I used to watch the birds, the unruly tribe of squirrels and the people. Strolling, jogging, thinking, talking, on mobile phones, to themselves, reading, eating lunch, clutching cardboard coffees, falling in love, falling out, in couples, in groups, alone, crying, laughing, sleeping, even dying – just once – he was old. And a tramp. It was better than a movie, because it was real.

~~~~~~~~~~

I first noticed her a couple of months ago. Always on her own. Never made eye contact with anyone. Something in the way she held herself said – keep your distance.

She wasn’t pretty, but there was an intensity about her that drew you in and held you there. She moved like a dancer – tall, willowy. Her long, colourless hair was never still; the air teased the fine strands, almost hiding her face. She didn’t look English, yet she didn’t look foreign. Sometimes she didn’t quite look human. I called her Titania.

She often read. Never books. Always an iPad. Sometimes she just sat. She had her favourite seat, but if it was taken there was another a little way along to its right that would do. They both faced the Walnut tree. They both faced me.

She ate apples – bags of them, usually Granny Smiths, occasionally Braeburns, or Pink Ladys.

Every weekday she came, but never at the weekend.

The weather was mostly good that Spring, but even on rainy days she appeared in an unwieldy black raincoat and men’s wellies – the sort builders wear with a pale cuff that’s turned over. On those days she brandished a huge yellow umbrella.

I would get quite frantic if I saw her seats were taken. I would will the usurpers to move and it always worked. She’d arrive around eleven fortyfive and leave at one fifteen. Maybe it was her way of wiling away her lunch hour, but I didn’t think so. I never imagined she worked in an office. Nothing so prosaic. I imagined it was just her routine. I feared the day when something would change that routine.

And then it did.

~~~~~~~~~~

It was eleven fortyseven and I was relieved to see her entering the square from the left, as usual. She headed straight for her seat, reached into her bag, retrieved an apple – a Granny Smith that day, and her iPad.

She’d been there for half an hour when a man, fortyish, in a shiny suit, settled his large butt on the other end of her bench. He undid his jacket releasing his paunch and his eyes slid towards her. I watched them – he casting surreptitious glances, she locked in her private space. He said something to her and she answered. I could see her lips deliver one short sentence. She never raised her eyes. He made no further attempts. I wanted to know what she said that cut all conversation dead. He stared at the ground in front of his shoes. They looked tired and dusty, like they’d seen better days. After a while he stood up, sneaked a last quick look and moved on.

A short woman and a thin, tall man wandered past. They held hands and headed for the spot Mr Shiny-Suit had just vacated. They didn’t speak, but they both wore smiles. I remember envying them. I remember thinking – I’d love to put a smile like that on Titania’s face – I bet she looks beautiful when she smiles. But even as I thought it, I knew it could never happen.

My attention was drawn to a kerfuffle on the far side of the square – a heated altercation between two young men. Their voices carried, even across the garden and through the glass between us. When I looked back she was rummaging in her bag. She pulled out her mobile phone – I’d never seen her use one before – answered it, and in one swift movement stood and ran. I watched her rush through the gate she’d calmly opened just quarter of an hour earlier. I watched her until she disappeared, still running, turning right down a street more than a hundred yards away. Her sudden departure shook me. Nothing had ever encroached on her time in the square. I had imagined her existing in isolation, much like myself.

I was about to turn away when my eye was drawn back to the bench. In her haste she’d left her iPad. I was outside on the pavement before I realised what I was doing. I ran across the road and over the grass, sidestepping a group of mums with buggies and crawling babies, hurdling two women stretched out on a blanket. My gaze never strayed from the bench, everything else a blur. I reached for the iPad, startling the smiling couple. I picked it up and clutching it to my thudding chest, sprinted back across the green. Stepping into the road a loud honk made me stumble back onto the kerb and lose my footing. An irate cabbi shook his fist at me. I looked down at my feet. I was still wearing my slippers.

Back within my own four walls a delayed panic set in. I couldn’t believe what I’d done. I was amazed that I’d dared leave my flat in daylight, the square still teeming with people.

