Fix Yourself

The secret to fixing yourself costs $1,997 plus processing fees.

Dr. Jared L. Tyrell adjusts his Patek Philippe. Click. Third time in two minutes. The gesture broadcasts: I bill more per hour than you make per month. His thumb finds the crown, rotates it twice. Click. Click. Like chambering rounds.

"Stop existing."

The words land in row seventeen, seat C-4, where a woman in Target activewear stops breathing. Just for three seconds. Long enough for her fitbit to register the anomaly.

"That's your problem." Tyrell's voice drops an octave. The frequency that makes spines straighten. "You keep insisting on being real."

The Marriott ballroom smells like industrial carpet cleaner and desperation. Two thousand bodies packed into a space meant for twelve hundred. Fire code violation. Nobody calls it in. They paid to be here. They borrowed to be here. Second mortgages. Maxed cards. Kids' college funds.

Someone's recording this on their phone. Shaky footage. The kind that goes viral posthumously.

"Be better."

The stage lighting turns his teeth titanium white. Veneers, obviously. Twenty grand worth of ceramic promises. He lets the silence stretch until someone coughs. Hack-hack. Row twenty-three. Male. Smoker's lung announcing itself.

Tyrell's eyes find him instantly. No, that's wrong. His eyes were already there. Waiting.

"You." Pointing now. The finger worth more than the man it targets. "Stand up."

The cougher stands. Creak of the chair. Polo shirt. Dad khakis. The uniform of surrender.

"When did you give up?"

"I—what?"

"Simple question. When. Did. You. Give. Up?"

The man's jaw works. No sound comes out. Someone in row three starts recording. Their flash is on. They don't notice.

"Sit down."

Thump. He sits. The woman next to him shifts away. Three inches. Just enough to establish: not with him. Her chair scrapes. Skreee.

Tyrell paces. Seven steps left. Tap-tap-tap-tap-tap-tap-tap. Pivot on the heel. Seven steps right. The exact distance that keeps everyone's neck at fifteen degrees. Optimal discomfort. He's counted. He's measured. There are tape marks on the stage that the lighting carefully obscures.

"Your marriage is a timeshare you can't sell." His laugh sounds like ice cracking. "Your job is assisted suicide at thirty-year intervals. Your kids google 'is my dad depressed' at 2 AM."

Nervous laughter ripples through the crowd. The kind that comes out wrong. Too high. Too sharp. Someone drops their water bottle. Nobody picks it up.

"But here's the beautiful part." He stops center stage. The lights dim except for the spot on him. Theatrical. Calculated. The air conditioning kicks off. The silence becomes aggressive. "You already know the solution."

Someone's phone vibrates against a metal chair leg. Bzzt-bzzt-bzzt. They don't check it. Their hand twitches toward their pocket, stops. Tyrell watches the hand. Smiles.

"Break into pairs."

The migration begins. Strangers becoming witnesses. A ballet of avoidance and resignation. Chairs scraping. Bags dragging. The woman in Target activewear pairs with a man whose wedding ring left a tan line. Fresh absence. You can see where the skin is still pale, soft, unused to exposure.

"Look at your partner." Tyrell's voice goes soft. Intimate. The voice of a priest who lost his faith but kept the collar. "Really look."

They look. Pupils dilating in the dim light. Micro-expressions of disgust, fear, recognition.

"Now tell them the last time you felt anything real."

Silence thick as motor oil. Someone's stomach growls. The sound is obscene in the quiet.

Then:

"My daughter's funeral."

The woman saying it doesn't blink. Her partner does. Rapidly.

"When I hit him."

Male voice. Which him? Doesn't matter. The admission hangs between them like a body.

"The pills didn't work."

This one's almost cheerful. Like reporting the weather.

More confessions leak out. Each one a credit card swipe. Each one a transaction. Pain for possibility. Trauma for transformation. The economy of self-help.

Tyrell walks among them now. Off the stage. The spotlight follows, operated by someone who isn't credited in the program. He stops behind a young man who's crying. Not movie crying. Ugly crying. Snot and salt and sounds that shouldn't come from humans.

Tyrell puts a hand on his shoulder. The crying stops instantly. Like a faucet turned off.

"Good," Tyrell whispers, but his mic catches it, throws it across the room. "That's very good."

