“YOU STOLE HIS KEYS?!”
They sat opposite one another in their tiny apartment, Iman on the futon, Brian on the nylon folding chair that served as a piece of econo accent furniture.
“I didn’t steal them,” Iman said. She palmed the strip of brushed nickel and held it to her chest, as if afraid Brian might try and snatch it away from her. “His set is back in his pocket or wherever, where it belongs.”
“So what is that you’re holding, then?”
“It’s a copy. I got it made at the hardware store.”
“I . . . ” Brian raked his fingers through his fine black hair, revealing a high forehead with a hairline in the first stages of retreat. “You can’t just copy someone’s keys without permission. I’m assuming you don’t have permission?”
Iman’s silence was answer enough. Brian threw up his hands in an exasperated sigh.
“You have to realise how crazy this is. Prying into the guy’s business is one thing. Probably wrong, yeah, but at least you’re savvy enough that you’re not likely to get caught. But this, with the key . . . what are you planning on doing with it?”
Iman hefted the key, enjoying its slight but palpable weight in her palm. “Well, really, there’s only so much you can do with a key, right?”
“You can throw it out. That’s something you can totally do with it. Or . . . ” Brian went on, pacing and thinking out loud. “My dad has a vice in his garage. We can take it there and smash it with a hammer, get it all busted up before we toss it. That way it can’t, you know, fall into the wrong hands.”
“Fall into the wrong hands? Christ, Bri, it’s not the nuclear launch codes I’ve got here. It’s a front door key.”
“But you obviously planned to use it when you copied it, right? I mean, it had to have entered your mind as a possibility. So why?”
Iman pulled an afghan from the foot of the futon and draped it over her legs, her toes probing through the gaps in the wool. “You know how when you were a kid, and you had a loose tooth? The kind that’s just hanging on by a little flap of skin? You’d keep prodding it with your tongue, and every time you did it’d hurt like hell. But you’d do it anyway, over and over, until you finally worked up the guts to just pull it out once and for all?”
“O . . . kay. Sure.”
“Something’s been bothering me. It’s this worry I’ve had. It’s crazy, I know it’s crazy, but I keep going back to it. Just like with the tooth. I’ll be eating breakfast or reading or trying to sleep, and I’ll catch myself mulling it over again and again. And I’m just gonna keep doing it until I rip it out and take a good look at it.” She held the key up to the light. Whorls of fluorescence bounced off its brushed nickel finish.
Brian removed his glasses and gingerly nibbled on the arm. “And that’s what you need the key for?”
“I guess. I dunno.”
Moving to the futon, Brian put a hand on Iman’s knee. “You could try talking about it. That might be an approach that’s a little less, you know, illegal.”
Iman set her hand on his and squeezed gently. “You’re going to think I’m a lunatic.”
“You think I don’t already?”
Iman gave Brian a playful slap on the arm. “You ass! I’m being serious.”
“Okay, okay. No jokes.”
Iman sifted her hands through her hair, twined a lock around her index finger. “You remember those websites Motes has been reading? The stuff in there? I think it’s more than just an online fantasy for him. I think he’s starting to act on it.”
“Based on what, exactly?”
“Based on all sorts of things. The way he’s been acting. The books. The crying. The emails. And the other day, when he came in, there was blood in the cuff of his jacket.”
Brian chewed a bit of dried skin on his upper lip. “How do you know it was a bloodstain?”
“Not a bloodstain. Blood. Fresh, dripping..”
“So what? Maybe he cut his arm on the way into work.”
“I checked. When I brought his keys back, I made a point of looking. No cut.”
“And based on this, you’re saying . . . he’s . . . ”
“I’m saying something’s wrong. I’ve felt it in my bones for months now. And maybe I am crazy, but if I don’t do something to settle this feeling one way or another, I’m gonna crack.”
“And by do something, you mean . . . ?”
“Motes has back-to-back classes this Tuesday afternoon. He’s been blowing off his first-years, but his fourth-year seminars he still makes it to religiously. He won’t let the seniors fall by the wayside. That gives me a solid six hours where I know he won’t be coming home.”
Brian opened his mouth to speak, closed it, chewed his words contemplatively. “I want you to think really carefully about this. I’m not going to tell you not to, and I’m definitely not gonna call the cops on you or anything like that. But you need to ask yourself if your suspicions are really firm enough to justify violating this guy’s privacy. I know you’re not trying to blackmail him or anything, but this is some serious stuff we’re stumbling into.”
Iman’s hand found Brian’s, her fingers lacing through his. “We?”
Brian’s Adam’s apple trembled like some strange oscilloscope measuring anxiety, but his hand didn’t slip away from hers. If anything, it gripped hers tighter. “Hell, a clean record can only get you so far, right?”
She felt a rush of affection for him like heat from an oven door. Her hand left his and ventured somewhere more intimate. Brian’s cheeks burned crimson.
“Feeling better?”
“A little bit, yeah. But I expect to feel a whole lot better still in a minute or so.”