The story so far: (spoiler warning) Levi, Brad, Maggie, and Pathik are making a movie together in Brad's dad's warehouse on the edge of their suburban town. But something has gone terribly wrong and the dead body of their lead actor playing the part of Gary Stu has fallen from the ceiling in a mangled, dismembered state. Flashback to three weeks earlier when the team has gathered at a local restaurant to go over the logistics of their new project. Here Kelly, Tracey, and Linh enter the story, along with a rag tag team of cult members that Kelly is in with. The cult has tracked down a local white supremacist dickwad and his son, the very Brad Miller of our story. The team breaks into the Miller's home in an attempt to gain intel, but things go wrong once again, and they're forced out. With Brad and his filmmaker friends unaware, a corrupt police force and local conspiracy start to unfold and might just end up with more very dead bodies falling from the sky.
Maggie rang the doorbell. Pathik stuffed his hands into this pockets and looked out at the craziness of the neighborhood. The Millers house, just across the street, was crawling with cops.
“You think they got, like, the whole village force to come out?” Pathik asked, counting three cop cars, all with lights on for some god forsaken reason.
Maggie turned away from the door and looked out, raising her hand to shield her eyes from the setting afternoon sun.
“You think it's, like, serious?” Pathik continued. He didn't exactly care if it was serious or not. Sure there was something in his gut that hoped no one was hurt, but it was soon replaced by the bile Brad usually stirred in him.
Maggie shrugged her shoulders. “I don't know, Debs is kind of a drama queen--”
“Hello?”
Maggie and Pathik turned back to face the open door. A woman they didn't recognize stood scrutinizing them. She wore a faded mauve sweater and slightly too short tan slacks; she had leftover pie crust stuck in the corner of her mouth.
“Oh hi Mags. Levi's in his room,” Camille's smooth and welcoming voice carried from the kitchen and Levi's aunt Miriam, as she turned out to be, stepped aside and let the duo in.
“Happy Passover Mrs. Schuler!” Maggie called as her and Pathik headed down the familiar hallway to the stairs leading to Levi's bedroom. Camille smiled back. The warmth of her eyes lingered on Pathik and he blushed and nodded before they disappeared into the stairwell.
“More filmmakers, I suppose,” Miriam whispered as she walked back into the kitchen.
“Yes, friends of Levi's from NIU,” Camille uncorked another bottle of wine.
“Hmmph.”
Maggie knocked on Levi's open bedroom door as they walked in.
“...because in The Mediterranean Caper—you really should read it first, like I said, it's the best opening to NUMA and...” Levi looked up from a paperback when Maggie and Pathik entered. He sat on the floor next to his bookcase and had been rambling about ultimate man of action Dirk Pitt to Brad who was half pretending to listen while he thumbed through the first few pages of their film script, or what Levi had started of it.
“Hi,” Levi smiled up at them.
“Hi,” Maggie smiled back and turned to Brad. “You know there's cops at your place, right?”
“Uh, what?” Brad jumped up and walked to the window over the side of Levi's bed that looked out onto their street. He peaked through the blinds. Two flashing red and blue cars sat parked outside his house, with one in the drive with it's lights off. Two officers walked out of his front door and Debra followed behind them, waving her hands in the air, obviously upset.
Levi tossed the paperback onto the bottom shelf of his bookcase and got up to join Brad at the window.
“Did you see anything?”
“Nope. Just cop cars, Pat said it was definitely the whole village force.”
“I didn't say that,” Pathik slid down to the floor where Levi had left and picked up the Cussler novel, flipping it over and pretending to be absorbed in the back summary. He could care less about why the cops were at Brad's house. Maggie smirked and winked at him.
Brad turned away from the window and left without a word.
Levi returned to the floor, nudging his shoulder into Pathik's and letting his hand ghost over Pathik's across the back cover of the book. “You can borrow it, if you want.”
“You said you never let people borrow your books.”
“Well, I changed my mind.”
Maggie rolled her eyes and mumbled under her breath, “Jesus, just kiss already.” Pathik caught her words and blushed a deep maroon red down his neck and across his cheeks. She walked over to the window to spy at the happenings at the Millers place. She could see Brad jog across the street and stop an officer as he made his way down the walk. Debra ran up to him and almost comically sobbed into his shoulder.
“Oh Brad! Thank goodness you're here.” Maggie feigned hysterics and let out a cackling laugh. Levi shifted uncomfortably. Everyone around him thought his friendship with Brad was something ridiculous. Maybe it was.
