Hateful by Eden Beck

Chapter Twenty-One

The hallway is blissfully empty,so no one is here to see me as I struggle to put myself together. How long before someone comes to find me?

I don’t have much time.

With a pit in my stomach, I realize Headmistress Robin is my only hope. She wants to get the schools integrated, right? Then I have to make sure that happens—or I’ll be expelled.

I might end up expelled anyway.

No. I’ll probably end up expelled anyway.

This is hardly the correct outfit for breaking into a locked room. I gently untie my jacket and tug what remains of the sweatpants off my legs. What the hell am I supposed to do with these? I throw them to the floor. They’re someone else’s problem now.

Pretty much the whole school is out at the track. I’m going to have to move quickly, so if that means I have to be pantsless, then so be it. I tie my jacket around my waist again and hurry down the hallway.

Nothing here that somebody hasn’t already seen.

If I’m going to get the headmistress’s help, then I can’t just show up at her office door unprepared. I have to have something to offer.

And I know exactly what that something is.

But how to break into the student records room, anyway? I can’t pick locks. I certainly can’t break down the door—that would be super obvious.

I stop when I get to the hallway leading up to the records room. The dean’s office door is open, so I hesitate a moment before daring a peek around the corner.

He’s not there.

But the key … the key has got to be in here somewhere, right? More likely here than anywhere else.

My heart kicks into overdrive, beating so fast I’m worried I might puke again. Am I really doing this?

I’ve never been in the dean’s office before. I creep across the floor in my dirty socks to his desk. It’s incredibly neat and organized. There’s little trays of papers, multicolored sticky notes, manila folders. I reach for one of the drawers of his desk. Lots of pens and highlighters. I open the next one, and my heart thuds to a stop for one millisecond.

Keys.

There’s a whole ring of them.

Most of them have labels. I reach into it with a trembling hand and flip through them one by one. He has a key to every room in the damn school. Every time I move on to another key, I feel like even more of a thief than I already am. I could do anything with these. Go anywhere.

They sure would have been helpful all the times I needed a place to hide.

The keys clink together as I shuffle them, reading the tiny labels on each one; storage, kitchen, entranceway. A couple of them only have abbreviations on them. Could one of those be the right key?

I pick out three likely keys: a gold one reading records; a little silver one that says R.R.; and a plain-looking one not unlike my house key that says S.R.R. in block letters, the only one with a printed label instead of handwritten.

Nervously, I hold the entire keyring in my shaking hands as I exit the dean’s office and go to the wooden door next to it. I try records first, but no dice. R.R. also doesn’t fit. S.R.R., though, fits neatly into the lock, and when I twist it, the knob turns.

I pause to consider what I’m doing, just for a second.

If I get caught here, I’ll surely be expelled no matter what Headmistress Robin or anyone else has to say.

Still, it’s my only option right now. I have to take the risk—so I push open the door to the student records room.

My heart beating quickly, I step in. It’s a large room, but it’s cramped with file cabinets that make it feel much smaller than it is. Beneath me is a tasteless teal carpet that looks like it’s from the 80s. All the cabinets are labeled in German, but I don’t have to read them. I know where I have to go.

“In the back left-hand corner,” the headmistress told me that day so long ago, when I first stupidly agreed to this, “there’s a very short file cabinet. It only has two drawers. It’s one of the darker ones, more brown than grey.”

I walk through the rows of cabinets and tall, bookshelf-like cubbyholes filled with folders and binders, moving quickly. My feet make no sound on the ugly carpet. I turn left to find a squat brown file cabinet shoved into the back corner. My heart skips a beat as I rush toward it.

“In the top drawer,” she’d said. “The top one. Open it. There will be a fat brown folder. It’s just labeled B. I don’t know where in the drawer it is—but I’m guessing it’ll be shoved to the back.”

I didn’t ask her how she knew all this.

I didn’t even ask her what was in it, why she really needed it. I should have.

But I knew I wouldn’t get any answers. Not truthful ones, anyway.

I slide open the top drawer as quickly as I can and start rustling through the folders. Most of them are labeled with words and names I don’t recognize, but just as the headmistress said, shoved at the back, there’s a fat brown folder labeled simply with a capital letter B.

I grab it and tug it out. It’s brimming with papers and emits a musty smell. Dust puffs out of it with each tiny motion, and I sneeze so hard I think my brain might shoot out through my nose.

I slide the drawer shut and hurry out of the records room, pulling the door shut behind me. I fumble with the unwieldy B Folder for a second as I use the key to lock the door behind me, then rush back into the dean’s office.