Sometimes, when the shadows were at their deepest, when even the orange of London’s night grew thick and dense, I allowed myself to enter the square. Sometimes I grabbed a couple of hours of solitude before a pale light seeped into the dirty brown sky and I was forced to retreat. Sometimes I sat on her seat, air moving over my face, sifting through the hairs on my bare arms. I breathed. And I imagined I was like everyone else.

You see – I stink.

I suffer from a disease called Trimethylaminuria and I stink of rancid fish, rotten eggs, bad meat, stale urine.

It informs my behaviour. It defines me. Change the tense and it will be my epitaph.

 That day it took me at least ten minutes to calm myself. I placed her iPad on the end of my desk. First, I needed to clear my head. Second, I needed to be in the right frame of mind incase I learned something about her I didn’t like. I covered it with the Maplins catalogue and returned to the window, hoping for some other distraction to occupy my mind. It didn’t work.

In a way I hoped she’d return, just so I could see she was all right. So I could see her again. In another, I hoped she wouldn’t, for I couldn’t have returned her iPad to her. Not then. But I couldn’t stop looking out for her.

I slept through the next twenty hours, a troubled sleep. I couldn’t bring myself to get up and face the day. The trauma of the day before had left me drained.

In thirty-two years I had never felt a desire to get to know another person. My condition had always made friendships impossible and from an early age I abandoned the idea of ever having a relationship with anyone. So what was it about Titania? I knew nothing about her, other than she spent an hour and a half sitting in my garden square five days out of seven and she liked apples. Her colouring implied she was Northern European. Slim and athletic, she preferred loose, masculine styled clothing and neutral colours to girlish frills and flounces. I didn’t know where she came from, whether or not she had any relatives, what she did for a living, who she loved, who loved her, what she liked about this world, her life or what brought her to my garden square.

Hacking into Titania’s iPad would be child’s play compared to what I did for a living. The British Government pays me to hack into their computer systems. They do that because if they didn’t, they know I’d be doing it anyway. They know they’re better off paying me to tell them where their holes are, rather than having me, or someone like me, find them and send in an army of viruses to play havoc with our national security. The truth is they caught me doing just that ten years ago. If I’d refused their offer I’d be writing this from a prison cell.

I discovered her name was Raisa Demidov and she was Russian. From there it became difficult. All her correspondence was written in her country’s strange language and it looked to me like a severe dyslexic’s first attempts at writing. The strange symbols reminded me of the runes and hieroglyphs carved into stone that had fascinated me as a child on my only visit to the British Museum.

But… Where there’s the internet… There’s a way.

I searched numerous translation sites, most of which, once I’d got past the price lists and copious testimonials, were little more than ‘introduction’ agencies – a foolproof route to marriage and virtual happiness. I eventually found one that seemed genuine. Rosetta Translation Services. I spoke to a real person on the telephone: a woman with a thick accent, who patiently explained their processes and the sums of money involved. They offered me a twentyfour hour turn-around service at a rate of five cents per word. We negotiated and agreed a flat fee of $500.00 for fifteen thousand words.

I copied and pasted almost two hundred emails into a word document, attached it, paid by Paypal and clicked the send button. Meanwhile I trawled back through the messages and with the help of Google Translate, attempted to learn a little more.

Certain words came up frequently – MockBá – Moscow, and the word for university, which although sounds close to English, I couldn’t even begin to type on a western keyboard. I began to recognise several names due to the frequency of their use – Filipp, Grigoriy, Magda, Timur and Ilya Boreyev, but little else made any sense. I gave up after a couple of hours, accepting I would have to wait until my translation came through.

Changing tack, I left her emails to one side and investigated the other apps on her machine. She’d downloaded a heap of books, mostly Russian, but there were a few English language titles: some classics – The Brontes, Jane Austen, Forster, Elliot, and some contemporary authors – Updike, Roth, Attwood and Lessing. If her taste in literature was anything to go by she was well read and presumably well educated. Apart from the fiction there were scientific reference books. Again, some ‘popular’ titles in English I recognised. A few I even had on my own bookshelves, although I’d only ever skimmed them, dipping in and out of their dense concepts: Carl Segan – Pale Blue Dot. Stephen Hawking – A Brief History of Time. Brian Greene – The Hidden Reality: Parallel Universes and the Deep Laws of the Cosmos. I typed the Russian names of others into Google Translate and they sounded completely unfathomable: Partial Differential Equations for Scientists and Engineers: Fouriers Series and Boundary Value Problems: Electromagnetism, Principles and Applications. I remembered with a sinking feeling my studies for A’ level Maths and Physics. But this was way beyond A’ level. Could Titania, or Raisa, as I had to learn to call her, be some kind of Physicist? Or perhaps she just had a very enquiring mind?

