He looked over his shoulder at the photo. “Actually, that could be Justin’s twin brother, Ryan. Ryan used to be an actor too. He and Justin shared the part of little Jimmy O’Hara on Five Times Five. But it seems as if Ryan grew out of his talent. He gave up the biz when he turned eleven. Now he has a solid career as a member of big brother’s posse. Fact of the night: Justin is older by a margin of only twenty-three minutes. And here’s a bonus. A Star Gazer exclusive. The new location for Justin’s movie is—Bayport.”
“Whoa. You think maybe we could be extras or something?” I asked Frank. “That would be sweet.”
“I think we’re going to be busy. You know, with our mission,” he said.
“Oh, right.” I shouldn’t admit this. But I’d forgotten for a second that I was supposed to be prep-ping for an ATAC assignment.
The screen went blank. Star Gazer’s hyper-peppy go-to-commercial music went silent.
A note on a piece of plain white paper filled the screen.
“Nothing unusual about the font. It’s on every computer,” Frank commented.
“Bet the paper is standard too,” I said as I began to read the note. It said: You think you’re so special. And you’ve got everyone else believing it too. But if you get cut, I’m betting you bleed just like the rest of us.
The note was quickly replaced by another one. This one was written on a sheet of pale lavender paper with flower petals glued to it. The edges of the petals had turned brown. It was a little harder to read than the first one, because the handwriting was really curly and loopy. My third-grade teacher would disapprove. According to her, cursive letters were supposed to look one way, and one way only. If anyone deviated from the system, we would no longer be able to communicate with one another in writing, and society as a whole would crumble.
Frank started reading the second note aloud—slowly. He was clearly having some problems with the handwriting too. “ ‘Justin, my love. We are meant to be together. I had both our charts done by an astrologist, and we are soul mates. There’s no doubt it’s our destiny to share our lives. What do I have to do to prove it to you? I’ll do anything to make you see the truth. Maybe I’ll have to kidnap you (ha, ha). That way you could spend enough time with me to really know me. Then you’d have to see the truth. I promise I’ll find a way for us to see each other soon. Love, love, love, from your love.’ ”
“I’m not sure I believe the ‘ha, ha’ in that letter,” I said.
“I definitely didn’t think there was anything funny in it,” Frank agreed, as another letter filled the screen. This one was on lined binder paper. Written all in caps, perfectly neat and uniform. But whoever had written the letter had pushed down so hard on the pen that it had made tears in a couple of places. The message was short and to the point: “Stop what you’re doing—or you will be forced to stop.”
The note stayed on the screen, as our ATAC contact began to speak. “Justin Carraway receives thousands of letters a week. Many are harmless fan letters. But in the past month, the number of letters red-flagged as potentially threatening to Justin have increased. His manager, John ‘Slick’ Slickstein, has become concerned that the writer of one of these letters will go further and try to get in touch with Justin in person. Your mission is to get close to Justin yourselves, become a part of his entourage, and determine if he is in danger.”
The screen went blank. That was all the information we were going to get. The rest was up to us.
“I see psycho stalker possibilities in all those letters,” I commented.
“And all of them contained a threat, or at least implied a threat,” Frank pointed out. “One talked about cutting and blood. One writer came right out and said she wanted to kidnap Justin. And one claims he will stop Justin from doing what he’s doing—although what that means, we don’t know—if he doesn’t stop on his own. So we’ve got three people who could possibly want to hurt Justin.”
“The three letters were just samples,” I reminded him. “Who knows how many other threats Justin has gotten? We might end up having to protect him from a whole army of stalkers.”
Plan A
Joe handed me a baseball bat and pointed to the ceramic clown on his floor. “Smash it!” he ordered.
I let the bat hang at my side. “This isn’t necessary,” I protested.
“You’re the one who’s all about preparation,” Joe reminded me. “Not just for cases, either. Don’t think I don’t know about your class-by-class checklist.”
