What Happens After Midnight, page 6
The jingle of my mom’s keys swiftly reminded me.
“Okay,” Manik finally agreed. “Let’s do it.”
“Hell, yeah,” Zoe said, and then Tag’s eyes met mine. It wasn’t until I nodded that his tensed shoulders relaxed.
“Right,” he resumed. “Before we head out…” He unzipped his backpack and pulled out a silver flask. “A salute.”
“Sweet.” Alex took the flask first, unwound its cap, and took a pull. Everyone jumped backward when liquid came spewing out of his mouth. “What is this?” he asked Tag. “Diet…” He choked. “Coke?”
“Excellent deduction skills, Alexander,” Tag said as Zoe grumbled. She liked soda about as much as I liked coffee. “I think it’s best if we kept our wits about us, don’t you?”
Alex rolled his eyes and passed the flask to Manik, who gulped before giving it to Zoe. Maya, still looking ill, smiled and raised the flask in solidarity instead of drinking. I took a sip of Tag’s favorite drink and then handed it back to him. Our fingertips brushed. Did he feel that? I wondered, sparks flickering through my veins.
“Cheers, fools,” he said and drained the flask before stowing it back in his backpack. “Now it’s time to take the stage.”
The six of us silently said farewell to King’s Court, creeping across the cobblestones and making our way back to Ames’s main paved road. “Stay out of the light beams,” Tag cautioned, so we zigzagged around the streetlamps’ dangerous pools of light. With the yearbook office in the student center, Hubbard Hall was our first stop.
“Crap, someone’s at their window,” Zoe whispered as we passed the sophomore girls’ dorm, and I stopped to see my friend was right. A girl sat on her window seat; we had a clear view of her, which meant she had a clear view of us.
“Don’t worry about it,” Tag whispered back. “She’s holding up her phone, see?” He pointed. “FaceTiming.”
Zoe released a breath, but I sucked one in…because I could hear the jester hat’s jingling bells in Tag’s backpack. They weren’t loud per se, but the sound was consistent and made the hair on the back of my neck stand up. Quickly, I sidled next to him. “Why do you still have the hat?” I asked in a low voice that only Alex could hear. “Your email said you didn’t want noise.”
Alex snorted. “I knew your emails would get personal.”
Tag ignored him. “We need it for one more thing,” he said through gritted teeth. The hat was bothering him too. “If I could stop the chiming, I would.”
“Okay,” I said, but instead of falling back in line, I stayed next to him and Alex, who patted my shoulder. That was one of the things I loved most about Alex Nguyen: He put you at ease. He calmed you. Tag always said that too. “If Alex isn’t nervous, then I tell myself I have no reason to be either,” he once said, then added, “And I feel safest with you, Hopscotch.”
Hopscotch, I recalled like a distant dream. “What kind of celebration dance is that?” Tag had asked during a sophomore whiffle ball game in the Circle. I’d scored a home run for our team and been a little smug about it, bouncing up and down on my feet. “It looks like you’re playing an invisible game of hop—”
“Don’t!” I’d read his beautiful mind. “Don’t even think about it!”
But he smirked, as if to say, Too late.
It hadn’t taken me long to warm to the nickname. I was Lily to everyone but Hopscotch to him. Every day, all day, always. He’d only started calling me by my name again when Blair and the other girls had started swooping in like vultures. Don’t let him pull away, I told myself, but it soon grew harder and harder to hang on to him.
My heart tumbled even now as our band successfully reached the front entrance of Hubbard Hall. Its columns looked especially intimidating, glowing pearly white from the moonlight and towering above us. I held my breath until someone gently nudged me. Tag.
It was go time.
Sorry, Mom, I thought before I pulled her lanyard from my pocket and flashed her ID card across the door’s sensor. There was a soft beep as the red light turned green and then the click of the lock. We were in.
The student center was pitch-black. “We can’t turn on the lights, can we?” Manik asked once we’d all slipped inside and carefully closed the door behind us.
“No way,” Zoe said. “Lighting up the whole first floor? Campo would be on us in seconds. There are so many windows here.”
“How are we supposed do this, then?” Manik countered.