I felt lightheaded, knew I should eat and wandered through to the kitchen. Apart from a pint of Almond milk, a few slightly wizened tomatoes and a flaccid looking cling-filmed chicken breast the fridge was empty.

I returned to my desk and put in an on-line order with Waitrose. I buy the same stuff every week so it’s easy. I have to be careful with my diet – TMAU means my body can’t process choline, a substance that’s present in most foods and necessary for the health of the liver and kidneys. But certain foods contain more choline than others and if I avoid them my odour is reduced to a level that I, at least, can bear.

 I am someone who eats to live. I avoid meat, other than chicken, dairy, other than Feta cheese – my occasional treat, eggs, fish, cruciferous vegetables, pulses, bread, onions, garlic and any seasoning, including salt and pepper. A general rule of thumb – if it smells going in, it will smell worse coming out. I’ve tried not eating, but up till now a sense of survival has always cut in, preventing me from doing away with myself.

I paid the usual seventy quid for my groceries and was about to return to the kitchen and my chicken when an email notification popped up. It was from the Rosetta Translation Services. The email read:

Dear Mr Brownlow,

Thank you for your business. We have translated 6,500 words of your documents but find we are unable to continue.

Unfortunately, due to the delicate subject matter contained in your correspondence, none of our standard translators are available. If you wish to continue I will have to charge you $0.20 per word and employ a specialist.

I have refunded the amount of $250.00 to your Paypal account.

If I can be of further assistance do not hesitate to contact me.

There was one attachment.

That would come to more than two thousand dollars. Serious money – I’d initially balked at five hundred. I presumed they would have begun their translation at the beginning of my document, which was a transcript of Raisa’s emails from about two months ago. I might, at the very least, learn what had brought her to my square, for I was sure she’d not turned up by chance.

I grilled the chicken and tomatoes and ate standing in the kitchen, forcing the food through the imagined blockage in my throat that made swallowing an effort. It was growing dark when I sat down to read. It was growing light by the time I’d finished.

It turned out that Raisa was a postgraduate student of Astrophysics at Moscow University. Her research involved investigating the fundamental properties of substances at their microscopic partial level. She was undertaking further research in the macroscopic properties of matter under extreme conditions based on microscopic matter structure. What that meant in layman’s terms, I had no idea, but it seemed she was at the top of her game.

The translation began mid-way through correspondence between her and the head of her department, Professor Budnikov. She must have requested time off from her research. Professor Budnikov was agreeing to a six month sabbatical, but not before expressing his worries for her welfare. His fears seemed to be in relation to her brother, Filipp, and the Professor obviously knew something of his business.

He wrote –

Filipp’s world is not your world. You do not know these people, Raisa. They are beyond the law. Lawless. No – more than that – they are dangerous! They will stop at nothing to protect their interests. You must be careful. Stay in touch with us at all times. Please. Do you have one special friend, or colleague, you can trust?

Next, was a series of letters between her and a girlfriend – Magda Lesnichy. She explained to Magda that Filipp had disappeared and she’d not heard from him for over a month. She believed he’d fled to England and she wanted to find him and make sure he was safe. Magda wrote –

Are you crazy? You can’t help him. Your studies have addled your brain. Or those scary x-ray machines have killed off too many of your brain cells. He knew what he was getting into. I don’t want you to do this.

Raisa asked her friend if she could lend her some money – two thousand dollars. She also asked if she could pass on any contacts she had in England. She would need a job, a place to live and money for rent.

