Page 34 of You Can't Hurt Me

“This strange mass that you can fit in the palm of your hands,” he said. “That it holds our dreams, our memories, everything it means to be us. That everything happening to us in any given moment is right there.”

“You mean it was love at first sight,” I suggest, tapping away.

“Love at first sight,” he muses. “You could put it that way.”

I begin to sketch out the opening paragraph. “Perfect. Which brings us back to Eva. Now let’s go back to that first meeting again and how you really felt.”

He sighs, and eventually says, “What I think you’re referring to didn’t happen straight away.”

“And what do you think I’m really referring to?”

“Attraction?” He leans forward, eyes honed on me. “Have you ever stopped to wonder what’s happening in your brain, when you meet someone attractive, I mean?”

“No, not exactly.” I waver, feeling as if I’m caught in the crosshairs. “Is it relevant?”

He leans forward, pushing his fingers through his hair, and I catch myself studying him. The tendons on his forearms, the shape of his throat as he swallows.

“The nonconscious you is the powerhouse of every interaction, every reflex and desire, even sexual attraction. Crack that and you can control any aspect of human behavior. What I’m trying to say is I had no intention, no conscious attraction, toward Eva at all. She wasn’t remotely my type. I’m not sure I’d usually have been drawn to someone so...out there.”

“You’d usually go for someone a little more straitlaced?” I suppress a smile.

“Who knows? What interests me is how little conscious control we have over any of this.” He whisks one hand in the air, talking quickly. “Any attraction we feel toward anyone. Our brain’s circuitry makes up its own mind, there’s very little we can do about it.”

“I believe we always have a choice, in the end,” I say with more conviction than I really feel.

“You’re sure of that?”

There’s an awkward pause as he watches me. “So, tell me about her. Conscious or unconscious, what was it about your attraction, not what the science books say.” I smile. “Describe her a little bit.”

“Well, there’s her photograph.” He nods toward it but I don’t turn around.

“I’m not interested in her photo. I need your own words, your own impressions of her.”

He looks lost somehow, his features shifting uneasily. I let him sit with his silence until muscles in his face start to relax a little. “When we finished the research project, when the newspapers got hold of the story about Eva, it was big. People wanted to interview her. This gorgeous-looking woman, a hugely talented artist who only realizes her skin is burning when she smells singed flesh. One tabloid described her as a...sexy mutant.” His mouth twists.

“She must have hated that.”

He nodded. “She was a serious sculptor but they had a sort of voyeuristic obsession in her condition. The truth is, as an artist she felt like a fraud.”

“Really? Her work was hugely respected.”

“Eva’s idol was Frida Kahlo, an artist who struggled her whole life with chronic illness after her pelvis and spine were shattered in an accident. Eva felt pain was intrinsically connected with great art. If she couldn’t suffer, how could she create? Maybe she had a point.” He thinks for a moment. “Scratch gorgeous, by the way,” he says, abruptly. “Sounds naff.”

“But how did you feel when you looked at her? Protective, perhaps?”

He lets out a short brittle laugh.

“I couldn’t have protected Eva if I’d tried. When the project finished, I took her out. We drank a bit, and in the end, it was me and her in this bar. Somehow, we got around to talking about our greatest fears, and I admitted after all my research, extreme pain was mine. That, and losing your mind. She was quite drunk by this point and rolled up one sleeve of her jumper. ‘Your real fear should be not feeling anything at all,’ she told me, showing me her arm from where she’d accidentally cut herself. The raised skin was like a silverfish trapped in scar tissue. I’ll never forget the way she looked at me, her face suddenly stiff and serious. ‘How funny you fear pain when all I can think of is new ways to find out what it really feels like.’”

The sound of Eva’s voice echoes in my ears. I type away. “So do you think there were other ways she liked to hurt herself?” He blinks, frowns a little. “I could unpack the question more, but—”

“The kinky angle? I should have guessed.”

“Readers would want to know,” I add, quickly.

“Well, you can check my wardrobe, if you want. No whips in there,” he says, his tone playfully indignant.

“I had to ask. But back to what you were saying, she eventually grew sick of people seeing her as superhuman?”

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