Not My Problem

“That’s my dad and Gerry, the caretaker,” Meabh said. I weighed up the options as fast as I could.

Kavi tried to send me a signal like he was a baseball coach. I didn’t roll my eyes, to save time. I just looked at Orla, Kavi, and Meabh, and said one word.

“Hide.”

Someone had to take the fall for this. If Mr. Kowalski came up here and found nothing, he’d search the school. If he came up and found me, he’d have no reason to think anyone else was involved. I wasn’t exactly known for my vast circle of friends. He’d have no reason to think I wasn’t alone.

“You’ll be expelled,” Meabh said, noticing I wasn’t moving.

“I’ll be fine,” I lied. This had been my stupid idea, after all. If one of us was going down, it should be me.

None of them moved. The car was almost at the front of the building. If the headlights hit the right place, they would show all four of us, frozen in the atrium.

“I have an idea,” Kavi said. “I’ll create a distraction. Hide in the office. Run when the coast is clear.”

“What about—”

It was too late for me to ask about him. He’d already taken off down the corridor toward the lockers. There was nothing else I could do now. The three of us dove into Mr. Kowalski’s office and I locked the door behind us. Meabh gave me a quizzical look. Seconds later I heard the beep beep of Mr. Kowalski disabling the alarm on the front door.

After a second there was blessed peace from the noise, but the echo of it still ran through my head.

“It’s likely nothing,” a man’s voice said. I assumed that was Gerry. “But we’ll have a look around just to be sure. Should we call the Gardaí?”

“No, I think that would be overkill. It’s probably the same as last time the alarm went off. Kids messing around,” Mr. Kowalski said. “Sorry for getting you up. We need to get that card copied or something.”

I could barely hear him over the sound of my own heart pounding in my ears. Orla was hiding behind the cabinet, as though that would help if he actually came in here. Meabh was slumped over in her dad’s chair, her forehead flat to the desk. I stood directly in front of the door. Even though I knew if he came in, we’d all be caught, I still felt vulnerable, like I was the first in the line of fire. I don’t think anyone was breathing. And then I saw the handle move, heard the door rattle slightly in its frame.

“Office is still locked,” Mr. Kowalski said.

Meabh brought her legs up to her chest and buried her face in her knees. Orla scrunched her eyes shut tight.

BANG.

I flinched.

BANG.

Two sets of footsteps took off, away from the direction of the office.

I could breathe again. Quick, short breaths, but still oxygen in the lungs.

“That’s Kavi’s distraction, guys. We need to get out of here.”

Orla and Meabh huddled up behind me as I put the key in the lock.

“Wait, where are we going?” Meabh whispered. “We can’t go out there without a plan.”

“The front door?” Orla said, like it was obvious. “Mr. Kowalski just disarmed it. It’s the closest to us.”

Meabh and I both nodded in response and I turned the key slowly. The click of the lock tumbling over was deafening.

I half expected when I creaked the door open to find Mr. Kowalski standing there with a thundering expression on his face and a pair of handcuffs or something.

He wasn’t. But the lights were on in the atrium, and I felt terribly exposed putting a toe out into the open space. Meabh was clutching on to the back of my jacket. I could smell her mango lotion again, she was so close. If the wafting scent of the Body Shop gave us away I was going to kill her. We took a few tentative steps out into the atrium, a weird conga line. I stopped almost immediately and turned on my two limpets.

Meabh winced and pointed at her foot, apparently thinking I was annoyed about the clicking of her boot on the tiles.

I shook my head and nodded toward the doors. The glass atrium looked out on the front drive, which was now completely lit up. It would take us at least ten minutes to get down to the gate with Meabh’s foot slowing us down, and if Mr. K or Gerry came back to the atrium, all they’d have to do would be to glance out the window and we’d be there, fully illuminated, trying to hobble down the hill.

I mean, Orla and I could get down there in three minutes and sprint home. But that didn’t seem in the spirit of Meabh’s Sartre speech, wherever that had been going.

Orla pointed toward the hallway we’d come down to begin with, through the doors that had started this whole mess. I looked around, wondering which direction Mr. Kowalski, Gerry, and Kavi had gone. I hoped he had escaped by now, but if he had, that meant Mr. K might reappear any second.

