The Fixes

by Owen Matthews

  (It would feel so fucking good to just tell someone.)

  (These are your friends, dude.)

  (Do it!)

  But Eric can’t get it together. He shakes his head. “It’s been a day, man. I’m too fucking high. I can’t even think straight right now.”

  And that’s where it ends.

  160.

  There’s a brief—

  (awkward)

  —silence. The others look at each other, and Eric wonders if they’re going to kick him out of the Pack or throw him in what’s left of the fire or just shun him and never speak to him again—

  (and he can’t figure out which would be worse).

  But Jordan’s still unfazed. “That’s okay,” he says. “You can think on it, E. We’ll revisit the topic after your Fix.”

  Eric blinks. “My what?”

  “Your Fix.” Jordan smiles, mischievous. “I did one, Paige did one, and Haley. . . . You’re next on the list, champ. You’re up.”

  161.

  You’re up.

  (I mean, talk about performance anxiety.)

  It’s one thing to go along with this insanity. It’s another entirely to conjure up some crazy yourself.

  Eric thinks about it all the way home. Can’t pick out anything. His mind’s blank. Too much pressure.

  (Like when someone tells you, “Be funny.”)

  (Um, could you be more specific?)

  (What exactly do you want?)

  162.

  Anyway, we’re going to leave Eric to stew for a while.

  (He has enough on his plate without us watching over his shoulder.)

  Let’s change tracks for a minute.

  Let’s look in on Paige.

  163.

  Suicide Pack successes notwithstanding—

  Paige Hammond is not having a good summer. Her family is imploding. Her college dreams are pretty well out the window.

  Her dad’s probably going to jail and definitely leaving her mom.

  The house is like a war zone.

  (Paige hardly ever goes back.)

  She’s couch-surfing now, most of the time. Her cousin Nate has a condo by the beach. He’s shooting some snowboarding documentary in Chile right now, so Paige has the place to herself.

  It suits her fine.

  (At least there nobody’s screaming.)

  But Nate will be back soon. Paige’s parents will still be splitting up. Her college money will still be tied up in the fraud investigation. The Hammonds will still be the laughingstock of Capilano.

  And then, there’s the Eric question.

  (The Connelly Conundrum.)

  The whole problem of how to feel about E.

  164.

  Once upon a time, Paige imagined she and Eric Connelly would grow up, get married, and grow old together.

  She’d wasted time in math class being a stereotypical, like, girl, imagining which friends she would pick as her bridesmaids and what gown she would wear for the ceremony. She wrote “Paige Connelly” over and over again in her notebook.

  (Paige isn’t proud of this time in her life.)

  But then Eric went away. And it wasn’t like she had seen it coming, either.

  First day of class, junior year, she’d come back from the family holiday in Morocco and Eric had told her, point-blank, they couldn’t be together anymore.

  “I just don’t have time,” he told her, avoiding her eyes. “I need to, you know, focus on school right now.”

  He’d sworn there wasn’t anyone else. But Paige hadn’t believed him.

  (She’d been in Morocco for a month, after all.)

  So she’d asked around. Done her research.

  (#Stalker.)

  (She isn’t exactly proud of this, either.)

  But everyone she talked to said the same freaking thing:

  Eric Connelly’s gone.

  Eric’s a ghost.

  Eric doesn’t come around here anymore.

  165.

  He’d buried himself in schoolwork, as far as Paige could tell. And as far as she could tell, it had paid off.

  (#StudentOfTheYear.)

  But now Eric is back. He clearly has some issues he’s trying to deal with. And Paige is happy to see him—

  (a part of her, anyway)

  —but another part of her hates that E joined the Pack.

  (Like, I don’t care how good you are at boosting cars.)

  (What happened to my apology, man?)

  (What happened to, you know, us?)

  166.

  Anyway.

  Paige has other things to worry about. If Eric Connelly was her only concern, she’d be laughing.

