Chapter 4

Julian is out getting lunch when Piper walks in on Thursday afternoon, looking lost and self-conscious and trailing behind them the mystery that will change Charles’ life.

“Hi,” says the visitor, standing in the middle of the empty waiting room and glancing around. “Are you the, um…?”

“Ah,” Charles says, his mind momentarily going white. Piper shifts their feet nervously and Charles automatically smiles his put-you-at-ease smile, which works to calm him down as much as it reassures Piper. “No, Julian—the private investigator—stepped out for a moment. I’m Charles Shelley, his assistant. But he’ll be back shortly. Please, take a seat.”

Piper nods and sinks into one of the stiff striped chairs. Charles bends over the case files he’s been working on but peers at Piper surreptitiously. The newcomer is around Charles’ age, he thinks, somewhere in their—her? his?—late twenties, with dark brown skin and black hair. Their appearance is extremely well curated. Their hair is parted to the side and slicked down in a black-and-white movie kind of way, and they wear large horn-rimmed glasses that diminish the contrast between their small features and large protruding ears. Their jacket is tweed, which Charles thinks ought to look pretentious on someone their age, but they wear it in a way that suggests they would look awkward and uncomfortable in something more modern. Their smooth round fingernails tap on the arm of the chair and one of their feet, crossed over the other, jiggles in their brown Oxfords.

“Can I get you a cup of coffee? Or tea?” Charles asks, leaning away from his desk so he can make eye contact with them. Eye contact is good, he reminds himself; it will make them feel less anxious. So will coffee or tea, which will also help him stall until Julian returns.

Piper hesitates. “Tea would be great. Thank you. If it’s not too much trouble.”

“Not at all,” Charles assures them, relieved to have something to do.

The coffeepot is small and has a chip in its rim. The bag of coffee grounds is nearly empty and the box reading “Assorted Teas” is stuffed with off-brand Scottish Breakfast.

“Black okay?” Charles calls into the waiting room. “I’m afraid we haven’t got cream or sugar.” Charles makes a mental note to ask Julian if he can buy some.

“That’s fine, thanks,” they say.

Charles fills the pot in the kitchen sink and pours it into the machine. After a long minute of silence in which Julian does not return, he sticks a teabag into a mug with “COMO ZOO, ST. PAUL” printed on the side, pours the hot water on top of it, and takes a deep breath.

“Here you are,” he says, smiling, as he steps back into the waiting room.

“Thanks.” They take the tea. Charles can see them relax a little as they breathe in the steam, their narrow shoulders settling into the chair. They take a sip, wincing at the heat, then rest the mug on their knee.

“This is not what I had expected a detective’s office would look like,” they say.

Charles laughs. “I know what you mean.”

“Not that I’m exactly sure what I was expecting.” Piper smiles at Charles cautiously, a crooked smile that takes away some of the gravity their professorial glasses and jacket add to their appearance. “Well, no, I know exactly what I was expecting. 221B Baker Street. A fireplace and pipe smoke and Mrs. Hudson bustling about with the breakfast plates.”

Charles’ stomach dips. He nods, trying not to seem too eager. “Exactly.” He hesitates for a fraction of a second, already feeling the disappointment of a blank stare, then goes ahead anyway. “I was thinking more along the lines of Sam Spade, when I first walked in myself. Bare lightbulbs and cigarette smoke.”

Piper’s eyes lit up. “And Brigid O’Shaughnessy crying in a corner. Yes.”

Charles laughs, warmth filling his chest. “But you know what I think it actually looks like?” He leans in. “I think it looks like an orthodontist’s office.”

Piper’s eyes widen. “That’s it. Oh my god, you’re right.” They look around, taking in the inoffensive wallpaper and the watercolor of a sailboat. “I think my orthodontist had that picture. That exact picture.”

“Mine had these chairs! I swear they were the exact same ones. I feel like I’m about to get my braces tightened every time I come in here.”

Piper gives a startled laugh, which is when Julian happens to walk in. The chime sounds as he opens the front door, and for a second he stops in the doorframe, taking it in: the client laughing, a cup of tea clutched in their hand, Charles leaning against the wall, surprised in the middle of his own mirth.

“Julian,” he says, standing abruptly upright, feeling as though he has been caught slacking off by the teacher. But Julian doesn’t look angry, just sort of blank and puzzled. For a moment, they stare at each other.

Then Julian’s face snaps back to normal, reserved and serious, and the young person stands, fingers suddenly tight around their mug of tea.

“I’m Piper Awasthi,” they say.

“Julian,” Julian replies. He inclines his head curtly in the direction of his office, and Charles takes that as his cue.

“Come on in, Piper,” he says warmly. “I’ll get your briefcase.”

Charles picks up Piper’s leather bag and follows the two of them into Julian’s office. As Piper sinks into the chair across the desk, Charles hesitates in the doorway, suddenly absurdly unsure whether he ought to stay or go despite his conversation with Julian just that morning. Julian frowns at him and he feels the back of his neck grow warm. Quickly, he shuts the door and takes a seat at his desk, grabbing paper and a pen to take notes; he’s not sure if that’ll be helpful, but it will give him something to do.

“What’s the trouble?” Julian asks Piper. He is doing a better job at making eye contact with Piper than he had with Charles at Charles’ interview, but only just.

“Well…” Piper hesitates. “I’m afraid you might think it’s nothing, but…” They shake their head, their thin eyebrows contracting. “No. I know it it’s not. So. My friend has gone missing. Her name is Lu Fairchild. Short for Lucretia, but she hates that. We’re both Ph.D. students at Schenley. Both working on our dissertations. English. I last saw her Sunday night, in our apartment. I’ve asked around and no one has seen her since.”

