TheTwist

What am I doing here? was the question on Timothy's lips.

It had been rolling around in his head all morning. All during the trip across town on the bus, and the walk to the building he now found himself staring at. He was unsure as to why he had applied for this particular job. True, he was broke, and desperate, almost, ( It had taken a lot of fishing around in his room to uncover enough cash for today's journey! ). It had been a while since he'd been employed in anything worthwhile. But Private Investigator?

Since he had left college the year before, he had become bored. He had become easily disillusioned by the various part-time  jobs he'd collected in the past year, most of them, in the fast food sector, excruciatingly monotonous. But he was really going to the other extreme here!

Four years of late nights, and long days of study, had made him a little stir crazy, and lazy. Keeping his head down in his books, staying in his cramped dorm room, he now wanted to get out into the world and enjoy it! No more study, no more of the restricted lifestyle he endured for all that time. But he needed money for that, and that meant getting a good job.


And so here he was. A quiet boy, from a quiet family, from a quiet part of town, standing outside a non-descript old building. It was on the other side of town, in the warehouse district, which was proving noisy and dusty. Trucks and vans, of all shapes, colours and sizes, trundled up and down the streets. Loading or offloading their wares, they belched fumes into the already grey skies, making him feel as worn down as the building. It was one of the few  that had remained intact, when the developers moved in, and moved out again. There seemed to be a constant buzz of movement around. Everybody doing something!

Now or never, he said to himself.

And with that, he pushed open the door, and walked into the offices of Krampit Investigations.

"Good morning. Are you here for the interview?" a female voice said.

She could just be heard above the Madonna music coming from the earphones planted on each side of her head. Besides those, all you could see were the pink-rimmed glasses, the bright multi-coloured eyes, the blond hair tied up like a palm tree. The rest of her was obscured behind a cheap fashion magazine, and a small mountain of paper.

"Yes, thank you, I'm Tim Crossley" he said, trying to sound a bit more confident than he felt.

"Take a seat. He shouldn't be long" Blondie said, tipping her head to a set of plastic chairs, as she reached for the phone.

As he sat down, the question fell on his lips again. The advert in the paper had stated 'no experience necessary' and 'good rates', and  'plenty of overtime'. Perfect! he thought. But he would have to pry into peoples lives, watch husbands and wives cheat, maybe. All sorts of sordid details and scenarios had been conjured up in his mind. He was just a normal, quiet guy.  What did he know about detective work?

Just as he was contemplating getting up to leave, a door opened.

Into the room stepped a rather large man. He wore a rumpled well-worn suit, a shade of brown no longer in use. His yellow shirt strained all the buttons down the front to bursting point, and the knot in his mustard coloured tie looked like it was never undone. And under this colourful costume, jiggled a lot of man!

No wonder he needed he some help, Tim thought.

"Tim, glad you could come. I'm Dale Krampit," the door-opener said, as he reached out a hand.

"Glad to be here," Tim replied, the one-shake handshake quick and meaty, almost pulling him off balance.

"Step into my office here, and we'll get this thing goin'," Mr. Krampit said, sticking the remainder of a well-chewed cigar between his surprisingly white teeth.

As the thought of how much they must have cost flicked through his head, Tim glanced around the room.

It wasn't big, and there were several pieces of old brown furniture standing in the corners. There seemed to be no order to it. The walls were decorated, if you could call it that, with pine shelves packed with files. The light coming through the street-front window was absorbed by the dark wood panelling on the walls, and by the worn dark blue carpet; whoever fitted out this office, knew how to bargain, he reasoned.

"Sit down, sit down," Krampit said, making it sound like 'sidow, sidow', with the cigar bobbing up and down in his mouth.

Tim sat in the rickety old armchair, in front of a rather grand old desk. It looked antique. But, even Mr. Krampit looked antique, so Tim guessed it was retrieved from a second-hand shop, or discount store, like the rest of the mismatched pieces.

As he tried to settle into the lumpy padding of the old chair, a plume of blue smoke drifted over him. The cigar was obviously a good one. The rich aroma that filled his senses reminded him of the tobacco smell in his grandfathers old house. And of being told that a 'good smelling cigar was all a hard working man needed after a good days work'. Didn't keep grandpa alive long though, he smirked.

No, Tim thought, I need a full wallet of cash!

Krampit leaned back in his leather chair. Much groaning and creaking followed, from both of them."So Tim, as you know, the position we are loooking to fill is for an investigator. Can I presume you have no experience?" an arched eyebrow looking my way.

"Yes. I mean, no. No experience" Tim replied.

"Tell me about yourself then," taking the cigar out of his mouth, crushing it into a glass ashtray within arms reach of his almost precarious looking position,"We've done the usual security checks, so tell me about you."

Tim proceeded to fill him in on the details of his ordinary life. Hobbies, likes, family, college, and the little work exierience he had gained during the summers. Krampit listened with the same level of interest he had given his cigar. Intense. When Tim had finished, Krampit leaned forward, elbows on the desk, fingers laced under his ample chins.

"Four years at college, a business degree, tells me much about you Tim," he said."You can obviously pay attenton, and remember things. But patience is also required in this line of work. We need lots of patience."

"Well, Mr.Krampit, I believe I can do this job." He said, as much to convince himself as his potential new boss."I have no committments, my parents are away a lot of the time. And being an only child, it means I have all the free time a job like this might require". 

Krampit seemed to study Tim then, for what felt like a few minutes.

"You will have the use of the company car at times," Krampit said at last, fishing for another cigar in a tattered old box on a shelf behind him. "You will also be required to do a lot of leg work, pounding the pavement, so to speak. Not much of our work is dangerous, and for the first six months, you will be doing mostly observations. That is, following people, making notes of times, trips, that sort of thing."

Tim was nodding now, feeling the interview was perhaps going good, and also coming to a close.

"If you agree with all the points on this form,"  Krampit said, straining a little to reach accross the desk,"then fill it in and we can get you registered, and away we go."

That was it! Tim was offered the job!

A broad grin spread accross his face. He almost snatched the form from Krampit. He read it quickly, re-read it just to be sure, and took his trusty old pen from his jacket pocket, and signed on the dotted line. There! Done.He had a job. A real, proper, well paying  job.

Krampit took back the form, gave it a quick once-over, and 'filed' it on his desk.

"Look, we are very busy here, as you can tell. So, I'm going to give you a file right now. Take it home, study it and come back tomorrow. We can go through the finer details then. That OK  Tim?" Krampit asked, handing him a thin file.

"Absolutely!" Tim gushed, reeling slightly at the sudden change of fortune."What exactly will I be doing with this?" he asked, holding the file up.

"Well, the couple involved are suspected of selling trade secrets to a rival company of their current employers. Nasty stuff. Lots of accusations flying about," Krampit said, leaning back again. 

A photograph slipped out of the file, and floated to the carpet, It came to rest under the desk, face down. The date on the back was September 2002. Why did that register in his brain as familiar? Tim reached down to pick it up.

Ah yes! Now he remembered It was the same date as his parents 25th wedding anniversary. Great party that, he mused, as he flipped over the photo.

Once again it fell to the floor.

Only now, it was accompanied by the scream of anguish of a son seeing his parents in a whole new light!

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