I shrugged at them both and we altered our course toward the corridor. I winced each time I heard the deafening click of Meabh’s boot and prayed it wasn’t really as loud as it seemed. We turned down one corridor as quickly and as quietly as we could. Then I heard a muffled voice and stopped dead, my procession bumping into each other and then me. I strained my ears and realized it was Kavi’s voice, coming from the corridor with the lockers in it. Then I heard Mr. Kowalski’s voice.

Kavi had been caught. My heart sank. Would he be in a lot of trouble? I gestured for Orla and Meabh to stay put as I crept forward toward the junction in the hallway. Holding my breath, I peeked around the corner. Mr. Kowalski was standing with his back to me; Kavi, taller than the principal, was trying to shrink into himself and look small and helpless. He held one of the bloody Get Well Soon balloons which bobbed absurdly by his face, the other two were on the floor, burst.

“Kavi, this is extremely serious.”

“I’m really sorry, Mr. Kowalski, I didn’t think. I wasn’t going to do anything bad. I swear I was just putting the balloons on her locker. I thought it would be a nice surprise. You know, one time my nan surprised me by putting balloons on my bedroom door on my birthday because it was a school day and my dad made me go even though it was my birthday so she wanted to cheer me up, so I wanted to cheer Meabh up.”

Kavi caught my eye. At least I thought he did. But his hangdog expression didn’t flicker. I realized in that second that he had meant to get caught. This was his plan.

“I wasn’t aware you were even friends with my daughter.”

“I’m not really. But I just . . . I haven’t told anyone this. I haven’t told her. Please, sir, you can’t tell her what I’m about to tell you.”

“Kavi, I’m not sure this is relevant. Let’s go back to my office. please.”

Shit.

“Oh, sir, it is relevant though,” Kavi wailed, and he slumped to the floor. Mr. Kowalski sighed but I could tell he wasn’t truly angry. There was something about Kavi that made him seem so harmless that you couldn’t really be mad at him. I had no idea what Kavi was about to say to explain what he was doing.

“Kavi, please stand up. We can talk about this in my office.”

I thought quickly. We couldn’t go back in the direction of the atrium. Even if we made it to the door before Mr. Kowalski got there, he would definitely spot us outside. The only choice was to get to the side door and get down the hill in the darkness.

I glanced back at Meabh and Orla. They hadn’t moved. Not even shifting their weight. I shuffled back to them as quickly as I could without making noise and prayed Kavi could keep Mr. Kowalski in the hallway for another few minutes.

“We have to go this way.” I gestured to the door at the end of the long, long hallway.

Meabh’s expression said, Are you fucking kidding me, but her mouth said nothing. My eyes met Orla’s. I looked to Meabh’s foot. Orla nodded. I put my finger to my lips, indicating for Meabh to be quiet, and for a second she looked confused. Then Orla grasped her under her arms and I picked her up by the feet. Meabh’s eyes bugged but to her credit she didn’t let out a peep. We carried her down the hall toward the junction, her expression mutinous the whole time.

“Sir, the problem is so huge.”

I edged backward, letting him spot me behind Mr. Kowalski’s back.

“I just need to tell you about it but I don’t know how to say the words.” Kavi sounded deeply upset.

Kavi began sobbing loudly and we used the cover of the noise to scurry past.

“What is it, son? Tell me,” Mr. K said gently.

We reached the door and I thanked myself for leaving it ajar earlier. I nudged it open with my shoulder and as the door swung shut behind me, I heard a loud, strangled yell.

“I’M IN LOVE WITH MEABH KOWALSKA.”

Out on the grass, Orla and I locked eyes and we both burst out laughing, dropping Meabh on the damp grass.

It took a moment for us to recover while Meabh scowled and struggled to get up.

“Come on.” Orla held out her hand. “We need to go.”

I stood up and dusted dirt off my butt but I shook my head.

“I’m not going until I see what happened to Kavi,” I said. “He got in deep shit for us.”

“Yeah, and I don’t think he’d want us to waste it by getting caught out here.”

“We won’t get caught out here. But you go on.”

“I’m staying if you’re staying,” Meabh said.

“Actually,” I said, “you’re the one who really needs to go.”

“Oh yeah, why’s that?” Meabh had her hands on her hips. I think that was just her neutral stance at this stage, after spending all her life in confrontation mode.

“Don’t you think your dad is going to look for his keys when he gets home again? You need to put them back before he realizes you’re gone or he’ll put two and two together.”

“What about locking the gate?” Meabh countered.

“We need Kavi for that anyway and that’s not happening tonight. We just have to hope your dad thinks he forgot to lock up when he sees it in the morning.”

