Logs:Of Hopes and Hotels (Or, A Break From Gaslighting)

Of Hopes and Hotels (Or, A Break From Gaslighting)
Dramatis Personae Kavalam, Murphy
In Absentia	2020-06-06 "Or am I just talkin' to empty space, again?"
Location <NYC> Boom Boom Room - Chelsea
At the top of the Standard Hotel on the High Line, this luxury restaurant and lounge offers breathtaking views of the Hudson and the glamorous clubs of of the Meatpacking District through floor-to-ceiling windows. The interior is striking, with a golden ceiling, dangling lights shaped like dandelion heads, polished brass fixtures, and plush leather seating. The booths are small conversation pits of flowing, organic design, all arranged around the eyecatching centerpiece: a horseshoe-shaped bar with gold countertops ringing a tree-like column lined with shelves of premium liquor, all lit up in warm amber light. Every night, New York's quality gather here to see and be seen, to hear the excellent live bands, sip expertly mixed libations and dine on the constantly rotating menu of delicacies. It's a busy evening and many of the tables are packed, the bar crowded with elegantly -- or at least expensively -- dressed patrons. Far down at the end there's -- not really an empty stool, not exactly, but nobody, at least, seems to be taking it. The half-finished plate of sliders and duck-fat fries sittng there beside a rum and coke are also -- largely skating by anyone's notice. As is the skinny bespectacled teenager in neat blue-and-gold embroidered mandarin-collar jacket with toggle fastenings, black slacks. Unlike some folks, Murphy isn't hard to notice. You'd probably have to go pretty far out of your way to not notice him. Even after three or four drinks, he looks like a man who's fighting his way through a perpetual, unending hang-over. An untucked indigo shirt, gray business jacket, gray slacks. Pale face lined with a constant five-o-clock stubble. The sort of jaw you could use to smash up concrete, dust off, then still take home to show to your ma. Right now, making his way toward the bar, one hand in his pocket. His eyes are firmly locked on the space directly adjacent of where Kavalam is sitting... which is probably a thing Kavalam is accustom to, by now. What he might not be accustom to is what happens next. Rather than settling half a dozen seats away, Murphy just plops down on the bar-stool two down from Kavalam -- leaving only one spot of space between them. He reaches into his jacket pocket, yanks out a foil of gum, then starts opening it... talking just above a whisper as he does. "So. ...you here?" He finishes unwrapping the gum, shoving it in. "Or am I just talkin' to empty space, again?" Chomp, chomp, chomp. At first there's silence. No reply for Murphy except the background thrum and chatter of alcohol-brightened voices in the expansive room. The bartender approaching to offer Murphy a menu, ask if he needs anything. Following that there's -- -- okay, still silence. And a slowly resolving presence coalescing at the end of the bar, insinuating himself into the scenery like he's been here all along -- -- which, to be fair, he has. Kavalam is nibbling slowly at a fry. Studying Murphy with faintly narrowed eyes from behind his half-frame glasses. "Again?" Blink. Chew. "Do you -- make that a habit?" There's a thick South Indian accent coloring his words. Murphy dismisses the bartender with a mutter of 'waiting for someone' under his breath. Meanwhile, he's keeping his eye on the surroundings, scanning the room -- as if trying to commit it to memory. As the silence mounts, he exhales, brows pinching together in frustration. He closes his eyes and recalls what he's seen. His left eyebrow starts to... twitch. Just a little. Just as he's ready to give up, the silence breaks. Murphy nearly lunges up from his seat -- which is funny, since -- to anyone else! -- it looks like he was just scared out of his wits by someone who was there all along. His gaze focuses on Kavalam. His own eyes narrow, studying the teen. He speaks slowly and deliberately, to himself: "Boy. Fifteen, maybe sixteen. Glasses. Light brown skin. Black hair. Scrawny -- 90? 100 pounds." Then: "Again, yeah. You've got some trick there, kid. Makes you slippery as an eel." Kavalam's head ducks when Murphy startles. "I'm sorry," he says automatically, "I didn't mean to --" His lips compress. His brows knit as Murphy speaks. "That won't work. It never --" But here he hesitates. Leans sliiightly back away from the man, even with the space of the empty stool between them. "Slippery? Are you looking for me?" With a sudden widening of his eyes: "Did my parents send you?" A little bit of the tension eases out of Murphy when Kavalam apologizes. More of that tension bleeds away when he mentions his parents -- as if something is just occurring to him: "Christ. This doesn't... your parents, do they..." His eyes drift to the half-eaten plate of food, lingering on the rum-and-coke. His nostrils flare. One possible answer dawns on him. "...Christ. No. No one sent me. But yeah, I've been looking for you. Your parents -- they remember you. Right?" There's almost an edge of pleading in his voice. As if he's saying: 'Please don't tell me this sucks as much as I suspect it does'. Kavalam bows his head, turns slightly away, but it's not possible to hide the sudden extinguishing of the light that had just begun to kindle in his expression. "Oh." It's softer than his last question, a little shakier. He takes a large bite of one of his sliders, chews it longer than necessary before he swallows and manages to speak again. "I don't know." Quiet as well. "I didn't see them for a while and they stopped answering my..." He blinks, shakes his head, takes another fry. "Why did you find me, then? How did you find me?" Whelp! "Jesus. Jesus. I'm sorry." Murphy lifts his hand to his face, pinching the bridge of his nose and rubbing. "Didn't know you were a kid, either. Should have figured, given..." He doesn't finish that sentence. "I... it's hard to explain. I remember things. Everything, in fact. I don't remember you, but..." His hand lowers from his face. He refocuses his gaze on Kavalam. "...I'll remember this conversation. I just won't remember your parts." "Remember