Free Numb by Sean Ferrell

the one, then turned back to the shelves. He put the camera back into itsproper place, shut the cabinet, and fanned himself lazily with the picture, waiting for it to reveal my image.
    He said, “There’s something you’re hiding from me. What you are afraid to say to me is the stuff you want to keep for yourself and that’s fine. Don’t tell me, don’t tell anyone. If you share too much, it will start to haunt you. We’re painting a picture of you. It can look any way we want it to.”
    The room quieted a moment, and the view of the street continued to plow along. Michael stopped flapping the photo and said, “I understand you’ve been trying to locate a shop that may be the place your suit is from. How’s that going?”
    â€œHow do you know that?”
    A shrug. “That guy selling the tapes sells more than just tapes. How goes the search?”
    â€œNot good.”
    Michael smiled. “I didn’t think so. You look lost. But you don’t have to be. Leave what information you have with Robert and we’ll get somebody on it. In the meantime, I want you to understand we can make you as big as you want to be.”
    â€œYou make it sound easy.”
    â€œIt is.” Michael looked at the picture. “This is the picture of you that we’re painting for the public. I think it’s a pretty amazing picture.” He handed it to me.
    Instead of a picture of my thigh, focusing on the scar, I saw a picture of me. All of me. I looked confused andtired, my pants dangling around my knees, my eyes focused up and to the left, toward the window that you couldn’t see in the picture. The light from outside illuminated me, and my hands hung at my sides. I must have been about to say something, though I couldn’t remember what, because I looked ready to speak. I was sweaty and shiny and something in my face made me think of Mal. I felt tired and scared.
    I said, “You’re always looking for new talent, right?”
    â€œOf course.”
    â€œWell, I have a friend. He’s got a great act, breathing fire and juggling. He could use an agent too.”
    Michael nodded. He avoided eye contact. “I could talk to him, see his act. I’d have to see what he can do before I could agree.”
    â€œSure. But if you were my agent and he wanted to meet with you—”
    With a great smile Michael said, “My door is always open for my clients’ friends.” He took the photo back and said, “This picture is just the first that will be taken of you. Are you ready to start helping me show you to the public?”
    I said I was. I pulled my pants up and buckled my belt.

four
    MICHAEL INTRODUCED ME to Hiko, a tall, slender, blind Japanese woman with large eyes, long fingers, and straight black hair she wore up on top of her head. She had a beauty mark on her upper lip exactly where Marilyn Monroe had one. Michael told me never to tell her that. “If you never trust me about anything else, you should trust me on that.”
    â€œWhy wouldn’t she want to be compared to Marilyn Monroe?” I asked. “Monroe was beautiful.”
    â€œSomeone told her that,” he said. “She went ape-shit.”
    Michael had been my agent for six weeks. I hadn’t gotten any work yet, but he’d put me in a hotel, the Thomas, a semiupscale retro hotel in Midtown. I’d been there, onhis tab, since signing the contracts in his office. At the time he told me, “You look like hell. Get some rest, let me take care of you.” I tried to let him.
    Michael also represented Hiko and had convinced her to do a portrait of me in time for an article about her in Modern Art . “You’re so unique that chances are good they’d use photos of any piece based on you in the article. Great cross promo.”
    â€œShe agreed to this?” She didn’t know me; neither did the magazine, for that matter.
    â€œFirst,