Meabh wanted to argue. I could see the urge bubbling on her lips, but she couldn’t come up with anything. She made a hmphing noise and threw her hands up in the air. Without another word to us, she started down the hill toward the gate.

I gave Orla a sidelong glance. “Maybe we should help her down, she’s going to—”

We watched Meabh slip on the wet grass and slide at least four feet before coming to a stop. I had to stuff my fist in my mouth. Orla clapped both hands over hers. Meabh stood, shoulders tensed around her ears and fists clenched, and very determinedly did not look around. She simply kept walking as if nothing had happened. However, after a few seconds, she raised one hand high and give us both the finger while we shook with silent laughter.

When we’d calmed down enough to speak in whispers again, I told Orla she should go.

“Nah,” she said. “The least I can do is wait with you.”

I smiled at my shoes. It was nice of her but I didn’t know how to say so without sounding like a total mush, so I pivoted back to our mission.

“You could tell me why we did this if all your photos are fully clothed.”

“Would it count as me paying you back if I do?” she asked hopefully.

“Dream on,” I scoffed.

She started talking anyway.

“My dads are just really . . . let’s be nice and say overprotective? When I was younger, these girls bullied me but it was all through texts and stuff and not at school so no one noticed, and it wasn’t until I went to secondary school that I told them what happened. I think they felt guilty for not noticing and it made them weird. They always want to check my phone and where I’m going and what I’m doing and who I’m with. They threw a party for the whole dance class once so they could meet everyone who was in it.” Orla rolled her eyes. “God forbid I hang out with someone they haven’t seen before.”

I couldn’t imagine Mam being like that. She loved Holly. She knew how hard things had been before Holly was my friend and I think she doted on Holly for saving me from hundreds of lunches eaten alone.

“When I started seeing Kyle, they went into overdrive,” Orla continued. “They put a tracking app on my phone. They were convinced he was going to pressure me into doing something I didn’t want to do. I get it. I know they care, but I am so sick of them looking in on every aspect of my life. So I told them me and Kyle broke up and I delete all my messages and get my friends to text me fake ones. You know, about homework and stuff.”

I tried to process all that information.

“Okay, so you’re thinking that with your phone confiscated they’re going to think that you were getting texts in class? Being bullied again?”

“Right,” she said, rolling her eyes. “And they’ll insist on looking at my messages, which I hadn’t deleted yet.”

“But what they’ll actually find is that you are still tipping at Kyle and you lied.”

“Exactly. And I want a bit of freedom. If that means lying to them then it’s their own fault for being so intrusive.”

She looked miserable and I felt a rush of pity. I wondered if that’s what Mam felt like when I was always snooping and checking up on her.

“You could have told me all this earlier,” I said. “Then you wouldn’t have had to come here. I’d have deleted everything for you.” I tried giving her a reassuring pat on the arm but I felt silly so I stopped. She didn’t seem to notice and she smiled at me.

“I didn’t want to explain everything about my life to someone I didn’t know. I’m sick of always being asked about everything I do. I guess I’m used to coming up with excuses too.”

She seemed to realize what I was thinking, which was that she didn’t know me any better right now than she did this afternoon, so why was she telling me now?

“But you seem really sound,” she said. “I don’t know anyone else who would help me do something like this, especially if I’d told them what I told you. Most people would say it was my own fault for sending sexts in the first place and to accept the punishment. My friends said it was my fault for lying and I should be honest about it. They don’t get it.”

I felt uncomfortable hearing nice things. I didn’t really deserve it just for not being a total arsehole.

“Kavi’s your friend. He didn’t say that to you.”

Orla’s brow knitted in confusion.

“Kavi’s not my friend. I mean, he seems lovely and all, but I don’t know him. He overheard me talking to Anna and he pulled me aside. He said he thought he knew someone who could help.” She looked at me curiously. “Why did you help?”

“I didn’t think it was fair for you to get in trouble when you didn’t really do anything wrong. Whomst among us hasn’t sent a dirty message?” I waved my arms grandly like the priest does in Mass when he gets going. “Let he who is without sext cast the first stone.”

I hadn’t sent any sexts. But only because no one wanted to see them.

“I haven’t sent any dirty messages. I told you that,” Orla said stoutly.

“Sure. Okay. In all those messages there isn’t one PG-13 text. I believe you.” I crossed my heart and winked at Orla, who looked away and pretended not to hear me.