The five of us have put in two weeks of prep work planning for today. As one thousand juniors and seniors leave the building at 10:00 a.m. to shoot the aerial photo, there’s really nothing to do but hope it all goes according to plan.
Malone and I walk near the front of the stream of students heading across the parking lot for the football field. All one thousand of us are wearing brand-new, district-paid-for yellow T-shirts with Asheville High displayed across our chests. It’s a perfect fall day with a cloudless, pale-blue sky overhead and just warm enough that no jackets are needed. Ellie’s ahead of us at the front of the line with Stranko and Jill Banks, the district’s public relations’ officer. Mrs. Banks is in a business-y skirt-and-jacket deal and always walks like she’s clenching a walnut between her ass cheeks. This whole let’s share the awesomeness of Asheville with the world stupidity is all her idea, but really it’s just a way to justify her existence and paycheck. When Mrs. Banks got out of her car at school this morning, Ellie was waiting for her, ready to explain she was to be her student ambassador during the shoot.
It’s Heist Rule #12: Have an insider.
“Should be anytime now,” I say, watching as Ellie nears the gate.
“And if it doesn’t work?” Malone says.
“Shh, don’t jinx it.”
The line suddenly stops as Mrs. Banks and Stranko get to the stadium gate and see what Adleta was assigned to do last night. It’s five full minutes of standing around, the words “soaked” and “a swamp” drifting back from the front of the line. I watch Ellie the whole time, and she’s watching Banks and Stranko brainstorm a solution. It’s been two weeks since my disastrous failed kiss. In that time, I’ve done my best to avoid her, and when we have been together, she’s spared me more humiliation by never mentioning it.
Ellie waits for a break in the adults talking before tapping Banks on the shoulder and pointing to the other side of the school. After brief words between Stranko and Banks, the front of the line starts marching toward the intramural fields.
“Why do you look so surprised?” I say to Malone. “Adleta said he took care of it.”
“Yeah, color me skeptical.”
We step out of line and take a quick jog to the fence. The football field is more a swimming pool at this point, the result of Adleta’s sneaking into the stadium last night after practice and turning on the sprinkler system. Now the picture will be taken at the intramural fields, which have no bleachers or press box from where Stranko or Banks can get a bird’s-eye view.
It’s Heist Rule #13: Set the rules when you can.
Once we reach the intramural fields, the section leaders, made up of senior student government members, take over. They call the members of their assigned homeroom, and the field becomes a mass of identical gold shirts. This whole prank is Wheeler’s idea, but I helped with the details and planning. One of his final jobs was to spray-paint the area in ten-yard sections like a real football field. It should make this go so much more smoothly and eliminate the chances of being discovered.
“Let’s go, everyone!” Stranko shouts into a bullhorn. “We’re running behind.”
I swear he’s glaring at me as he says it.
“I’d better get going,” Malone says. “I’m over there in Becca’s group.”
“You know what to do?” I say.
“Yeah, I think I can keep it straight, Einstein,” she says. “I already did the hard part anyway.”
“So to speak,” I say.
“Right, so to speak.”
The press release Banks sent to the media showed a diagram of the picture the hired pilot and photographer are supposed to take: AHS Pride, the letters formed by students standing in meticulously prepared positions in our yellow T-shirts. When Wheeler and I went to Malone with his idea and what we needed her to do, she was less than enthusiastic.
“Ew, gross! No way.”
“Come on. It’ll be awesome,” Wheeler said. “You’re the artist. We can’t do this without you.”
“Something tells me you’ve drawn your share of those before,” she said.
“Well sure, but not on this scale. It needs to stretch across the field and be broken down into forty sections, one for each homeroom. There’s no way I can do that.”
Malone looked at me for help, but I just smiled back. Her sigh of defeat came a lot quicker than I expected.
“Let’s just say for a minute I do this,” she said. “How are you going to get them to follow these instructions? Don’t you think Banks will have already sent them the design?”
“Max and I will take care of that,” Wheeler said. “So that’s a yes?”
Malone rolled her eyes and said, “And to think I call myself a feminist.”
“Do you need help? Because I can model if you need me to.”
“Sure,” Malone said. “Let me borrow a microscope from one of the science labs.”
“Ouch.”