AlexMcGilvery Array - Nano Bytes

Thinking about it, he realised he'd never seen a phone like that one before. It was an ugly thing, sort of rounded with a tiled skin - maybe an alligator skin carry case. Still, he wasn't likely to know what model it was. He didn't really pay much attention to the endless slew of slightly different models his friends insisted on demoing for him. Increasingly they seemed to be made somewhere in the Far East, with brand names he'd never heard of, by companies involved in endless patent disputes.

Alighting the bus near Holborn, the air felt doubly cold. The older buses vented engine heat directly around the passengers legs, adding the stench of diesel to what rapidly felt like a sauna. The shock of the change in temperature was brutal. Before he could break free of the throng and slip down the invariably empty ginnel which formed a short–cut to his office, a balding man sneezed furiously, pebble–dashing the back of James' neck with what he figured was probably SARS. Or maybe Ebola.

Cursing he rooted through his satchel and extracted the small bottle of antibacterial gel. He had to take off his wedding ring before applying some. There was a twinge of guilt as he slipped the ring into his pocket. Taking his ring off for a moment didn't mean anything. He'd only smiled at Pink. He was so preoccupied with his thoughts he didn't notice the thing as he boarded the lift. It was only when the elevator was half way between third and fourth he saw it.

He froze.

It was a smartphone in a black scaled case with small spikes. It was like the thing had followed him, sitting there like some kind of oversized slug that had oozed its way onto human skin. The finance–bro holding it was wired for sound, and James could hear the heavy bass of some trance, or techno or whatever they called that shit you had to be on drugs to enjoy.

Trying to be casual, James peeked over at the screen, trying to spot the logo of the brand, but he couldn't see anything. The cover was open, but the screen was a smooth black void. Abruptly, he realised Finance–bro was glaring at him.

«Nice phone," he coughed. Finance–bro blanked him. James wasn't sure that he could even hear with that music blaring. «I was thinking of getting one of those. What model is that?»

«Fuck off.» There was no intonation. The whole delivery was deadpan. And hostile.

«Sorry," James muttered. «I didn't mean to bother…» he didn't finish the sentence. His gaze was fixed on something strange. There was a drop of blood on the man's collar. It wasn't much. Probably just a nick from shaving. Or maybe it was splatter from the hobo he'd beaten to death. The guy had a serious Patrick Bateman vibe. The stain stood out against the immaculately starched white. «Just ignore me.»

James turned to face the doors, edging a step away. He wasn't scared of this guy, or at least, that wasn't why he turned away. He was beginning to feel queasy. The whole morning had been unsettling. The lift carried on up in silence, only the two of them in the confined space. Sticking to the dice principle – that all passengers in a lift maintain the maximum space between them by forming a pattern like the dots on a dice – he edged into the front corner. He could feel the back of his neck burning. When it finally reached the thirteenth floor, James dived out of the elevator, glancing behind him as he hurried down the corridor.

Ensconced in his cubicle, a soothing cup of Ceylon tea steaming on the desk, he checked the news websites to see if the accident at the train station had made the local section. As expected, the article was only a couple of hundred words long. The authorities were blaming the incident on 'dumb–walking'. The journalist had linked the death to some recently published statistics about the number of road accidents in which mobile phone use was considered a contributory factor, along with a call for greater awareness among the general public of the risks of using mobile phones when on the move. There was no mention of the altercation with the pink–haired girl.

The whole thing didn't sit right with him, but he pushed it out of mind and focused on his work.

At precisely six–thirty, he removed the marinated lamb from the refrigerator and browned it in a skillet with the onions. Once this step was complete, he combined it with olives, chickpeas, dried apricots and raisins, along with a mixture of chilli, cumin seeds and cinnamon, before slow cooking in vegetable stock for two hours.

While the stew heated through, he went to his bedroom mantelpiece and lit the incense in front of the picture of his wife. He rang the bell, clapping once before his prayer, and twice after. The ritual was more of a coping mechanism than a religious belief. It was just what he did to get by each day.

He worked out for an hour to fight off the silence of the house, then took a shower, emerging just in time to take the stew off the heat and let the meat rest while he steamed some vegetables.

The nine o'clock news featured a six car pileup on the M25 North. Police were investigating reports the lorry driver responsible had been using a mobile phone while in control of the vehicle. Smart phones, dumb people, he thought, bitterly.

The driver that killed his wife had died in the collision. The police had held the driver criminally responsible, but in the light of his death, nothing had gone to court. The insurance people had paid up based on the police report. It hadn't mentioned anything about a phone. At the back of his mind, James couldn't help but wonder. Not that it made any difference now. Lauren was gone.

He watched a ten o'clock comedy program to kill the emptiness, then rolled into his bed, ready to do it all again from the beginning.

The pink haired girl wasn't at the station for the next couple of days. Not that this was unusual. Most mornings they boarded the same train, but the station was crowded and sometimes he didn't see her for a couple of weeks. In all honesty, it was a relief she wasn't there. Things would have been awkward, and he didn't want there to be a thing hanging in the air every time he saw her. It would all blow–over in a couple of weeks, and they'd go back to being two people living parallel lives. There was no need for him to even think about her.

Smartphone spotting became a little way to squash free time. He was determined not to let it become an obsession, but he couldn't help noticing them in a way he'd never done before. What struck him most was the sheer number of phones he saw every day. It was by no means unusual for people to have two. A lot of people had a work mobile and a personal mobile, and kids often had more than one, though he suspected the second ones were old units repurposed as games devices and music players. There was also an immense variety of devices and accessories in the market. Oversized earphones and giant fat–ass screens seemed to be the popular. What he didn't see was any more of was the scaled black phones with the barbed wire headphones. He even Googled for phone catalogues and images to find the brand, yet he couldn't get them anywhere. There were simply too many types of phone. It wasn't so much a needle in a haystack as a phone in an immense stack of phones.

By the third morning he'd put it out of his mind. It was raining, so the train was crammed to Third—World levels with people sitting in the luggage racks, yet clutching his satchel he forced his way down the aisle. He hadn't seen Pink or Finance–bro since the day of the accident. He figured the sociopath in the suit was probably rearranging a freezer full of prostitute heads or drowning kittens in a sack. He didn’t care what Finance–bro was doing with himself, but Pink's absence worried him. He didn't need to talk to her about what happened. All he needed to do was see her, and make sure she was okay. For some reason he felt like she was in danger.