I plop the keyring back into his drawer and push it shut with my knee. Am I really going to get away with this? My heart thumps against my chest, sure that any second he or someone else is going to come back and I’m going to get caught.

But doesn’t. No one does.

They’re still too busy out at the track doing whatever else the two schools have planned after my little mishap.

Little mishap. I just exposed myself—both literally and figuratively—to the entire student bodies of both schools. I’d barely call that “little”.

I clutch the folder to me and dart out of the dean’s office, still not believing I just actually did it. Believing less still that I appear to have gotten away with it.

I stand frozen at the mouth of the hallway. What should I do first? Find the headmistress? Get dressed? The sound of footsteps distracts me. It sounds like the crowd is coming back inside the school.

I can’t linger here. Someone could turn the corner at any second, and I’d still look all too suspicious. It’s hard to blend in when you’re not wearing any pants.

So without anywhere better in mind, I dart off toward the dorm. It’s a reflex. I’m used to running back there—the only safe place in a school filled with students all too happy to report directly back to the fraternity that’s marked me this last year.

Well, a school of students who used to be all too happy.

I keep myself ahead of the cresting wave of students, trying to dodge out of sight when I can, clutching the big folder to my chest, desperate not to let any of the papers slip out.

I burst into my own dorm and slam the door shut behind me, locking it. I don’t care if Rafael needs to get in. Not even he can help me now. I strip off my clothes and throw on the most nondescript things I can find. I’m sweaty and gross, but there’s no time to shower … so I’m sure I smell awful.

I grab the folder and shove it underneath my oversized hoodie, listening to the sounds of people moving around outside the dorm.

“Did you see? That Trevellian kid?” someone says loudly as they walk by.

I don’t hear what he says after that, but I understand the inflection in his voice. Glee. Spite. Incredulity.

Just like I knew would happen when I was found out.

For one second, I squeeze my eyes so tight that a single hot tear is forced to trail down the side of my face. What a waste.

What a waste.

But then my eyes snap open.

No.

No, this can’t be it. I can’t just sit back and let this all be a waste.

Jasper knows the truth—how could he have let this happen? I think back, and he did try to warn me … at least I think he did. I remember him following me all over school, shouting about warnings, asking what I was wearing to the race. He knew.

He knew, and he didn’t stop it. Why? Because he doesn’t want his friends to know what a piece of shit he is for attacking me the way he did. The way he … he …

I can’t think about that now.

But it wasn’t just him. Not anymore. What about Heath, too? I thought we had something. I thought that maybe he liked me. He could have stopped this.

I grit my teeth. I don’t know where the headmistress is, but come hell or high water, I’m going to find her. I can’t just sit in here and hide like I have been for almost a year now. Almost a year now.

Almost a year too long.

I wait for a lull in the noise outside before darting out of my dorm. Further down the hall I see a crowd of boys hanging around, laughing—probably at me. Fortunately, they’re laughing too hard to notice the subject of their mockery as I rocket in the other direction. I skip down the stairs toward the main floor of the school.

I have one thing on my mind. I have to focus on it to keep my ears from burning with shame. Where would the headmistress be right now? Outside?

Maybe she’s looking for me, too.

I pace at the foot of the stairwell for a moment, thinking. Normally the girls get a little space like a classroom to hang out in while they’re here. Would that be the away team locker room this time? How can I go near a girls’ locker room without everyone noticing? They’ve got to have someone standing guard or something.

I realize for the first time that I’ve never actually had to find the headmistress before. She’s just always kind of … turned up, whether I wanted her to or not.

Now that I have to find her, I’m at a loss.

At least, at a loss of how to find her without being seen by anyone else in these crowded halls.

I don’t want to go the main way outside, so I head toward my smoking spot instead. I can take the long way toward the track. Hopefully she’ll be there still.

It’s not much of a hope, but it’s the best I’ve got at the moment.

I slip outside and make my way back over toward the track, heart pounding, the folder still stuffed beneath my hoodie. When the stands come into view again, I can see that the seats have almost completely emptied. Will the girls even still be there? Will the headmistress?

I make my way beneath the bleachers on the west side of the track, listening to the people above me shuffling around. I hear mostly girls’ voices. A few guys are trying to flirt.

“What was up with that guy in the tighty-whities?” one girl asks.

The boy beside her laughs. “Just some loser.”

I purse my lips into a thin line and keep moving. At least not everyone got a close look at the absence between my legs. That’s not the sort of news that takes long to spread, however, so I can’t let my guard down.