Magda agreed and they arranged to meet the next day. She gave Raisa an email address for a Grigoriy Pankov who owned a nightclub in London. He was always looking for dancers, waitresses, escorts… And then she wrote – But Raisa, I thought you’d put all that behind you?

Raisa replied – Thanks to Filipp… It was only his love and generosity that enabled me to return to my studies. That’s why I must help him now.

I took a break. I didn’t want to know what she’d put behind her. I didn’t want to know what her brother was involved in. I didn’t want to know what danger she was in. I made myself a herbal tea, turned down the lights, lit a candle to focus my mind and lay down on the sofa. I hoped half an hour’s meditation would give me the courage to continue. I was in half a mind to take the translation, along with Raisa’s iPad and all memory of her, and bury them in our large communal refuse bin. But I couldn’t. Twenty minutes later I was back at my desk.

Raisa had made contact with Grigoriy who replied by return saying he remembered her well from her time as a dancer on The Riverboat, back when he was a mere security officer. He’d moved up in the world since then and now managed a very ‘classy’ venue in London. Work was offered in return for a room in a house with some of his girls and fifty dollars per week. She would, of course, be entitled to keep any tips she earned. He explained his clientelle numbered some very important Russian businessmen and local dignitaries, so a woman of her refinement would be a valuable addition to his staff.

I wondered what kind of local dignitary frequented nightclubs in West London with Russian businessmen. I couldn’t picture my quiet, fair, studious Titania as a nightclub entertainer, or worse – the vile reality of whatever that role actually entailed.

The next series of emails were between Raisa and two men named Evgeny and Maksim. They both had the same surname – Sochinsky, so I presumed they were brothers. They had been friends or colleagues of Filipp’s, but something had happened to change their view. At first they were dismissive and mocking and refused to help, but after several pleading letters, and an offer of two hundred dollars, they passed on a little information.

They too believed Filippe had fled to England. It seemed he had in some way double-crossed a guy called Ilya Boreyev, which had led to the collapse of their operation, leaving the Brothers Sochinsky without work. I say work, but it sounded like they were involved in some kind of smuggling. I thought it was probably drugs or maybe human trafficking. Whatever it was, Filipp had managed to piss-off a whole heap of crazy Russians.

They supplied Raisa with a name, Timur, and a mobile number to call when she arrived in England. They reckoned he would have been Filipp’s contact and would know more than they did, and possibly where he was now and what he was doing. The Brothers Sochinsky told Raisa that if she found Filippe she should let him know – Ilya Boreyev had threatened to kneecap him if he came across him first. They also warned her that Timur wasn’t the friendly, easygoing type either, having spent most of the eighties and nineties behind bars for crimes ranging from drug dealing to kidnapping and extortion.

There was a confirmation of her flight booking – a oneway ticket to Heathrow on March 20^th and more correspondence with Professor Budnikov who helped her to arrange her visa. The penultimate email confirmed to Grigoriy her estimated time of arrival. She supplied her mobile number and arranged to contact him on her arrival in the UK.

The final email was from Magda. She wrote – I will pray for you every day. Keep in touch. I will worry until you return safely and I curse that no-good brother of yours.

I wrote out a list of all the information I had gathered:

Raisa Demidov: Student in Astrophysics at Moscow University.

Tel: +7927883246430

Arrived in the UK March 20^th.

Brother: Filippe Demidov

Friend: Magda Lesnichy

London Contact: Grigoriy Pankov – Manager @ Streblinski’s Night Club, Warwick Road, Earl’s Court, SW5 9SH

Filippe’s Contact:  Timur 07957884329

I wasn’t sure what to do next, but I was exhausted. I had a pounding headache from staring at my laptop screen for almost ten hours without a break. As the sun came up, I lay down and slept like a dead man. Just after one the doorbell buzzed me awake.

My Waitrose order had arrived and I busied myself carrying it up the stairs, unpacking it and filling my cupboards and fridge, whilst weighing up all the possible courses of action open to me.

1)    Do nothing.

2)    Do nothing, other than bin the translation and the iPad.

3)    Send Raisa an email (would she have the type of mobile that received email? Probably – she was an Astrophysicist, after all) explaining that I have her iPad.

