Not Now, Not Ever: A Novel

At least, we were supposed to think we were going to our next class. I knew from our pinched schedule that the campus run was today. If the Cheeseman events were still allowed. Which I prayed they were, because I hadn’t been allowed out of sight of a counselor in days, much less allowed to get actual exercise. Leigh kept trying to get me to do yoga with her, but it was too much standing still. I had way too much energy to burn. I’d tried jogging the length of our floor, but Perla’s shouts for quiet had drawn Meg out of her room and had sent me back to sit on my mattress. I really regretted not stealing the Octavia Butler book out of the Lauritz before we’d been denied access to it. I suddenly had free time.

While everyone else started collecting plates and silverware, Brandon and I volunteered to stay behind to wipe down the table with one of the sudsy rags that had started being left out in big red buckets at the end of every meal. I got the feeling that Lumberjack Beard was taking the lockdown particularly personally. Three days in, our food wasn’t even imaginatively bad anymore. Lunch had been last night’s meatloaf set out with bread for sandwiches. Add in our new “clean your own table” mandate and some rumblings about teams being told to wash dishes, and all signs pointed to one grumpy, gangly Lumberjack.

Brandon wrung out a rag and handed it to me and then got one for himself. We stood on either side of the table, wiping down the wood in tight circles. Uneven streaks made Meg twitchy. Then again, few things didn’t make Meg twitchy these days. She kept glaring at the Perfect Nerd Girl and snapping at Hari.

“Did you get fan mail?” I asked Brandon, keeping my voice quiet so as not to draw attention from the surrounding tables.

He made a confused face before jumping with recognition and pulling the envelope out of his pocket. He tore it in one long swipe and shook out an index card. He smiled. “Good. Our ride is secure.”

He passed me the card. The handwriting was inhumanly neat, nearly its own font of round corners and ruler straight lines.

Meet me at the corner of College and Hillview at 8 pm on the dot. Stick to the shadows. If you get caught, I don’t know you. Hang in there, kid.–HKL

I handed it back across the table and continued buffing ketchup out of the wood grain. “That looks like a ransom note. Are you sure you aren’t being kidnapped?”

He folded the card with three creases and slipped it back into his pocket. “Well, we are. Technically. Only in the strictest legal parameters.”

Under the strictest legal parameters, I had kidnapped myself the second I’d crossed the state line into Oregon, but I really didn’t want to think about that right now. “If we get caught—”

“We won’t,” he interrupted. “I’ve already talked to Jams. He and Hunter will cover me. Leigh will make sure that no one comes looking for you, right?”

“Yeah.” Leigh had been too delighted when I’d unfolded the plan for Brandon and I to leave campus on Friday night. In return, she wanted a box of Raisinets from the movie theater and a full recitation of the menu of gelato flavors, since I wouldn’t be able to transport a waffle cone for her.

I hadn’t told her that this was my first real date. I was afraid that she’d start joy-screaming again and the whole plan would completely unravel.

“Back to the trenches,” I said as I wiped up the last shred of lettuce. “I’ll take the towels back to the bucket.”

He pushed in the bench and met me at the head of the table. Instead of handing me his towel, he gave mine a tug, pulling me an inch forward. He placed a kiss on my cheek and a towel in my hand.

Beaming, I dropped the towels off and dashed down the dining hall stairs. My fellow campers were clumped together in the quad sans counselors. Bryn Mawr stood alone under the oak tree on the green, her hands on her hips as she spoke in a carrying voice.

“Today’s event is a three-mile run around the interior of campus, following the directions given to you by the counselors along the way. Each counselor will hold a different color straw, which you will collect as proof of your route. The first person with every kind of straw across the finish line,” she pointed at a line of bright blue painter’s tape stretched across the pavement in front of the residence hall, “wins. Obviously.”

“Why are we bothering with this crap?” Perla asked loudly, as I joined my team at the edge of the grass. “They should be looking for my binder, not making us run a footrace.”

“Why do you care?” Kate asked. “Do you even want to go here?”

Perla looked stricken. “Here? In the middle of nowhere? Are you kidding?”

“I’m going to regret asking,” Jams said, rubbing his forehead. “But then why do you want to win the Melee? Winning means going to this school.”

“No,” Perla said sharply. “Winning means being the best.”

Kate made a sputtering whinny of disbelief.

“I’m glad we still have the Cheeseman events,” Hunter blurted. “If none of us can study, at least we might win for the extracurricular stuff.”

“But should anyone else even bother to enter this one?” Leigh asked. She covered her mouth with her hand and fake whispered, “Ever does this for fun.”

“Because only one person can be good at running?” Perla asked, tilting her face so that her nose was literally in the air.

“Yes,” Kate said in a sarcastic flat line. “That’s obviously what Leigh meant. How astute of you for picking up on that deep subtext.”

Perla gave a disgusted sigh and, without any counselors to stop her, stormed off.

“After the break-ins, she called her parents and begged to go home,” Kate said, watching as Perla joined her friend at Team Three. “They said no, but I’m holding out hope that they’ll change their minds. Her snoring is so much worse when she’s been crying.”

“Team Six lost someone this morning,” Jams said. “One of their guys quit. I heard Hari and Cornell talking about how his parents came to pick him up after breakfast. They didn’t think the camp was safe if people could break into the rooms.”

“The same thing happened with one of the girls on the floor above us,” Kate said. “Team Four or Five? Someone was talking about it when I was in the shower this morning. I guess this girl’s parents came to get her because they were pissed that Professor Cheeseman didn’t call everyone’s parents to let them know what was going on here.”

Leigh sniffed. “The burglars didn’t bust down the doors. Either they had a master key or they had a lock pick.”

The hair on my arms stood on end. How had the burglars gotten into all of the rooms? Leigh and I were pretty consistent about locking up behind us. But if anyone got locked out, the counselors must have master keys to let them back in.

So, had someone gotten ahold of one of the master keys, or had someone with a master key abused their power?

“Perla has a point, though,” Galen said. He barreled ahead as the rest of us scoffed. “Why haven’t they found the binders yet?”

“When would they have time to look?” Hunter asked. “They’re stuck babysitting us.”

“And it’s not like all of the binders have to be together,” Brandon said. “If it were me, I would have taken the pages out and dumped a little in different garbage cans, so that none of them would be overly full. No one would notice if there was some garbage in every can on campus…” He made a face and smoothed his hair over his eyes. “That was too specific, wasn’t it?”

I patted his arm. “Hopefully, you’re too smart to have just blurted out your entire evil plan.”

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