The Fixes

by Owen Matthews

  ( just lies there.)

  Finally, Jordan’s satisfied. “Good,” he says. “I think we’re in the clear. Now we just have to get out of here.”

  E points to the body. “We’re just going to leave him?”

  “You want to wrestle a famous movie star’s body out of a five-star hotel?” Jordan shakes his head. “We’re leaving him. Let the cops try to put it together. We’re clean.”

  He’s still in control. After this, after all of this, he still knows what he’s doing. He’s not stressed at all.

  “We just have to get out of here,” Jordan says. “And we can’t let anybody see us, okay?”

  “Yeah, okay,” E says. “But how do we get out?”

  Jordan points to the door. “Use the fire escape, dummy.”

  He ushers the Pack out of ’s suite. Hangs back for a long moment, lingers inside the suite while the others wait out in the hall. Then he’s out.

  “Had to make sure we were clean,” he tells them. “Let’s go.”

  They sneak down the hall to the emergency fire stairs, Jordan in the lead, then E, then Paige and Haley. Nobody comes out as they’re sneaking. Nobody sees them. Jordan disables the alarm. They hit the fire stairs and Jordan pushes the door open, and they start the long descent to ground level.

  They don’t say anything. They go slow and cautious and as fast as they dare. Their footsteps echo through the stairwell as they descend. They listen for doors opening, or anyone who might see them.

  The drop takes forever. Then they reach the ground floor. There’s a fire door to outside. Jordan pushes it open. E and Paige and Haley follow him out to the night.

  They’re in an alley. There’s a hedgerow opposite. On the other side is the public beach parking lot. Jordan leads them up the alley, toward the front of the hotel. He sticks to the shadows. He doesn’t make a sound. E creeps behind him and tries to emulate what he’s doing. Tries to forget the sight of ’s dead body.

  They reach the front of the hotel, the end of the hedgerow. Jordan circles around to the other side, the beach parking lot. It’s nearly deserted, at this hour. His dad’s Tesla sits in the shadows.

  E follows. Nobody sees him. Haley pushes Paige around the edge of the hedgerow too. Goes to follow her, and doesn’t notice the curb in between the two lots. Sees it too late and falls flat on her face.

  The others are already halfway to the car. Haley pulls herself to her feet, feeling stupid. Looks back at the hotel, for god knows what reason, and stops cold.

  A kitchen worker, a sous chef or something. He’s coming out of a service entrance like, thirty feet away. He’s lighting up a cigarette. He stops when he sees Haley. He stares right at her. His eyes lock on hers for an interminable length of time.

  Then Haley shakes it off and keeps going.

  266.

  “This is not a catastrophe,” Jordan says.

  They’re all in the Tesla now, a couple miles from the St. Regis, cruising west on Marine Drive toward Jordan’s mansion. The roads are mostly deserted. No police cars. No sirens. Nobody knows what they’ve done.

  (Yet.)

  None of the others reply. Paige is having a freak-out in the backseat of the Tesla. She keeps mumbling things that none of the others can understand. Haley keeps trying to get her to calm down. It’s not working.

  “Paige, listen to me,” Jordan says. “All of you. Listen up.”

  There’s something in his voice E’s never heard before. Something hard and maybe mean.

  “Nobody was supposed to get hurt,” Paige says. “That wasn’t the fucking Fix, Jordan. Nobody was supposed to get hurt.”

  “It was an accident,” Jordan says. “I didn’t mean it. But he was a piece of shit, Paige. I would do it again if I had to.”

  Paige looks like she’s ready to cry.

  “I’m not saying this is an ideal scenario,” Jordan says. “But it isn’t the end of the world. Everything’s going to be fine.”

  E looks at Jordan, and he can’t tell if Jordan’s lying, or if he really believes it. E’s pretty sure he doesn’t believe it. E’s thinking they’re screwed.

  “That piece of shit,” Haley says. “Why couldn’t he just drink his fucking roofie?”

  “It’s over,” Jordan says. “What’s done is done. That guy was a creep, and he had it coming. It sucks that we killed him, but we didn’t get caught.”

