

‘I’m watching it, Saffron. I’m watching it like a hawk.’

I end the call. Then I turn to make sure I’m not being watched, and punch the air with a fist, very, very gently.





23





I study the photos on my phone, the ones of Phin’s photos that I took in Joe’s apartment. I establish that at least four of the photos have been taken in the same bar; it has tongue-and-groove walls painted black and hung with black-and-white photos of rock stars. The windows are plate glass and through them I can see the outline of a row of motorbikes and behind it a food shop called Organic something beginning with a D. I google Organic plus a D, and a shop called Organic Delightful comes up. There are four branches around Chicago. One of them, according to Google Maps Street View, is opposite a bar called the Magdala that has large plate-glass windows and a row of motorbikes parked outside. I order an Uber.

The Magdala is most categorically not a gay bar. It’s a biker’s bar, a pub. I feel hideously self-conscious as I enter. A couple of guys at the bar turn to appraise me and I feel glad that I look a little wilted and not the daffodil-fresh thing I was when I left the hotel this morning. ‘Take My Breath Away’ by Berlin is playing on the sound system, which I find strangely comforting. I get a beer and drink it in the precise chair that Phin is sitting on in one of the photos. It feels strangely emotional. I try to imagine what sort of life he was living when the photo was taken. Had he bought his beautiful apartment yet? Had he become a game ranger? Was he happy? Was he loved? Was he lonely? Was he rich? Poor? Where was he living? What, I wonder, was he thinking? What was playing on the sound system? I try to plant myself into his moment, transport myself there by some magic energy he may have left deposited in the cracks of the leather of the chair.

But, of course, there’s no such thing as magic energy.

I finish my beer, and I order another.

I feel, very strongly, that tonight I will get drunk.

When she walks in an hour later, I have had four beers and the world looks very golden and fun. She looks almost exactly the same as the girl in Phin’s photo. She is wearing a black T-shirt that is small and tight enough to see that she is not wearing a bra. She looks young at first, but then, as she gets closer, not so young. Late thirties, I’d say. Her hair is tied back with a patterned scarf. She has good legs in a denim mini-skirt and tanned feet in flip-flops. In her hand is a bike helmet. If you like dark-haired, thirty-something women who ride motorbikes, she’s probably a solid ten.

I start to get to my feet but stop myself when I see that she is being followed at close quarters by a large man with sleeves of tattoos on both arms and a shaved head. He bumps fists with the two guys sitting at the bar as he passes them and then he and the woman take what look like their ‘usual’ seats at the bar and order drinks.

She looks at her phone while he talks to the bartender and I gaze from the photo on my phone to her and back again, checking that my eyes have not deceived me, that this is the woman in Phin’s photograph. But my eyes have not deceived me. They never do, of course. I should have been a detective.

I finish my beer and take my empty glass to the bar where I stand alongside the woman, who smells of dry shampoo, and say, in my best Joshua-from-Zone-5-London accent, ‘I’m really sorry to disturb you. I’ve been trying to trace my old friend? He’s called Phin and he’s been missing for a few days. I have some photos of him taken in this bar, and there’s one taken with a woman who looks a lot like you? Would you mind if I showed you?’

The woman bristles. I see a trail of uncomfortable energy work its way through her entire physiology as I wait for her to respond. She glances abruptly at the man to her left, who is chatting with the other men, and then down at my phone. ‘Sure.’

I open the app and show her the photo. I watch her closely. ‘Yeah,’ she says. ‘That’s me. But I have no idea who that guy is. I mean’ – she leans in to look closer – ‘this must have been about six, seven years ago, judging by the length of my hair and the way I’m dressed.’ She pushes my phone back towards me and sniffs. ‘You know what it’s like. You have a few drinks. You get chatting to a stranger. Someone takes a photo.’ She sniffs again and shrugs.

‘So, this guy, he’s a stranger to you?’

‘Er, yeah. Basically. Sorry.’

The guy with the tattoo sleeves has been growing increasingly interested in our exchange. He turns away from the other men and says, ‘Hey. Everything OK?’

The woman puts a hand against his forearm. ‘Yeah. It’s nothing. This guy’s just trying to track down his friend. Apparently he used to come here. But I don’t recognise him.’

He looks at me warily. Then he says, ‘Let me take a look. I’ve been coming here for years. Maybe I’ll recognise him.’

I feel something radiating from the woman, something I recognise, something that almost has a smell to it, a hormonal musk. It’s fear. Instinctively I go to the photo of Phin with the baseball-capped man instead of the photo with her in it. I hold the phone tightly in my hand and point out Phin to the tattoo man. He stares at it. ‘Nope,’ he says, tersely. ‘Never seen the guy. But …’ He uses his fingers to zoom in on the face of the other man in the photo. ‘This guy.’ He taps it. ‘I feel like I know this guy.’ He looks at the woman. ‘Do you know this guy?’