Paul Cleave - The Laughterhouse

“Doing what?” she asks. “Fucking men for money or having nothing to show for it?”

“Both.”

“Since I was thirteen.”

“Jesus,” I say.

“You almost look sorry for me.” She lights up a cigarette, then offers me one again, and I am sorry for her, who wouldn’t be? I shake my head at the proffered cigarette. “Life is what it is, right?” she says, the end of the cigarette catching her attention for a few seconds. “This may look bad, but others I’ve known have gone through worse.”

There are pictures on the walls, prints of white tigers, posters of muscle cars and horses, a vase on top of the mantelpiece with a long-dead rose in it. The TV has buttons and dials to prove how old it is, and if I checked the back the serial number would probably only be two digits long. There are photographs of friends with blank looks, but there are other pictures too-her as a child, her face full of innocence, family or friends in the photos, her dad or uncle in them too, family snapshots of a normal looking family with normal looking smiles, and I wonder where they are now, what they did wrong for their daughter to want to take this path.

“You’re wondering how?” she asks.

I turn back toward her.

“You’re wondering how I became this way,” she says.

“Yes.”

“The universe fucked me,” she tells me, “it fucked me for free. So ask me what you came to ask and let me finish my drink and get to bed.”

I get the photograph of Brad Hayward out. It was taken two months ago. His wife has been cropped out of the picture. He’s happy and that could be because he’s had a good summer, or because he has a coupon card and he’s nailed ten prostitutes and his eleventh one is free.

“You saw him last night.”

“Yes.”

“Have you seen him before?”

She shrugs. “They all look the same,” she says. “What I remember more is whether or not they are a showerer. This guy-he didn’t shower beforehand. Then again, nor did I,” she says, holding eye contact with me.

“What time did you see him last night?” I ask, hoping she just sticks to the facts.

“I don’t know. I don’t keep a schedule.”

“Did he seem like he knew what he was doing? Was he nervous? First-time user? Experienced?”

“I can’t remember. All of that I guess. None of it. Whatever,” she says, losing interest in the questions.

“It’s important.”

She takes a drink and swirls it around in her mouth for a few seconds before swallowing it. “It wasn’t his first time with a hooker,” she says, staring at the ice cubes. “I doubt it was his second or third either.”

She sucks on the cigarette and blows the smoke into the cold air, where it hangs in front of her face and doesn’t go anywhere, her face behind it like a mask. I get the feeling I could come back in an hour and that mask would still be there. I have the urge to shake her. Every few seconds or so when she blinks, her eyes seem to open a little less than the time before.

“Where do you work?”

“Normally corner of Manchester and Hereford.”

“That’s where you were last night?”

“Pretty much.”

“And you got into his car. Where did he drive you?”

“About half a block away. There’s an alleyway further up Hereford Street.”

“That’s where you normally go?”

“You have no idea what normal is in my kind of work,” she says. “But yeah, the alley is a favorite spot. Driving is the last thing they’re thinking about.”

“How long were you with him?”

“I don’t know. Why does all this matter?”

“It matters because somebody murdered him and it’s my job to find out.”

“And I should care?”

“Yes. People ought to care when somebody gets murdered.”

She shrugs. “Whatever. I don’t know. Five minutes. Maybe ten. I’ve told you everything I know. I’m tired.”

I’m tired too. “Just another couple of questions. Two minutes and I’m gone.”

She sighs, like I’ve just told her she has to help me move next weekend.

“Make it quick,” she says.

“How long were you with him?” I ask again.

“Five minutes.”

“You recognize any of these people?” I ask, and I show her photographs of the other three victims. They’re all before shots-no need to traumatize any witnesses with photos of bloody corpses. I lay them out on the coffee table side by side.

“Nope.”

“You want to take a closer look?”

“No.”

“None of them were clients?”

“I don’t do chicks.”

“The other two?”

“I don’t do men who look like they might die in the process. I don’t need that kind of trouble.”

I run their names by her and she keeps shaking her head. “I don’t know. Maybe. Are they famous?”

“No,” I say, scooping the pictures back up.

“The last one, isn’t she a lawyer?”

I pause with my hand on the photographs. I slide the one of Victoria Brown back out and put it on the table. “You know her?”

“When was this photo taken?” she asks.

“Ten years ago,” I say, the hint of a connection forming, a hint of excitement growing inside me.

“Jesus, I can’t remember anything from ten years ago. I got into some trouble with some drugs three years ago, which I’m sure you know about and the fines are the reason I’m living in this shithole and not the slightly better shithole I used to live in. I think she was my lawyer.”

My excitement fades. “She was in a coma three years ago.”

“That’d explain the job she did.”

“You must know her from somewhere else. Take another look,” I say, tapping the picture.

“You said this was only going to take a few minutes.”

“Please.”

“I don’t know,” she says, and I’m losing her again.

“What about these other two men?” I ask. “This one, he was a lawyer too,” I say, showing her the first photograph again.

“Never seen him,” she says.

“You sure about that?”

“No, of course I’m not sure. I go out. I buy stuff. Clothes and food. Maybe I’ve walked past him in a supermarket or on the street. How the hell would I know?”

“And this one?” I ask, back to victim number two.

“I don’t remember him.”

“But you remember her,” I say, pointing toward Victoria Brown. “She’s been in a coma for seven years. It means you remember her from before then. You ever need a lawyer before that?”

“Needed one, sure, but could never afford one.”

“This guy here wasn’t your teacher?” I ask, pointing at McFarlane.

“What? I don’t know. I can’t remember my teachers.”

“He taught at Papanui High School, you go there?”

“Of course not. You must really think my parents hated me.”

“You knew she was a lawyer,” I say, tapping Victoria’s picture again. “You have to know her from somewhere.”

“Jesus, enough about the lawyer, okay? I don’t know where I know her from.” She yawns and makes no effort to cover her mouth, then finishes off her drink. “Maybe I saw her on TV. Maybe she had some big case that made the news. You think of that?”

It’s a good point.

“You see anything suspicious?” I ask her. “Anybody follow you? Anybody watching?”

“What? When, last night?”

“Yes, last night. Or any other night.”

She shrugs. “Nothing like that.”

“What can you tell me about your other clients last night?”

“About as much as I told you about that one,” she says, and nods toward the photograph of Hayward on the coffee table next to the other three. “You show me some photos and I can tell you who did and didn’t shower, but that’s about it.”