  “Dude,” E says. “It’s great that we didn’t get caught and all, but we just killed a guy.”

  Jordan exhales. “I know you’re scared, E. But if you don’t want to spend the rest of your life in jail, you’re going to need to man the fuck up a little bit. Like, now.”

  E doesn’t say anything. He doesn’t exactly like Jordan’s tone. It’s like E’s part of the problem. That’s not what E wants.

  Jordan keeps driving. They’re almost at his house.

  “Nobody panic,” Jordan says. “We’re going to be fine.”

  267.

  E and the others bag up their black clothes and hide them in Jordan’s pool house. They change into sweats and hoodies and go back into the mansion and bring pillows and blankets down to the theater room and turn on the TV. There’s nothing on the news yet. It’s too early in the morning. Nobody’s broadcasting.

  There are a couple of lines on the internet, though. Twitter is picking up the story. It’s all rumors and conjecture at this point. There’s nothing about the Suicide Pack.

  They divide up the blankets and the pillows and the couches. Jordan mutes the TV and turns the lights low. E lies there in the darkness and the quiet, trying to fall asleep, trying to erase the dead movie star from his brain.

  Eventually, he drifts off. But isn’t going anywhere. He haunts E’s dreams until morning.

  268.

  E wakes up. The TV is off, and Paige and Haley are still asleep. Jordan’s gone. E sits up and wraps himself in the blanket.

  He wanders out into the mansion and finds the nearest bathroom. As he comes out afterward, he hears a door close. He follows the noise.

  Jordan’s in the kitchen. He has croissants from Artigiano and four coffees. He looks pretty well rested. He doesn’t look like he stayed up all night worrying about .

  (E has a series of thoughts as he walks into the kitchen.

  The thoughts are as follows:

  Jordan bought coffee from Artigiano.

  Artigiano is not at all close to Jordan’s mansion.

  (It’s all the way over by Capilano Marina.)

  (There are multiple coffee shops closer.)

  So why Artigiano?)

  Jordan looks up when E walks in. “Morning, sunshine.” He slides E a coffee and the bag of croissants. And an iPad with a video loaded on the screen. “Check this out.”

  He shows E the iPad. Presses play.

  And E watches in absolute horror.

  269.

  What E sees:

  A slow pan across ’s penthouse suite.

  The city skyline out the windows. Drinks on the coffee table.

  Pan across to ’s body, lifeless on the floor.

  (Cut to black.)

  Then the Suicide Pack logo.

  Then the punch line.

  ROMEO MUST DIE.

  (Cue Robo-Haley’s maniacal laugh.)

  270.

  “What in the actual fuck, dude?” E stares at Jordan. “What did you do?”

  Jordan smiles like the sphinx. “It’s our latest Vine, E. It’s going to break the internet, right?”

  “No.” E grabs the iPad. Fumbles with the touch screen. “You have to delete it. You can’t post that shit.”

  “Too late,” Jordan says. “It’s already posted.” He gestures to the bag of croissants. “Try a croissant, E. They’re delicious.”

  But E isn’t thinking about eating.

  E’s thinking about the freaking electric chair.

  “What the fuck are you thinking?” he’s saying.

  “Will you quit with all the drama? We’re going to be fine.
We were careful last night. The plan was a good one. The only witness is dead. Nobody even knows we were at the St. Regis. You kept your head down so the cameras wouldn’t see your face, right?”

  “Yeah, okay, but what about the other Fixes?” E asks. “Paige had connections to the movie star. Haley’s freaking mom owned the Côte d’Azur. And what about Mike? He knows we bought explosives. He already suspects we set that bomb.”

  “Don’t worry about Mike,” Jordan says. “Mike’s a nonfactor.”

  “How do you know that?” E’s running his hands through his hair. E’s feeling like he might, you know, faint.

  Jordan sips his coffee. Bites into a croissant. Takes the iPad back and fiddles with it. “Take a look, E,” he says, handing the iPad back. “They love us.”

  E looks at the screen.