“That’s only during exams,” I said. “And I think if a situation comes up where I need to take care of a very ugly ceramic clown, I’ll be up for it without a rehearsal.”
“You won’t. I know you,” Joe insisted. “And you’re not going to make it as a member of Justin’s entourage if you can’t produce a little mayhem. If he wants to trash a motel room, you’re going to have to do more than leave a towel on the bathroom floor. You’re going to have to smash it up. So smash!” He pointed to the clown again.
Sometimes I just ignore Joe when he’s being ridiculous. But sometimes he just won’t be ignored. So I raised the baseball bat, aimed, and whacked the clown a good one.
A second later Aunt Trudy threw open the door and rushed inside. “What was that horrible noise?” she cried. Her eyes went from the bat in my hand to the pieces of clown and back to the bat. “Frank Hardy, why in the world would you do a thing like that? That was a present to Joe from Mrs. Iburg. She gave it to him when he was five years old. And she gave you a ceramic pirate. How would you like it if Joe destroyed your pirate?”
“He already did,” I answered.
“When I was seven. And it was an accident,” Joe protested.
“It was not,” I shot back. “You hated it. You said it was always staring at you.”
“Maybe I did give it a little help off your dresser,” Joe admitted. “It gave me the wiggins.”
“You go get a broom and clean that up, before you even think about showing up in my kitchen for an after-school snack,” Aunt Trudy told me. “I expect more out of you, Frank. You’re usually so tidy and respectful of other people’s things.” She turned around and marched out the door.
“Do you think the snack thing applies to me, too?” Joe asked.
“Absolutely,” I told him. I shook my head. “I bet no one in Justin’s entourage has an Aunt Trudy.”
Joe laughed. “Justin doesn’t, that’s for sure. He’d never get away with even a quarter of what he does if he had an Aunt T.”
“Okay, now that I’ve established my hotel-trashing potential, let’s figure out how we’re going to get ourselves into Justin’s entourage in the first place,” I told Joe.
“Not a problem. Justin’s new in town. He’ll need a couple of guys to show him the happenin’ Bayport spots and introduce him to the hot Bayport chiquitas.”
“And those guys will bring us along?”
“I am those guys,” Joe bragged. “All you have to do is stand next to me, and we’ll be so in. As long as you don’t talk much.”
• • •
“There he is—Justin Carraway. Told you it would be easy finding a movie star in Bayport,” Joe said. He rubbed his hands together. “Time to work my mojo.”
Justin stood about half a block away, talking to a thin girl with blond hair. “You’re telling me that this famous mojo of yours can work from this distance?” I asked.
“It’s a powerful thing,” Joe answered. “But I’ll probably have to get a tiny bit closer,” he admitted after a beat.
“I really think this is a situation that cries out for a plan B,” I said.
Justin kissed the blond girl. Then he turned and started walking toward us.
“Plan A is going to work just fine,” Joe retorted.
Then the sound of a gunshot rang out.
And Justin Carraway went down.
Good Death
“Man, he does good death,” I said. Justin’s body had bucked and twitched just the way it should ha
ve after getting shot.
“Like that killed him,” said Frank. “Didn’t he get shot about twelve more times in One Phone Call—and then get up and fly a helicopter?”
“And?”
Frank shook his head. “What’s this new movie about, anyway?”
I laughed. “You’re not going to believe it. It’s called Undercover. Justin plays a guy who is part of a secret organization that uses teenagers to solve crimes.”
“Totally unbelievable, right?” a girl behind us commented.
“Totally,” Frank agreed.
Justin moved a little closer to the crowd that had gathered to watch the filming, and cheering started up everywhere. Wait. I listened harder. Not everyone was cheering. There were a decent number of boos mixed in, and I heard a guy yell, “Somebody should shoot you for real, Carraway!”
“Did you hear that?” I asked Frank.
“Yeah,” he told me.
I turned toward the voice, scanning the faces in that part of the crowd. I noticed that several people over in that area were holding signs. I pushed ahead a little and leaned forward so I could read them.