Their speech, Charles thinks, sounds rehearsed. Their fingers move, their thumbs running unconsciously over their smooth fingernails. They look very worried.

“All right. Let’s start by having you describe what happened the last time you saw her,” Julian says. He is very still, his voice quiet and even. The sense of witnessing something sacred, some kind of private rite, envelops Charles, and he struggles not to keep his eyes on Julian as Piper speaks.

“We just…We fell asleep. She wasn’t there in the morning.”

“Do you sleep in the same bed?” Julian asks.

Piper hesitates. “Sometimes. We did that night.”

“What did you do that evening, before you went to bed?”

Piper hesitates again, a ghost of a crooked grin crossing their face. That’s enough of an answer for Charles, but still Julian waits, his expression unchanging. Charles wonders if he really doesn’t understand—it seems ludicrous and yet somehow just possible—or if he wants Piper to spell it out for him.

“We had sex,” Piper answers finally, without a blush.

“Was there anything unusual about it?” Julian asks. Still his face retains a mild, sober expression. It isn’t a rude question, the way he asks it, but it catches Charles off guard nonetheless, his pen frozen above the paper.

Piper shrugs, another private smile flickering briefly across their face. “Not by our standards.”

Charles bites back a grin. Julian nods imperturbably. “And then?”

“We went to sleep. When I woke up, she was gone.” They pause, looking down at their knees. Charles can tell they’re on the verge of saying something difficult; his reporter senses are tingling. Julian is quiet, waiting.

“She left a note,” Piper says, reaching down for their briefcase. They pull out a white sheet of notebook paper, upon which Charles can see several bold lines of print, written in black ink. Julian reads over it in silence, then, without looking Charles’ way, passes it to him.

Piper,

I’ve decided it’s time for me to go. I think—I hope—you’ll understand why.

I’ll think of you often; try not to be blue for too long; and believe me to be, my dear friend,

Very sincerely yours,

Lu.

A lot of small things happen in the silence that follows. Piper puts one elbow on the desk and rests their forehead lightly against their extended fingertips, closing their eyes very gently. Julian watches them through long pale eyelashes, not speaking—unsure, Charles imagines, of what to say, of how to break it to Piper that a detective isn’t what they need. When Piper opens their eyes again Julian’s gaze skitters away, landing on Charles, who is surreptitiously taking a photo of the note with his camera phone for the agency’s records and firmly trying to talk his heart out of breaking.

“I know what it looks like,” Piper says into the silence, a little defiantly. “I know it looks like she just left. That I—that I just don’t want to admit it. But—” They shake their head, their whole face seeming suddenly to coalesce into something sharp and hard. “I know Lu. She wouldn’t leave, not right now, not like this, not—this isn’t right.” They look Julian right in the eye, with a force that even Charles can feel, and Julian shrinks almost invisibly backwards. “Something’s wrong about it, and I’m worried Lu’s in trouble.”

Julian takes the note back from Charles and slides it across the desk to Piper. “I can trace her either way,” he says quietly. “Whether she left of her own accord or not. That’s my job.”

Piper stares at him, then shakes their head vehemently. “No. No. That isn’t—there’s a difference. There’s a substantial difference between stalking someone who doesn’t want to be found and looking for somebody you think might be in trouble.”

“Not for me.”

The thing is, Charles thinks, as Piper’s long fingers clench and they look momentarily angry enough to storm out of the office, that he’s pretty sure Julian is trying to sound comforting. He’s encountered plenty of fictional detectives who are arrogant, antisocial bastards and Julian is emphatically not one of them. When he was on TV as a kid it was obvious to Charles that he cared both about solving puzzles and about helping the people caught up in them, and however shy he’s become Charles doesn’t think he’s changed so dramatically as that. He just…isn’t good at talking to people anymore.

“Then don’t,” Piper says abruptly. “If you think Lu left on her own, that she’s fine, then don’t take the case. Just—just don’t.”

Charles wants Julian to take this case, he realizes; maybe it’s because Piper is one of the first clients he’s met in an official capacity, or maybe it’s because of the moment he and Piper had shared before the detective came in, or maybe it’s because he just can’t stand the thought of a chance to watch Julian work slipping away. But slipping away it is—Charles can see it in the tension in Julian’s shoulders, hear it in the pause that grows more uncomfortable as time passes.

People skills. That’s what the Craigslist add had asked for. That’s what Julian wants from him. Charles flicks the little switch inside him that makes him into someone smooth and confident and speaks up.

“I think what Julian meant,” he says, and they both look at him—Piper guarded, Julian caught off guard—“is that right now, we don’t know enough for there to be a difference. We can’t tell if your friend left because she wanted to or because she had to. We could do a bit of preliminary investigating and see what turns up. Would that be okay?”

Piper’s face softens. Julian’s tightens, the skin around his eyes contracting as his eyes narrow, and Charles’ heart skips a beat. If he’s said the wrong thing…

“Yes,” Piper replies, relief evident in their voice. “Please.”

Julian nods. “All right then.” He stands. “I’d like to begin by seeing your apartment.”

“Now?” Piper asks.

“If that’s all right. The sooner the better.”

“Yes. Of course.”

“Did you drive?” Julian asks Piper, slipping into his long grey coat.

“I took the bus. I don’t have a car.”

“We’ll take mine, then,” Julian says, and walks out of the room. Piper grabs their briefcase and follows, and Charles finishes shoving his arm into the sleeve of his thick jacket and hurries after.