The Quick Fix Read online

  I picked the wooden block up off of my desk and looked around the basement for a place to hide it.

  I had an old metal filing cabinet that I kept my case files in. There was no lock on it, but the bottom drawer stuck. I pushed on the side of the cabinet and jiggled the drawer in the special way it took to get it open. Then I put the block of wood, and the bag of designer Pixy Stix, underneath a stack of old school papers. It was the best I could do at the moment.

  I headed outside, locked the door, checked it twice, then pedaled off to Sal’s.

  I was riding to Sal’s, I went over the events of the day. I was trying to wrap my head around the particulars of the case, but like a board game bought at a tag sale, there were a bunch of pieces missing. Melissa Scott (cheerleader, member of the popular elite) hires me to watch her boyfriend, Will Atkins (captain of the basketball team, most elite member of the popular elite), because she thinks he’s acting strange. Also, he gives her a block of wood to hold but tells her it’s no big deal. It may not be a big deal to him, but it turns out that it’s a big deal to Vinny Biggs and the Thompsons, which pretty much guarantees there’s something fishy about it. Melissa gets put in the Outs by the Thompsons, who take the block of wood. Then someone opens Tina Thompson’s locker like a tin can but leaves the wood inside. Why? What was so special about this particular “decorative piece of wood”? And who gave it to Will to hold in the first place?

  It was a week before Halloween, so some of the lawns looked like sets for low-budget horror movies. The air had a bite to it that wasn’t there a couple of weeks ago, and I knew that pretty soon it’d be too cold to ride my bike. The wind would freeze my face off.

  Sal Becker was a kid in my class who wanted to make a place where kids could get a sandwich and a soda without having to deal with the “grown-up shuffle” that kids had to face in most places. So Sal and his dad spent the summer fixing up the big old toolshed that was sitting to the side of their house. They put in a bar and some tables, made the place look nice without looking too showy. Various tag-sale lamps were scattered around, giving the place a warm, inviting glow. Sal had a little toaster oven behind the bar and could whip up a toasted cheese sandwich, or a peanut butter and jelly (strawberry or grape). Those were the only two things on the menu. He also served root beer and cream soda—the good kind, in glass bottles. His parents let him run the place himself. They only had two rules: no fighting and no fighting.

  I walked in and grabbed a cream soda at the bar. Jimmy was sitting at a table in the back with Cynthia Shea. She was wearing sweats and a baseball cap pulled low over her eyes, trying her best to look inconspicuous. It was like trying to hide a Porsche by putting a napkin over it. When Jimmy saw me, he stood up and waved.

  “Mac,” I said, trying to keep my voice from cracking.

  “Matt. This is Cynthia—”

  “Shea,” I said finishing his sentence. “Head cheerleader.”

  “We met earlier today,” she said.

  “Twice,” I countered. “And so far, we’re oh-for-two. So what’s the plan for the third time? You going to punch me out or just have me arrested?”

  “I want to hire you,” she said.

  “I don’t hire myself out for abuse. Plus, I’m sure you can find someone who’ll let you yell at them for free, just for your attention.”

  “I’m sorry about earlier. Jimmy here vouches for you. That’s good enough for me.”

  “Cynthia’s family and mine go way back,” Mac added. I looked at him. He was more hyped up than usual, which I didn’t think was possible.

  “That’s great. Congratulations,” I said. “If you’re trying to hire me to find out who pulled the trigger on Melissa, you’re too late.”

  “Who?” Cynthia asked.

  I didn’t answer.

  She looked at Jimmy, who just shrugged. I couldn’t tell if he didn’t know or was just bluffing.

  “Who?” she repeated.

  “Why do you want to know?” I asked. “So you can find them? Get a little revenge?”

  “No,” she said.

  “Yeah, next time try saying it without gritting your teeth,” I said. “You might be more convincing.”

  “Did it have something to do with these?” She threw a handful of the Thompsons’ special Pixy Stix on the table.

