Breaking and Entering Is the Cool New Thing

Ring.

What do you want?

Ring. Ring.

Who's doing that?

Ring. Ring. Ring.

Would whoever the hell keeps doing that just shut up already?

Ring.

I lurched myself into a seated position and flopped my body to the side in an attempt to reach the source of the noise. It kept ringing. Accompanied by an anemic sigh, I placed my hand on the floor of my bedroom and stretched out further. The tips of my fingers were barely able to bump it. Then, almost entirely leaning out of my low bed, only the tops of my feet still touching the covers, I grasped at the device. And the ringing stopped.

I gently slipped onto the floor, stomach first, looking at the blank screen.

Now you stop?

As if in response, the phone lit up again and the ringtone startled me enough that the thing flew out of my hands. I rushed to grab at it and examined the screen upside down, tilting my head to read Unknown Number.

I tapped the little phone icon and placed it against my ear.

“Hello?”

“WHAT TOOK YOU SO LONG?” screamed a familiar voice.

A rush of memories from earlier in the day resurfaced in my mind.

“Oh—”

“DO YOU HAVE ANY IDEA WHAT TIME IT IS?” yelled Haruko.

I checked the upper left of my phone, 10:15 p.m. “Late?”

“I’ve been calling you for the last hour and a half! Did you die or something?!”

“Briefly, I think. Why does your voice sound so weird?”

“I’m on a payphone! Do you know how many times I called you? Forty-seven! You’re reimbursing me for all the change I put into this thing.”

“Yeah, yeah, yeah, that’s fine. I’ll be there in like… twenty minutes?”

“Hurry!” she said before hanging up.

I lay there on the floor for a moment, unable to summon the will to move.

Don't payphones give you your change back if the call doesn't connect? Ah, whatever.

My parents were in their room watching TV, so sneaking out wasn’t too much of a problem. It also explained why they hadn’t heard my phone ringing over and over again. As soon as I got out of the house, I worked my tired body into a sprint, barely catching one of the trains headed towards River High.

Instead of using my bone-dry brain for some last-minute reconsiderations, all I did was wonder whether we’d finish this adventure in time to make it back home. Staring out the window, counting down the trains before the last one at midnight. Soon enough, I was off at my destination with nothing but my phone and a time-sensitive sleep-deprived subway ride home.

I spotted Haruko and Sato waiting up by the school gate. You can guess who was jumping and frantically waving her arms at me.

“We don’t have as much time, here! Take!” Haruko shoved an overstuffed tote bag into my arms.

Sato deftly hopped over the gate and Haruko followed suit, though with much less grace. I stuck close behind, following around to the back of the school.

“You still haven’t told me how you’re planning to get inside, by the way,” I said.

Haruko reached into her bag, digging around and spilling a few pieces of cardboard before emerging from the depths with a key between her fingers.

“I stole it from the teacher's lounge." She gave a proud little wiggle of her head and placed the key against the lock. "Noiji, the honours?”

Sato complied, pressing it into the keyhole with a grating series of ratchets until it hit against the back of the lock. With one swift flourish of her wrist, the deadbolt withdrew, giving out a satisfying click. The back entrance creaked open in protest, revealing a deep, dark, and desolate hallway.

Haruko led us in.

***

"We're breaking into the school, okay?" Haruko whispered into my ear.

"Oh, you should have told me earlier. That sounds like fun. I'll see you tomorrow, Arakawa. I'm gonna go take a nap."

"I'm being serious! We need your help or it'll take too long."

"Take too long to do what?"

"I already told you! QR codes!"

"I don't know what that means!"

"Would you catch on already? QR codes in every student's desk. That's my campaign strategy!"

"Breaking into the school is your campaign strategy?" I asked.

"Exactly! And you're gonna help us!" she said.

***

This was an objectively terrible idea. So, why did I have to find it so exciting? The darkness ate up any familiarity we might have normally felt. Haruko pulled out a flashlight and flicked it on, pointing it down the hallway.

"Were we planning on splitting up?" I asked.

"It would be best if we didn't," Sato said.

"Huh? Why not? We'd be done in a flash if we each did a floor," Haruko said.

Sato shook her head to a near-violent degree, "I believe it would be a poor idea."

Was she… afraid?