4)    Send her a text message – as above.

5)    Contact Grigoriy.

6)    Contact Timur.

Number 4 seemed the best option and the only one that could safely hide my identity. I opened a new Gmail account under the name of Simon Granger, a name I made up on the spot, and wrote her a short note.

Dear Raisa,

I have your iPad. You left it on a bench in the square at Fernhill Gardens.

Please contact me and I can arrange its return.

Best regards,

Simon.

Within a few seconds Raisa’s iPad emitted a beep. I unlocked it and saw the number one in the red circle above the white envelope. I opened up her email with trembling hands only to feel very foolish. It was, of course, my own note landing in her inbox.

There was nothing more I could do for the time being. I’d not worked for two days, not answered an email, nor had I sent in a report and I’d be receiving irate messages in my own inbox if I didn’t get down to some serious graft. I made myself a light supper – the usual grilled chicken and salad – sat back at my desk and tried to concentrate. I answered a few emails and checked on a few blogs I follow, which wasted a couple of hours. At 4pm she replied.

– Who are you?

Succinct.

– Simon Granger. Just an innocent observer who happened to find your iPad. I only wish to return it.

Two minutes passed

–      How did you find out my name?

–      Easy. Hacked in to your iPad. Your security is weak.

–      Are you Russian?

–      With a name like Simon Granger? No

–      Do you speak Russian?

Now I was in a quandary. I felt I needed to come clean and admit to having some understanding of her situation, but I also needed her to trust me if I was going to make any progress. In that moment I realised how much I wanted to see her again. I wrote.

–      No, but I admit to having had some of your emails translated. I am concerned for your safety. I am a friend, or I can be if you trust me.

Five minutes passed. I thought I’d blown it.

–      Trust you? You don’t know what you are asking. I trust no one.

–      What would make you trust me?

Trust. What did I know about trust?

My disease is a genetic defect – a recessive gene both my parents must have carried in order for me to inherit it. You might have expected them to feel guilty, or at least acknowledge responsibility. But no. They dumped me on the doorstep of a children’s home before I’d had time to file them away as a memory. I grew up surrounded by children without ever managing to make one friend. I’ve lived alone since I turned seventeen. I am alone. I will always be alone. What could I possibly know about trust?

Raisa didn’t reply. I stayed up until after midnight, almost falling asleep at my desk. I went to bed feeling despondent and sure that I’d never hear from her again.

I woke early, made a herbal tea, exercised for an hour on the rower and bike, worked with the free weights, had a shower and a shave, then looked at my watch – seven am. I couldn’t put it off any longer. I opened up my laptop and checked my emails. There was one message. And it was from Raisa.

–      I need to hear your voice. Call me. +7927883246430

It was the same number I’d already noted down. I could understand why she wanted to hear me, but that didn’t make me any more willing to call her. I rarely spoke to anyone, let alone a complete stranger who was probably in mortal danger, due to her brother having fucked with the Russian mafia. But on the other hand, what had I got to lose? My wonderful, solitary existence, which up till now had contained not the faintest possibility of change? I called her. She picked up on the seventh ring.

‘Raisa. It’s Simon.’

‘Simon?’

‘Your iPad.’ I was so nervous I’d forgotten how to form a sentence.

‘Hello. Yes. Simon. The man with the machine…’

‘So… What can I say? What do you want to know?’

‘How did you find it?’

‘I live in a flat that looks on to the square. I was watching you. You answered your phone and ran. And in your haste you left your…’ She interrupted,

‘That day. How long had you been watching me?’

‘Since you first sat down.’

‘Did you see the man who sat next to me?’

‘The fat man? In the shiny suit?’

‘Yes that’s him. Would you know him again?’ I was confused by her question. Although her spoken English was excellent, her accent was strong, a bit like the woman’s from Rosetta Translation Services, but deeper, and more sultry.

‘Know him?’ I repeated.

‘If he returned to the square would you recognise him?’

‘Oh. Er… Yes… Probably… Why?’

‘I need you to tell me if you see him again. In the square.’

‘OK. But can you tell me why?’

‘Not now. I have to go. I will call you later.’

