2026-07-08 03:31:09Chris sat back down at the table and opened his browser.
He knew exactly where to start. St. Augustine's Preparatory Academy had a website that looked the way the school looked in person He had visited the page once before, months ago, after James had pressed his face against the fence that Saturday. He opened it now and went through it properly this time. The academic programmes. The extracurriculars. The boarding facilities, the library, and the science block that had apparently just been renovated. He clicked through to admissions. The f*e structure was listed clearly. Annual tuition: twenty-two thousand dollars. Boarding: nine thousand. Uniforms, materials, and activity levy: six thousand. Total for one full academic year, all inclusive: thirty-seven thousand dollars. Thirty-seven thousand dollars against fifty-one thousand in his account. He didn't hesitate. He filled the enrollment form and submitted it A payment portal loaded. The total sat at the top of the page. $37,000.00 He entered his account details and pressed confirm. The processing screen lasted four seconds. “Payment Successful. Enrollment Confirmed. Welcome to St Augustine's Preparatory Academy. Enrollment documentation will be sent to the provided email address within minutes.” The email arrived even before he closed the payment screen He opened it. A formal admission letter, St Augustine's crest at the top, and James's full name in clean type beneath it. “Dear James Hayes, We are pleased to confirm your enrollment at St Augustine's Preparatory Academy commencing the next academic term…” Chris downloaded it. He looked at it on his screen and the smile that came was different from last night's quiet, dangerous smile. As he sat there smiling, his stomach grumbled loudly, signifying his hunger. The last time he had had something was the afternoon of the previous day. He patted his jacket pocket. The sixty dollars he had remaining was still there in his pocket. He could use that for food without any worries. He could eat. Properly. Without calculating... He grabbed a fresh set of clothes from his backpack and headed for the small bathroom down the hall to take his shower Chris stood under the water longer than necessary. Not thinking about anything in particular. Just standing there, letting the warmth do whatever warmth does when a person has been running on adrenaline and shock and grief for the better part of twenty-four hours. He thought about his father. "The world will be unfair to you, Chris. Specifically and repeatedly and sometimes brilliantly unfair. The question is never whether it will happen. The question is what you're made of when it does." He remembered one of his father's pieces of advice he received when he complained of life being unfair to him after he was sacked from school for his father’s inability to pay his fees back in grade six He turned off the water. He was towelling his hair dry, pulling on his shirt, and running the conversation with James through his head on how much to say, how to say it, and how to show him the letter without making it feel like charity from a brother who was supposed to be as broke as he was. He stepped out of the bathroom. James was sitting on the bed. He was still in his St Matthias uniform. His backpack was at his feet, bigger than usual, clearly packed with everything he owned. He was sitting very straight, both hands in his lap, and his face was dropped. Their mother's stubbornness. Their father's dignity. All of it sitting in a fifteen-year-old's face on the edge of a bed in a one-room apartment. When he saw Chris, something in the blankness shifted. "Hey," Chris said. "Hey." James's voice was flat and careful. Chris crossed the room and sat beside him on the bed. For a moment neither of them said anything. The city moved outside the window. "They told everyone," James said finally. "Before I left this morning. Mr Coleman made an announcement at breakfast." He paused. "He said your scholarship was revoked because you were caught stealing." Chris said nothing. "The other students were asking me about it." James kept his eyes forward, at the wall opposite, not at Chris. "They were saying things." "I know," Chris replied calmly "Did you?" James turned then, and his eyes were direct and serious and fifteen years old and there was no ambiguity in the question. He was not asking to be comforted. He was asking because he needed to know. "Did you steal anything, Chris?" Chris met his brother's eyes. "No," he said. Simply. Without decoration or defence. "I have never stolen anything in my life. I was framed. Someone at Virell set me up very carefully and very deliberately, and they used the scholarship board to make it stick." He replied James held his gaze for a long moment. Then he nodded. "Okay," he said. That was all. Okay. Complete and unconditional, the trust of someone who has had every reason to develop it over years. "So what do we do?" James asked. "We have both lost our scholarships." He looked around the room without finishing the sentence because the room finished it adequately on its own. Chris reached into his pocket. He took out his phone, opened his email, and pulled up the document he had downloaded an hour ago. He held the screen out to James without saying anything. James took the phone. He read the letterhead first. Chris watched his eyes track to the crest, to the name of the school, to his own name in the line beneath. He watched him read the first sentence, stop, and read it again. "This is ..." James looked up. "This is St Augustine's." "I know." "Chris, how did you …" He looked back at the screen, scrolling now, reading faster "This says fees paid. This says all fees paid. This says…" He stopped scrolling. He looked at his brother. "How?" Chris smiled. "I am going to explain everything," he said. "All of it. I promise. But right now I need you to know that you are going to St Augustine's, your fees are paid for the full year, and you are never going to have to worry about a scholarship board making decisions about your future again." He said James stared at him. Tears dropped from his eyes and a sob followed Not loudly. He sat on the edge of the bed with Chris's phone in both hands and the admission letter on the screen and cried Chris put his arm around his brother's shoulders. They sat like that for a while. Eventually James straightened. He wiped his face with the sleeve of his St Matthias blazer and he looked at the admission letter one more time. "St Augustine's", he said quietly. "St Augustines," Chris confirmed. James looked at him with eyes that were still wet but steady now "Dad would have gone crazy," James said. Chris laughed "Yeah," he said. "He really would have."
