He stared at the ceiling. If there was anything to be said for McKinley High, it was that, with enough time, it revealed the truth about everybody.
22
Will gripped the handle of locker 733.
This was the moment of truth. He looked back at Lucy. She smiled at him. But it wasn’t her full smile. He knew what Lucy looked like when she was truly happy, and this wasn’t it. He hadn’t planned on taking her out tonight. He hadn’t even checked out what was in the locker yet. He was going to do that tomorrow. But earlier in the night, when Lucy gave him the book on Alexander the Great, he knew he couldn’t wait.
She’d told him that Alexander had conquered the ancient world even though he had epilepsy. She wanted to inspire Will, she believed in him, and that meant she really cared about him. Will couldn’t hold it in. He told her he had a surprise for her, but they’d have to sneak out again. She didn’t want to go at first, but he’d convinced her.
Tonight was the night he would make his move.
As he lifted the locker’s handle, he panicked. What if there was nothing inside? What if this was all a big practical joke by Smudge? He didn’t know what could be in there. Maybe a map to another location? A ring of keys that unlocked a door that no one else could get through? He took a big breath.
“What’s wrong?” Lucy said.
“Nothing,” Will said. He swung the locker open.
There was a giant hole in the back of the locker.
The metal back wall of the locker had been bent inward, and a hole had been knocked through the drywall behind.
There was darkness beyond. Lucy gasped.
“What is this?” Lucy asked.
“I said it was a surprise, didn’t I?” Will said.
He hoped she bought that. This was way better than he hoped. It was taking everything he had to hide his shock.
“Ready?” Will said.
“I think so. Where does it go?”
“You’ll see.”
He took her hand. He stepped into the locker and through the ragged hole. Will led her into the black void on the other side. He clicked his phone on, and its thin light revealed that they were in an interstitial space between the wall of lockers and the load-bearing concrete wall. It was a slim space, three feet wide. He couldn’t tell its length, it was too dark. The air smelled stale. Someone, probably Smudge, had drawn a large black arrow on the concrete wall. It pointed left.
“Will, should I be scared?”
“No way. It’s gonna be fun.”
He prayed he wasn’t wrong. He reached back through the hole and closed the locker behind them. It felt like closing a coffin from the inside. The hallway’s light barely illuminated the underside of the locker’s horizontal vents. Will got a little scared himself. They were inside the guts of the school, head-ing who knew where. He didn’t let go of Lucy’s hand. Her palm was the littlest bit damp now, just a trace of sweat.
“This way,” he said.
Will followed the arrow and pulled Lucy down the thin pas-sageway. His phone’s anemic light only revealed a few feet in front of them.
“How do you know about this?” Lucy asked.
“I know a lot of places in here you’ve probably never been to.”
“Is that so? Like what?”
“Don’t worry about it.”
Lucy chuckled. “Bullshitter.”
The passage came to an end at a drywall and stud wall, with another hole knocked through it. Again, there was only darkness beyond it.
Will stepped through the hole. By his phone’s illumination he saw a light switch on the wall. He flicked it. Bright ceiling lights sputtered on. Will and Lucy were in a small ten-by-ten-foot
room with a metal access panel, sort of a hatch, in the middle of the floor. The hatch was open, revealing a maintenance shaft with a utility ladder that led down toward the basement level. The room had a single door on the far wall, but the knob was missing.
“Is this… it?” she asked.
“Yeah, I just wanted to show you a supercreepy room.” She rolled her eyes.
“Keep your pants on. It’ll be worth it,” he said.
He had the distinct feeling that he was digging himself deeper each time he said something like that. He was depending entirely on Smudge’s good will now, and that was less than reassuring.
“I should tell Sasha about this place. She’s always looking for a private place for her and Gonzalo to have sex,” Lucy said.
“Maybe you should. I hate having to listen to them go at it.”
“I know, right?”
Will peered down the shaft. The metal ladder extended down to a dirty concrete floor. He was getting nervous that this wasn’t leading anywhere good at all. Lucy tried to open the knobless door, but it wouldn’t budge.
“This way,” Will said.
He climbed into the maintenance shaft and took the ladder down one cold metal rung at a time.
“Don’t look up my dress,” Lucy said as she followed him onto the ladder.
He looked. But she was just a black silhouette against the light of the room above. The shaft emptied into a small hot room full of large humming machines with blinking control panels, and a network of square metal air ducts coming off them. He hopped off the ladder. He spotted another arrow.
It pointed to a square hole in the side of a low-lying air duct.
The vent cover was missing.
Lucy stepped off the ladder and took in the room. For the first time, she looked genuinely disappointed.
”Now what?”
“It’s just through here,” Will said, pointing toward the hole in the air duct.
“There? Come on. You’re joking. I’m going to get my dress dirty. Can’t you just tell me what it is?” He was losing her.
“I promise it’s worth it,” Will said. Lucy pursed her lips and waggled them from side to side, weighing the decision in her mind.
“Is it far?” Lucy asked.
“It’s super close.”
He should just shoot himself now. He had no idea how much farther it was, or how the hell he’d know when he was even there. His big romantic date was going off the rails. Not that Lucy knew this was a date.
Will didn’t wait for her answer. He climbed headfirst into the air duct. He shined his phone ahead. The duct seemed to extend forever and the air inside was hot and dry. It flowed in the direction he crawled, away from the room full of machines.
He could hear Lucy climb into the duct behind him.
“Oh, my God, it’s so hot in here,” she said.
“It’s not that bad,” Will said.
But it was. The farther he crawled, the hotter he got. He hoped she liked sweaty guys. The duct metal was hot, and it hurt the skin on his forearms.
“Will, I’m getting burned. I don’t like this.” He could hear the aggravation in her voice.
“Not much farther.”
With every foot he crawled, Will could feel Lucy slipping away from him. She was probably wishing she had never agreed to come out with him at all. Whatever was at the end of this journey had to be huge. Impossibly huge.
“I want to go back,” she said. Will ignored her.
The end had to be soon. Either that, or Smudge had boned him. Hard. He’d probably hit a dead end, or pop out of a vent in the middle of the trash dump. Smudge was probably holding his stomach, cackling at that very moment at the thought of Will stuck inside this hot metal esophagus, ruining any chance he’d ever had with Lucy.
“Will, are you going to answer me?”
The duct turned again. He saw a faint blue glow ahead.
Finally. He crossed Smudge off his mental To Kill list.
“We’re here,” he said.
“Really?”
It had to be it. He didn’t know what it was, but it had to be.
“Yup.”
Will crawled faster. The blue glow was shining through the black slats of a large vent cover. He scurried up and pressed his face to the slats. The vent cover popped right off and clanged down onto a white-tiled floor below. The sound hung in the air.