  He’s in the Capilano High message group.

  (And it looks like a freaking piranha feeding frenzy.)

  271.

  OMG.

  OMFG.

  Is this fucking real?

  How the fuck did they get this footage?

  Can anyone trace this?

  Hoax? Y/N

  Why the f would they post this?

  Why the f would they kill him?

  Meh.

  I never liked his movies anyway.

  [Etc.]

  [Etc.]

  [Etc.]

  272.

  “We just have to act normal,” Jordan says. “Nobody knows it’s us. You guys need to relax, okay?”

  They’re back in the theater room. E’s feeling like his brain is oozing out his ears, and Haley and Paige look about the same. Paige’s makeup is smudged; she’s been crying. Haley can’t take her eyes from Jordan’s iPad. She keeps shaking her head and muttering something E can’t hear, but it’s probably profane.

  Jordan holds out a coffee and the bag of croissants. “Eat up, you guys,” he says. “Everything looks better on a full stomach. I promise.”

  Haley looks at him like he’s insane. “I don’t have an appetite.”

  “Have some coffee at least. Perk up a bit.”

  “I don’t want coffee, Jordan.” Haley’s voice is menace. “What I need is to understand what you were thinking, posting this Vine.”

  Paige curls up, hugs her knees to her chest. “We have to tell the police,” she says. “They’re going to find us anyway. We have to get ahead of this and just hope they’ll be lenient.”

  E feels a brick in the pit of his stomach. Sees law school disappearing before his eyes. Sees a long life in prison instead.

  He looks over at Haley and sees the same fear in her eyes. But Jordan sits down on the couch beside Paige. “Look at me,” he says.

  Paige doesn’t answer. She doesn’t look at Jordan. She hugs a pillow to her chest and stares across at the wall.

  “We’re not going to the police,” Jordan says. “We’re not confessing shit, either. We’re the Suicide Pack. We don’t let anyone in this town mess with us.”

  “We fucking killed a guy, Jordan,” Paige says. “And it’s still just a freaking game to you?”

  Jordan looks at her, hard. “It isn’t a game. It was never a game. It sucks that had to die, but he was a total fucking sleazeball. This is just the universe paying him back.”

  “I still don’t get why you had to post that freaking Vine, though,” Haley says.

  “Nobody’s going to trace it to us. No one ever has to know. As long as we act normal, we’re totally fine. And if not?”

  He grins.

  “I have a six-point-eight-million-dollar trust fund,” he says. “If that won’t keep the heat off us, it will at least get us somewhere far away, fast. Okay?”

  He looks around the room. Nobody answers.

  “Okay?”

  Weak nods. Feeble shrugs.

  Jordan shakes his head. Sets down the bag of croissants. “You guys should really drink that coffee,” he says. “It’s like a morgue in here.”

  273.

  And that’s that.

  Paige promises to keep quiet. They all promise to keep quiet. They drink coffee and eat croissants and spend the day in the theater room, watching the news.

  Their faces never show up onscreen.

  The police never knock at the door.

  (Holy shit, E thinks. We might actually get away with this after all.)

  274.

  Paige leaves the mansion the next morning.

  “I just need to get out,” she tells the others. “Clear my head a little, get some space.”

  She catches the way Jordan and Haley and E look at her. “I’m not going to sell you guys out, okay? I just need to be alone for a while.”

  “I should get home, too,” Haley says. “Check on my mom and, like, try to act normal, I guess.”

  “Keep your mouths shut,” Jordan tells them. “Anyone tries to talk to you about this, you let me know ASAP, okay?”

  Paige and Haley nod.

  “We’re going to be fine,” Jordan says. “Just everyone trust me.”

  KIK -- CAPILANO HIGH PRIVATE MESSAGE GROUP – 08/22/16 – 11:58 AM

  USERNAME: Anonymous-9

  MESSAGE: Another bat-shit crazy Suicide Pack production. Bravo. As if murdering Gatsby makes you all heroes. I know you’re on here. I know you can see what I’m writing. Well, tick-tock, losers. Destiny is about to catch up with you.