“Fear not,” Tag said, “for we have the magic of flashlights.” I heard him unzip his backpack again and someone else unzip theirs too.
“You said you didn’t know what we were originally doing,” I muttered to Alex.
“I didn’t,” he muttered back. “My email said to come equipped with flashlights.”
He and Tag began switching them on while the rest of us watched. Why did Tag and Alex have so many mini flashlights?
It was a rhetorical question. Just, of course they did. They had everything, including a contraband cat. Rumor was that they’d found a stray kitten in town and smuggled it into their dorm room.
“Turn on your phone lights too,” Tag instructed. “We’re going to line these up from the yearbook office to the storage room—”
“We’re hiding the Almanacs in the storage room?” I blurted as the others simultaneously asked, “What storage room?”
“The storage room at the other end of the lounge,” he answered. “Right behind the Hub.” I recognized something wry in his voice. He was pleased, pleased that most of the group had no idea what he was talking about; it boded well for the prank.
“But that’s so close,” Maya said, her voice strained. She was definitely going to puke again. “Why hide them here when we could hide them across campus?”
“Because transporting them would be too much work,” I guessed. “Carrying all those heavy boxes for that long would slow us down and pose more of a risk of getting caught.”
“Exactly,” Tag said. “Hiding the Almanacs as close to the office as possible is the safest and most unexpected move.”
“And the funniest,” Alex said with a laugh, and again, I suspected he knew more about this prank than he was letting on.
“I like it.” Manik nodded. “I’ve never seen this storage room before, but it sounds secure enough.” He reached for a flashlight. “I’ll head to the office.”
“Zoe and Maya, if you could go too?” Tag asked as I handed Manik my mom’s keys. The yearbook office was locked. “Start moving some of the boxes? Alex and I should have the runway finished soon.”
“Oh my god,” Zoe said. “Are we the muscle, Swell?”
Tag chuckled. “I wasn’t going to put a label on it, Wright, but…”
“I love it,” she said and exchanged a grin with Maya. “Instead of two lacrosse lugs, you chose us.”
“I’ve seen you in the gym and Maya in the workshop,” Tag said. “You’re both much more capable.”
Egos extremely boosted, Zoe and Maya turned to follow Manik to the yearbook office. Although Maya soon made a detour to the restroom.
Uh-oh.
I blinked when I heard Tag ask if I could go open the door to the storage room. “Sure,” I said softly, remembering when we had first explored it together. It was down the hall and around the corner from the Hub, its door partly covered by a large blue-red-and-gold Ames flag. We’d never given it a thought until Josh had brought it up at dinner at my house one night. Apparently he and the Alumni Relations office were in a heated battle over who deserved use of the space. “They have plenty of room in their offices upstairs,” he’d said, stabbing his pork loin in frustration, “while I don’t have nearly enough in the kitchen!”
Tag and I’d checked it out to find the room filled to the brim with supplies for reunion weekend. Storage shelves lined the walls, housing boxes of table linens, graduation flags, and even old class T-shirts. Circular tables, folding chairs, speakers, and DO NOT PARK HERE signs covered the floorspace. “I’m sorry, but I have to side with Alumni Relations,” Tag had said. “This is a lot of crap.”
“A lot,” I’d agreed, suddenly very aware that we were very alone.
Tag had thrown back his head and laughed as I backed him into a dusty corner. We’d had to brush some dirt and cobwebs from our clothes before leaving.
Yes, I concluded with a twinge in my ribs. It’s safe to say no one will find the Almanacs in here.
After kicking the door stopper into place, I reunited with the others in the yearbook office. About thirty cardboard boxes were in the far corner, and Manik looked like he was about to tear his hair out, watching as Zoe and Tag each hefted a heavy box onto their shoulders. “Where’s Maya?” I asked, even though I had a pretty good guess.
Zoe smiled faintly. “Bathroom, with Alex holding her hair back.”
“I knew he wouldn’t be any help in the transport department,” Tag said with mirth. While you couldn’t get Tag out of the gym, Alex was all but allergic to it. Instead of playing sports, he was Ames’s favorite student commentator.
