Page 54 of What Did I Miss?

On a god-awful Friday, Makayla’s doing the same song and dance routine she has since term started two weeks ago.

Chugging bitter coffee, pretending to teach classes and playing the role of bathroom police.

She ought to get a bravery award for walking into the toilets next to the computer lab. At least the paperwork keeps her busy.

It’s been an agonising thirteen days, fourteen hours and fifty-three minutes since Makayla last spoke to Beau – or, rather, since he spoke to her.

With a free period on her hands, she marches down the hallway, taking a longer route, determined to avoid Beau’s classes at all costs. Having attended her second pregnancy loss support meeting the night before, she’s ripe for tears. One glimpse of him and she’ll fall apart.

The photocopying room is thankfully empty.

The ancient machine takes up more than half the floor space.

Makayla bangs on the screen to fire it up, then keys in the Science department’s code; the annual sports budget is already blown.

If Jeffrey were better at allocating funds, she wouldn’t have to resort to such measures.

Makayla holds her breath until a promising whir indicates the photocopier is playing nicely today. It can go either way; such a moody cow.

A collage covers a crack in the wall that Jeffrey has done nothing about.

In the middle is a photo of Makayla and Beau at the swimming carnival.

She has no recollection of it being taken – must’ve been after she swallowed her body weight in chlorine.

She’s sporting a grin that can only be described as awe-struck, a face she doesn’t remember making.

Perhaps that’s the look she always had around Beau, unable to hide her interest as well as she thought.

The image is much better than the one that was taken at Rongo’s wedding, which he nervously handed over.

She didn’t ask – won’t ask – if Beau also has a copy.

He probably ripped it into pieces, the way Makayla tore up his heart.

Her copy lives inside her bedside table.

She can barely bring herself to look at it.

That Charlie’s Angels pose she conned him into is embarrassing.

Why can’t she have a nice photo to remember him by?

Wait. She can. She can have this one.

If she shuffles things around, no one will notice it’s missing.

Two graduate teachers roam the halls, and Makayla waits for their giggles to fade. Can’t have witnesses. The entire faculty were at her birthday party; they’ll assume she’s a stalker.

Even Handyman Hank is side-stepping her like she’s unhinged. Quite insulting, considering he triple bolts the school shed every day and won’t let anyone inside. If the rumours are true, he’s either living in there or growing weed. Maybe both.

The collage is more intricate than expected. Makayla removes a single pin and the entire thing comes undone. Photographs splash across the carpet and she wades through them to find the one she wants.

‘What are you doing?’ Agnes appears out of thin air.

‘Nothing.’ Makayla messes up the pile to hide the evidence. ‘These were like this when I got here.’ She dumps them on a workbench, making them someone else’s problem.

Agnes starts getting her documents ready for photocopying, licking her finger and sighing on repeat.

She’s annoyingly loud, and definitely doing it on purpose.

Makayla wants to leave, but can’t; a laminated sign explicitly warns that discarded print job offenders will be named and shamed.

There was an uproar about it at the last staff meeting.

She’s far too fragile to be called out for admin crimes right now.

‘You know, most people say thank you when you give them a gift,’ Agnes says, all high and mighty.

‘Uh … thanks, I guess.’ Agnes’s present hadn’t been a bomb, surprisingly. It was her precious mug featuring two fluffy rat-looking dogs. ‘Look, Agnes, I don’t know what kind of twisted game you’re playing at, but I’m not in the mood.’

‘Didn’t you hear? I’m retiring.’

Makayla’s ears prick up and the news pinches at her chest unexpectedly. It’s not the ding-dong-the-witch-is-dead moment she’d always imagined. What will Goldbrooke Secondary College be like without Agnes?

‘Think of the mug as a symbolic gesture. I’m passing the baton.

For years, I’ve tried to get my backside into the principal’s chair to improve this school, but the council keeps hiring buffoons like Jeffrey who come in with their big promises and leave this place worse than when they started.

I’m too tired to keep at it. I trust that you might one day – if you can wield your power the right way. ’

Makayla soaks in Agnes’s words, wondering why she’s the chosen one. Has she been Agnes’s protégée this whole time and didn’t realise?

‘At least you’ll have something else to focus on since you messed things up with Beau. You’re not really going to let him go, are you?’

