The Release

“What?” Salem asked in a whisper and Lucy pointed above them. The red light was pulsating and the purr of the lens rotating around was barely noticeable.

“This complicates things,” Grant mumbled. He watched the camera and took a step. “Wait,” he said. “Wait.” The camera whirred to capture the other end of the hall and they had a second to move—the girl’s bathroom was mere feet away. While the camera could easily capture the bathroom entrance, it was common knowledge that the bathrooms were free from video. Which was why in her four-year tenure as a student, Lucy had witnessed three girl-fights and two drug deals during routine bathroom breaks.

As the lens scrolled over the top of them, in the second after it could no longer see the bathroom, they bolted and scrambled inside and shut the door, leaning against the back of it, holding their breath and waiting.

“How will we know if he saw us?” Salem asked.

“He’d say something,” Lucy whispered. “Call us out on the intercom.”

“Maybe not,” Grant replied. “Maybe he’d just come for us.”

Salem moved away from the door and walked over to the mirror. Someone had scrawled, “You are beautiful to someone” in Sharpie on the expanse of wall between the two mirrors above the sink. Salem put her finger on the writing and traced the words. “We’ll hear the gates go up,” she replied. “Simple. He says he sees us or he puts the gates up and comes to get us.”

“There are three of us and one of him,” Lucy noted. This gave her confidence.

“But he has a gun,” Grant reminded them.

“He has a gun,” Salem repeated.

“But maybe it’s just for show,” Lucy said.

As soon as she said it, they heard a second shot as it echoed down the hallway and rang out over the intercom.

Spencer’s voice yelled and called as he retreated back into the office. “Stop, stop where you are!”

A group of voices called out, distant at first, but then getting closer to the office.

“Get him!” someone shouted.

“Go around! All sides, all sides!”

There was the sound of breaking glass and then a struggle.

A mob had moved in and Spencer was shouting, his tone vacillating between wrath and sheer panic.

“What’s happening?” Salem pushed herself against the bathroom door, as if the fight was bearing down on her, getting closer.

Grant’s eyes landed on a spot on the bathroom wall, and he stared at it as he listened intently. It was just noise raining down from above; and it was the noise of things falling apart. “Students. Has to be. I think other students are on the attack.”

One of the voices, female and young, screamed something indecipherable before someone else yelled, “We’re losing Sarahi. She’s down…oh no, help her…Somto…wait! Wait! Don’t…”

There was another shot and screams. And then they all heard Spencer’s voice clear above them. “Get. Out.” He was breathless and angry. Something scraped along the floor; there was the sound of muffled shouting and doors opening. “Get out!”

Then: Nothing.

Each of them paused and then at once they let out long breaths.

“Why?” was all Salem said, she looked to each of them.

“This is not good for us,” Grant added. “Any kid is now a potential threat to resources and his life. Was it too much to ask for everyone to just hide?”

Lucy walked to one end of the bathroom and back—peering into the stalls, with their graffitied walls and dwindling toilet paper supplies. A deserted binder perched precariously against one of the toilets and the wall. There was a picture of a baby taped to the front that reminded Lucy of her binder, which was still in Ethan’s backpack left abandoned in Mrs. Johnston’s classroom. She made a note to retrieve it when it was safe to go in the hall again.

“There could be others still in the building,” Grant continued.

Salem’s shoulders slumped. “But maybe they don’t have roof access?”

“And maybe they do. What do we know?” Grant kept his back firmly planted against the door. His feet fell outward, his toes pointed up. He stared at his shoes.

“I realize this is neither the time nor the place to a

“Well, I’m not stopping you,” Salem replied as if the act of urinating a

Lucy glanced over at Grant. He smiled, his single-dimple appearing in a flash. “I’m definitely not going outside to wait if that’s what you want. I’m not getting shot over girly privacy issues.”

“I have four brothers. So, I’m not embarrassed to pee in front of you.” Lucy marched into the stall and slammed the door, locking it for good measure. She pulled down her jeans and underwear, careful not to pull them too low so that Grant, if he were so inclined, would notice the bright blue and pink argyle pattern of her undergarments. After a second, Lucy sighed. “Salem...can you turn on the sink water or something?”

“What? Need inspiration?” Salem asked and soon the sound of the sink filling with water echoed in the small bathroom and Lucy allowed herself to go to the bathroom—she realized as her bladder released, how much better she would feel and she rested her elbows on the exposed flesh of her thighs and closed her eyes. After she was done, she just sat for a long second. It was a second that belonged only to her.

Then she felt wetness hit her exposed flesh; a gush of lukewarm water bubbled up, pouring over the sides, spilling at her feet.

Lucy shrieked and scrambled off the toilet, pulling up her pants and underwear in a quick motion and clawing at the door, yanking it with force. The water had pooled below her feet and Lucy slipped, sliding forward into the side of the bathroom wall; she turned to look as the toilet overflowed—the water was clear at first, and then it turned a murky brown, and it began to spew like a geyser, sending a spray of water and sewage into the stall, drenching the wall and the floor—creating a stream that ran down into the drain in the floor.

Then the other toilets followed suit by gurgling and belching up waste and water. Salem and Grant sprang up and huddled together on a tile near the door while the water crept slowly toward them. But every time Lucy tried to move, she would slip and tumble back down into the wetness. When the water calmed down to a mere trickle, the explosion subsiding, Lucy regained her footing and stood sopping wet in the middle of the bathroom. Her jeans clung to every inch of her skin, scraping along the inside of her thigh like a razor as she took a step forward. She lifted her arms up and watched the water drip with a repetitive plop-plop-plop to the floor.

Salem cried out, “Oh no, Lula!”

She wanted to laugh—her instinct encouraged her to let out a giggle. Embarrassment usually garnered this type of response; she wanted to laugh and blush while she wished for reprieve. Her pants were still unbuttoned and she reached to fasten them, but as she looked up she saw Grant and Salem huddled in the bathroom corner, close together, pushing themselves as far away from the water as physically possible. Lucy stifled her smile when saw the fear in their faces.

Lucy took a step toward them, her shoes swishing.

“No, Lucy, wait,” Grant said and put up his hand. “Just wait.”

The water was contaminated.

The water was poison.

They stared at her as if she were already dead.

CHAPTER TEN

They stood there for a long moment and then Lucy lowered her arms a bit, feeling the weight of her clothes pull her body toward the floor. The intercom right above her broadcast the banal sounds of an empty office. Then they heard a door click and Spencer started to hum again. Not happy, jaunty humming, but a focused and intense hum. There was an edge to his musical interludes, a hardness to the melody that seemed entirely for show.