by Heidi Ayarbe
It doesn’t fit.
I get a heavy-duty paper clip and am twisting it to get it to the right size. Josh interrupts me, squeezing my shoulder. I nod. There’s a light clack of heels on tile. The footsteps get louder until they’re right outside the door.
My head pounds in the place right above my right eye. Like somebody’s striking it with a ball peen hammer. A phone rings. “Hello? Yeah. Just came back to make sure the office is closed. Uh-huh. Yes. It’s closed. The kids are so excited. The ski trip is tomorrow. They’ve worked so hard. Uh-huh.” Mrs. Martinez laughs. Keys jingle.
Josh motions to her desk. He crouches underneath, then I do, miraculously folding myself into his lanky arms and legs, my knee screaming in pain from the position. We soundlessly pull her chair toward us.
The door opens. I can hear how the knob is wobbly. Mrs. Martinez keeps talking. “Yep. It was closed. My OCD moment. Totally. Okay. I’m on my way.”
Her perfume floods the air—a kind of woody, floral scent. She flicks on the light, pauses, still “Uh-huhing” on the phone.
Please go now. Please, please, please go away. Please. Now. Please.
“Hello. Yes. I’m on the way.” She closes the door, jiggling the handle to make sure it’s locked. We listen to her convince whoever she’s talking to that she’s not obsessive. Her voice fades into nothingness, and the only thing I can hear is Josh mumbling something incoherent.
We lean forward, foreheads touching. “Okay?” I ask.
“Okay.” He touches his watch. “I don’t know how we’re gonna get out of here without triggering the alarm.”
How does he know about the school alarm system? I look at my watch and shrug. “First things first.” I jimmy the lock on the desk drawer and take out the metal box that says HEAVENLY.
We count out over twenty-five hundred dollars. Do these people know about banks?
“Are we gonna take the cash?”
I nod. “And we’re going to do one better,” I say. “Feel like going skiing tomorrow?” I grab the unsold tickets, taking out the ticket registry list, shoving it into my backpack. “It looks like tickets have gotten an awful lot cheaper.”
“Ahhh, somebody’ll want a refund.” Josh smirks.
“But who’ll know who bought the tickets?” I take out the registry list, hoping they don’t have one saved on a computer somewhere. I doubt they do. I point to the sign on the inside of the cash box: CASH ONLY. “Did you buy a ski pass?”
Josh grins. “Yes. As a matter of fact, I did.”
“Fancy that,” I say. “So did I.”
We close the lid, placing the box back in the drawer, and organize the office, wiping off surfaces with Kleenex from Mrs. Martinez’s desk. I have an urge to leave a message—tell them they all suck. But I can’t think of anything more creative than “You suck.” I have more style than that.
“Now. Let’s find a way to get out of here,” Josh says.
Antibullshit division reborn. Mission totally possible.
Chapter 13
I CAN BARELY CATCH MY
breath. I squat down on the curb, ignoring the pulsing in my swollen knee. I inhale and close my eyes, feeling the jolt of excitement, letting the rush wash over me. Josh sits next to me. Silent. I wonder if he feels it, too.
“Michal, shall I escort you to my stealth getaway car?” Josh points down the street.
“I kind of have to get into my own, which I parked over at the Starbucks.” I look down Saliman Road and sigh, wishing I could teleport to my car.
“One: Your Buick is anything but stealth. Two: I’ll drive you. I parked over here, off Pinto.”
“So you weren’t just following me. You had something in mind yourself.”
“Great minds. Plus I spent the last two hours hiding out in the janitor’s utility closet. When I got out, I saw you and . . . voilà!” Josh pulls me to my feet, his warm hands wrapped around mine. He doesn’t unhold my hands as soon as I’m on my feet; he laces his fingers in mine. “You’re going to have to teach me your technique—breaking into an office without breaking a window. You’re much more polished.”
“Thanks.” I blush and pull my hands away, shoving them into my jacket pockets.
“I’ll drive you to your car, but only if you let me invite you to dinner.”