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97. The Police Raid
About an hour later, Chris finished his essay. He dropped the pen and heaved a sigh of relief.Then he remembered something: he had not ironed his uniform, and he still had some dirty clothes he needed to wash.He went to the phone in the room and dialled reception. The receptionist came on the line. Chris asked directly if they had a laundry service in the hotel or around the hotel. The receptionist confirmed that they had a laundry service and he could either go there or call them to come for his clothes and get them done. Chris asked for their extension, and the receptionist read it out. Chris thanked the receptionist and hung up the phone. He then dialled the extension of the laundry. A man answered the phone. Chris told the man he had some laundry that needed to be done and wanted someone to come over and pick up the clothes. The man asked for his room number, and Chris mentioned it. Then he told him someone was going to come pick it up.The call ended.While he waited, he too
96. Preparations
Chris was a block from the diner when Sandra called him."The motel," she said. "Did you go there?""This morning," he said. "Extended the stay two more days. The receptionist saw me coming and going." He kept walking. "I am just finishing my breakfast a few minutes ago at a diner.""Good," Sandra said. "The fund manager's email about the bid he sent earlier, I received a copy of it. The bid strategy makes sense. Patient approach, last-day move. I have flagged it for review when the first counter bid comes in so we are ready for them. I also received a copy of your response you sent as well." Sandra told him"I told him to wait for my confirmation before doing anything," Chris said. "He will monitor and hold. To me, I don't really know about all the strategies, but to me, the most important thing is we are able to acquire the trust and the board and have control. That will be all for me. The strategies are technical and a little complex for me, so I will just let the fund manager
95. The Strategy
Chris left the hotel with a spare shirt folded into his jacket pocket.He walked to the motel. Twenty minutes, the same route he and Sandra had driven the previous night, now covered on foot in the Sunday morning quiet. The city was doing its slow weekend startup, fewer people, less noise, and the particular ease of a day that had not committed to itself yet.The motel reception had a different face behind the desk. Day shift. A younger man, reading something.Chris nodded at him and went upstairs to the room.He let himself in with the key fob, hung the spare shirt on the hook behind the bathroom door, and sat on the edge of the bed. He pulled out his phone.The group chat had thirty-two unread messages.He scrolled through them. Nothing was urgent, the group had been talking among themselves through the evening and into Saturday night, the natural conversation of people who had done something new together and were still running on the energy of it. Ryan had posted about a large ti
94. Sunday
The light came through the gap in the curtains and found his face.Chris blinked. Turned his head. Blinked again.The ceiling of the hotel room looked back at him, neutral and unhelpful.He lay still for a moment, letting consciousness assemble itself.The whole room was very bright, signifying that it was already daytime.He stretched lazily on the bed and sat up slowly after a loud yawn.Then he reached for his phone on the bedside table where it had been charging overnight.Two missed calls. Two unread messages. Both from Sandra.He checked the time first.Past nine. He quickly realised what was happening. He had slept through the night without checking the cameras at midnight to see what was happening.He opened the messages.The first, sent at a half past 7 am: “Any camera alerts overnight? Did police come?”The second, sent at 8:51 am: “Chris. Are you okay?”He typed back immediately.“Just woke up. I am fine. So sorry. I slept through the night and everything. Checking the feed
93. Saturday Night
The two of them made their way back to the hotel and headed to the rooftopThe rooftop was warm with the kind of light that hotel suites use to make evenings feel longer than they are. The city glittered through the glass walls in every direction, and the table had been reset with dinner while they were at the police station The table now had fresh covers, new cutlery, and covered plates that released good smells when lifted.Jessica was already at the table when they came up. She looked at Chris's face when the elevator opened and read what she needed from it."Done?" she asked."Done," Sandra said.They sat. They ate.For a while the conversation was lighter than it had been all evening. Jessica asked about the firm first: how Sandra had built it and how long it had taken to get properly established after going independent."Three years before it felt stable," Sandra said. "The first year was difficult. The second was manageable. The third time, I stopped being afraid of the end o
92. Police Station
Sandra's phone rang as they were getting up from the table.She answered on the second ring. A brief exchange, three sentences, maybe four; her side of it were just single words and a yes. She ended the call and looked at Chris with relief on her face."My contact is at St Augustine's," she said. "He has started."Chris stood still for a moment.He exhaled a long, slow breath that had been waiting since Sandra first used the word 'leverage' in reference to his brother. The specific relief of a person who has been holding something they can't put down and has just been told someone else has it.James was covered."Good," he said. His voice was quieter than he intended.Sandra looked at him for a moment with an expression she didn't try to manage.Then she picked up her jacket. "Let's go."They went down in the elevator together. Jessica split off at the garage level, keys already in hand."Don't open the glovebox for anyone," Sandra said."I will be here," Jessica said. No dramatics
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