  But Eric’s a distant memory at the moment.

  Right now, Paige is navigating a movie set. She’s wearing, like, her ID on a lanyard and it is killing her. Every second.

  She’s looking for the catering van.

  She’s supposed to fetch his coffee.

  167.

  is filming a movie in a studio in the city. It’s a prestige picture—

  (Scorsese’s executive producing)

  —and everyone’s saying it should win another Oscar. But doesn’t seem to care about awards, or prestige—

  (or even freaking Scorsese).

  All seems to care about is chasing Paige Hammond.

  168.

  Paige met at the Cactus Club, as discussed.

  was there with his homeboys, a motley collection of B-list TV actors and, like, sleazeballs with money, standing out like a Patek Philippe at the Walmart watch counter. She’d run into him on his way out of the bathroom, and he’d cornered her, chatted her up, bought her a drink—

  (and Paige would be lying if she said she didn’t go along with it).

  ( might not be as gorgeous as he was when he was twenty years old and dodging icebergs, but he’s still hot.)

  Long story short, invited Paige to an after-party with his boys in his suite at the St. Regis that night.

  And Paige demurred, because one simply doesn’t just go to hotel suites with a group of strange men, no matter how famous they are.

  But she did get drunk and spill the whole truth and nothing but the truth about the scorched-earth situation going on at her home address—

  (“My dad’s going to jail. He embezzled a shitload of money from his real-estate partners. The government seized everything. My college fund included. So, like, you know, everything’s up in the air right now. I was supposed to go to Yale. Now I’m, like, trying to learn how to make a résumé.”)

  And she did give her number.

  And damned if didn’t call her the next day.

  169.

  “It’s a great opportunity,” he told Paige. “People kill for these jobs. You’re basically living the movies, sixteen hours a day.”

  Paige was unimpressed. Paige knows movie people. Paige doesn’t really want to live the movies, sixteen hours a day.

  But still . . .

  “How much does it pay?” she asked .

  And laughed. “Name your price.”

  So she did.

  And now Paige Hammond is Paige the PA.

  And now she’s fetching ’s coffee.

  170.

  There’s a catch, though.

  (There’s always a catch.)

  Paige knocks on the door to ’s trailer. Hears him shout from inside, Come in. She opens the door and climbs into the trailer, and as soon as she sees she can tell that coffee isn’t the only thing on his mind.

  “Come on in,” he tells her, and it’s the gleam in his eye when he says it. “Shut the door.”

  He’s sitting on a couch along the wall of the trailer, and he does everything but pat the seat next to him as Paige brings him the coffee. He’s wearing jeans and a simple white T-shirt, isn’t even in makeup, and Paige has this fleeting thought like she isn’t even sure ’s on the call list today.

  Paige sets the coffee down. She can feel ’s eyes on her, even with her back to him, and when she turns
around again, he’s still checking her out.

  “We never got to finish our conversation from the other night,” he says. “I’ve been thinking about it ever since.”

  He slides over on the couch more, clearing a space, and Paige feels her stomach churn.

  (Shit.)

  (Is this what she’s been reduced to? Sleeping with some asshole for a job?)

  Paige debates this with herself for longer than she would care to admit. Then she turns and picks up the coffee cup again.

  “I forgot the cream,” she tells . “I’ll be right back.”

  171.

  Paige goes all the way back to the catering van. Fills a new cup of coffee for . Has another PA bring the cup to ’s trailer—

  (some Spielberg fanboy named Devon).

  She wanders the set for another half hour, her stomach still nerves and chaos. Then she calls E, and Gs the FO.

  (Shit.)

  172.

  “So you think he gave you the job just to sleep with you?” Eric asks Paige.

  (They’re driving home from the city, over the bridge and into Capilano. E’s working at the health center and ’s movie is shooting in the city.)

  (It’s an uneasy détente, but it’s better than nothing, Paige figures.)

  (Anyway, she doesn’t have a car.)