“Well, he does want to be a doctor someday,” I said slyly. “He might as well work on his bedside manner.” I looked at a fretful Manik and gestured to the boxes. “May I?”
He nodded slowly. “Just don’t drop it,” he said. “You might dent the books’ covers or crack their spines.”
My brows knitted together. Maybe I didn’t hit the gym regularly, but I’d run the Chicago and Boston marathons and danced in every school musical. “I can handle it,” I told him at the same time as Tag called back, “She can handle it!”
Then he pretended to fumble his box, catching it just before it fell to the floor.
Manik sucked in a sharp breath, and I felt my lips twitch. There was goofy Tag.
Zoe, as predicted, was a workhorse, moving her boxes in half the time I moved mine. They were extremely heavy and I didn’t want Manik to have a meltdown if I did accidentally drop one, so I took it slow and steady. “I don’t understand why Alumni Relations gets this room,” Zoe said as we deposited boxes. The center had been cleared, supplies moved aside, and concrete floor swept. When did Tag find the time do this? I wondered. “It seems like it should belong to the Hub.”
“We wouldn’t be able to use it if this was the Hub’s territory,” Tag said, carrying the last box with Manik, Alex, and a seriously pale Maya. “Josh—I mean, Mr. Bauer—would be in and out of here all the time. Alumni Relations doesn’t set foot in this place after the class reunions in May.” He placed the final box on top of the fortress we built. Together, we watched in awe. It was a perfect pyramid.
“Damn.” Alex whistled. “This is worthy of Giza.”
“It needs one more thing,” Tag said before jogging out of the room. A minute later, he returned with none other than his kooky hat. We laughed when he crowned the pyramid.
Ames’s Jester had spoken.
“Alright, alright, everyone out,” Tag said afterward, his cheeks a little red. “It’s time to move on to the scavenger hunt.”
The scavenger hunt was the second phase of the prank. “We can’t really deprive Ames of the Almanacs,” Tag had said back at King’s Court. “I’m sure as hell not graduating without mine, so after we hide them, we’re going to set up clues all over campus that’ll send our esteemed president on a treasure hunt to find them.”
“I love that journey for him,” I’d said, which had made Tag bite his lip so he didn’t laugh. But Alex did. He cackled. Schitt’s Creek was their favorite, and my Alexis impression was apparently scary good. I used to greet Alex every day by booping him on the nose.
Now though, it struck me again that this was Daniel we were pranking. It was Daniel who would be going on this treasure hunt. My stomach stirred. Even though I didn’t like him the way he liked me, he was still…
Well, he was still.
We shuttled out of the storage room and quickly disassembled the lighted pathway, collecting the flashlights and phones. Everyone turned their lights off except for Alex, who shined his on the Jester’s backpack so Tag could dig through it. It seemed to be bottomless. “What’s the first clue?” Manik asked excitedly. “Where does it lead?”
“Someone’s sure changed their tune,” I mumbled and felt Zoe pinch my arm in amusement.
Tag pulled out a nondescript manila folder. I squinted to see that it was full of unsealed black envelopes, the same ones used for the Jester’s invitation. But instead of names, each envelope was numbered. It seemed like everyone was holding their breath as we watched Tag tug out the first clue. Again, there was no handwriting—only the magazine letters.
We all huddled together to read:
To Our Fearless Leader:
If there’s something you seek,
visit Cassiopeia at the peak.
Meet her at midnight for your second clue.
“There’s a catch with this first one, though,” Tag said mildly as I deciphered the clue to mean the observatory. Most Ames students took astronomy at one point or another. It had a reputation of being easy.
“What is it?” Maya asked.
“I’m going to slip it in his mailbox…” Tag gestured to the darkened mail room. “But not tonight. We want him to discover the Almanacs are missing and then sweat for a few days before following the bread crumbs. If we give him the clue now, he might find it before noticing the yearbooks are gone.”
“And what’s wrong with that?” I heard myself say as Maya gave him a thumbs-up before sprinting for the bathroom again. Zoe followed her. “The Almanacs will still be MIA.”
