GINGER AND BUBBLES

12| IT'S COMPLICATED

I look at the pin that my handler Mr B dropped for our meeting.

Thirty minutes. Make sure you're there before he rocks up.

I park my car a few streets away from the rooftop restaurant and walk the rest of the way.  My heightened vigilance over the past few weeks bothers me. The paranoia is eroding my mettle. I eat and sleep less. I look over my shoulder. All the time.

He is already there. Seated at a table with a wide-angled view of his surroundings, taking a swig from his beer when I take the last three steps leading onto the roof.

I stroll to the bar and remain at a distance while checking out the tables dotted around on the synthetic grass. The waitron hands him two menus. He dismisses her with a hand gesture and lights a cigarette.

I take a seat opposite him at the small round table and pick up a menu. He pretends to be engrossed with the content of his.

After greeting, which roughly boils down to some weird way of acknowledging each others' presence minus the frills of exchanging cumbersome pleasantries, I get to the point.

"Extract me." His eyes burn into me. I just crashed through a barrier. From his expression it is not what he expected but for me it brings release. At last, a window. An opportunity to unburden my heart.

He slides his glasses almost to the tip of his rough nose and, holding onto it, looks over them, eyebrows raised.

"This is sudden."  He sighs and pushes the menu aside. "Explain what the bloody hell happened between last month and now?"

"Slit is suspicious."

He does not react the way I anticipated; merely sits there with his poker face fixed on the laminated menu.

"That it?" He snorts. "Slit is suspicious?" He grins and shakes his head as if in disbelief.

"My initiation. It... It didn't pan out the way it was supposed to..."

"Details," he demands. His eyes flash, hard as steel. His voice is controlled but laced with a tone of impatience waiting to explode.

"It went south. Now I'm involved with the mark—"

"You are what?"

"here was an accident and... It's complicated."

"Complicated? I don't get it."

"The accident left her... She's a mess."

"You involved with her?"

"Not romantically, but I can't walk away from her. Not now, it's—"

"Complicated," he completes my sentence. His sarcasm riles me, as always. "I heard you the first time. It doesn't explain what why you want out."

He flags the waitron down, clicking his thick fingers, but she's held up at another table. He snorts indignantly. Swears in hushed tones. Fed up he jumps up and walks to the mobile bar in the corner and returns with a beer. He pulls the glass closer and empties the content into it.

He runs his fingers down the side of the glass, eyes on the droplets dripping down. "I'm sitting opposite you and I'm hearing something different."

"Which is?"

"Correct me if I'm wrong," he smirks. "From over here I don't see a problem. You see, if I trim away all that emotional bullshit I'm left with this. At your initiation, you chose the mark..." He takes a huge gulp from his beer, puts it down and wipes across his moustache with tthe back of his hand." Something went wrong with the mission. Now she's altered..." He takes another gulp. "Shit happens. Move on."

His annoys me. I can't remember if he was always this way or not. "That's cold B... If you knew the situation—" My intercession on behalf of Suzan does not move him; it enrages him.

"Your girly guilt has you, how to put this. Immobilised. Glued. Like a fly trapped on one of those... Those things." He makes a wiggly motion with his fingers in the air. "Those sticky, gooey traps. Disgusting. Now you're stuck like those stupid flies. That's what I hear."

"I don't think you're hearing me—"

Without batting an eyelid he glares at me, adjusting his thick, square-framed glasses. "What I'm also hearing is that my...your actual target, Slit, is suspicious about you or something about you, lately. Is that correct?"

True to his mannerisms I've become accustomed to over the past two years, he repeats the same shifting of his glasses up and down his nose routine, waiting on my response.

"Correct."

"Right. What I'm also hearing is that you and that...that weakness of yours at play. Again." There's a slight tremor in his hand as he empties the glass with a hasty gulp and slams down the glass. "Insisting to take care of her? Dammit! You are practically lugging your prey around with you...how long do you think it will take him to figure it out? And then? If your cover is blown? What happens to the prey you try and hide in that secret tree up there in Walmer Estate, Mr Wiseguy? What then?"

"You knew?"

He let out an indignant snort. "I know everything that happens in your miserable life. Everything." The snake that formed on his forehead eventually disappears and his skin colour is pale white chicken once again.

I throw down the menu and get up. "I had enough."

"Sit down. I'm not done here."

Reluctantly I sit down.

"Pull you out now? You want me to extract you? Surely you know that will blow your cover and possibly the whole operation." He lights another cigarette and throws down his lighter.

"You are my handler. You are supposed to help me!" I'm struggling to keep my emotions under control in the confined environment. "What are you saying to me?"

"Finish the mission, professor know-it-all. Break it off with the girl and walk away. Tonight still."

"You promised I could bail whenever I felt compromised and I'm telling you that I want to. I am compromised. Damn you..."

"You will do what you are ordered. End of story. And your orders are to pursue the target. The real target. Execute the mission."

"You don't understand...she—I can't do it. I can't."

"You don't have a choice. Finish en klaar. She's doomed if you don't cut her loose. You know that. Do you honestly think I will allow your penis to derail my operation?"

"I can't walk away..."

"I'm off. I have more pressing matters waiting. I'll be in touch. When is your next job?"

"Friday night."

He walks away without looking back. I order two takeaway sandwiches and two cool drinks, settle his bill as well as mine and make my way back to the car. And back to Suzanne.