Alien Tongues Page 17

  "Barbara," he replied. "I know this is a wholly inadequate response to what you've said, but I can assure you that more than half of the men at the Agency fantasize regularly about a real relationship with you, and perhaps a few of the women too. If they knew you were the least bit interested, you would have a terrible time fending them all off."

  She smiled. "You make it sound like you're with the less-than-half."

  Trapped! "I make a big effort to remain professional. But pure fantasies are not unprofessional, are they?"

  His boss raised her glass. "To our fantasies." They toasted their fantasies, then she added, "I'm switching from the sublime to the ridiculous, but this may be our last chance to get your annual review done. I want to spend thirty minutes with you on that. We'll do it in my room. I'll have them take our drinks up there, if you don't mind getting my bag from the car?" She handed him the car key and a card for the room.

  Séamus collected the bag as requested and took the stairs to her room. When he opened the door, she was not to be seen but he could hear the sound of the shower in the bathroom. Was this normal? He wished he could judge what was normal at that moment, but his personal values were in transition, quite apart from the alcohol. His colleague, with whom he had shared emotional friction over Sheryl, and now empathy over the pains of their vocation, was evidently feeling sticky from her road-trip and wasn't going to stand on ceremony with her career-partner.

  The drinks were sitting on a table, so he swilled back half his own in order to prevent further mental debate. Go with the flow until things get clearly awkward. And of course they wouldn't go that far, because this was his polished, stylish boss. She would never throw herself at him and he would never push himself on her, so that was that. By misinterpreting the girls' behavior, he had shown himself to be mildly obsessed with sexual explanations when the female perspective was simpler and more innocuous. Chill out.

  She had left a folder open on the bed. It was his review, so he started reading it. It sounded great, as did the recommendation for promotion. She was being as good as her word, making her praise official. He took a copy of it with his phone, so he could savor it later alone. He held up his glass towards the bathroom and drank the remainder of his whiskey. He felt energized, if not any more sober. He suddenly realized that the room was very warm, almost stiflingly so. Why did booze delay your recognition of temperature? He pulled off his jacket, loosened his tie and rolled his sleeves up. Sweat trickled from his armpits down the sides of his chest. Woozy – that was a good word to describe the sensation. Some Irishman he was, unable to handle his drink.

  Barbara emerged from the bathroom in a dressing-gown. "Sorry," she said, "As soon as I came up here I felt the urge to get thoroughly clean." She sat on the corner of the bed and sighed with some contentment. "Séamus, would you mind very much if I climb into bed? You can sit on the edge, or bring up a chair if you prefer."

  How could he mind? He pointed to the bed and said, "Please."

  "Thank you," his boss replied, and slipped off her dressing gown. Now naked, she unhurriedly folded the gown and placed it on a chair, then pulled back the bedcovers and slid beneath them. "Oh, could you pass me that cardigan?" she asked him, pointing to the dressing table. It was as if she were in her office and asking for a file from a shelf.

  The words about the cardigan at first seemed like a foreign language. He looked at her, then where she was pointing, then back at her, sitting up bare-chested in bed. Then he felt himself moving across the room, saw one of his hands pick up the cardigan, and next realized he was moving back to her and handing over the garment. She put it round her shoulders, not even bothering to cover up what he never imagined seeing. She continued to look at his file, patting the bed next to her for him to sit down. He did, forgetting the option of a chair.

  "I just needed to check with you," she said, "I think we didn't get round to doing your mid-year review. We're going to have to make something up for it. Can you give me a sentence to summarize the results from the Wembey investigation? It's a bit vague in my memory."

  Séamus wanted to take his eyes off her breasts, but he could simply not make himself do so. He could also find no words to describe the results of the Wembley investigation. He opened his mouth, but could go no further. Barbara stared at him with a questioning but pleasant expression, then finally relaxed back against her pillow.

  "Séamus FitzGerald, you seem very distracted," she said teasingly.