  275.

  There’s a For Sale sign on Paige’s front lawn when she gets home. No cars in the driveway, a lockbox on the front door.

  (She hasn’t been home since forever, due to the divorce and the acrimony and the constant stress. Couch surfing has been a much less uncomfortable living arrangement.

  But right now, Paige needs her own space.)

  She unlocks the back door and walks into the house. The air is still. The place is unnaturally clean. There’s a stack of brochures on the kitchen counter, a real-estate agent’s smiling face, a bunch of professional photographs of the house.

  (There’s nothing in the fridge but fucking Perrier.)

  Paige pours herself a glass of water. Downs it, and leaves the empty glass on the counter, beside the brochures. Then she hauls her bag upstairs to her room.

  Her room is different, too. Someone messed with her stuff. Her books are all hidden and her stuffed animals rearranged. Someone threw out her old journals, or moved them somewhere. Paige sets the bag down on the floor, kicks off her shoes. Pulls out her laptop and tries to connect to the internet, but she can’t get a signal.

  Even the freaking Wi-Fi is gone.

  276.

  Paige lives like a squatter in her own home. She buys cookies and chips and soda from the little family-run convenience store down the hill, a box of stale Cinnamon Toast Crunch. She studies the case on TV.

  (Or, rather, the cases.)

  (Her cases.)

  The murder. The bombing. She combs the newspaper’s website.

  died from massive head trauma. There were recreational drugs in his toxicology report. No signs of forced entry into the suite. Capilano PD is reviewing the St. Regis’s security tapes now.

  (No suspects yet in the Côte d’Azur bombing either.)

  Rumors abound.

  But no one in the real world is talking about the Pack.

  (Yet.)

  277.

  There’s something else in the news besides bombing coverage. A little article, barely four paragraphs long: MISSING MAN CONFOUNDS POLICE, FAMILY.

  Paige doesn’t know why she clicks through. Boredom, maybe, or just morbid curiosity.

  The missing man is a sixty-five-year-old Vietnam veteran. He now works as a special effects technician for Grant Studios—Jordan’s dad’s company. He hasn’t been seen in almost a week.

  (He disappeared the day after Paige’s Fix went awry.)

  There’s a picture beside the article. A man with white hair and a big, shaggy beard. Tattoos. He looks like an old biker thug. The article says his name is Michael McDougall. He’d worked with mo
vie kingpin Harrison Grant for nearly twenty years.

  Police don’t have any leads.

  278.

  A couple days later. Paige is sleeping late when she hears something outside in the driveway. Voices, two of them, a man’s and a woman’s.

  (At first Paige thinks it’s the real-estate agent. He’s been coming around now and then, showing the house off to prospective buyers. He always looks at Paige with a mixture of pity and, like, desire.

  Paige tries to stay out of his way.)

  The doorbell rings.

  (The real-estate agent has a key.)

  Paige goes to her window and looks out at the driveway. Sees the unmarked police car parked by the front door.

  It’s not the real-estate agent this time.

  It’s the cops.

  279.

  Two cops, in particular. Plainclothes detectives.

  (You know who they are.)

  Dawson and Richards. They badge Paige at the door. Ask if they can come in. Paige lets them in. She has nothing to hide—

  (here).

  The detectives leave their shoes on. They follow Paige into the kitchen. Dawson picks up a brochure from the counter. “Your parents selling?”

  “Divorce,” Paige tells him. “My dad’s in some legal trouble at the moment.”

  “So why’s your mom leaving? Because he’s getting locked up, or because the Feds froze his bank account?”

  Richards gives him a look, and he holds up his hands, grinning a little. There’s something mean about him that sets Paige on edge.

  “You heard about the murder at the St. Regis,” Richards says. She smiles a little nicer, playing the good cop. “, the movie star. We’re running the case.”

  “We’re working that bombing, too,” Dawson says. “The bathing suit store down on Main Street, the real trendy one. What’s it called?”

  “Côte d’Azur,” Paige says after a moment.

  “That’s right. Your friend owns it.”