‘OK… When?’ She hung up.

So what I had witnessed that day wasn’t an innocent exchange between two strangers. I wondered if the fat man was Grigoriy, or Timur? A shiver traced my spine.

I checked my bank balance. £504.68. I couldn’t afford to translate the remaining emails. I didn’t get paid for another ten days. I regretted buying my new computer the month before – it had cleaned me out. But I wasn’t to know that I’d urgently have need of $2,000. I’d have to wait for her phone call. I made another herbal tea and took up my vantage point at the window. Perhaps Mr Shiny-Suit would return and I’d have something to report back to Raisa.

I looked down onto the square with new eyes. I was suspicious of everything and everyone. I no longer saw lovers smiling, women gossiping, children playing, friends chatting, individuals relaxing. I saw secret assignations, spies, informers, plants, diversions and collusions.

I managed to work for a while that afternoon. I had to accept that Raisa could disappear from my life as suddenly as she’d arrived. I had to try to behave as if everything was normal.

She called at six o’clock that evening. Her number didn’t come up on my screen, but I answered anyway.

‘Simon.’

‘Hi. Yes. Where are you calling from?’

‘It doesn’t matter… A call box. Have you seen him?’

‘Mr Shiny-Suit?’

‘Of course.’

‘Can’t you tell me what’s going on? Then at least I know who I’m looking for…’ There was a long silence. I thought she’d hung up.

‘Raisa?’

‘I’m still here… I can’t.’

‘Why not? Maybe I can help?’

‘I think not.’

‘You don’t trust me.’

‘I don’t know you… I have to go. Sorry.’

‘Don’t go. What about your iPad?’

‘Derrmo! Oh… Sorry… Maybe we should meet. Yes?’

‘Yes. When?’

We arranged to meet at ten o’clock the next evening. I had to persaude her to meet in the square. She was nervous of the fat man, but I couldn’t even consider travelling further afield. My hands began to shake as soon as I hung up. What on earth had I agreed to? I wanted to see her again, to look at her again, not to meet her. The thought of leaving the flat filled me with dread. The thought of being anywhere near her terrified me. We wouldn’t even get to the part about building trust. I’d hand over her iPad, she’d take one breath and I’d be waving goodbye.

The next day I didn’t eat, deciding it safest to avoid everything. I sat at my computer, but couldn’t focus. I tried to read, but the words swam on the page, the letters making as much sense as the Russian in Raisa’s emails. I drank gallons of water thinking I’d flush out as many toxins as I could, but then I couldn’t stop peeing. I worked out, pushing myself hard for two hours in the hope that I’d sweat so much there’d be nothing left by the time we met. I felt quite ill. I meditated for two hours and began to prepare at eight. I bathed and scrubbed and shaved and doused myself in cologne. I changed three times, finally settling on a loose black shirt and jeans. Then I sat at the window and watched the sky grow dark.

It had been raining all day and it had only just stopped. My window was open wide. The birds were singing at top volume. The squirrels were scurrying up and down the trunk of the Walnut. Everything was dripping and glossy. Low sunbeams were poking through the trees like long pale fingers and I could smell the Bluebells.

At five to ten I saw her approaching the square. She was wearing jeans, a white tshirt and a loose, pale cardigan, the sleeves rolled up to the elbows. I picked up her iPad and walked slowly down the stairs, my heart pounding in my chest.

By the time I entered the square she was there. I sat down on the bench next to her leaving as much space between us as I could.

‘Hi.’ I said.

‘Hi, Simon. I’m Raisa.’ She turned towards me and stretched out her hand. Flustered, I thrust her iPad into it. She almost dropped it.

‘Thank you.’ She said. I couldn’t look at her. I breathed in through my nose, worried that she would already have caught a whiff of me. All I could smell were Bluebells. Relieved, and at a loss as to what else to say, I blurted out,

‘Can you smell the flowers. The Bluebells?’

‘No. I can’t.’

‘They’re lovely. Like clean washing… dried outside.’

‘I wouldn’t know.’

‘Don’t you dry washing outside, in Russia?’

‘No. I don’t. But it’s not that. I can’t smell.’

