Rule 34 - Charles Stross [61]
“Five hundred euros for the father of my niece and nephew. Trust me, I wouldn’t be asking you to do this if I thought they might end up growing up without their dad.” Tariq raises his glass. “Just remember to stay off-line while you run it, and nothing can possibly go wrong.”
When you get home an hour later, you find, to your relief, that Sameena has gone home. Bibi’s in the kitchen, perched on a stool at the breakfast bar, poring over a pad, clearly engrossed. “Hello,” you say, then pause. “Where are the kids?”
It takes a moment for her to look up. “Naseem’s at PlayPal’s. They’re doing five-a-side football tonight. Farida’s staying with her grandparents for the evening.” Which isn’t so unusual, but then she drops the bomb. “Is there anything we should be talking about?”
You hate it when Bibi gets like this: nostrils slightly flared, brows drawn in, squinting at you like you’re a bug in a test-tube. You call it her professional face. “What are you reading?” you ask. It looks to be illustrated, but you can’t read English upside down.
“Oh, just community practice training material,” she says dismissively. “We have to do these revision exercises regularly to stay up to date. Current best practice in identification and clinical management of at-risk groups, communicating infection-control information about STIs to MSMs, that sort of thing.” She rests a hand on the screen. “Where’ve you been?”
“Out seeing Tariq,” you say. There’s no point concealing it from her. “He’s got a little job for me.”
“Oh Anwar.” She smiles, eyes narrowing. Then the smile fades, leaving only the set stare. “Tell me he hasn’t talked you into one of his schemes?”
“I have a perfectly good job!” you protest. “I’m the honorary consul for the Independent—”
Bibi sighs and taps one of her shoes against the table leg. It begins to dawn upon you that you may be in real trouble here.
“How much did he promise you?”
Surrender is inevitable. “Five hundred euros. It’s just a—”
She interrupts: “I’m going to kill my little shit of a brother one of these days.” Your stomach does a back-flip. Your wife is a nice, quiet, well-brought-up lady who does not interrupt people unless they’re in so deep they need to pause for decompression on the way back up. Right now, she’s exuding more quiet menace than Keanu Reeves in The Godfather remake. “He knows where you’ve been, he knows you’re on probation, and he ought to know better.” Her hands are balled up into fists like walnuts, small and hard as wooden clubs.
“It’s nothing, he just wants me to test a website,” you protest. “Listen, it’s not malware and there’s nothing shady about it, it’s just that he wants me to test out a chat-room set-up he’s configuring for a friend. He knows I need the work, and I can be discreet—”
“Really?” Fist on hip, she glares at you. “If you’re so good at being discreet, perhaps you’d like to explain this?” She points, and now you really know you’re in trouble, because the object of her ire is sitting on the countertop beside the sink, looking for all the world like a bag of Produce of People’s Number Four Grain Products Factory of Issyk-Kulistan—
“It’s, um, bread mix?” Your heart sinks. “Isn’t it?”
“Quite possibly. Although I don’t suppose it meets EU standards on food safety. Or labelling. Hygiene, for that matter. And I’m curious, oh my husband, as to why anyone would bother shipping prepackaged bread mix from Kyrgyzstan instead of bulk grain, or maybe flour.”
“Oh, that’s easy enough!” you exclaim with relief. “Colonel Datka’s got his finger in the flour factory and is using the shipments to—”
“I’m told the going price is sixty euros a bag,” she hisses: “For bread mix. Do you really want Naseem and Farida to grow up fatherless, my husband? Motherless, too, because I swear if you get yourself arrested again, I shall die of shame. But no, you don’t need to worry about me; you just carry on and thoughtlessly follow your own selfish urges without considering the consequences, man.