“Why?” I ask. Suddenly I am so so tired.
“Wrong question, Michal. You should always ask ‘Why not?’”
There are always more reasons not to do something than to do it. That’s why being a bookie is so easy—it’s easy to watch people place the bets and take the chances while I sit back and wait. I’ve always been okay with that. But now I’m not and I don’t know why.
“A celebration.” He holds out his arm and links mine through it.
“For making it out of the school by climbing through an open boys’ bathroom window the size of a postage stamp, jumping two fences, running across a field through a herd of cattle before I collapsed into a not-quite-frozen patty pile?” I feel happiness bubble up and fill me, then start to laugh. “I stink. I think if anything, we’d better get takeout.”
Josh’s eyes crinkle and fill with tears. I have to lean up against the fence to keep steady. Our world explodes with laughter—belly-aching, can’t-catch-my-breath joy. “I can’t believe we just pulled off an actual heist.” He pulls dried grass from my hair, tucking a loose piece that fell from my ponytail behind my ear. I feel like my scalp is on fire, prickling where he touched me.
“Nothing unlike your past exploits,” I say. “Hard to top those.”
Josh shakes his head. “You know, changing schools so much is like hopping into parallel high school universes—the only distinguishing mark is the school mascot and colors.
“There’s always a Nim. There’s always the in crowd, the band geeks—they can’t help that. I think it has to do with the polyester uniforms—institutionalized nerddom. There’s always the overachieving student council president-slash-debate club captain-slash-basketball point guard-slash-valedictorian-to-be. There’s always a Trinity.”
It’s unsettling to think I’d be the same in every school—the girl who wore jeggings for a year because she felt too bad to tell her grandma she spent thirty bucks on something totally uncool. I think I just wanted to wear something Lillian had bought for me, something she had picked out; she had taken the time to think about me. That doesn’t happen much.
“But,” Josh says, stepping closer to me, “you’re the first.”
“I don’t know what that means,” I say. “The first what?”
“You have purpose. You’re the one,” he says.
And now I feel like I’m going to be a virginal sacrifice, recruited to work in the CIA or . . . I can’t let myself hope for the or. That happens in movies. Not to Michal Salome Garcia in Carson City, Nevada. I clear my throat. “Stealing ski trip passes and catering to my peers’ vices aren’t purpose. According to your line of thinking, I should open a brothel.”
Josh laughs. “Nah. You’d never do something so legal.”
His intensity is gone and I feel like I can breathe again. I picture myself dodging between the cows in the pasture and cover my mouth to keep the snorts muffled.
Josh pulls me close to him, wrapping his arm around my shoulders. “We’ve got some ski passes to distribute. At least let me take you to coffee.”
“Deal,” I say.
At Starbucks we debate about what to write on the invitations, then decide simple is best. “But who should the invitations be from?” Josh asks, tapping away on his iPad.
I shrug. “Anonymous?”
Josh shakes his head. “Anonymous is cowardly. We want to stand by our work. Give it a name.”
“Like we really need a name for delinquency,” I say.
“This isn’t delinquency. This is big, like Dead Poets Society big. Hey . . .” He pauses. “Dead Poets?”
I sigh. “I think that’s been done. Plus we don’t read poetry.”
“Or hang out
in a cave.”
“Or go to an all-boys school.”
“Thank God,” he says, and winks.
“We just steal ski trip tickets.”
“Just steal ski trip tickets? Please. We’ve done more than that. We’re exacting social justice for—”
“For kids like me,” I say, swallowing a little of the perma-shame that comes with being considered substandard. PWT.
“And Moch,” he says.
I’m grateful he says that, like he knows what Moch means to me. “To the exiled,” I say.
“Exactly,” Josh says. “To the exiled. Plus tonight we get to play Santa Claus.”
“How are we gonna pass this stuff around and not get caught?” I ask. “Hell. We’re gonna get caught.”
“Not if we didn’t in the office when Mrs. Martinez walked in, turned on the lights, and didn’t even look our way. Not us.”
Since when did I become an us?