Haruko stopped to think before a literal lightbulb popped up above her head. Then she ran off towards the first classroom, "No time to waste!"

Sato scurried after her and both of their footsteps left an uncharacteristic echo inside the building. This place was no longer our school, instead, it was the set for a horror movie. My mind briefly bloomed with potential filming opportunities. I hope Sato isn't too scared.

The routine was fairly simple. We split the rooms evenly into three, carefully putting QR-coded cardboard squares inside each desk. Placing them where students would spot them but a teacher roaming classes in the mornings would not. The first room took us about five minutes.

"How many rooms are there?" I asked.

"Twenty-four," Haruko said.

I looked into my Haruko-assigned tote bag, "Do we have enough of these things?"

"Yep! I counted."

"To what?"

"The number of desks in the school. I brought extras too, just in case!"

Oh, that's why she visited every class during lunch. To count desks.

"Are we gonna be able to finish the whole school?" I asked.

"Duh, what kind of question is that?" Haruko said.

"Before the last train?"

"If we keep on pace," Sato said.

Easy, right?

Well, we kept on with the mundane work without too much of a hitch. We got a bit quicker with each classroom we completed. Normally, we'd have finished in no time.

Sato and I followed closely behind Haruko, especially while in the hallways. Her flashlight made the whole horror vibe a little less terrifying. It was around when we finished the first floor, after making our way up the stairs, that Haruko yelped. The guiding flashlight went dim and a heavy thud echoed through the walls.

"Mouse!" Haruko yelled.

Sato let out a blood-curdling scream. I thought I might've heard her trip over herself. Right then, Haruko turned the flashlight back on and shone it in our direction, stifling her laughter.

"There's no mouse, Noiji! There's no mouse! Are you okay? You let out the funniest scream."

Cowering behind me was Sato. Standing right on top of her bag, which had spilled its contents all over the floor, "Hm? Th-there's no mouse?"

Haruko rushed over to comfort her. "I'm so sorry! I didn't realize you would get that scared."

"I dropped my bag…" Sato's eyes darted around the mess.

We spent about ten minutes waiting for her to calm down and cleaning up all the scattered cardboard. Haruko insisted she didn't know Sato was afraid of mice. She intended it to be an innocent prank.

"Mice are less scary than ghosts after all," she said.

Fortunately for Sato, we finished the rest of the night without any more of Haruko's shenanigans. Unfortunately for us, midnight had come and gone. We checked the train station just in case but, sure enough, no trains. We had to walk.

For me, an hour-long trek. For Haruko, half that. For Sato, I wasn't sure.

"You better apologize for scaring Sato," I said.

"I already did! She isn't mad, right Noiji?" Haruko turned to ask her.

Sato nodded her head once. She was already a dozen paces behind us so it surprised me that she'd even heard the question. Maybe she's got superhuman hearing. Or maybe Haruko talks way louder than I'd realized.

"I mean you should apologize to me. You do know that I have to walk twice as far as you do, right?" I asked.

"Walking is one of the most efficient forms of exercise," Haruko said, jumping between steps.

Thanks, doesn't help.

She brought both arms out from her sides, balancing on a crack in the sidewalk. "You know, if you weren't so late in the first place none of that would've been a problem."

If you picked any other day than today, I wouldn't have needed an afternoon nap.

"Why so tired, anyways?" she asked.

"Didn't sleep last night."

"Hmm, my fault?"

What? No, shut up. What do you mean?

"Aha! I knew it!" She grinned, skipping ahead.

God, this girl.

The rest of our conversation wasn't too far from the usual. Playfully insulting each other and listening to her ramble. This time, she picked the school system to complain about. Knowing Haruko, I would've assumed that to be a normal, random topic. But instead, I would soon discover, it had more to do with our present circumstances than any of her other rants. Combined.

I saw Haruko off at the halfway mark and debated waiting for Sato. She had lagged so far behind I could barely see her through the darkness. Not a fast walker, but she was a fast website maker. It occurred to me I hadn't seen Sato's handiwork, so I stopped underneath the yellow illumination of a street light, grabbed an extra QR code from Haruko's tote bag and scanned it with my phone. I thought it would just be some text and a picture. I thought.

A verifiable monolith of words materialized before my eyes, one character at a time. At the top of the website was a title I couldn't believe: How to Overthrow a School.

What… is this?