things. Remember everything." Kavalam's laugh is a little bit rough at the edges. Short lived, too, before he presses his palm to his mouth to stifle it. "Yes. I can see how maybe that would do it. I wish that were a trick you could teach." He stares down at his plate -- then over at Murphy. "It is not, is it?" "No. Even if I could, you got no idea what it's like, remembering every goddamn little thing. Even the shit you don't want to remember. After a while, it just feels like... shards of glass in your brain. And then there's all the times you feel like everyone's constantly messing with you, acting like they don't remember a thing when you remember it, but no matter how hard you try they still don't --" Murphy pauses. Backs up. Then: "...yeah, okay. Maybe that one, you get." He inhales. "What's your name? I'm Murphy." "It is not a good feeling. Like everyone is gaslighting you about your own -- experiences or existence, even if you know they do not mean it." Kavalam draws a fry lightly through some of the juice that has dripped out of one of his tiny burgers. "Kavalam. You -- but why are you here? You had to look." He looks up from his plate, eyes fixing back on Murphy. "You had to be good at looking." "It's hard to realize that. That they don't mean it. And even if they don't, it still feels like they do." Murphy's eyes have drifted back toward the bar, for a moment. Lost in thought. "Kavalam," he repeats. "There. I'll remember your name, now." His attention drifts back to the teenager. "I'm pretty good at looking, yeah. One of the benefits of having perfect recall." He taps the side of his head. "Makes detective work a hell of a lot easier." "You're a detective?" Though that spark of hope had been quenched earlier, now it is re-lighting. Kavalam looks at Murphy with renewed interest, swiveling on his stool to face the man properly. "Are you -- expensive? How do I -- how do you take -- I don't know what hiring a detective is like. I have some money." Murphy isn't expecting the sudden change of interest. His eyebrows launch up toward his hairline; his head cocks to the side -- like a crow watching a human trying to communicate with it. "Well, I ain't cheap, but..." His brow crinkles into a tightening knot. Eyeing Kavalam cautiously... but also very curiously. "What's the job?" Kavalam frowns just slightly, his hand dropping to fidget with his glass. "I can get more money. If I need. I just. Nobody else even remembers if I ask for --" His eyes lower, his brows pinching deeper. "I need you to find my parents." Those eyebrows of his manage to inch even higher, somehow. Murphy gets them under control, then takes in a slow, big breath. There's quite a long stretch of silence before he responds. He's thinking about his next words very carefully: "Look, kid... Kavalam. Look. Kavalam." He slides a hand into his pocket, fishing something out. "I'm not gonna take your money. Also, be careful with this whole... thing you're doing, okay? This power of yours, it puts you in a real dangerous place. I ain't gonna tell you not to steal, but..." He looks to the plate -- the rum, the coke. "Be careful about what you steal. Nobody's gonna look twice if you snatch a free lunch, but you start stealing cash...? Lots of cash...? Somebody's gonna notice. And then, somebody's gonna get hurt. Maybe not you. But somebody." Then, back to Kavalam. He's managed to pull the item out of his pocket; it's his business card. He slides it toward him, speaking softly. "I'll help you find your parents. Hell, I owe you. You could've driven me nuts with this trick of yours. You know how long this has been driving me up a wall? Seeing six people, but only rememberin' five?" "I am fifteen, I am not even American, and as soon as I am out of sight everybody forgets I exist. I will let you guess how trying to have a proper job goes." Kavalam draws in a slow breath, eyes slanting aside to fix on the floor. "... but I will be careful." He turns forward again, nibbling once more at his fries. "Thank you. I don't want to hurt anyone. I just want to -- go home." Murphy scratches his jaw, thinking. The card he's slid toward Kavalam is neatly printed on white (it looks pretty cheap, though). It declares: MURPHY LAW. PRIVATE INVESTIGATOR. It's even got its own little motto: ```The Guy YOu Call When Everything That Could Go Wrong... Did.```"Not-American," he states. Committing it to memory. "Wants to go home." Like he's taking dictation. And, really... in a way, isn't that precisely what he's doing? "I got a place you can hold up in, if you need it. I mean, it ain't..." he gestures at the hotel around them. Then, he fishes out a pen from one of his jacket pockets, flips the card over -- and scribbles down an address. "But at least someone'll know you're there." Kavalam picks up the card. Scrutinizes it a very long time before tucking it into the breast pocket of his jacket. "Is that good or bad? At least when nobody is noticing me --" His smile is just a little thin, here. Just a little crooked. "Like if you take me home and killed me, who would ever know?" The smile is -- very short lived. "I guess that is as true sitting right here as anywhere else. Um. Thank you. I don't know how this works. Should I -- email you? Meet you again? There is a lot to tell." The corner of his mouth twitches, fleeting and difficult to decipher. "It has been a while since anyone could listen." "No one would," Murphy replies. It's almost... automatic. "That's what I mean about you bein' in a dangerous position. It protects you, yeah -- but it also makes you vulnerable." Again, his nostrils flare. "But, yeah. I'll know you're here, too. And... Christ, if you leave me a message... will I remember it? Or will I have to read it aloud?" Again, he pinches the bridge of his nose. "We gotta see how this works -- how your thing interacts with my thing. I can't see you on tapes, but when I remember the tape, I know something's off. Is it the same for recordings of your voice? Emails? Dunno." "We'll schedule another face-to-face. I'll bring some shit we can experiment with -- we'll figure out... what I gotta do, to remember you. Communicate. How I can keep all the details in my head. That way, you only gotta tell me this story once."