The security man stood by the wide-open window looking puzzled. While the breeze violently blew the curtains back and forth, it did little to take away the smell of stale smoke that clung to the material. ‘He’ll be fined for that,’ the man mumbled in broken English.
Alex glanced around the room and eventually spotted the sealed envelope which sat atop the pillow on the neatly made bed. He felt a sudden chill from the wind when he recognised his name and the handwriting, then held his breath as he dashed to the window and looked to the concrete roof of the building nine floors below.
Chapter 85
ELLIE
Matthew brought the decanter of whisky from the drinks cabinet back with him to the sofas where Ellie sat.
As he poured himself another glass, Ellie tried to disguise that she was becoming increasingly agitated by his accusations and threats. But they were both aware that he knew her well enough to see straight through her titanium veneer. He sat down opposite her and took an over-exaggerated breath.
‘After my dad left my mum – thanks to your test – in the space of a few months he forced her to sell the family house, so all she could afford was a flat miles away from her home and her friends,’ he continued. ‘She was lonely, humiliated and isolated, and over the years she turned to booze to blank it all out. It was just a matter of time before she lost her job because of alcohol dependency. Do you have any idea what it’s like for a son to have to change his mother’s underwear because she shat her knickers when she was paralytic? Or to pick her up from the police station when she was arrested for being drunk and disorderly in a supermarket?’
Ellie wanted to shake her head but refused to give him the gratification.
‘Of course you don’t know,’ he said. ‘Then, just when she reached her lowest ebb, she was Matched with somebody.’
Ellie paused and placed her glass on the table. ‘Well, what’s your complaint then? Everything worked out for her in the end.’
‘You’d think so, wouldn’t you? Bobby Hughes was his name,’ Matthew said. ‘He seemed like a good guy at first and she fell for him hook, line and sinker, just like Matches are supposed to. But he was a manipulative bastard and she was so desperate not to be alone that she agreed to do anything he asked, including turning a blind eye to the fact he took a fancy to young girls. Very young girls, judging by the 3,000 or so images the police found when they seized his laptop. He tried to claim they were already on the computer when he bought it on eBay and Mum was stupid enough to believe him – she paid his legal bills and took out loans for him right through his court case. But when he was put behind bars, she was left with nothing but final demands she couldn’t pay back. And all of this, everything that went wrong in her life, was because of a test that she and my dad had no knowledge of taking, because you’d decided to play God. You, sitting here in your ivory tower up in the clouds, have never had to watch someone you love transform into something else right before your eyes.’
Ellie shot him a withering glance. ‘You think?’
‘I’m not talking about me; this is different,’ he continued dismissively. ‘I’m talking about watching a strong, intelligent woman disintegrate into a physical and emotional mess. You know she was passed out drunk when she set herself on fire with a cigarette? She burned alive. She was so badly injured that I couldn’t even identify her body.’
He folded his arms defiantly while Ellie took a sip from her gin and tonic. He appeared to be counting on her feeling pity towards his unfortunate mother. But the more accusatory he became, the more she quietly seethed.
He had underestimated her. He hadn’t known her back then when she was an ambitious young woman trying to convince a scoffing scientific community of her DNA discovery; she hadn’t told him of the sacrifices she’d made to be heard and how much of her old self she had been forced to surrender to become the powerhouse she now was. While Tim had certainly softened her, Matthew was a fool if he thought she couldn’t snap back into her previous shape in a heartbeat.
‘There are millions of couples across the world who have taken the test and found they aren’t Matched,’ she began firmly, ‘but they’ve stayed together because they’re in love. I may have taken certain shortcuts back in the early days, but I won’t be held responsible for the decisions those Matched people eventually made. I didn’t force your dad to leave your weak-willed mum, and I didn’t put a bottle in her hand or pour booze down her throat. At some point, people have to take responsibility for their own actions.’
‘And at what point do you take responsibility for your actions, Ellie?’
‘My actions have put homophobia, racism and religious hatred on the edge of extinction – a Match doesn’t recognise sexuality, colour or whatever God you choose to celebrate. It has united people of all faiths and persuasions in a way we never thought possible. Show me what you have done to make this world a less hostile place.’
‘But you’ve divided just as many people by creating a “them” and “us”: those who are loved by design and the rest who’ve been made to feel like their relationships are less worthy. Do you not see a parallel between what you’ve done and what Hitler did to the Jews? The Nazis eroded them, one by one, until they were a ravaged minority, treated like vermin. Is that your aim for un-Matched people? To gradually break them?’
Ellie laughed. ‘You’re more deluded than I thought.’
‘Matches are better off financially than the un-Matched. Matched couples get bigger tax breaks, better life insurance deals, they’re more productive at work because they’re happier at home so they’re offered better jobs. For the un-Matched, suicide rates are higher, as are divorces and depression—’
‘Both of which actually fell last year as more and more people are finding happiness with those for whom they were designed. Domestic violence against both men and women has also dropped.’
‘Only because people are too scared to report those kind of crimes against their physically and mentally abusive Match. They don’t want to risk a better relationship with a non-Match.’
‘Immigration and emigration are no longer such contentious issues,’ Ellie continued, getting into the swing of her arguments. She was going to take this Matthew down. ‘People are fast-tracked through red tape and are allowed to travel worldwide and settle with their Matches in other countries.’
‘And that’s damaged almost a fifth of businesses across globe who have lost key members of staff because they’ve relocated to another city or country.’
‘You can throw as many figures at me as you want, Matthew, but you cannot deny one thing. Match Your DNA exists, whether you like it or not.’
He gave her a knowing look. ‘I don’t deny it, but I predict it’s not going to be around for very much longer.’
‘That’s not your decision to make.’
‘That judgment belongs to the people,’ he continued. ‘And the people always prevail.’
‘What are you talking about?’
He stood up and stretched his arms behind him. ‘Another drink?’
Ellie shook her head. She watched as he helped himself to a third whisky, unable to recognise the man before her as the one she had loved. Everything about Matthew was different from Tim, from his arrogance to his mannerisms and even the way he sat. She wondered how hard it must have been to maintain the facade in her presence for so long.
‘Even now that you know what kind of person I am, you’re still in love with me, aren’t you?’ Matthew said, the ice cubes cracking as whisky oozed over them.