I believe him. Like by being with Josh I’m covered in lucky fairy dust. He splits a chocolate graham cracker in two, handing me the bigger half. “Living in the land of exiles isn’t so bad after all, right?”
“Depends on who you’re talking about. I don’t think Napoleon was too into Elba or the Jews were particularly fond of Babylonia.”
“Nah. But our little Babylonia isn’t so bad.” He raises his eyebrows. “Right?” he says through a mouthful of graham-cracker crumbs.
I nibble on the chocolate cracker. “No. Not too bad.”
“That’s it,” Josh says. “Babylonia.”
“What about it?”
“That’s us,” he says. “Babylonia.”
“Babylonia,” I say. He’s right.
Dear Valued Member of Carson High Student Body,
You are invited to the Pearly Gates Heavenly Ski Trip. Show up to the ski bus tomorrow at seven a.m. sharp, appropriately dressed for the best ski day ever!
Put the ticket in your wallet, pocket . . . wherever.
Trash this letter as soon as you read it.
It will not self-destruct. It will not turn into a toxic poison that melts your skin off. It is a simple piece of paper that is evidence of our wanton disregard for trees (in the name of justice). And an invitation.
Cordially,
Babylonia
We take the file to Kinko’s and print out the invitations. I feel a shudder of excitement. Josh and I Google a list of Carson High students, then pop their names into Spokeo on my iPhone. We map out a reasonable route and pass out the letters and ski passes, making sure we leave one for Seth. He won’t go. But he can write about it. I hope.
Josh pulls up next to my car, still parked outside Starbucks: the least ecologically friendly machine on the planet; an eighties throwback; an embarrassment to American car makers everywhere. But I have grown to love the splotchy maroon Buick beast. She’s trying to hang in there like the rest of us. I just need her to make it to the end of the school year and through the summer so I can do my one and only road trip with her to the Great Basin National Park. My graduation present to myself. My chance to say good-bye to Mom.
“Here we are,” Josh says.
“Yep.” I’m not really sure what the protocol is for saying good night to someone you committed larceny with. I can feel Josh looking at me, and I tuck my hair behind my ears. “Thanks. This was—”
“Magic.” Josh smiles. “See you tomorrow morning, Michal Garcia.”
“Bright and early,” I say, opening my door. The blast of cold air practically takes my breath away. The scent of snow lingers in the air. Clouds shroud the mountaintops. Nice. Fresh powder for tomorrow.
“Will you be there for the show?”
I look over at him. “Wouldn’t miss it.” I get into the Buick and tap its dashboard. “C’mon, Little Car.” I turn the engine and pump the gas until she growls to life, the heater blasting me with icy air that smells like a musty basement. I shiver until the air turns tepid. “Thanks,” I whisper to the car. Josh waits until I pull out of the parking lot.
The streets are pretty empty. I drop a ticket off at Moch’s place and drive home. Lillian looks up from her book. “After nine? On a school night?”
“A new study group for the AP tests this spring,” I say casually, trying to mask my limp. I don’t need Lillian to kick into parental guidance mode right now. “Good night,” I say, closing my bedroom door behind me.
My memoir notebook is open beside my bed. I pick it up and write:
Remember when yesterday and tomorrow disappeared?
Chapter 14
I SHOULD SLEEP.
But this is too big, too important.
I surf for a while, trying to drum up good ideas on how to spend the twenty-five hundred dollars. It’s student body money, money the whole school should be able to enjoy.
I flip through the yellow pages.
Fly-Me-a-Message.
It’s almost ten. I doubt anybody’s there. I call the number. Someone answers. He doesn’t sound happy until I offer double the normal rate. Cash.
“Gotta get FAA approval.”
“Okay. I’ll give you two and a half times the rate to speed up the approval process.”
“I’ll need the cash first thing tomorrow morning.”
“Done.”
“What’s the rush?”
“It’s a last-minute gift to the school,” I say. “From the student council.”
He laughs. I’m relieved that he doesn’t ask any more questions.
I spend the rest of the night organizing the Commandments.