  If I had morals carved in stone, he thought, I would stand up, asked to be excused, and leave right now. But then she may not excuse me. And for what purpose those morals? He would be slighting the woman who held the key to his career, and feel no better about it at all. He very much doubted he would ever feel any better about it. Yet to stay any longer was to be complicit in whatever happened next. In any event, it was moot – he could not physically get up to leave.

  "I'm overwhelmed," he told her.

  "If you are, then you're the first man to have been overwhelmed by my tits since I was a teenager." She cupped them in her hands and looking down at them. "You know, they used to be so firm before I had Ashley. I guess you're not used to seeing floppy, middle-aged tits. A bit disgusting for you?"

  "God, no!" Séamus couldn't bear her reaching that conclusion. "They're gorgeous, really."

  She looked at him skeptically. "Not sure I believe you. If you think they're so hot, why haven't you touched them yet?"

  "I didn't want to presume." The words sounded terribly lame, even before his boss laughed at them.

  "Dear Séimi. I was comfortable enough to get naked in front of you. I told you at dinner that I never get the chance of decent sex anymore. As a middle-aged woman I am not on principle going to jump on a young man, no matter how physically appealing he is. So I don't think you have to presume very much in order to get inside this bed with me. However, if you don't feel up to it, I did book you another room and the key is on the dresser. Feel free to make your exit now and we can pretend like this never happened."

  You've made an ass of yourself long enough, Séamus thought. It's time to stop thinking so much. He pulled off his shirt, stepped out of his pants and climbed in beside her.

  10. The Big Picture

  He awoke the next morning to bright sunshine, alone in the bedroom. He realized it was late and called Alice, who expressed concern for him. He told her he had worked late with his boss and taken a room at the hotel, then forgot to ask for a wake-up call. Alice told him not to worry, she would escort the girls to the lab as they were eager to get started. Her voice indicated no suspicion, and she sounded relieved there was a simple explanation for his absence. She told him to take his time.

  Hanging up, he looked around for a note from or even evidence of his boss, but there was none. It was almost as if he had dreamt the prior night. He threw himself back on the bed and smelled the pillow and sheets. He believed he could detect her scent, but possibly he was imagining it – after drinking his sense of smell was not so good. He closed his eyes and remembered the love-making with Mrs Barbara Coates. Oh My God. Now everything in the world had changed, and he would never go back to being the Séamus FitzGerald of the prior evening. How many times had he had sex before? A hundred times with Sheryl? Maybe another two hundred times with a half-dozen girls before her? Yet he now knew he had been a virgin before last night.

  In one of the psychology courses he had attended as part of his training, the instructor had analyzed the difference between desire and pleasure. Understanding the difference was key to motivating informants – tap into their desires, not into their pleasures, in order to keep them on the hook. Séamus realized that what he had previously understood as sexual pleasure was, in fact, sexual desire. He had deeply desired Sheryl, largely because she was an exceptional prize as a mate. But he wondered if, after the first few times, he had more than moderately enjoyed their love-making. It seemed like part of the problem was that he had no real sense of how much she was enjoying it. Yes, sh
e apparently had orgasms, but he had no idea of how they felt to her. When she had finally come, it was almost a relief that he could then do the same and be finished. Having proven his manhood one more time, he fell asleep contentedly, reassured that he possessed one of the prettiest and most desirable girls who was ever likely to tell him she loved him.

  But last night he had, for the first time in his life, gorged for hours on sheer sexual pleasure. The middle-aged mother seemed determined to squeeze every drop of manhood out of him, unable to quench her constant thirst for him. Of course, at first he felt like he was almost exploding with desire, and the desire kept coming back almost every other hour during the night. But once they were in constant motion and her unending cries confirmed that he was what she desperately needed to feel a woman again, he could simply join her in a mutual fest of personal enjoyment. Neither need concern themselves with the other's fulfilment because it was so obvious, so blatant, so uncontrolled and shameless. It was a kind of riot of carnality, like they had unleashed themselves upon each other, getting high from watching the other struggle for their complete climax.