  Paige sighs. Looks out the window as Eric drives the G-Wagen over the crest of the bridge and down toward the shore.

  “Yeah, but what else is new?” she says. “Fending off sleazy older men is just part of being a girl. It’s just this particular sleazy older man is the eighth-most-powerful person in Hollywood.”

  “So no pressure.”

  “Yeah. I did consider sleeping with him,” Paige says. “Just for the story, you know? Something to tell the grandkids.”

  Eric glances over from the driver’s seat. “But?”

  “But?” She smacks his arm.

  “I mean.” Eric blushes. Stammers like he does when he gets embarrassed. Paige has always found it cute.

  (Infuriatingly, she still finds it cute.)

  “I’m starving,” she says finally. “Are you hungry at all?”

  They head to the mall across from Paige’s cousin’s condo. Eric doesn’t want to go home to his terrible dad, and Paige is putting off being alone.

  (Plus, Eric’s hungry, too.)

  (Hence, Subway.)

  “You have to order your sandwich without saying ‘um’ at any point in the process,” Eric’s telling her. “That’s the Subway Challenge. It’s harder than it sounds.”

  Paige doesn’t get it at first. Then she thinks it sounds dumb. Then she turns to the counter and starts to order a cold-cut trio on, um, Italian herb and cheese.

  “Noooo,” she says, laughing. “That one doesn’t count. One more time.”

  “One more time. This time it’s for real, though.”

  Paige turns back to the counter. Makes it through the cheese question, the “Do you want it toasted?” situation. Almost messes up on the veggies issue, skates through the sauce and the salt and pepper. Then the girl behind the counter asks if she wants to make it a combo.

  “Um,” Paige says.

  Eric claps his hands behind her. “Boom. It’s over.”

  “What?” Paige spins. “No way, you asshole. That doesn’t count. I ordered the sandwich already.”

  “You have to maintain control through the whole process,” Eric says, smirking. “You lose.”

  “Technicality.” Paige turns to pay. “But fine, whatever. I lose. What were we betting?”

  “Pardon?”

  Paige takes her change. Turns back to face Eric, and she’s smiling, too. “I said, you won,” she says. “So pick out a prize. What do I owe you?”

  And Eric looks at her, and for a moment, it’s just like old times, the summer before junior year, when they were pretty much inseparable and everything in the world was one big, secret in-joke.

  And Paige is thinking, This is it, this is how we get back to normal.

  But then Eric’s smile fades.

  He looks away.

  “Just, like, make out, like, an IOU or something.”

  Paige grabs her sandwich and makes for the door. “Gah. You know what? Forget this.”

  173.

  “Are we ever going to talk about what happened to us?” Paige asks—

  (after Eric follows her into the parking lot and apologizes and whatever, and Paige doesn’t know what to say, so she just shakes her head and starts walking back toward her cousin Nate’s condo building, her sandwich in its little baggie, uneaten).

  (And Eric is still following her.)

  “Like, it’s all nice and great that you’re back from the dead and all,” Paige continues, “but you could have at least said good-bye.”

  Eric doesn’t look at her. He keeps walking, and he can’t make eye contact, and he doesn’t say anything for, like, minutes.

  (Guys. Can’t. Communicate.)

  “I know,” he says finally. “I’m sorry. I should have, like, talked to you. I shouldn’t have just disappeared.”

  “Well, you’re back,” Paige says. “So now’s your chance. Talk to me now.”

  Eric glances at her. Then quickly away.

  And Paige holds her breath, but there’s really no point.

  “It’s not that easy,” Eric says. “I just can’t.”

  174.

  “I just can’t.”

  (#Weaksauce.)

  It rings pretty hollow.

  But that’s where they leave it, awkward and stilted and incapable of looking each other in the eye or even having a decent conversation.

  And Paige goes up to Nate’s condo.

  And Eric goes away.

