Page 176 of Every Time I Go on Vacation, Someone Dies

Call if you need me, Oliver had said not twenty minutes ago, and then he put that text in my phone so I’d have his number.

I can do this.

“Have you checked out the view?” I say to Sylvie in a voice that sounds unnatural.

“I have seen the view, of course. Many times.”

“Oh, right, great.” I use my finger in my pocket to unlock my screen, doing the pattern that is my password, a gesture I repeat dozens of time a day. My finger slides to my texts, and I hope I’m clicking on the right part of the screen to call Oliver. Miraculously, I hear that faraway sound of an international call and hit the volume button, then cough to cover it. I don’t know if Oliver will be able to hear me, but maybe the call is enough.

“You are acting strangely,” Sylvie says. Her eyes are staring straight at me, unblinking. And did she always look this menacing, or is that just a product of my imagination?

“Am I? I’m just… a bit out of sorts today. You understand.”

“Because of the shooting.”

“Well, yes.” I look around me as if there might miraculously be someone up here besides us two. But no.

There’s no magic here.

Only malice.

“It’s high up here in the tower,” I say, and try to make my voice sound normal. “Did you find it hard to climb the stairs, Sylvie?”

She cocks her head to the side. “It was nothing.”

“I think I’m going to go back down.”

“No, come, look at the view with me.”

She’s blocking the door, and how can I get by her without looking like a complete lunatic?

Without giving what I know away?

And oh, shit, shit, shit. Did she come up here to kill me?

“I don’t feel well.”

“Ah, yes, you are afraid of heights, no?”

“How did you know that?”

She smiles the same smile she’s been giving me this whole time, only this time, as the kids say, it hits different. There’s a glint in her eye that I don’t like.

“I know lots of things about you, Ms. Eleanor.”

“Oh, ha…” I try to laugh it off. “The price of fame, I guess.”

“The price… Yes. There are prices to pay for things in life.”

“I mean, sometimes?”

“Only sometimes?”

“Sometimes people get away with things. And I’m okay with that.”

She looks at me, but through me like I’m transparent. Like she’s seeing a ghost. “What does that mean?”

“I’m not looking to get anyone into trouble.”

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