Page 54 of You Belong Here

BEFORE: THE PLAN

The plan seemed so simple. Flawless in its ease.

We knew they were coming. Cliff had warned me that they were coming to campus to find us—to track us.

It was Adalyn’s idea to let them.

The freshmen were starting to slip into the night, but we were waiting by the access road. It was the same place I’d heard the rev of the truck engine earlier in the week, when they had prowled through campus, looking for us.

The snow was falling. I wished I’d brought gloves. I could see my breath in front of my face, feel the cold in my lungs, the scratch of wool against my cheeks from the mask.

Footsteps raced behind us in a brisk crunch of snow. I spun in time to see a senior in a mask sprinting into the woods—in chase.

“Maybe they’re already here,” I said. We could’ve missed them. They could’ve changed their plan, come on foot.

They could’ve changed their minds.

And then suddenly: headlights.

“Got you, assholes,” Adalyn said.

Adalyn stepped into the street first, black mask pulled down over her face, blond braids escaping out the bottom. The headlights blinded me as they crested the hill, so I had to put a hand up to block the glare.

The truck stopped. We waited there for a beat. Then two. And then the passenger door swung open.

They were here, like Cliff had promised.

“Ready?” Adalyn said. “Go.”

Adalyn ran, and I took off after her.

The clock had started.

I glanced over my shoulder as we raced down the snow-slicked path toward the academic buildings on the lower campus. Two men were out of the vehicle, long shadows stretching toward us as the truck backed down the road, leaving them there.

Adalyn was skidding down the path in front of me, laughing, and I was desperate to keep up. I could hear my heart inside my skull: Go, go, go—

We had enough of a head start to make it to the entrance of Beckett Hall before they caught up—but not by much.

“Keep it open,” she said, and I made sure it didn’t latch behind us before racing to the tunnel doors.

It took so long to unlock the tunnel entrance, and all I could think was: Faster, faster. I could hear them outside the building now.

Then the click of the lock resounded in the atrium, and I pushed the door open. She slipped the key around her neck and grabbed my wrist. “Let’s go.”

It was a simple plan, to contain them.

We thought it was the safest thing, to keep them out of the game and out of the night. To keep them away from us.

To win.

Adalyn laughed as she ran, but I felt terror even then.

What did she imagine two grown men were doing chasing two undergrads through campus?

They were twenty-four years old. She had carved the word TRASH into a brand-new truck.

What did she think would happen if they caught us?

I could feel it: This was no longer a game.

We were in the dark of the tunnels, and no one would find us if something happened. No one would get to us in time to help. We were on our own.

I’d thought I could protect her if I stayed with her, but I was starting to panic. There was no safety here. I had let her lead me straight into danger. Worse, I had given her the key.

The beam of Adalyn’s flashlight bounced along the wall in front of us. “It’s a dead end,” she said—but I knew it wasn’t.

“Left, go left,” I shouted, lungs burning.

They were faster than we were, and they were getting closer.

But they didn’t know how the tunnels worked. While the outer tunnel doors required a key to lock or unlock from either side, the inner doors didn’t work the same. They locked automatically as they swung shut behind you.

They would lock you inside if you didn’t have the key.

The plan was painfully simple. At the next fork, she’d keep going, heading toward the exit at the storage barn beside the ruins of the old president’s house—home base—and turn the lock. I’d stay behind, tucked around the corner.

All I had to do was wait for them to pass and shut the door.