‘You can’t smell?’

‘No. I think you call it anosmia. I was ill as a child and since then…’ I began to laugh. She looked alarmed.

‘I’m sorry. It’s not you. It’s just that… I’ve never met anyone that can’t smell. It’s unusual.’

‘Not that unusual. If there’s a name for it, it must be quite… quite normal.’

‘Oh, I’m sure. Yes. Quite normal. What is normal anyway? Are any of us normal?’

‘I don’t know. But it’s not so bad. Not all smells are good smells. Though it means I don’t taste much. Food is not very interesting for me. I eat to live, rather than the other way.’

‘Is that why you eat so many apples?’

‘Yes. I suppose. Apples I seem to be able to taste – the sweet and the sour – both at once. I love apples… So tell me about yourself, Simon. You know all about me.’

I could have told her then. But I didn’t.

‘I’m very boring. I work at a computer all day. I live alone. I don’t go out… much.’

‘Why?’

‘It’s a bit like agoraphobia. You know it?’

‘Yes. I know it. So… It’s a big thing you meeting me here. Tonight.’

‘Yes. It’s a big thing.’ She was quiet.

‘Do you want to stay for a while… And talk?’ I asked.

‘I suppose.’ She said. I dared to look at her then. She was even more arresting without the distance of the square between us. Her profile was fine, her skin almost translucent, her eyes grey and serious.

‘You could tell me about Mr Shiny-Suit?’

‘I don’t know him.’

‘You could tell me what you do know.’

‘I don’t know where to start.’

 ‘I’ve always found the beginning to be a very good place.’ Then she laughed. And she looked beautiful.

‘We never knew our father.’ She began. ‘And my mother died when I was eight. Filipp, my brother – he’s ten years older than me – he brought me up. We struggled. He had three or four jobs, all casual, only cash, and he ended up in jail for tax avoidance. I was fifteen. Suddenly on my own. I’d been doing really well at school. I’m quite… clever… studying comes easy to me… but I had to leave school and support myself for a while. I met Magda and she got me a job at The Riverboat.’

‘What did you… do… at The Riverboat?’

‘I was a dancer… I was more than a dancer…’ She paused. Her voice was almost a whisper.

‘I had no choice.’

‘I’m not judging you. I understand what it’s like to have no parents. And what it’s like to be on your own. I’ve not always worked on the right side of the law myself. You do what you have to… To survive.’

‘Yes… To survive… Sometimes I wonder if it’s worth it. No?’

‘Yes. It’s worth it. It has to be. Now you are at university. In Moscow. Things have worked out for you both?’

‘When Filippe was released he was so angry to find me working at The Riverboat. He’d met many criminals in prison and he asked them to give him work. He began driving for this man, a terrible man, Ilya Boreyev. But he began bringing home good money and for the first time we rented a decent appartment. He made me go back to school. It was good for a while.’

‘What went wrong?’

‘They were smuggling.’

‘Drugs?’

‘No.’

‘Not people?’

‘No… Caviar.’

‘Caviar? You’re joking.’

‘No. I’m not joking. The UN decided that the Sturgeon was an endangered species and exporting caviar became difficult. Since then the black market has become more and more profitable. More so than cocaine or heroin. Filipp was a member of one of the gangs that smuggled Beluga Caviar into the UK. His boss, Ilya Boreyev is a very rich man and was getting richer by the day until someone informed on him.’

‘And everyone thinks it was Fillipp. Was it him?’

‘I don’t know. Maybe. Perhaps the police struck some kind of a deal with him. Or maybe he is just the scapegoat. I can’t find out.’

‘Why do you come to Fernhill Gardens? This square?’

‘Filippe got a message to me. Through a friend – Magda. He said to meet him in this square between 11.45 and 1.15. He said to wait there and he would come to me. So I did. Everyday, other than the weekend. I work at the weekend.’

‘The other day in the square, who called you?’

‘The fat man – Mr Shiny-Suit. –  He told me I should answer the call when it came. Because it would be about my brother.’

‘Who was he?’

‘I’ve told you, I don’t know. But the call was from Timur. He’s a contact I was given in the UK.’