“What's going on?” Brad questioned the officers as he reached them. He recognized one of them from when the alarms at Miller Industrial had gone off the first day Levi and Brad and the gang had walked through the warehouse trying to decide if it would work for them to build their set there in the empty racks. His name was Officer Boyd. The other officer next to him wasn't much older than Brad was. The name badge velcroed across his breast pocket said Nowak.
“Nothing to worry about, Brad,” Boyd started to explain as Debra came running down the walk towards Brad.
Brad held out his arm to his mother as she came to him and buried her head in his shoulder crying.
“Doesn't seem like nothing.”
“Brad,” his mom sniffled. “We've been burglarized.”
“Like I was saying, Brad,” Boyd pressed forward. He was as polite as a suburban police officer usually was, stern, a little annoyed, but doing his job. Brad stood a little taller in front of him, held his shoulders back, tried to look strong while he comforted his mother. “It appears there was a break in. They came in from the back kitchen door, but it doesn't appear that anything is missing.”
“I've been violated,” Debra whined.
Nowak shifted on his feet and grabbed hold of his utility belt. His gun and his nightstick shifted and clanged against his handcuffs and pepper spray. He gave a slight sigh that looked like he was stifling a yawn.
“What do you mean, Mom, what happened?”
“I was trying to tell the officers here that I know who did this. A hoodlum came to my door and started talking to me about...about...” Debra heaved another unrelenting sob into Brad's shoulder. Brad looked up to Boyd for direction. He knew enough about his own mother to know when she wasn't exactly being truthful to make an impression.
The front door opened and slammed shut and another officer walked down the front steps and down the walk. He was Deputy Chief Tom Donahue, a veteran officer on the village force. If Brad ever thought to check the village Facebook he'd see his face on every other post. Donahue was seventy but he looked fifty-five. He was fit and looked like he was born in his police uniform—pressed and pinned to perfection. The only thing that stood out was a small pin on his chest, next to his name badge, a small rectangle of red with a black X from corner to corner and the tiniest gold rose in the center. He mostly looked like he could fuck you up good if you got on his bad side, and the only indication of his actual age was the gray prickly growth of beard on his leathery skin.
“You must be Brad,” Donahue held out his hand and Brad shook it, firmly. “Tom Donahue. I've known your father a long time.”
“Does Dad know?” Brad looked curiously around him and settled on his mother, whose tears had dried up as Donahue walked towards them.
“I gave him a call,” Donahue nodded to Brad. “I let him know that we've got the situation handled, but he is on his way.”
“Handled!?” Debra pulled away from her son and stood in front of the three officers, gesturing wildly before putting her hands on her hips in frustration. “This is handled?”
Nowak shifted on his feet again, like he was afraid of Debra Miller. It was his second week on the force, after all, he'd get used to the likes of her soon enough.
Levi sat on the edge of his bed while he watched Maggie and Pathik flip through the start of the script he had written for their movie. He felt nervous now that it was at the stage that these two were reading it. Somehow letting Brad sneak peak at the words was never as big a deal as sharing his writing with Mags and Pathik—mostly because Maggie actually knew what she was talking about in regards to film making and he cared about Pathik's opinion. Not that he didn't care about Brad's opinion, too, it was just...different.
“It's not finished,” Levi stuttered out as they reached the last page of the script before them, where Kelly and her so far nameless Gary Stu shared a heated stare.
“You left me at the juiciest part, Levi Schuler. What's a girl to do?” Maggie laughed and handed the script over to Pathik who no so subtly skipped forward several pages to be rid of the romance plot and reread the intro.
“I, well, uh..”
“Hey man, it's totally cool. I liked it. You do need some romance lessons, though,” Maggie smirked and her eyes darted to Pathik, but he forcibly ignored her and focused on the words in front of him.
“I'm all for including the romance, as cliché as it is, don't get me wrong. But she's not very good at flirting is she?”
Levi blushed and ran his hand through his curls, messing them up from where they had been tamed down for the Seder meal earlier.
“Well, I think, maybe, he's not the right one for her.” Levi said quietly.
“Oh?”
“I thought about what it might be like to build up the romantic story line, only to have him be such a disappointment. Right at the end he fails her, and...I don't know.”
“Ah yes,” Maggie smiled, a genuine smile this time, “his fatal flaw, he's too cliché.”
“Exactly.”
“Gary Stu.”
“Mmmhmm. Gary Stu.”
“So, it starts in the padded cell?” Pathik spoke up. “She's already crying?”
“Is it too strong of an opening?”
“No opening is too strong, Levi,” Maggie interjected.
