Лиана Мориарти - Nine Perfect Strangers

“What?” Frances frowned. “That doesn’t even make sense!”

“None of this makes sense,” said Lars. “None of it.”

He saw again the dark-haired little boy with the hazel eyes, felt the tug of his hand and heard his insistent voice: I’ve got something to show you .

64

Jessica

Jessica and Zoe sat opposite each other, cross-legged, on a yoga mat, as if they were about to do a joint Pilates exercise.

Jessica would have given anything to be in a Pilates class right now. Even the cheap one she did before they won the money, in that drafty community hall, with all the local mums.

“Do you think this is, I don’t know, serious?” Zoe’s eyes darted over to her parents and back. Jessica couldn’t help but notice Zoe had great natural eyebrows.

“Ah, yeah, I kind of do,” Jessica answered. “I feel like Masha is, like, totally capable of anything. She seems very unstable.” She tried to control her breathing. The fear kept rising and then receding in her stomach, like bouts of nausea on an amusement park ride.

“She wouldn’t really, like, execute anyone of course,” said Zoe, smiling fiercely, as if determined to show she was making a joke.

“Of course not,” said Jessica, but how did she know what this woman could do? She’d given them drugs without their consent, and who knew what she’d done to Yao and Delilah. “It’s an exercise, that’s all, to make us think. It’s just a really stupid exercise.”

“I’m worried my mother might antagonize Masha. She’s not taking it seriously enough.” Zoe shot a look at Heather.

“Don’t worry, I’ll do a really good job defending her,” said Jessica. “Your mother is a midwife . She helps bring new life into the world. Also, I was on the debating team. First speaker.” Jessica is a conscientious student. That was the comment she used to see most often on her report cards.

“And I’ll do a good job defending you!” Zoe sat up straighter, with the air of a fellow conscientious student. “So, okay, I thought, first of all, I should obviously mention your pregnancy, right? You can’t execute a pregnant woman. That would be against some convention or something, right?”

“That’s true,” said Jessica doubtfully, although she wasn’t sure why she felt doubtful. Was it because the pregnancy wasn’t confirmed? Because it seemed like that was exploiting a loophole? She only deserved to live because her innocent child deserved to live?

And if she wasn’t pregnant, why should she live? Just because she really wanted to live? Because her parents loved her? Because she knew her sister loved her too, even if they were currently estranged? Because her Instagram followers often said she “made their day”? Because last financial year her charitable donations were higher than what had once been her annual income?

“When we won the money, we really tried to, you know, not be selfish ,” she told Zoe. “To share it, to give to charity.” She ran her fingers through her hair like a comb and lowered her voice. “But we didn’t give it all away.”

“No one would expect that,” said Zoe. “It was your prize.”

“That’s one thing I miss about our old life,” admitted Jessica. “Before we got rich we didn’t ever have to think about whether we were ‘good’ people, because we didn’t have time to be good. We were just paying the bills, getting by, living our lives. It was kind of easier.” She winced. “That makes it sound like I’m complaining and I promise you I’m not.”

“I’ve read about lottery winners who go on crazy spending sprees and their relationships end and they lose the lot and end up on benefits,” said Zoe.

“I know!” said Jessica. “When we won, I did a lot of research about lottery winners. So I, like, knew the pitfalls.”

“I reckon you’ve done a good job of it,” said Zoe.

“Thank you,” said Jessica gratefully, because sometimes she had longed for someone to give her a good mark for how well she’d handled the prize money.

She’d tried so hard to be a well-behaved lottery winner. To invest properly, to share appropriately, to get tax advice, to go to posh fundraiser balls where terrifyingly elegant people sipped French champagne while they bid obscene amounts of money on obscure items at charity auctions: “All for a good cause, ladies and gentlemen!” She thought of Ben tugging at his bow tie, muttering, “Who the fuck are these people?”

Should she have spent more at those charity balls? Less? Not gone at all? Sent a check? What would have made her a better person, more deserving of life right now?

If this had happened before the win, what would Zoe have said? Jessica deserves to live because she works really hard at her boring-as-batshit job and she’s never even flown business class in her life, let alone first class, so what sort of life is that?

The money defined her now. She didn’t even know who she was before the money.

“Ben didn’t want to make any decisions except for which car to buy,” she told Zoe. “He didn’t want anything to change … and that’s just not possible.”

She touched her lips and looked down at her boobs, which were objectively awesome.

Would her defense case be better if she didn’t look like this? If she hadn’t spent so much money on her body?

“Why would you want to look like one of those dreadful Kardashians?” her mother had once asked her.

Because Jessica thought those dreadful Kardashians were stunning. It was her prerogative to think so. Before the money Ben had drooled over images of luxury cars and Jessica had drooled over pictures of models and reality stars, that were maybe photoshopped, but she didn’t care. He got his car, she got her body. Why was her new body more superficial than his new car?

“Sorry.” She looked back up at Zoe and remembered that this girl’s brother had committed suicide. Zoe had probably never met anyone as superficial as Jessica in her life. “None of that helps you build my case, does it? Why should this girl live? Oh, because she tried really hard when she won the lottery.”

Zoe didn’t smile but gave Jessica a very serious, focused look. “Don’t worry, I can put a good spin on this.”

She looked up at the television screen where Masha’s face had loomed. “What do you think will happen next? After we’ve played her stupid game?”

“I don’t know,” said Jessica honestly. “It feels like anything could happen.”

65

Masha

Masha collected a cushion from the Lavender Room. Yao made no sound as she lifted his head from her desk and slid the cushion beneath his cheek. His fluttering eyelids were not fully closed, revealing the shimmery slivers of his eyes.

She remembered adjusting a blanket around a small sleeping form. It felt like a memory that belonged to someone else, although she knew it was hers. The memory had no texture to it, no smell or color; it was like the scenes from the security cameras around the building.

That was not correct. She could give the memory color and texture if she so chose.

The blanket was yellow. The smell was No More Tears baby shampoo. The sound was the tinkling tune of the Brahms lullaby as a mobile with dangling toys turned in slow circles. The touch was of soft warm skin beneath her fingertips.

But she did not choose to remember that right at this moment.

She switched off the monitor so she could no longer see or hear her guests. She needed a break from them. The pitch of their voices was like fingernails on a blackboard.

The sedative she’d given Yao was one they’d prepared in case a guest had a bad reaction to yesterday’s smoothies and became so violent or agitated as to be a danger to themselves or others. Masha understood that Yao would sleep for a few restful hours and then he’d be fine. It was Yao himself who had taught both Masha and Delilah how to urgently administer the injection in the event of an emergency.