There were plenty on the roof, and if they hadn’t been able to pull Omar and Jordi up from there already, a few more people wouldn’t have helped. She had to buy Marisa more time, had to keep the boys from falling somehow.
She studied the side of the building, the nooks and crannies of its brick, its windowsills and attached pipes.
There was only one way. She looked back toward her mother, knowing she was about to give herself away, would have to explain years of hidden rebellion. This was going to unravel the version of herself that existed at home, and who knows what else would unravel with it. But, she supposed, it was better than the alternative. She began to scale the building.
* * *
Kenji was having lock-in night flashbacks. While Peejay had joined the others upstairs, Kenji stayed in the classroom with Celeste. He didn’t want to see any carnage, didn’t want to face another broken leg, another mob, another scenario which couldn’t be “Yes, and...”-ed.
“Well, that didn’t accomplish much.”
Celeste watched the police officers coming at the glass a few classrooms over, somewhat halfheartedly, as if this was entirely a CIS issue and they weren’t sure why they’d been called in. “You’re wrong. You stood up to him, Kenji. That means something.”
“Not for Marisa. And not even for me, either. I didn’t want to stand up to him. I wanted him to listen to me, you know. To care about what I had to say.” He took his glasses off and rubbed his eyes. “This sucks.”
The police hit the glass again, making them both flinch. They could hear the voices of the crowd clamor at whatever was happening upstairs. They’d caught a few words when everyone had scrambled out the classroom, but right now it was a bit of a mystery.
Celeste thought of her past self, the version that had existed back in Illinois, comfortable in her skin, filling all sorts of roles. Would that Celeste have any idea what to do in this situation? Would she be able to console an improv-loving boy while her parents ran around in the rain outside and police threatened to bring the walls in?
And even if she didn’t really have her place at CIS, even if she only had a handful of people who weren’t quite friends but had been friendly to her for a week, wasn’t that something? Some proof she could fit in? Maybe not now, maybe not like she did in her previous home, maybe not among the other Americans, or the other black kids, but eventually?
“If it helps make you feel better at all, I’ll play improv with you.”
Kenji snapped out from his thoughts. “You will?”
“Yeah. Next meeting. If the school ever lets it happen.”
He chuckled, shivering at the breeze now that the air could circulate from one end of the building to the other. He toyed with the megaphone in his hands, not wanting to look up at the soccer field, where his dad, last he saw, was still on the phone, even while people screamed in horror at whatever Jordi had done.
* * *
Ms. Duli and Peejay arrived on the roof around the same time and started working their way to the front. They both knew how to make a crowd part for them and soon enough they were at the front by the window, or what remained of it. They could feel the rain dampen their clothes.
Ms. Duli kicked aside shards near Omar, then got on her belly on the floor near him to peer over the edge. Peejay opted to stay away from the giant hole on the side of the building. Instead, he shooed away a stick-thin sophomore who had been trying to help but was one gust of wind away from getting sucked out of the roof, and took his place.
Peejay hooked his fingers into Omar’s belt loop, and though he had no way of knowing who was holding on behind him, later Omar would swear he knew it’d been Peejay. (“No,” Peejay would joke, “it was that terrifying, bodiless, plastic version of Hamish. It came to life and hooked you with its teeth, like something out of the horror movie it belonged in.”)
“Help is coming,” Ms. Duli told Omar, though it was only a guess. Good God, she hoped the boy didn’t slip, hoped Omar had the strength everyone said he did.
“I know,” Omar responded, trying not to choke on the rain. “I see her.”