“No! No, it's great. It's good. I, uh, I like it,” Pathik rushed to reassure Levi.
“But?”
“It's just. I don't know any actresses that are that good.”
The three sat in silence for a little while.
“Yeah, we need actors don't we?”
“Yeah, that's kind of how movies work.”
Levi bit his lip and then started to giggle. Maggie picked up the pillow that was sitting on the floor in front of her and tossed it at Levi. “Yeah, you numbskull.”
“So, this girl, she was threatening you?” Officer Nowak held his notebook open in his left palm and he was attempting to write down the details of Debra's encounter with the girl at her door during the time of the alleged break in.
“She was one of those types, yes.”
“What do you mean by one of those types?”
“You know what I mean.”
Nowak nodded in acknowledgment but he glanced sideways at Boyd who sat next to him.
“Right, of course,” Boyd added in. “We all know those types.” He nudged Nowak and awkward laughter ensued. “But uh, can you just elaborate for the report?”
“Ghetto,” Debra said matter-of-fact.
“Debra,” Richard Miller's heavy voice filled the whole front of the house as he called to his wife. He kept his shoes on as he walked into the living room, tracking a little bit of crusted mud into the house. “Can you let these men do their jobs? They can't catch the bad guy if they're in here having coffee cake, can they?”
Debra sat back exasperated. “I was just describing the girl I spoke to.”
“You spoke to someone?” Richard stood behind Debra where she sat on the couch, his hands came down on her shoulders and he gripped her hard.
Nowak flipped through his notebook nervously and settled on the description of the conversation that Debra had given earlier, which she was in the process of repeating now for emphasis.
“Uh, hi Sir. It was a young...black girl, twenty something,” Nowak looked at Debra for confirmation as he went on. “Kind of, umm, strange, I guess. Mrs. Miller said she talked about unborn fetuses.”
“You look young, so I'm going to assume that you are new to this job, but why are you wasting your time Officer,” Richard looked to his name badge. “Nowak? You wouldn't be related to Jim Nowak?”
“Uh, yes Sir, he's my father.”
“Oh, well,”
“Richard!” Donahue came up from the basement stairs in the hallway between the kitchen and the living room where they all sat and were discussing the break in.
“Tom,” Richard pushed Debra forward slightly and then let go of her shoulders and walked over to Donahue. “What's going on here, Tom?”
“Nothing to worry about. Just neighborhood kids, likely, they broke the kitchen window, ate some of your snacks.”
Richard leaned in and whispered to Tom. “Just neighborhood kids? You know, in this political climate...”
“Everything seems to be in order. We have no word of any antifa groups operating since Jerry took down those kids in Aurora.”
Richard nodded and looked out at his wife who was presently arguing with Nowak about some detail in his notes. Boyd looked on, stifling chuckles.
“You know, if she's worried, wouldn't be too bad to teach Debra how to use a handgun.”
Richard chuffed. “Debra, with a gun.”
“Brenda uses one.”
“Does she?”
“She could do some damage.”
“That's Jim's boy?”
“Yes, he joined the force a couple of weeks ago.”
“Looks a little in over his head.”
“Yeah, he's young. But impressionable.”
“Good. Listen, Tom, let's keep this out of the papers.” Richard reached into his breast pocket of his jacket and pulled out a money clip. Donahue eyed him and then looked up at his officers and Brad and Debra all focused on the report. Richard handed him several bills. “And bring the kid to the next meeting.”
“Certainly.”
“Thank you for all of your help. I can take it from here.”
Donahue walked up to the couch and placed his hand on Nowak's shoulder, gently, and turned to Debra with a kind smile.
“I think we've got enough to get a great head start on this search. We'll find them in no time, I can assure you Mrs. Miller. We do our best keep our affluent neighborhoods safe. I'll keep Dick in the know. Might I suggest Larsen Siding and Windows to fix that door of yours. They redid our windows last year, Brenda loved them.”
Debra opened her mouth to respond but caught Richard's eye and closed it into a polite smile. She stood up and shook Tom's hand and walked with him and the other two officers to the front door.
“Thank you, Deputy Chief.”
“Oh,” Donahue winked, “I shouldn't be Deputy for much longer. Chief Karnowski is set for retirement.”
“Shouldn't you be set for retirement soon Tom?” Debra held the door open and Boyd and Nowak filed out of the house. Donahue lingered and looked down at Debra with a glint in his eye.
“Me? Retire? Not until I'm dead. Have a good evening, Mrs. Miller.”
To be continued...here.
For bonus content, become my patron at patreon.com/prismaticjill42
Comments
Post a Comment