Page 2 of Defined and Defiled (Ghostlight Falls)
I could easily be convinced that the basement was shut off purely, because no one wanted to walk down the steep, dusty staircase. The stairs to go down to the basement should have the school condemned
Both of us are dusty and out of breath by the time we make it to the basement door. The door is barred with chains and a lock the size of my fist. Mark has to shuffle through his overloaded keyring a few times before he finds the correct one.
“If this place is forbidden, why are you allowed down here?”
Mike does not strike me as someone overly trustworthy. He is the guy you would hesitate to let take you home on a rainy day, even if your car was smoking on the highway. I don't think he would murder me and leave me in the damp space underneath the lunchroom, but with a man, the odds are never zero.
“Someone has to fix the boiler if it breaks.”
He coughs. I feel relief at the knowledge that I can take down a man with chronic cough if I need to.
Mike's persistent cough is the only sound in the stairwell as he leans down to unlock the door. He removes the chains that cover the knob, rust coating his fingers.
I hope Marge is right, or else I'm walking through this elaborate spiderweb for no reason. It's clear that Mike has not come down to clean the basement in a while. Out of the corner of my eye, I spy him wiping at the dust on the wall.
Mike pulls at the chain on the ceiling, casting the room with the murky glow of two blinking light bulbs on their last legs.
The floor is sticky with a faint red outline on the ground that I chose to ignore. There are some boxes marked for things that are too young for my curriculum, a couple of beat-up nap mats, and loose desk chairs.
Mike keeps glancing towards the door, but my eyes settle on a cardboard box labeled: 5G, sci.
Bingo!
The box is heavy and wedged beneath two equally hefty boxes. It doesn't budge as I try to pull it out, but I keep trying. I can't have done two weeks of pilates for nothing. The box finally moves, but it brings the top box tumbling down with it. I wonder if seeing me knocked to the floor, beaten by a box of building blocks, will make Mike think again about this crush. Dusty supplies smack me in the face as they fall, one of them knocking my glasses off.
“What are you doing?”
Mike asks as he attempts to unearth me from the wreckage. I've been trying to regain some air in my lungs, which are currently being squashed by a weighty book. Lifting the book reveals a spine that read.
“Meryham-Debster Unofficial Dictionary”
in big golden letters.
It is the kind of book you set on a podium in the front of the library for students to absent-mindedly flip through. It's a gorgeous tome to be suffocated by. Mike pulls it off me and pushes it to the ground with a grunt.
“Are you okay Shirley?”
Mike's brow scrunches as he looks down at me. With my glasses off, I can't quite make out his expression even as he leans in. I’m choosing to believe he’s not mad.
“Mike, do you mind grabbing me some water?”
Mike blinks before nodding, “Sure.”
He clears his throat.
“Sure. Just try not to touch anything else while I'm gone.”
I give Mike a two-finger salute and bring my glasses back up to my face for inspection. Thankfully, the chain kept them from going too far, or I'd be on the floor saying 'Jinkies' while I searched for them. When you fall as much as I do, you start taking precautions. They don't appear any more scratched than usual so I put them on and get to work.
The science box is full of hand lenses and plastic graduated cylinders that I shove into my laptop bag. There are broken test tubes, but the real treasure is at the bottom of the box, a container of twenty unused safety goggles.
I've reached capacity in my bag, but there's no way in hell I'm leaving these behind. Mike's heavy tread thuds on the staircase as he makes his way back to me. I panic just a little and shove the box of goggles under my shirt. The bulk of the contraband is hidden by my cardigan, but I'm still suspiciously more box-shaped than I was before.
I grab the heavy knock-off dictionary and hold it in front of me, shoving it as close to my chest as possible to keep the goggles hidden.
I swear I can hear a muffled shout, but it's covered up by Mike's voice as he returns.
“They were out of everything in the vending machine, so I just filled this up in the water fountain.”
He holds out what I suspect is his water bottle to me, the front covered in stickers.
“I'm tired. Maybe we should just head out.”
He lowers the water bottle, looking down at it before shrugging.
“What do you have?”
For a second, I think my heisting days are done. Mike knows everything and is about to have me thrown in educator jail. Which is probably, definitely, a thing and filled with development days and parent-teacher meetings. Then I remember that the only thing he can see is the big book I have smashed into my chest.
He takes a sip from his water, and I pray to the Booktok gods that they forgive me for what I'm about to do. I rip a page out the dictionary and show Mike the damage. I swear I hear another muffled shout, but that could be my soul dying at having to deface a book.
“I accidentally damaged this when it fell on me. I was going to take it to For the Plot to see if they can fix it, and then we can return it.”
Mike takes about three more sips of what was meant to be my water. I shuffle my feet, struggling to maintain hold of the dictionary.
“Do you think that anyone would notice a tear?”
Mike asks.
Honestly, probably not. It’s clear that no one comes down here and who would miss an outdated dictionary. Still, if I can do this, not only will I get away with 'long-term borrowing' these materials for my class, but I may also be able to come back and search for more.
“I don't want anyone to know we've been here, do you? If I fix this, then there's no evidence.”
I lean into him, the bulky book the only thing between us.
“It can stay our little secret.”
I'm close enough that I can hear the sound of Mike's gulp before he nods.
“Okay.”