CLEAN UP YOUR ACT, CARRAWAY a couple of them read. MORE ACTING, LESS DRAMA! was printed in huge letters on another one. And three people held up a banner that just said CLEEN TEENS.
“What’s with them, you think?” I said.
Frank had spotted the group of sign holders too. “You’ve never heard of Cleen Teens?” he asked.
“I don’t think so,” I told him.
Frank rolled his eyes. “You know the human brain has a finite capacity, don’t you? Maybe you should try to forget a few of your celebrity factoids and clear up some space in there.”
“Knowledge of celebrity culture has been essential to the successful completion of many of our missions,” I said, trying to sound as much as possible like my math teacher explaining an equation (otherwise known as my impression of Frank).
“I guess that’s why we make a good team,” Frank told me, back to sounding like a regular human. “Together we know everything that’s important enough to know.”
“So, Cleen Teens,” I prompted.
“I want to go again, right away!” a woman working a jeans-sneaks-cowboy-hat combo called out before he could answer. I figured she had to be the director, because a bunch of crew people started rushing around. One dusted Justin’s face with powder. One brushed Emily Slater’s hair so it fell just the way it had at the beginning of the scene. One reloaded the gun that had been used to “shoot” Justin with blanks.
“Cleen Teens is an organization dedicated to making teenagers better citizens. It started in Delaware, but now it’s a nationwide movement. Everyone—all the volunteers, the president, everybody—is eighteen or under.”
I checked out the group of sign holders again. Yep, not an adult in the bunch. “So what’s their problem with Justin?”
“Uh, do you think good citizens trash hotel rooms and pretend to start fires in restaurants?” Frank asked.
“But he’s just one guy. Don’t they have more important things to do than stand around waving signs at him?”
“He gets thousands of fan letters a week,” Frank reminded me. “He’s not one guy. He’s insanely famous, especially with kids his own age. That makes him a role model. I’m betting that’s why the Cleen Teens are after him.”
All the Cleen Teeners were behind blue police barriers. “Looks like the Bayport security has them pretty well contained,” I said.
“Not just them,” Frank commented. Besides the protesters, there was a whole mess of fans and a bunch of people who had to be paparazzi. Or camera salesmen. And there was plenty of security to keep all of us off the section of street where the filming was happening.
“Justin, can I get an autograph?” a girl near the front of the crowd screamed, jumping up and down with a pen in her hand.
“Sign my Weirdness poster!” a guy who was dressed like Justin in Weirdness yelled out.
“I’ve been waiting here since five a.m. Sign my shirt! Please!” begged a different girl.
Justin waved but didn’t move any closer. “Sorry, we’re about to start up again!” he called back. “And they’re still making me beautiful.” He grinned, then turned his back to the crowd.
“We’re definitely not going to get close enough to him to do—whatever it is you were planning to do,” said Frank. “Maybe we should stake out his hotel.”
“Then we’ll look like stalkers,” I answered. “Not the impression we’re trying to make. There’s got to be another way.”
“Maybe we just got lucky,” Frank said. “Isn’t that the guy Justin pulled that prank on?”
I followed his gaze. “Yeah, that’s him. Rick something.”
“Rick Ortiz,” Frank supplied.
I raised my eyebrows. “How come you know that? All pop culture is supposed to be stored in my half of the Team Hardy brain.”
“It was part of our briefing,” said Frank.
See, I was right about him and the prep. I don’t mind keeping things loose, thinking on my feet. Frank likes to have a plan B, a plan C, and a plan D. He doesn’t like surprises.
“Let’s go talk to him.” I figured Rick was heading toward the Java Joint, down at the other end of Main. I saw this reality show where people competed to win a production assistant job on a movie. One of their tasks was remembering a coffee order for ten. And the order was really complicated. Half caf. No foam. Double foam. Only one girl got it completely right.
“What’s the plan?” Frank asked.