‘Yes… I know about Timur. I read about him in the translation of your emails.’

‘He’d not answered my calls before. I tried to make contact with him many times. But that day Timur called me and he said – Come now, to a street behind King’s Cross station – Argyle Walk, and you will see your brother.’

‘Is that where you rushed off to?’

‘Yes. I was so scared, but pleased, excited, also. But when I got there I found only his jacket… and his shoes. In one of the jacket pockets there was a photograph of him. He was hanging by his feet from the ceiling… In some kind of dark, broken down room.’

‘Was he…?’ I was going to say ‘dead’ but changed my mind. ‘Was he alive?’

‘I don’t know.’ She began to cry. ‘I have to go.’

‘Can we talk again?’ I didn’t know what else to say.

‘Yes. Maybe tomorrow. I’ll call.’ And then she left. I watched her until she disappeared from view. I sat for a while. It was good to be outside. I felt like I’d run a marathon, climbed Everest, conquered my darkest fear. I felt good.

I spent most of the next day lying on my back in my bedroom staring at the ceiling. I wanted to make sense of Raisa’s story and of the wild mix of emotions rising up inside me.

She called me at eleven. We arranged to meet again. Same time. Same Place. I felt like dancing and singing. I plugged in my iPod, scrolled to my Soul playlist and turned it up loud. I danced and sang to Arethra, Chic, George Benson and Frankie Valli. I think I was happy. It was a new feeling and I didn’t trust it. How could I allow myself to trust such serendipity? Raisa, having no sense of smell? It was crazy, unimaginable, a fairytale.

And then her story. I was completely taken aback. I had no idea people could get so het up over a load of fish eggs. I googled ‘Caviar Smuggling’ and found dozens of articles. I read of a case where the Police in Saint Petersburg discovered a huge stash of contraband caviar stored in a hospital morgue freezer alongside several dead bodies. It was hidden in canisters marked ‘Aviation Security. Inspected.’ The stash weighed in at 175 kilos – that size of a haul would be worth hundreds of thousands of dollars on the open market. The morgue had been partially leased to a local businessman who used it as a transport and packaging centre. The newspapers said the discovery was made after an insider tip-off. I imagined the businessman to be Ilya Boreyev and his gang peopled with the likes of Filipp and the Brothers Sochinsky.

And then back to Raisa. I flitted from one decision to the other and then back again. I wanted to meet her. I wanted to know her. I wanted to slide a finger between those strands of silver hair, ease them off her face and look into her eyes. The want was fierce.

But it wasn’t enough. That she herself wouldn’t be able to smell my foul body odour wasn’t enough either. How could we ever become friends? Any kind of normal relationship, even the most basic, would never be possible. We wouldn’t be able to go out in public together. We wouldn’t be able to invite people back to our home… But my imagination was running riot. I had conjured up more than a friendship. I had dreamed up a world in which we lived together. And we had friends. And we loved each other…

The more I thought about it I knew it would be ridiculous to meet her. The longer I allowed our communication to go on, the deeper my feelings would become. There was no point. It was doomed. It had always been doomed.

I decided to text her. It took me two hours to get it right. It said,

Raisa. I’m sorry but I can’t meet you. There’s no point. I can never be the sort of friend you need. I hope you find Filipp and that he is OK.

 Goodbye and Goodluck! Simon.

But I didn’t send it then. I wanted to wait until she arrived in the square.

It was raining again. I saw her yellow umbrella first: a huge bright bird bobbing over her head, its wings outstretched, glowing in the harsh sodium light. She sat on her seat holding her raincoat closed over her knees. I picked up my phone and pressed send. She shifted the umbrella behind her head and the bird became an orb, a dazzling sun, sinking behind her. I watched her read the text. I pulled the curtains together, walked through the house turning off all the lights and lay down on my bed in the dark. I closed my eyes. The image of her pale face surrounded by a semicircle of gold had burnt itself onto my retina.

I began to cry. I don’t know whether I was crying for Raisa, or for myself, or for the dream of a love we could never have shared. The landscape of our dreams is a hospitable place – as hopeful as our imaginations will allow, but the truth is a far more desperate country.