  It should have been one of life's happy lessons – a young man shown sexual ecstasy by an older woman. But this was the woman who controlled his career and was the deciding judge on it – both practically and psychologically. He was starting to feel too dependent upon her and far too manipulated by her. She had the power to not only make his fiancée abandon him, but also make him feel his sex life with his fiancée had always been inadequate. She could set up his career for life, or lock him away in a corner, maybe thwarting any steps he took to escape to outside consulting. The woman had too much power over him and he sensed she reveled in it. To say he was her toy-boy was not to underestimate him but to underestimate her – she demanded something much more complex and useful to play with. If he had a strange gift in life, she would milk it for her own professional ends while getting her own buzz from it.

  He could not blame her. She was amazing, magnificent even. It was a privilege to experience the finesse of such a colleague. But his mounting sense of depression arose from how far he fell personally short of her, and even the girls and Alice. Their talents could draw crowds, generate flattering articles in quality magazines, even form the basis of respectful academic papers. And his tendency to lead women on and his unthinking, rapid reflexes? Liable on a bad night to land him in jail.

  He went to the room under this name, dutifully crumpled the bed and splashed water in the bathroom, then went downstairs and called a taxi. Back at the facility, he forced himself to focus on his routine emails, trying to dismiss the fact that there was no message from his boss. He didn't love her, he knew, but just then he sensed he was developing a craving for her. He now knew he would not be even the slightest bit tempted by Alice lying next to him, and that this change would surely be noticeable.

  Phyllis was the first to comment on what set in over the following days as a mild but chronic depressed state. "We've all noticed a change in you," she said while they sat together on her bed, "And we decided that I would be the one to first mention it. You know, we all realize that you are virtually living like a monk here. It's not natural for a boy of your age. Are you missing your girlfriend in London?"

  "I don't think that's my problem," he told her. "In fact, I really should be missing her more than I am."

  "Then what is that, Séimi?"

  "It's feeling like I am just a useless spare part in this project."

  Phyllis hugged him and kissed his neck. "Don't be ridiculous. You're our leader. We don't follow anyone else."

  "Kind of you to say so, but it doesn't change the fact I'm a fraud. I'm not actually doing anything. By bumbling along like some untrained security guard I've somehow won your affection, but that doesn't make me worthy of anything." Then he couldn't help himself. "Also, I made the huge mistake of sleeping with my boss. Now I have this endless porn movie playing in my head with her and me in it. I think I'm really sick."

  "Séimi!" Phyllis pushed him flat on the bed and lay on top of him. Her weight and warmth were comforting, and he slowly stroked her back. "Does Alice know about this? You know she's really in love with you? I mean, we all are, but the rest of us know it's impossible love. I think Alice has some actual hope."

  "You're mistaken," he told her. "We're very good friends but there's no basis for a romantic relationship between us. Anyway, I don't love my boss either. I'm not sure I even like her now. I'm just obsessed. And I'm inadequate next to all you highly gifted people."

  She placed her hands round his neck in a mock strangle. "We need to put the fight back into you!" She stared down at him, thinking, then snapped her fingers. "Double-knife fight! It's a contest we have in my village. To find the best knife-fighter without getting anyone hurt."

  She went to her closet and took out four sticks, each about half an inch thick, tubular shaped with rounded ends. She dipped them in a small pot of yellow paint.

  "This paint doesn't drip but it stays wet," she told him. "It's a primitive version of paint-ball. Now, this stuff is terrible to get out of clothing so we're going to have to strip down to our underpants, OK?" With that, she took off everything except her briefs.

  "I think it would be better if you put your bra back on," he told her, worrying about her exposed breasts. "You could get hurt."

  Phyllis laughed. "I know you're not going to hurt me, Séamus. I don't want to get paint on my bra. Anyway, this gives me an unfair advantage. Maybe you can't take your eyes off my little sisters here. Get ready!"

  He duly undressed and they cleared as much floor as possible. Then they faced each other, each with two "knives" in their hands. "Try to imagine it's real," she told him. "If you thrust and miss, I'm going to slice your arm. The depth of the cut is measured by the amount of paint. Usually there's an independent judge as to who becomes physically disabled – we're just going to have to be fair with each other. Oh, by the way, I'm the female champion for all the villages in four municipalities!"

