Page 25 of The Apparent Trap

“Easier said than done,” I point out. “But I’m guessing you aren’t going to be okay with Carmen getting hurt in this process.”

“Of course not.”

“Right. And I’m not going to hurt my dad.”

“Beyond poisoning him,” he says with a laugh.

“But that’s just it,” I counter. “I was barely comfortable with giving him mild flatulence! This is hard. It’s a difficult needle to thread, coming up with ideas that remind them of their age gap but don’t include anything nefarious or harmful.”

“True,” he admits.

“So? Any ideas?”

He’s quiet for a beat. “Maybe,” he finally says, but he doesn’t elaborate.

“They can’t possibly be worse than mine.”

He’s silent, considering. Neither of us speaks for a few minutes.

“We’ve gotta up our game a little bit,” he finally says.

“That’s not an idea,” I point out. “Maybe this entire plan is just one bad idea,” I repeat. “Maybe we should—”

“No,” he interrupts. “Tummy trouble was a bad idea,” he says with a chuckle. “But I think I’ve got something better.”

I roll my eyes, even though he can’t see me. “Care to share with the class?”

He hums for a moment, like he’s deciding. “No, I think it’ll be better if you have plausible deniability.”

“Plausible deniability?”

“Nothing extreme,” he clarifies. “I just think you’re probably a bad actor, and I’m going to need you to be surprised.”

“Who assumes someone is a bad actor?”

“Are you not?”

I think about all the theater I did in high school and college, planted firmly in the background as a producer or otherwise backstage person.

“Okay fine,” I say. “But don’t do anything extreme.”

He sighs. “Ezzie, this whole gambit is reciprocal ruin. Even though we both are on a particular side, our incentives are aligned. If I do something extreme, it hurts both your dad and Carmen.”

“The war analogies aren’t exactly making your point.”

“Would you prefer we wage a battle with beans?”

“Ha ha, you’ve made your point. My idea was basically a whoopee cushion in a trench coat. But you’ve got a lot of bravado for someone who can’t even tell me their plan.”

“You’ll know it when you see it.”

I almost retort like porn, but then clam up thinking of our conversation in the bar. It hardens me, a reminder that for all this camaraderie right now, it’s not real. It’s not because he thinks I’m interesting.

“Okay, fine,” I say succinctly, then hang up before he can reply.

I look at my phone and notice I have a Slack message from one of the senior producers, Sarah, asking me to swing by. I desperately need to get back to thinking about work and not about Lee Morgan, so I walk over to her office.

“What’s up?” I ask.