  Jimmy Mac’s eyes opened wide, as if she had just handed him a lit stick of dynamite. “Where’d you get those?” he whispered.

  “Did it?” she asked me without even looking at Jimmy.

  I didn’t answer. Jimmy tried to pick the Pixy Stix up off the table, but Cynthia put her hand on top of his. Once he stopped trying, she took her hand away. He left his hand on the table, obviously hoping she’d do it again.

  “Melissa was a client of yours, wasn’t she?” she asked.

  “I know you’re used to getting your way,” I said, “so this is going to be a major disappointment, but that is none of your business.”

  “Hey, come on, Matt,” Jimmy Mac said. “I know her. I’m vouching for her.”

  “Don’t take this the wrong way, Jimmy, but judging by what I’ve seen so far, you’d vouch for her about anything … even if she said she was the queen of England and had traveled here from Mars.”

  “Is there a right way to take that, jerk?” he asked.

  “To hell with you, Mac.” I stood up. My chair made a loud raspberry as it skidded on the floor. “I don’t appreciate you springing this surprise two-against-one consultation about what my next job should be.”

  “Shut up!” Cynthia yelled. If the kids who were in Sal’s hadn’t been staring at her already, they were now. “Cut all this macho posturing! Both of you.”

  I glared at her, but she glared back at me. I learned a long time ago that there was no way to win a staring contest—or a glaring contest—with a pretty girl. I sat down and looked away.

  Cynthia leaned over and whispered in Mac’s ear. He had a dreamy look on his face, like he had waited his entire life for this scenario. But Cynthia must’ve whispered something different in Mac’s dream scenario than in the one playing out in real life, because by the time she finished, his expression had changed to a bucket of ice-cold realization.

  “I have to go,” Jimmy said in a stiff voice. “Paper’s due out tomorrow.” He got up to leave, slowly, as if he were hoping for Cynthia to reconsider and stop him. She didn’t. After a few seconds, he accepted his fate and walked toward the door. I grunted at him as he passed; he grunted back.

  Cynthia waited until he was gone before she spoke again. “You guys couldn’t have apologized to each other?”

  “What do you think that grunt was? Jeez, for guys, that’s practically falling into each other’s arms.”

  She was giving me a long hard look. I could see it out of the corner of my eye. There was no way I was going to look at her directly. She was too pretty, and I needed to remain professional.

  “Why are you angry with me?” she asked. It was an odd question, and the last thing I expected.

  “What makes you think I’m angry with you? I don’t even know you.”

  “I was just thinking the same thing. And yet here you are, acting like I’m your mortal enemy.”

  “Let’s just say I have a hard time talking to girls who expect the world to collapse at their feet when they bat their eyelashes.”

  “I haven’t batted them once,” she said.

  “No, but I did see you purse your lips a couple of times.”

  “Are you watching my lips?” she asked. A small smile started to creep across her mouth.

  “Uhhh …” was all I could muster. The supersmooth Matt Stevens strikes again.

  “Forget it. I withdraw the question,” she said. “So can I hire you, or what?”

  “Or what, for the moment,” I said. I pointed to the Pixy Stix still on the table. “Where’d you get these?”

  “Some of the girls on the squad. They use them before a game sometimes.”

  “You allow that?”


  “No, but they do it anyway,” she said, obviously not happy about it. “Well, they did. As of today, they can suck down as many Stix as they want … they just won’t be cheerleaders anymore.”

  “What makes you think these have something to do with Melissa getting popped?”

  “Do you know who makes them? The Thompsons,” she said. “They look like they’d pop their own grandmother for a couple of nickels.”

  “Or a piece of wood.”

  “What?”

  “Nothing.”

  “If the Thompsons were the ones who put Melissa in the Outs—” she started.

  “You’re afraid they’re going to go after the rest of the squad, now that they’re no longer buying.”

  She nodded.

  “And you’re here to protect ‘your girls’?” I asked.