“Yes, but the point is to draw out the prank,” Tag said. “If he recovers the yearbooks only a night after students were supposed to get them, it isn’t very—”
I cut him off, my heart thumping hard. “I don’t get why you’re doing this,” I said. “Why are you picking on Daniel?”
“Manik, let’s do some recon,” Alex chirped. “Check and see if there’s any activity outside.” He grabbed the yearbook editor’s shirtsleeve and dragged him over to a window.
Tag dropped his voice. “I’m not picking on Daniel,” he said. “I’m pulling a prank that happens to heavily involve the school president. If Alex had won the election, we would still be standing here right now.” He shook his head. “In fact, I wish it were Alex. It would be a lot funnier—he would have an open breakdown while I’m sure Rivera’s gonna put up a front that everything’s fine.”
“But everyone helping has an issue with Daniel,” I whispered.
Tag raised an exaggerated eyebrow. “You have an issue with Daniel?”
The back of my neck heated. Yes, I thought. I don’t want to go to prom with him.
“No, of course not,” I stammered. “I meant the others do. You only need me for the keys.”
“Lily, you don’t actually believe that, do you? That you’re just the key holder?”
I didn’t respond.
“Alex and I have watched many a YouTube video on how to pick locks. Leda’s ID makes things infinitely easier, but we could’ve managed without it.” He reached out as if to touch me but ended up running a hand through his hair. “I asked you because…”
“We should get going,” I said when he trailed off. From the sound of his voice, I knew he had an answer, but I also knew it wouldn’t be what I so dreamed of hearing.
I asked you because I trust you.
I asked you because I miss you.
I asked you because I love you.
Maybe Tag trusted me, but there was no way he missed or loved me anymore. He’d moved on after that day in his room last spring. “I think it’s for the best,” I’d told him as he sat on his bed, head in his hands. “Because I’m really tired, Tag. I’m really tired of playing all these games and tuning out the noise. I love you so much, but I can’t do this anymore.”
“I just don’t get what you’re talking about,” he eventually said, green eyes glassy. “What games? What noise? Am I doing something wrong? Hops, please tell me…”
But I didn’t tell him. If he didn’t realize the gold rush of attention he got from girls and how hard it was for me to handle, it meant he was enjoying it. Breaking up, then, really was for the best.
“I don’t know where the Jester’s clues lead,” I said now, throat thickening, “but I imagine we’re about to embark on a campus tour?”
“Yeah,” he murmured, giving me a half-hearted smile right when Alex and Manik returned. Zoe also reappeared, but without Maya. She was still in the bathroom.
“Coast is clear, Captain,” Alex reported, then turned to Zoe. “Can the last troop be rallied?”
Zoe shook her head. “I don’t think so,” she said. “She’s, um, made camp in there.” She sighed. “And I’m sorry, but I’m going to stay with her. I don’t want her sneaking back to her room alone later. Maybe I can meet up with you after?”
Everyone looked at Tag. I caught his jaw just barely twitch, but other than that, he appeared unfazed. “No worries,” he said. “Tell her I hope she feels better.”
Alex, Manik, and I echoed him.
Zoe nodded.
“And please ask her to text me,” Tag added. “Or have you text me.”
“Text you what?”
“Four digits,” Tag said, then thanked her for the heavy lifting. They exchanged a fist bump, and Zoe affectionately tugged my ponytail before hauling ass back to the restrooms.
No one else moved.
“Is anyone else out?” Tag asked after a beat. “Feel free to speak now.”
My hands shook a little, knowing he was talking to me. I thought for a moment. Was it unfair that Daniel was going to take the brunt of this bank job? No. It was unfortunate, but not unfair. The Almanacs were the president’s responsibility, and Daniel just so happened to be the president.
This isn’t personal, I reassured myself. It’s a prank.
“Brilliant,” Tag said. “Who’s ready to count constellations?”
SEVEN
My lungs quivered with nerves when we headed back to Hubbard Hall’s entrance. Sneaking out of my house, sprinting through the faculty neighborhood, and breaking into a school building were one thing, but trekking across Ames’s four-hundred-acre campus? That felt like another quest entirely.