  Séamus quickly discovered her skill, narrowly escaping "cuts" several times. Then he realized the essence of her technique, how she feinted with her eyes, head movement and hips as well as arm thrusts to throw her opponent off-guard. He studied the sequence while concentrating on defense until he came up with a decent mental model of the pattern. Then he went into attack and repeatedly scored small hits as she kept missing him. After thirty exhausting minutes, small dabs of yellow ran all the way up her arms. Phyllis was pouring sweat in concentration, her skin shiny as if oiled. She had started off in silence but now was making regular squeals as his sticks touched her. Finally, it appeared she decided that her best chance was a killer cut, even if her arm got hacked in the process. She went straight for his stomach but he parried her arm away and drew a long yellow streak lightly from her neck to her navel. She collapsed on the carpet, and spent a minute catching her breath. He knelt down next to her.

  "You bastard!" she cried as she climbed on top of him, her body slipping with the sweat. "Why aren't you a gentleman and give a girl a chance?"

  Séamus laughed. "I did give you lots of chances, but you never took them up."

  She screamed and pummeled him with the sides of her fists. After a while she said, "Man, you are so amazing. I've never seen any of our men move like you."

  "It's easy with a wooden stick," he told her. "The question is whether I can do the same with sharpened steel."

  She lay again on top of him and they rested there a while. He could feel her heart thumping through her breast against his rib-cage. "I'm going to tell the other girls we really are safe with you. Not that we doubted it before. But it's good to see you in action, Séamus FitzGerald."

  Yes, that's all I'm good for, he thought. But despite himself, he sensed his mood lift a little. For the first time in a couple of months, he felt some real mental focus and an escape from his routine plodding into dumb mistakes.

  Alice became increasingly excited about progress in the lab. A
bout a week later, the three letters were exchanged for the missing numbers, one per day, without any noticeable slowdown. Less than two weeks after that, she sat down to dinner with Séamus in the cafeteria wearing a knowing smile. She split a beer between them in plastic cups and announced a toast. "Today I can say with confidence, we have a number-based creole. Here's to the girls!"

  "All my questions are going to be the usual ones," Séamus said, after he had also congratulated her, "so please go ahead and give me the details any way you wish."

  "Of course it's still developing," Alice added, "But there's a rock-solid foundation to it. New syntax is growing by the hour. They are having conversations they could never have had with the sign language. They can talk easily now about their aspirations, their concerns, their regrets, their fears, their dilemmas. They can add politeness, formality, offbeat humor, teasing, comforting, cajoling… they're so ready now to get deep into a topic and make sure everyone's contributing. I'm estimating that, at the rate they're going, it will look like a complete language in another four weeks. But here's the really exciting part. Our software is already learning from what they're doing. It's working out rules of grammar formation we didn't know before. It's allowing our systems to develop other number-based languages using this one as a template. It really looks like we are cracking some code within the language-building part of the brain." She reached across the table and took hold of Séamus's arms. "I really think we've just bought our ticket to finding out what this whole thing's about. Wilkie is making that case to the project leadership"

  Which included his boss, Séamus mused. In fact she had sent him a message the previous day saying she and several other government principals were coming the following week for a meeting at the facility. He wondered if that was a likely occasion for expanding the inner circle of knowledge-owners. It should have been by far his most critical thought around the meeting, yet he found himself thinking more about whether or not he would get the chance to sleep with her. He hated himself for obsessing on the idea, knowing there was a good chance they wouldn't even get any time alone. What made his mental state even more precarious was the fact that he and Sheryl had not exchanged any messages since their phone call. He had been unable to write her anything, as not telling the full truth would now seem like a lie. Her absence of contact could mean only one thing – she had given up on him, and had decided he wasn't worth further communication because he himself had not attempted any. He had allowed their relationship to fail in the most ignominious way because he had not had the courage to do anything. He couldn't do anything because he only wanted to spend his time with Barbara Coates.