  “This,” she said, pointing to the cheerleading patch on the jacket hanging off the back of her chair, “is a sisterhood. We look out for each other.”

  “Oh yeah? Like you looked out for Gretchen Jacobson? She was on the squad last year, wasn’t she? Yet when Vinny and his crew put her in the Outs, your ‘sisters’ knocked her off the squad, then took turns kicking her around. That ‘sisterhood’ garbage may work on the parents and new recruits, but it doesn’t fly with someone who’s been around.”

  “Yeah … but I’m in charge now,” she said. “If I say we take care of our own, then we take care of our own.”

  I shrugged.

  “You don’t believe me?” she asked.

  “Does it matter to you what I believe?”

  “Not yet, but it might.”

  I didn’t believe her on that point, either, and I gave her a look that told her so. “Why do you do it?” I asked.

  “What?”

  “Cheerlead. It’s a status grab. Nothing more. But you don’t seem like that type of girl. So what gives?” I asked.

  “What ‘type of girl’? You mean stupid and shallow?”

  “You said it, I didn’t.”

  “But you were thinking it.”

  I didn’t deny it.

  She sighed. “Look, I’m not going to lie. Status wasn’t the main reason I joined the squad, but it was definitely in my top five.”

  “You keep a list?”

  She shot me a sarcastic smile, then continued. “But there is also this feeling of performing … of dancing … of getting people excited and cheering and pumped. The adrenaline rush is addictive. Plus, I get to be part of something that’s bigger than me … a sisterhood with traditions and—”

  “Come on,” I said, cutting her off. “Some of those girls would be hard to take if you were related to them and you had no choice. You’re either in denial, or you have a high tolerance for being around really annoying girls.”

  “Again, why are you angry with me? Is it because I don’t fit in to one of your neat little boxes?” She leaned in close. “Is it because I scare you?”

  “Look, I know this whole ‘flirty’ act is just to get me to do what you want, but I’m not buying it. You’re probably going to leave here and call your basketball-player boyfriend.”

  “I don’t have a boyfriend … yet.” She stared into my eyes. I tried to look away but found that I couldn’t.

  “Here,” she said, and slid a five-dollar bill across the table. “I believe that’s your usual deposit.”

  “I didn’t say yes.”

  She brought her face inches from mine. “Do these look like the eyes of someone who just gives up?” she asked.

  I swallowed hard, then slowly shook my head no. Her face lingered in front of mine for a moment longer, as if to say, “If you take my case, you’ll be able to look at this face more often.” It was a convincing argument.

  “So what would you be hiring me to do?” I asked.

  “You know who did this to Melissa. Do whatever it takes to keep it from happening to anyone else on the squad.”

  “People who say ‘Do whatever it takes’ usually have no idea what that actually means.”

  “That’s why I’m hiring you,” she said. “I have a feeling you do.”

  She stood up. I stood up with her. She held out her hand. I shook it. She held on. “I’ll check in with you tomorrow,” she said. I was going to say that I still hadn’t taken the case, but there was no use. We both knew I had, just not verbally. Our eyes locked. We both blushed. She let my hand go, then turned, swept her jacket off the back of the chair, and walked out the door. I slumped back down into my chair, exhausted.

  Sal came over with another cream soda. “On the house,” he said, and winked. I didn’t argue.

  • • •

  Twenty minutes later, I was riding my bike home, trying to think of something other than Cynthia Shea holding my hand, saying that she’d see me tomorrow. I wasn’t doing so hot. The only thing I could come up with was wondering how “Sucker-for-a-Cheerleader Detective Agency” would look on a business card.

  It was around eight when I got home. My mom was still a good six hours from the end of her shift at the restaurant, so I went down to my office to examine the block of wood. Before I took it out it, I checked the dark corners of the basement for anyone who might be hidden there. I even opened the door to the outside and checked the bushes, then went back inside and locked the door behind me. I opened the drawer to the filing cabinet. I half expected it not to be there, but it was. Right where I had left it.