It takes me forever to decide whether or not to text Josh with my plans until I finally decide to talk about it the next day instead. If we get caught, they’ll go through our texts and connect the dots, and then good-bye, U-Dub. It’s three in the morning by the time I get everything organized.
I fall asleep and wake up before my alarm goes off. My head feels heavy, my thoughts fuzzy. I can’t tell if the tingly feeling I have is from sleep deprivation or excitement. I’m afraid I won’t make it through first block without slipping into a coma. Time for caffeine overdrive.
“Good morning,” Lillian says. “You’re early.”
“Good morning,” I say, grabbing a cereal bar, skipping the coffee to avoid any kind of prolonged exposure to her inquisition stare. “Study group. Gotta rush!”
I get the pamphlets printed out, drive south to Minden, then shove them in the door slot of Fly-Me-a-Message’s offices with the money he asked for, and pray nobody sees me. I am back at school a little after seven, just in time. Thank heaven for twenty-four-hour Kinko’s and a relatively police-free morning. I can’t afford a speeding ticket.
At school a crowd has gathered around the ski bus. Student council even took the time to decorate the bus with cloudlike powdered slopes and skiing cherubs. Mrs. Martinez paces around the patchwork crowd of students. Seth is weaving his way through the crowd, trying to get the inside scoop.
I feel a twinge of guilt, because I can tell some kids really wanted to go. Some probably saved up awhile to buy those tickets.
Josh is waiting for me on the bench, facing the parking lot. He nods at me, holding up a supersized coffee. Thank God. The crowd grows. More kids. More tickets. Mrs. Martinez is on full-blown fluster now and has been joined by Mr. Holohan, Mr. Randolph, and a few other teachers. A police car pulls into the lot.
Oh crap.
Josh whispers, “We’re cool.”
Icy, more like. My leg bobs up and down and Josh presses his hand on my thigh, the warmth like an electric shock. I feel like I’m being branded, the palm of his hand searing my jeans, and I do all I can to not pull my leg away.
By the time the first-period bell rings, everybody’s heard about the robbery, the letters. The hallways are electric. Everybody wants to talk about Babylonia. First block, most teachers end up doing holiday-style work because nobody’s listening. The news is short-lived; at lunchtime the buzz has died, and most kids don’t even care about Babylonia or ski
trips. I can’t keep my eyes from the clock. Come on. Come on. I need this to happen now.
I hear the faint sound of an airplane motor and see the first glints of gold paper drift to the ground.
The lunch bell still hasn’t rung. We’ve got five minutes.
“Dude, you guys have gotta see this.” Some kid points outside.
That does it. In about two minutes, the entire student body is gathered in front of the school, staring at the plane, reading the banner. I’m impressed. They even made it with a little bit of gold glittery stuff in loopy letters.
Thou Shalt Not Use Student Funds for Elitist Events
The bell rings. Nobody cares. The golden papers pass through kids’ hands. Someone hands me one. “Check out the Commandments. That’s just sweet.”
I try to find Josh in the crowd, but it’s impossible. Everybody’s talking about the Commandments. Some kid laughs out loud. “‘Thou Shalt Revere Napoleon Dynamite as Our True God.’”
“I don’t get it,” another kid says, pointing to the ND reference.
“You wouldn’t.”
“Dude, this one about not cussing in pig Latin, gibberish, or Klingon kills me.”
The Commandments, the message . . . everything works.
Perfect timing.
We’re finally herded to class after Principal Holohan screeches at us in his megaphone. In last block, Government, Mr. Sullivan talks to us about student manifestations and the power of movements—how misguided they can be. He reads us a story about the Third Wave, an experiment where a history teacher used his students as guinea pigs, getting them to believe in a made-up movement.
But Babylonia isn’t made up or invented. It’s real. I can see the excitement in everyone’s eyes.
The last bell rings, and I exhale. I’ve been waiting for the office to call me down since I arrived. Nobody’s called. Nobody’s looking for me. Nobody knows who Babylonia is.
We weren’t caught.