Too exhausted to pretend she doesn’t care, Makayla lets the truth spill from her lips. ‘I have to. It’s too late.’

‘Ha! Throughout all my years here, you’ve been my toughest competitor. I’m surprised you’re admitting defeat this easily. The Makayla I know would win him back at all costs.’

‘I don’t think he wants to be won back.’

‘You’ll never know unless you try.’

Agnes feeds her papers into Tray A and slinks away, abandoning her print job until later. Laminated signs don’t scare her, clearly.

Agnes’s parting words echo as she leaves, worming their way into Makayla’s brain.

What can she do to win Beau back? He won’t speak to her in person, and she’s sent him a barrage of messages and called a dozen times.

After a few days, he texted back: Please stop contacting me.

Even when he’s angry, he has impeccable manners.

Makayla’s respecting his wishes, clinging to the idea that someday they can be friends.

Something would be better than nothing; every fibre in her body misses him.

What she wouldn’t give to hear him laugh again.

Nothing beats it. Husky and fully committed, with his head thrown back.

Not even Rongo’s got a smile out of him lately.

And when one finally does find his lips again, it’ll be some other woman who puts it there. Makayla wants to hurl at the thought.

Alone once again, she sifts through the pile of photos.

Beau’s kind-hearted eyes stare back, transporting her to that day at camp when she froze on the platform until he helped her down.

That moment flicked a switch that gave her the courage to tell him how much she’d miss him if he left.

If only she’d bottled that bravery, she’d tell him how she really feels, and things could be different.

That’s it!

An idea smacks her in the face like a frying pan and her body pulses with energy.

‘Agnes!’ Makayla sprints down the hallway to catch up. ‘Can you get me into the school shed?’

‘Yes.’ Agnes smirks with I-still-own-this-place attitude. ‘But why?’

‘I can’t believe I’m saying this, but I’m taking your advice. It’s time to face my fears.’

Don’t look down. Don’t look down. Don’t look down.

Climbing a ladder to get on top of the school library seemed like a brilliant idea thirty minutes ago. But now that Makayla’s standing near the edge, one clumsy slip away from death, not so much.

An angry breeze whistles through her hair, stealing her breath. Her knees wobble and her chest pounds. She plants her feet firmly on the tiles, determined to carry out the plan.

Where’s Agnes?

The two women met up earlier to break into the shed and steal the ladder. Instead of bickering, they bonded. Her new partner in crime is supposed to interrupt Beau’s class and send him on an errand to the library. But time is ticking and there’s no sign of him.

On a walking path below, two students sneak by.

Waggers! Their excessive over-the-shoulder glances give them away.

Unfortunately, Makayla can’t bust them without alerting them to her secret operation.

She remains statue-like, there’s nowhere to hide.

The only things up here are stray footballs, plastic drink bottles and a desperate thirty-year-old woman.

One boy stops suddenly and points at her; the other crashes into his back. A chorus of obscenities fly out of their mouths and they immediately panic.

‘Help! Teacher on the roof! She’s gonna jump!’ They run in different directions.

‘No, no, no! You’ve got it wrong,’ Makayla calls. Out of context, this looks bad. Very bad. If she had more time (and sense), she would have executed this better.

Students spill out of the classrooms and congest the yard. Some cover their mouths with their hands. Others (sick individuals) are filming. Hundreds of wide eyes blink at her.

Things are looking up when Agnes frog-marches Beau outside, but they get worse when he races towards the ladder. Agnes uses supersonic strength to restrain him, and The Whiny Bunch step in to lend some muscle.

‘Makayla?’ Beau’s voice is laced with concern. ‘We can talk about this.’

‘I know. That’s why I’m up here.’ Murmurs blaze through the crowd – it’s still not clear that this is intended to be a grand gesture.

This looked far more romantic in her head.

‘The rest of you can go back to class. Nothing to see here, people.’ Makayla cautiously shoos them away, afraid of making large movements.

No one budges. Many sit cross-legged, like they’re waiting for storytime. Things like this rarely happen at school; they’re not going to miss it.

Jeffrey bulldozes through staff and students to get to the front. ‘Get down right this instant! You’re making a spectacle of yourself.’

‘That’s the point,’ she replies. ‘This will only take a minute—’

‘If you don’t come down, I’m coming up.’