  I went back to my desk and sat down. Apparently, I had forgotten to put the sheet of paper with my father’s clue back in my desk drawer because it lay on the desk. I turned the block of wood over in my hands, noticing the grain and wondering what was so important about this thing that kids would splash each other to get their hands on it. I gave it a little shake. Something rattled. I felt like an idiot for not thinking of that sooner.

  It wasn’t a block of wood; it was a box.

  I looked at each side, trying to find an obvious seam, but there wasn’t one. It was a trick box, designed to prevent people from taking whatever was inside. I shook it. It rattled again, but this time I noticed that it only rattled on one end. I tapped that end, but nothing happened. I tapped the bottom. Nothing happened. I tapped the other end. Something inside clicked, and a small piece of wood slid out. The grain of the wood had hidden the seam.

  I looked inside, expecting to see something small but solid, like a coin or a plastic trinket … something to explain the rattle. I was wrong. The rattle was caused by the magnet that served as the latch for the hidden door. Inside there was only a small slip of paper. I turned the box upside down, and the piece of paper fluttered onto my desktop, like a moth that had croaked mid-flight. There was something written on the paper, something I recognized, but at first, my mind wouldn’t accept it as real. I rubbed my eyes and looked again. It was real.

  There were now two pieces of paper on my desk: one from my desk drawer, which I had never shown anyone before, and one from the wooden box I got in school that day. The pieces of paper were different in every way, except one … they both had TMS136P15 written on them.

  not possible,” I said out loud, as if hearing it would make me believe it more. I had never shown that sheet of paper to another person. No one. It wasn’t possible. And yet, there it was.

  My mind was racing, running through every possibility as to how and why a clue to my father’s disappearance had ended up in a wood box that caused my most recent client to gt banished to the Outs. The first thing I did was check my desk drawer, the one where I kept the original clue. I didn’t keep it locked, so there wouldn’t be any signs of forced entry. But I’ve had people go through my stuff before—mostly in my locker at school—and no matter how much they’d try to hide it, there was always a feeling like something was off … like my mind was carrying around a subconscious picture of the inside of my locker, and someone’s digging, regardless of how careful they were, always screwed that picture up. I wasn’t getting that feeling about my drawer.

  I got up and checked t
he lock on the outside door. It was intact. No one had tampered with it. I could have left it unlocked. Locking a door is something you do thousands of times, so that you never really notice if you remember to do it. But you do remember if you come home to an unlocked door, and I hadn’t had any moments like that in the recent past.

  Could someone have gotten this information from an outside source? Who? And from where?

  I kept coming back to one name, the one kid who ended up being involved in every dirty deal that went down at the Frank … the one kid who always seemed to be five to ten steps ahead of everyone else. I grabbed my address book, picked up the phone, and punched in the numbers. He picked up on the third ring.

  “Biggio residence, Vincent speaking.”

  “I found it.”

  He paused. I heard him exhale slowly. “Did you, now?” he asked.

  “I did, but there’s a problem.”

  “Is there, now?”

  “Yeah,” I said, “and it’s even worse than you putting ‘now’ at the end of all of your questions. Did you know it isn’t just a piece of wood? It’s a box.”

  “Matthew, I do not wish to discuss this over the ph—”

  “What am I saying? Of course you knew it was a box. Didn’t think to tell me, though, did you?”

  “You didn’t need to know.”

  “Really. Because from where I’m sitting, the stakes for a piece of wood are vastly different than the stakes for a box … especially when what we’re really talking about is what’s inside that box. And that’s what this is all about, isn’t it? What’s inside the box.” I picked up the piece of paper that had fallen out. “The Thompsons knew it was a box … probably even knew what was inside it, which is why you sent your thugs after them.”

  “And now you have it.”

  “I do.”

  “And you want something.”

  “Yeah, you could say that.”

  Vinny sighed. “Well, this is surprising. I must say, Matthew, I never expected this from you.”