Out Of Focus (Wattys 2023)

29. Hey Siri: How Do I Go Into Hiding?

"I'm still not awake enough for this shit, I think I'm gonna have to break into your stash of K-cups for this buddy."

"Don't you fucking dare," Shayne is saying on a three-way call with Max and Lily. It's a call he's been on for the last ten minutes while trying very hard to avoid Oliver. He's still at the park, but the party is winding down. Tents and flags are being taken down, musical guests are loading up their stuff, and the paparazzi are long gone (thank God for that at least).

"You two have the attention span of a singular goldfish," his sister's voice says. "And I want to emphasize the singular part of that sentence."

"Love you too sis but we need a plan," Shayne says, glancing at his surroundings to make sure no one's noticed the bush he's dived into.

He spots Oliver, who seems to be walking around in a half attempt to search for him, but knows he can't go all out without being insanely obvious. He's about as cute at that moment as the golden retriever Shayne spotted while trying to find this spot. He thinks the guy and girl leading him around might be Oliver's friends from how close they're sticking to him, but he wonders why Oliver's never mentioned them. They're far enough away from him to not be obvious friends, but just close enough for Shayne to pick up on.

If only I had this much luck at figuring out who's stalking me, he thinks to himself as he finally starts to listen to Lily and Max's voices again.

"Sorry, can you guys repeat that?" He asks.

"Did you seriously just space out on us while you're in the middle of a crisis?" Lily asks. "I'm losing sleep for this."

"OK, on that I can agree on it going in the not cool category my dude," Max adds.

Shayne rolls his eyes and sighs, sinking further into the bush. "Oh please, you both probably weren't doing much sleeping anyway. I can hear Max's voice echoing, you gotta be in the same room."

There's a long pause.

"Yeah," Lily says, "consider yourself very lucky you're in a different country."

"Considered and thankful," Shayne says. "But I'm very far from lucky. Any ideas?"

He's opening the message thread from the unknown number now, his finger scrolling back up to the pin drop that has got to be a trap by now.

"Well, definitely no more going into the woods to potentially get murdered, that's a no for me," Max says.

It's the one thing they all collectively agree on with a big ol' YEP before moving on.

"OK, so we still have no idea who this could be right? Any more evidence you can drag up before you meet them?" Lily suggests. "As much as I would've loved to see a video of you fist-fighting a contestant going viral, whoever is doing this is smarter than we're giving them credit for."

"I agree," Shayne replies. "To clarify, I agree with needing some more leads, not the fighting. These texts have me ready to press the block button and just go about my business like I never saw them."

"But how do we get the upper hand?" Max asks.

Shayne's mind starts racing, trying to come up with a plan. "What if we stage a fake meet-up? We can create a scenario that will force the blackmailer's hand and reveal themselves."

"A decoy operation, I like it!" Lily exclaims. "But how do we make it believable?"

"We need to make it seem like we're onto them," Shayne explains. "We can send a message, pretending to have evidence that will expose their identity. We'll set up our own meeting point, to put things into our hands, but instead of me going, what if I loop Oliver in and have him go instead?"