Not yet, anyway.

Not until I know I’m protected.

The away team locker rooms are in an outbuilding just north of the track. I head there, still in my dirty socks. I don’t see my shoes on the track. Guess I’ll need new ones.

Great. One more thing I’ll owe Rafael … if Rafael sees the point in helping me out again now that this little charade is crumbling around us.

I flit from the western bleachers to the northern ones to get myself closer to the away team lockers, and that’s when I see her: Headmistress Robin, her back to me, arms folded, talking sternly to the girls’ team.

I’m momentarily drunk with relief.

And then just as immediately embarrassed.

“If I catch anyone making fun of that boy,” she’s saying in a low voice, “there’ll be hell to pay. Am I understood?”

“Yes, Dean Robin,” they all chorus back at her, but from the looks the girls exchange, it’s already clear that’s all anyone is going to be talking about.

The girls all turn and head inside. I recognize the girl who ran the third leg; she’s already leaning over to whisper to the girl next to her. Headmistress Robin sighs and turns toward the bleachers, rubbing her fingertips on her temples.

“Headmistress?” I croak out, my voice hoarse from the bile that scraped it earlier.

Her head snaps up and she squints around. I start to step out from beneath the bleachers with my arms clasped over my stomach, pressing the all-important B Folder against me.

That’s when she spots me.

“Alex,” she says quietly. She moves toward me, takes me by the shoulders, and pushes me gently back beneath the bleachers. “Are you all right? What happened out there?”

“I guess my teammates—” I growl through the word, “thought it’d be funny to give me pants that fell apart.” I have to stop for a second to compose myself. “Do you think anyone saw that I’m—that—”

“No,” she interrupts me softly. “I don’t think so.” She hesitates, then very gently pushes a bit of hair back from my forehead. It feels very … motherly. I suddenly get a fierce pang in my stomach as I miss my mom, my dad, even my brothers.

My eyes fill with tears. “I just want to go home,” I whisper. I barely know what I’m saying anymore. “I don’t want to be treated like this.”

“Oh, dear.” The headmistress pats my shoulders. “You’re so strong. You’re doing so well.”

I take a few gulping breaths, determined not to break down in front of her. “I got it.”

“Yes, you do. You’ve got this.”

“No, I mean—I got it. The folder.”

Her eyes sharpen. “What?”

I slide the B folder out from beneath my hoodie and her fingers reflexively tighten on my shoulders before she removes her hands altogether, reaching for it. The motherly spell is immediately broken, but the wave of homesickness doesn’t fade as quickly.

“Everyone was out here,” I explain, my voice coming out as a croak. “Even the dean. They were all distracted.”

Her hands open and close eagerly. She slowly reaches toward the folder as if scared I’ll pull it away at the last second, but I thrust it straight into her hands. I don’t want it. I don’t even want to know what’s inside.

She grabs it and looks into my eyes.

“Thank you, Alex,” she says. “This is a big step toward making sure you’re not treated like this again.”

I bite down hard on the inside of my cheek to suppress a sob and try to nod stoically. Headmistress Robin’s eyes light up as she looks down at the folder. She holds it gingerly, almost reverently.

“This will help immensely,” she sighs happily, but something about her tone seems off.

“And … and …” I stammer, “you think you can help me if you’re wrong? If someone noticed …”

She stops me with another, far less reassuring, squeeze on the shoulder. “Of course, Alex.”

But her words sound hollow. They do nothing to quell the rising surge of uncertainty in my gut.

Did I just make a terrible mistake?

Maybe I should have checked what was in the folder after all. Maybe I just gave her something I shouldn’t have.

“Well—I’m going back to my dorm,” I say hoarsely, after a second. If no one did see that I’m a girl, then all there is to hide from is my own embarrassment. I can handle that, I suppose.

At least it means I won’t be expelled.

It looks like it’s a struggle for her to tear her eyes away from the folder she holds.

“Are you sure you’ll be all right?” she asks, but I can tell it’s not a sincere question. Her eyes are slightly unfocused. Her mind is already buried in that folder, delving into Bleakwood’s secrets.

“I’m fine,” I assure her. My words are empty. She accepts them anyway.

I nod, turn on my heel, and walk away. The bleachers are truly empty now. No one sees me make the long, lonely walk back to my smoking spot. I pause there and pull out a cigarette—I’m here, so I might as well.

It’s not until I’m leaning against the wall and taking my third or fourth drag that I finally start to feel guilty.

Really guilty.

What have I done?