The Fixes (17 page)

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?”

“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.

“We should be filming this,” he tells Eric. “The fans are getting restless. Get your phone out.”

Eric aims his iPhone at the garbage drum—

(now just a shadow on the dark grass).

Jordan aims his Galaxy at the garbage drum too. Eric grips the cedar for support and ducks as low as he can. Aims his iPhone out around the trunk and wonders if it's the last he'll ever see of his hand.

Jordan grins at Eric. “Fire in the hole,” he says.

Then he presses the send button.

178.

Nothing happens.

“It might take a second,” Jordan says. “Cellular signals and whatnot.”

Eric nods. “Okay.”

“You're still filming?”

Eric shows him the iPhone. “Still rolling.”

“It's coming.” Jordan peers out around the cedar. “It'd
better
be coming.”

179.

But there is no kablamo.

They wait two, maybe three minutes.

Maybe more.

“Do you have the wrong number?” Eric asks Jordan. “Maybe you're just calling some random.”

“I have the right number,” Jordan says. “I tried it, like, eight times. It should be working.”

“Maybe you didn't pay your phone bill. Or, like, the coverage isn't good here.”

Jordan glares at Eric. “I fucking paid my phone bill, E. Something's fucked up.”

He stands and walks out toward the picnic area, still typing things on his phone.

“Wait,” Eric calls out. “Don't mess around while you're out in the open. You could get blown up.”

“
Thanks
, Captain Obvious. If I'd known you were going to be so much of a pussy, I would have made you wait in the car.”

Jordan walks up to the garbage can, leans over, and rummages inside. “It should be working,” he says. “What the shit is going on?”

“Maybe the wiring was loose, or something?”

“Or maybe you screwed it up when you jostled it,” Jordan says. “I
told
you to be careful.”

Jordan kicks the garbage drum. The sound resonates. It
scares Eric a couple steps backward. He's still filming with his iPhone. Jordan sees it, and flips out.

“Am I on-screen? Turn the fucking camera off,” Jordan says. “For fuck's sake, E.”

Eric turns off the phone.

Jordan paces.

Eric watches, and tries to figure out the right thing to say. “We can probably fix it,” he says.

Jordan spins at him. “What are you, E, fucking retarded? It's fucking ruined. Wake
up
!”

He starts walking away, out of the picnic area and back toward the trail to the parking lot. Eric hurries to follow.

“Wait,” he says. “Where are you going?”

But Jordan doesn't slow down. “I just can't hold your hand right now, E,” Jordan says. “Just leave me the fuck alone, okay?”

He stalks toward the parking area. In the distance, E can hear his car pull away.