This is my first lie to the police. She seemed thinner, she didn’t laugh. She picked at her food, when usually Tila has a voracious appetite. I kept asking her what was wrong, but she said she’d just been working too many late nights at the club. The lie fell from my mouth before I thought about it, and I can’t take it back.
They’ve mapped my brain to see if I’m lying. A model floats above our heads, delicate and transparent, dotted with neuron clusters like stars. Oloyu glances up to check. Between my mechanical heart not growing as excited as a flesh one and my Hearth training, nothing happens. I could lie with impunity. If they map Tila, she can too.
“So nothing unusual over the last few weeks? No signs she was keeping anything from you? You two must be close.” Again, I can hear from his tone what he really means: close enough that if one of you did it, the other would know about it.
“Closer than you can ever imagine,” I say, my voice sharpening with fear. I don’t want him to see he’s struck a nerve, but by the flint of his eyes, he knows he has. I decide I’m not going to let him scare me, even if terror still rolls in my stomach. Even though I hate the Hearth and all it stands for, another one of Mana-ma’s sayings comes to me: They only have power over you if you let them.
“Does your sister have any enemies?” Oloyu leans forward. I can’t stand anyone that close to me unless it’s Tila or someone I know extremely well. But I lean forward on my elbows, right in his face, ignoring the mirrored window behind him and whoever watches me through it. I’m still scared, but I haven’t let it paralyze me.
“Everyone loves Tila. She can go buy food and make a new friend.” That’s true. If we take a shuttle somewhere for a holiday, I read, ignoring those around me. Tila will become fast friends with whoever is sitting next to her: an old man with a white beard, a new mother and her squalling baby, and once a Buddhist monk in his saffron robes.
She can make enemies as well: people who don’t like her because of her blithe way of speaking, her easy enthusiasm. I’m sure there are probably a few other hostesses at the club who are jealous of her. She can charm clients with a half-lidded glance and she often crows to me about how she receives the lion’s share of the tips. Tila seems to know what it is each person wants and reflects that back to them, flirting by acting like one of the ribald men as easily as playing the coquettish minx. Heaven knows where she’s learned all that. I sure haven’t.
“Nobody at all?” Officer Oloyu presses.
I shake my head. “None that come to mind, no. Sorry I can’t be more helpful.” I’m not sorry I haven’t given them anything to incriminate my sister. Or at least I hope I haven’t.
He presses his lips together. “Now then. The question you must be expecting: where were you at 1700 hours this evening?”
“On the way home from work on the MUNI.” My voice has stopped shaking, and I feel as though I’m no longer attached to my body. That I’m just a floating head. I have taken full control of my emotions, like Mana-ma always taught us to do in the Hearth.
“Which line do you take?”
“Clement Lot.”
“You do understand we’ll be checking the cameras.”
“I’d expect nothing less.”
Officer Oloyu narrows his eyes. At first, he thought he had me. Now, he thinks I’m being secretive, and he’s right. But there’s not much more he can do without concrete proof, and I’m not giving him anything. Even if there was anything to give.
“Can I have any details of the case, or is it all confidential?” I ask. “Maybe if I understand what’s happened I can think of someone who might wish to harm my sister. Whose body did they find? Was it a guest of the club?” I’m desperate for more information. Anything to help piece together what happened tonight. Murder. The word keeps pulsing through my mind, until it doesn’t even seem like a word anymore.
“We can’t name the victim,” Officer Oloyu says. The unspoken: not to you.
Thanks for nothing. “Right. Well, if you can’t tell me anything, and I have nothing to tell you, is there anything else you need? Or can I go home and clean up the mess you made of my apartment?”
“I don’t appreciate your tone, Miss Collins,” Oloyu says. “You don’t seem overly upset by tonight’s events.”
Fuck you, I want to say. You don’t have the first clue how I’m feeling. Instead, I look at him calmly. “Am I free to go?”
“For now.”
“Good.” I stand and clutch my purse, and then I bend down and look him in the eye. I’m pleased to see him move back slightly. “I’m not upset because I’m sure she’s as much of a victim in this as whoever died tonight.” I lean back and pull my collar down. It’s a good way to unnerve others. In San Francisco, where everyone has made such an effort to appear flawless, nobody likes to see such obvious signs of imperfection. Tila taught me the trick. For all she changed her face and hair to not look like me, she kept the scar.