Nine Perfect Strangers

‘Did you sleep well?’ asked Masha. She took a drag of her cigarette.

Yao ran a diagnostic eye over her: dilated pupils, sheen of sweat on her forehead, fidgeting.

‘Did you have a smoothie?’ he asked. He lifted an empty Doritos packet from Masha’s desk, shook it and watched the yellow crumbs fall. If she’d eaten Doritos, she had to be in an altered state. The Doritos were more shocking than the cigarette.

‘I did.’ Masha exhaled smoke and smiled at him. ‘The smoothie was delicious and I have been experiencing many remarkable insights.’

He’d never seen her smoke. She made smoking look beautiful. Yao had never smoked and now he wanted to try it. It looked natural and sensual, the smoke curling languidly from her fingers.

He remembered the first time he met her, ten years ago in that big office, and how she’d smelled of cigarette smoke.

Yao looked at the computer screen on her desk. A clip of a burning two-storey house. An eave crashed to the ground.

‘You sedated me,’ said Yao. He ran his tongue around his dry mouth. He felt dull-witted with shock. He couldn’t quite comprehend that she had done this.

‘Yes, I did,’ said Masha. ‘I had no choice.’

The sky outside the window began to lighten.

‘The guests?’ asked Yao. ‘Are they still down there?’

Masha shrugged moodily. ‘I don’t know. I am sick of them. I am sick of this industry.’ She took another drag of her cigarette and brightened. ‘I’ve made a decision! I’m going back to FMCG.’

‘FMCG?’ asked Yao.

‘Fast-moving consumer goods,’ said Masha.

‘Like toothpaste?’ said Yao.

‘Exactly like toothpaste. Would you like to come and work with me?’

‘What? No.’ He stared at her. She was still Masha, she still had that extraordinary body, still wore that extraordinary dress, and yet he could feel her power over him slipping away as he watched her morphing back into the corporate executive she’d once been. How was that possible? He felt as betrayed as if a lover had admitted infidelity. This wasn’t just a job for him, it was his life, his home, it was virtually his religion, and now she wanted to leave it all behind to go and sell toothpaste? Wasn’t toothpaste part of the ordinary world they had turned their backs on?

She didn’t mean it. It had to be the smoothie talking. This was not an example of a transcendental insight. With her medical history, she should not have had the smoothie, but now she had, she should be lying down, with her headphones on, and then Yao could guide her psychedelic experience away from toothpaste.

But right now he had nine guests to worry about.

He looked away from her and turned off the burning house footage on the computer. He clicked onto the security program that showed the yoga and meditation studio.

There was no-one there. Crumpled towels lay all over the floor of the deserted room.

‘They’re out,’ said Yao. ‘How did they escape?’

Masha sniffed. ‘They finally worked it out. The door has been unlocked for hours.’

chapter seventy-three

Carmel

All the men insisted on walking ahead of the women up the stairs from the yoga and meditation studio, ready to slay lions or wellness consultants offering smoothies. It was kind and gentlemanly and Carmel appreciated it, and felt glad not to be a man, but it seemed their chivalry was unnecessary. The house was silent and empty.

Carmel still couldn’t believe there was no fire. The images in her head had been so real. She had thought she wouldn’t see her children again.

‘Surely it won’t just open,’ Heather had said when they all stood at the door and Napoleon put his hand on the handle, insisting they all stay back, stay back, stay back . . .

It opened, as if it had never been locked at all, to reveal a steel rubbish bin

sitting directly outside the door.