  And for all this Pack sticks together bullshit, they still don’t even know each other anymore.

  KIK -- CAPILANO HIGH PRIVATE MESSAGE GROUP – 07/20/16 – 07:56 PM

  USERNAME: PradaMane

  MESSAGE: WTF is up with the Suicide Pack? They got me hyped with that Molotov cocktail shit but no Vine? Did they blow themselves up, or what?

  175.

  Thursday night, Jordan texts Eric. You busy?

  Eric is not busy. Eric is sitting in his room, hiding from his dad, with whom he’s had an uneasy truce since their showdown at dawn.

  Eric knows he should probably be doing more reading for college in the fall. Eric can’t focus. He’s trying—

  (and failing)

  —to think of a good Fix instead.

  Not busy, he tells Jordan. Bored.

  Jordan replies in thirty seconds. Meet me at Lighthouse Park. One hour.

  176.

  Lighthouse Park is on the far west end of Capilano, where the mansions stop and the forest begins. It’s only a park in the sense that it isn’t anything else; it’s just trees and rock and a path to the little beach by the lighthouse.

  Eric parks his mom’s G-Wagen at the trailhead and zips his jacket up tight. It’s nearly dark, and what little light is left is filtered through gloomy gray clouds. Jordan’s dad’s Tesla is the only other car in the lot.

  Come to the picnic area, Jordan texts. By the beach.

  The beach is about half a mile down the path. The forest is spooky quiet, only the wind in the branches and the odd raven calling. Eric is shivering, partly from fear and partly from excitement.

  (Spooky’s kind of sexy, when you’re with the right company.)

  Jordan isn’t at the beach when Eric arrives. There’s a Herschel bag on the picnic table, though, and Eric can hear something rustling in the bushes. “Jordan?” he calls out. “Where are you?”

  There’s no answer. The rustling continues. Then the bushes part, and Jordan backs out of the forest, dragging a green garbage can behind, one of those big steel drums.

  “Some asshole dragged this into the woods,” he tells Eric.

  “There’s a garbage bin back at the trailhead, Captain Planet,” Eric says. “We can’t just carry our trash out like normal people?”r />
  “Who said anything about trash?” Jordan rolls the drum toward the middle of the picnic area. “Grab me that backpack, would you? But be careful.”

  There’s something inside the bag. Eric can feel it when he picks it up. It shifts and clinks, metallic.

  “E,” Jordan says, wincing. “I can’t stress how important it is that you be really freaking careful with that backpack.”

  “Okay, geez.” Eric holds the backpack like it’s a baby. Carries it over to Jordan. “What’s in here, anyway?”

  Jordan muscles the garbage drum a little farther. He looks up, and in the last gray light of day, Eric can see the look in his eye, all mischief and bad behavior, and he figures it out, fast.

  “The bomb,” he says. “You actually built it.”

  “Exactly.” Jordan sets the backpack down—gently—at the bottom of the garbage can. Then he straightens. “Okay. Here’s what’s going to happen.”

  Eric listens.

  He listens intently.

  (He’s curious now, and apprehensive, the kind of electrifying worry like when you’re waiting in line for the tallest roller coaster in the park.)

  “What we have is a basic pressure-cooker bomb,” Jordan tells Eric. “I’ve packed it full of Demolition Mike’s gunpowder and rigged a detonator up to a cheap burner phone. I’ve programmed the burner phone’s number in here—” He holds up his own Samsung Galaxy. “So when I press the send button . . .”

  (He smiles wide.)

  “Kablamo.”

  177.

  Kablamo.

  Eric and Jordan take cover behind a cedar tree at the edge of the picnic grounds. It’s a big tree, the trunk wide enough that it shelters them both, but barely. Jordan huddles close to Eric, close enough that Eric can feel his warmth.

  (Eric wonders if Jordan can feel him shivering.)

  Jordan holds up his Galaxy. Scrolls down his contacts to the burner phone number. Then pauses.