His hand leaves a mark on the man's shirt. Not visible to the naked eye. But the cameras catch it. All seventeen of them. The ones nobody noticed being installed. The ones that don't appear on the Marriott's security system.

Here's what the testimonials don't mention: Dr. Jared L. Tyrell hasn't touched another human being in three years.

The hands that touch shoulders, that gesture and point? Latex. Hollywood grade. The kind they use for presidents' body doubles. The seams are hidden by the ten-thousand-dollar suit, by the careful lighting, by the fact that nobody looks that close. Nobody wants to see the seams.

The real hands are in a room with no windows. Typing. Always typing. Response rates. Conversion metrics. Optimal desperation indexes.

"Now," Tyrell says, back on stage, back in the spot, "who wants to disappear?"

Every hand goes up. Whoosh of air displaced by two thousand arms. Even the crying man. Especially him.

"Good," Tyrell says. "Because you already have."

The video stutters.

You're watching this on your phone. Tuesday, 3:17 AM. No—wait. Check again. Tuesday, 3:18 AM. You lost a minute. Where did it go?

The algorithm found you. Or you found it. Same difference. Your search history says everything: "how to be happy," "why am I like this," "online therapy cheap," "Tyrell method reviews," "is life supposed to feel like this," "how to delete search history," "how to delete search history permanently," "can websites see deleted history."

The pixels reorganize. Bzzt. Your phone's getting warm. Too warm.

That's your face in row twelve.

You've never been to Phoenix. Never been to a Marriott ballroom. You don't own that shirt. The one you're wearing in the video. You check your closet later. It's there. Tags still on. Receipt in the pocket. Dated tomorrow.

But there you are. Staring up at him. Mouth slightly open. The expression of someone watching their house burn from across the street. Your fitbit, the one you don't own, shows your heart rate: 97 BPM.

The video keeps playing but Tyrell's looking at you. Through the screen. Through the lie of distance. His eyes track when you shift positions. Left. Right. He's still watching.

"I know you."

Your thumb hovers over the pause button. Doesn't press it. Can't press it. Try. See?

"You're watching this in the dark." His voice comes through your earbuds like he's speaking from inside your skull. "You've watched fourteen self-help videos tonight. Fifteen. This is fifteen. You'll watch fourteen more tomorrow."

The woman next to you in the video—the you that's never been to Phoenix—starts crying. Real tears. You feel them on your face. Salt on your lips. But your eyes are dry. You check in your phone's black screen. Dry.

"You're wondering if this is real." Tyrell leans forward. The camera pushes in. Impossible angle. The camera would have to be inside the stage. "Wrong question."

Someone in the video stands up. Starts walking out. The camera doesn't follow them. But you hear it: tap-tap-tap-tap-stop. They never reach the door.

"The right question is: when did you agree to this?"

Your phone knows. Check your terms and conditions. Page 247, subsection 18-C. The part about biometric data. The part about improving user experience. The part you agreed to at 3:17 AM on a Tuesday six months ago. Or tomorrow. Time's negotiable in the fine print.

"Here's your free sample." Tyrell adjusts his watch. Click. But his hands don't move. The sound comes from somewhere else. From your room. "The secret to fixing yourself—"

Pop. The video cuts.

Black screen. But not empty. There's something in it. Moving. Breathing.

Your face reflects back. Lit by nothing. Visible anyway. And behind it, another face. Watching.

The suggested videos populate below. "TYRELL METHOD FULL SEMINAR $997." "TRANSFORM YOUR LIFE NOW." "DOCTORS HATE THIS ONE TRICK." The prices are different each time you look. $997. $1,997. $2,997. The number that makes you pause but not close.

Your thumb hovers. The motion sensor in your phone tracks the micro-tremors. Calculates exactly how long before you break.

Click.

The transaction processes. Your card, the one you cancelled last month, approves instantly.

In a room with no windows, notification arrives. Not a ping. Not a sound. Just knowledge. Another one. Row twelve. The one who cried without crying.

The latex hands type: "Send confirmation video."

You receive it instantly. It's you at the seminar. The one in Phoenix. You're smiling. You're fixed. You're better. The timestamp says tomorrow.

Your fitbit, the one you now own, shows your heart rate: 0 BPM.