What’d I tell you?
FRANK
Okay, I have to step in. Plans are encouraged by ATAC. Plans are—
JOE
You wouldn’t let me talk during your part. So you don’t get to talk during mine. And besides, a chunk of our ATAC training was on improvisation.
“We’re winging it,” I told my brother as we started after Rick. When we passed the Madison Hotel, I headed inside.
“Quick detour,” I said. I walked straight over to the rack with all the brochures on local attractions. You know what I mean. They have them in every hotel everywhere. I grabbed a handful, plus a two-for-one pizza coupon. “Take some.” I shoved half the brochures into Frank’s hands.
“I think I see where you’re going with this,” said Frank. “Good plan.”
“Good improvisation,” I corrected. We hurried out of the hotel lobby and on down the street. Rick disappeared into the Java Joint, just the way I thought he would. Frank and I followed him inside.
We waited until he’d put in his coffee order. A big, complicated order—I guess reality TV is actually pretty real sometimes. Then, while he was waiting for it to get filled, we made our move.
“You’re Rick Ortiz, right?” I asked. “I’m Joe. That’s my brother, Frank. We were wondering if you could help us out with something.”
Rick fingered the mic of his wireless headset. “Guys, I’m working right now. If you want an autograph from Justin, the best way to do it is to write to him care of his production company, Just Justin. It might take a while, but you’ll get one. You’ll get it faster if you send in a stamped return envelope.”
Rick gave out the information in a fast monotone. Sounded like he’d done it a thousand times before.
“No, that’s not the deal,” Frank told him. “We go to Bayport High—”
“And we were elected to welcome Justin to our town. Everyone wanted to do it, but the principal said two max,” I added, holding up my brochures. “There’s a coupon for a free pizza, too. Not that he needs it.”
Rick laughed. “The way he eats pizza, he might be broke before the end of the year. The makeup people are always nagging him to stay away from the greasy stuff so his skin will stay clear. But Justin doesn’t give a rat’s long pink tail. He says it’s their job to make sure any zits get covered.”
He jammed his fingers in the pockets of his cargo shorts. “I can’t believe I said that. You guys aren’t u
ndercover for Star Gazer or anything, are you?”
“No worries,” Frank said. “I don’t even watch that show.”
The guy behind the counter started putting Rick’s coffee order in cardboard trays. I grabbed one. Frank got the next one.
“Thanks,” said Rick. “If you ever want to be a PA, start working on growing at least one extra hand.”
“Do you think you could get us a minute with Justin? To do the welcome thing?” I asked.
“No way,” Rick answered. “Uh, Justin is one of those actors who likes to stay in character until we’re done for the day. Talking to fans brings him out of it,” he explained. “But one of these coffees is for Sydney, Justin’s publicist. She might be able to set up something later. Sounds like a good photo op.”
“Cool,” Frank said.
Rick crossed the street and turned down a side street a couple of blocks from where the movie was being filmed.
“Whoa,” I said when I saw the row of silver trailers. One of them was three times as long as all the others. Rick stopped in front of it and knocked on the door. It was opened by Justin.
No. Not Justin. Different clothes. No makeup. But same haircut, same dent in the chin, same everything else. Ryan. The twin who “grew out of his talent,” according to Sanders Smith of Star Gazer.
Rick reached for a cup on my tray, but Ryan held up a hand to stop him. “Justin decided he wanted one after all. He said pretending to like Emily—forget about love her—for one more minute is going to take major caffeine.”
“I guess I’d better get over there fast then,” Rick said. “Any chance you could take these guys over to Sydney? They’re from the local high school. Want to welcome Justin. You know the drill.”
Ryan nodded. “I’m sure Sydney will at least want to set up a photo. Come on. She’s over in the wardrobe trailer,” he told me and Frank.
“Any chance you could give this to her?” Rick held out a coffee. “It’ll get cold if I don’t get it to Justin first.”
Double Trouble Page 2