a thousand mistakes // psych

Chapter 4

Gus's POV

The car sped towards Joey's Diner - incidentally, best waffles on this side of anywhere - and and I stared out the window, contemplating. There was a lot to contemplate, and lot to try not to think about. An unexpectedly good idea rose in my mind as the mustard-colored sign shaped like an unneccessarily happy pancake swam into view.

"Hang on, did Shawn say Malone, Scott, and Dunder?"

"No, he said bacon, eggs, and toast. Keep up, Guster."

I frowned. "Excuse me? I think of ideas, too, you know. And I think I've got one."

"Does it involve getting the blueberry back? I miss that car," Shawn whined.

"C'mon, son! You know if I could I would! Anyway, what do those three names have in common?"

Shawn slammed the breaks. "None of them can get us the blueberry? I don't know, aren't you supposed to be the smart one?"

"And you watch even more tv than I do," I countered, trying to ignore the sound of Lassiter peeling his forehead off the back of my headrest. Shawn inched his way into the shoulder of the street.

Lassiter snapped his fingers, leaning up between our seats. "I got it! It's the Office!"

Shawn groaned and pulled back into the lane, earning us an angry honk and a probably deserved middle finger. "I could've gotten that. Okay, next one."

"There is no 'next one,' Shawn! Do you get it?" I interrogated him. He nodded, exasperation showing.

"Dunder as in Dunder Mifflin, Malone as in Kevin Malone, Scott as in Michael Scott. I watched every season of that show with you, Gus. We skipped the American Duos finale for it one year. Kelly Kapoor is both of our spirit animals." He neatly skidded out of the way of a cement mixer.

"No way. I am clearly Jim Halpert. He's educated, funny, charming -"

"Okay," Lassiter plowed on, "so could they be pseudonyms?"

I exhaled slowly. "That was my train of thought."

"So maybe the culprits are guys whose names have something to do with the Office? It could of course be one man acting completely on his own, but that's very unlikely. I'm guessing a crew of about three to six," he speculated. Shawn snorted.

"Glad to see someone's back," I snapped. "What's your problem with our theory?"

"Nothing," he said. Lassie leaned up from the backseat again.

"Dammit, Spencer, just tell us what you know."

"Okay." Shawn gave in easily, obviously eager to act clever. "There's this one guy; you'll never guess what his name is."

"What?" Lassie and I growled in unison. Shawn put his hands in the air defensively, triggering a symphony of keep your hands on the wheel! as he narrowly avoided a pickup truck.

"Jim Vance!"

His excited reveal was met with silence.

"Who the hell is that?" Lassiter snarled impatiently, checking his phone even though it hadn't buzzed.

"Jim as in Halpert, Vance as in Bob and refrigeration," Shawn said, his eyes nowhere near the road. I was close to slapping him. "He's a dentist."

"Okay, loose connection, but it's the only lead we've got," I admitted.

Lassiter glared at me. "Who died and made you king, Guster?"

I bit back a comeback about his missing ex-partener and turned to Shawn. "Okay, Vance is our only clue at all to possibly find Juliet. We're going with it."